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Wall Street Helped Greece to Mask Debt Fueling Europe’s Crisis

February 14, 2010

Wall St. Helped Greece to Mask Debt Fueling Europe’s Crisis

By LOUISE STORY, LANDON THOMAS Jr. and NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
New York Times

Wall Street tactics akin to the ones that fostered subprime mortgages in America have worsened the financial crisis shaking Greece and undermining the euro by enabling European governments to hide their mounting debts.

As worries over Greece rattle world markets, records and interviews show that with Wall Street’s help, the nation engaged in a decade-long effort to skirt European debt limits. One deal created by Goldman Sachs helped obscure billions in debt from the budget overseers in Brussels.

Even as the crisis was nearing the flashpoint, banks were searching for ways to help Greece forestall the day of reckoning. In early November — three months before Athens became the epicenter of global financial anxiety — a team from Goldman Sachs arrived in the ancient city with a very modern proposition for a government struggling to pay its bills, according to two people who were briefed on the meeting.

The bankers, led by Goldman’s president, Gary D. Cohn, held out a financing instrument that would have pushed debt from Greece’s health care system far into the future, much as when strapped homeowners take out second mortgages to pay off their credit cards.

It had worked before. In 2001, just after Greece was admitted to Europe’s monetary union, Goldman helped the government quietly borrow billions, people familiar with the transaction said. That deal, hidden from public view because it was treated as a currency trade rather than a loan, helped Athens to meet Europe’s deficit rules while continuing to spend beyond its means.

Athens did not pursue the latest Goldman proposal, but with Greece groaning under the weight of its debts and with its richer neighbors vowing to come to its aid, the deals over the last decade are raising questions about Wall Street’s role in the world’s latest financial drama.

As in the American subprime crisis and the implosion of the American International Group, financial derivatives played a role in the run-up of Greek debt. Instruments developed by Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and a wide range of other banks enabled politicians to mask additional borrowing in Greece, Italy and possibly elsewhere.

In dozens of deals across the Continent, banks provided cash upfront in return for government payments in the future, with those liabilities then left off the books. Greece, for example, traded away the rights to airport fees and lottery proceeds in years to come.

Critics say that such deals, because they are not recorded as loans, mislead investors and regulators about the depth of a country’s liabilities.

Some of the Greek deals were named after figures in Greek mythology. One of them, for instance, was called Aeolos, after the god of the winds.

The crisis in Greece poses the most significant challenge yet to Europe’s common currency, the euro, and the Continent’s goal of economic unity. The country is, in the argot of banking, too big to be allowed to fail. Greece owes the world $300 billion, and major banks are on the hook for much of that debt. A default would reverberate around the globe.

A spokeswoman for the Greek finance ministry said the government had met with many banks in recent months and had not committed to any bank’s offers. All debt financings “are conducted in an effort of transparency,” she said. Goldman and JPMorgan declined to comment.

While Wall Street’s handiwork in Europe has received little attention on this side of the Atlantic, it has been sharply criticized in Greece and in magazines like Der Spiegel in Germany.

“Politicians want to pass the ball forward, and if a banker can show them a way to pass a problem to the future, they will fall for it,” said Gikas A. Hardouvelis, an economist and former government official who helped write a recent report on Greece’s accounting policies.

Wall Street did not create Europe’s debt problem. But bankers enabled Greece and others to borrow beyond their means, in deals that were perfectly legal. Few rules govern how nations can borrow the money they need for expenses like the military and health care. The market for sovereign debt — the Wall Street term for loans to governments — is as unfettered as it is vast.

“If a government wants to cheat, it can cheat,” said Garry Schinasi, a veteran of the International Monetary Fund’s capital markets surveillance unit, which monitors vulnerability in global capital markets.

Banks eagerly exploited what was, for them, a highly lucrative symbiosis with free-spending governments. While Greece did not take advantage of Goldman’s proposal in November 2009, it had paid the bank about $300 million in fees for arranging the 2001 transaction, according to several bankers familiar with the deal.

Such derivatives, which are not openly documented or disclosed, add to the uncertainty over how deep the troubles go in Greece and which other governments might have used similar off-balance sheet accounting.

The tide of fear is now washing over other economically troubled countries on the periphery of Europe, making it more expensive for Italy, Spain and Portugal to borrow.

For all the benefits of uniting Europe with one currency, the birth of the euro came with an original sin: countries like Italy and Greece entered the monetary union with bigger deficits than the ones permitted under the treaty that created the currency. Rather than raise taxes or reduce spending, however, these governments artificially reduced their deficits with derivatives.

Derivatives do not have to be sinister. The 2001 transaction involved a type of derivative known as a swap. One such instrument, called an interest-rate swap, can help companies and countries cope with swings in their borrowing costs by exchanging fixed-rate payments for floating-rate ones, or vice versa. Another kind, a currency swap, can minimize the impact of volatile foreign exchange rates.

But with the help of JPMorgan, Italy was able to do more than that. Despite persistently high deficits, a 1996 derivative helped bring Italy’s budget into line by swapping currency with JPMorgan at a favorable exchange rate, effectively putting more money in the government’s hands. In return, Italy committed to future payments that were not booked as liabilities.

“Derivatives are a very useful instrument,” said Gustavo Piga, an economics professor who wrote a report for the Council on Foreign Relations on the Italian transaction. “They just become bad if they’re used to window-dress accounts.”

In Greece, the financial wizardry went even further. In what amounted to a garage sale on a national scale, Greek officials essentially mortgaged the country’s airports and highways to raise much-needed money.

Aeolos, a legal entity created in 2001, helped Greece reduce the debt on its balance sheet that year. As part of the deal, Greece got cash upfront in return for pledging future landing fees at the country’s airports. A similar deal in 2000 called Ariadne devoured the revenue that the government collected from its national lottery. Greece, however, classified those transactions as sales, not loans, despite doubts by many critics.

These kinds of deals have been controversial within government circles for years. As far back as 2000, European finance ministers fiercely debated whether derivative deals used for creative accounting should be disclosed.

The answer was no. But in 2002, accounting disclosure was required for many entities like Aeolos and Ariadne that did not appear on nations’ balance sheets, prompting governments to restate such deals as loans rather than sales.

Still, as recently as 2008, Eurostat, the European Union’s statistics agency, reported that “in a number of instances, the observed securitization operations seem to have been purportedly designed to achieve a given accounting result, irrespective of the economic merit of the operation.”

While such accounting gimmicks may be beneficial in the short run, over time they can prove disastrous.

George Alogoskoufis, who became Greece’s finance minister in a political party shift after the Goldman deal, criticized the transaction in the Parliament in 2005. The deal, Mr. Alogoskoufis argued, would saddle the government with big payments to Goldman until 2019.

Mr. Alogoskoufis, who stepped down a year ago, said in an e-mail message last week that Goldman later agreed to reconfigure the deal “to restore its good will with the republic.” He said the new design was better for Greece than the old one.

In 2005, Goldman sold the interest rate swap to the National Bank of Greece, the country’s largest bank, according to two people briefed on the transaction.

In 2008, Goldman helped the bank put the swap into a legal entity called Titlos. But the bank retained the bonds that Titlos issued, according to Dealogic, a financial research firm, for use as collateral to borrow even more from the European Central Bank.

Edward Manchester, a senior vice president at the Moody’s credit rating agency, said the deal would ultimately be a money-loser for Greece because of its long-term payment obligations.

Referring to the Titlos swap with the government of Greece, he said: “This swap is always going to be unprofitable for the Greek government.”

Kenya rounds up zebras for starving lions

Kenyan wildlife officials are ferrying thousands of zebras and wildebeest to a park in the country’s south to feed starving lions and hyenas, and prevent a conflict with humans.

The animals will be hauled from four locations to restock Amboseli National Park’s population, which lost 80 percent of its herbivores in a recent drought, said Kentice Tikolo, spokeswoman for the Kenya Wildlife Service.

“It was the worst drought in 26 years,” Tikolo said. “The Amboseli ecosystem was severely affected. … Lots of herbivores died, carnivores don’t have anything to feed on, and have been attacking neighboring livestock.”

Should the zebras be brought in to help the lions?

“There are only 2,000 lions left nationwide, and we are concerned because the numbers are dropping,” the spokeswoman said.

“Maasais are getting angry and threatening to spear them — the human versus wildlife conflict is getting out of hand — and our carnivores are already greatly endangered.”

About 4,000 zebras and 3,000 wildebeest will be transferred to Amboseli. The zebras will go first. The wildebeest (left) will follow, after calving season, Tikolo said. Once at Amboseli, they’re expected to breed and sustain the lions over the long term.

Shipping the animals from Soysambu Conservancy in the Rift Valley and three other nearby locations will cost about $ 1.4 million, according to Tikolo.

The animals are herded into a funnel-shape enclosure using helicopters and loaded into trucks to Amboseli. From there, they are released into the wild, she said.

Tourism is the second-largest source of foreign exchange in the east African nation. About 20 percent of the income comes from tourism, with Amboseli as the second -highest earner, Tikolo said

Lions are among the big five — the list of top wildlife tourist attractions in the nation. Others are elephants, leopards, rhinos and buffalo.

Source:
Cable News Network, “Kenya rounds up zebras for starving lions“, accessed February 12, 2010

Somalia News Bulletin: Al-Shabab Declares All-out War Against US-backedTFG

Al-Shabab declares all-out war in Somalia

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 09:22:56 GMT

Al-Shabab fighters have declared an all-out war against the fragile transition Somali government and African Union peacekeeping forces in Mogadishu.

Al-Shabab’s declaration of war on Friday comes amid heightened tensions over a possible government campaign against the militia’s fighters.

A senior al-Shabab official, Sheikh Mukhtar Robow Abu Mansur, said his group has prepared its fighters for a holy war against the UN-backed government and its supporters.

“Our fighters are prepared to take part in this war that we are declaring against the enemy of Allah. We must take part in this war because it is our responsibility as Muslims to defend the religion and eliminate the enemy from our country,” he told a congregation at Nasrul-din Mosque in southern Mogadishu.

You are aware of the recent “indiscriminate shelling of the enemy against our people. This war is a religious obligation for all of us to join and fight them,” Robow told the crowd after prayers.

He added that his group was aware of plans by neighboring countries to deploy newly trained recruits to fight them in some regions in the war-torn country.

“We are aware that Kenya and Ethiopia are discussing on how they can send in Somali militia trained for the western puppet (government), but we are telling them that we are ready,” Robow stated.

Thousands flee Mogadishu

Published: Feb. 13, 2010 at 9:15 PM

MOGADISHU, Somalia, Feb. 13 (UPI) — More than 8,000 people have left Mogadishu in February, trying to escape fighting in the Somali capital, United Nations officials say.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said there had been at least 24 deaths and 40 people have been injured in the city since Wednesday, the BBC reported Saturday.

Melissa Fleming, a spokeswoman for UNHCR, said the violence has limited the agency’s ability to help refugees. She said UNHCR is increasing efforts in Somalia so help will be available when security improves.

Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the U.N. special representative for Somalia, said the interim government is making some progress.

“Unfortunately, they have had to spend time and resources trying to stop the violent attacks by extremists who oppose all their attempts to bring normality back to the country,” he said. “Many people recognize that Somalia is moving from being a failed state in conflict to a fragile state with major development and reconstruction needs.”

Violence in Somalia claimed another victim Friday when the sports minister, Saleban Olad Roble, 46, died in a hospital in Saudi Arabia, Arab News reported. He was injured in December in a suicide bombing that killed 23 people, including three cabinet members, at a graduation ceremony for medical students.

Garowe Online (Garowe)

Somalia: 5 Killed in Mogadishu Clashes, Al Shabaab Declares Jihad

12 February 2010

At least five people are killed and 15 others injured on Friday in fresh clashes that rocked parts of Somalia’s restive capital Mogadishu, medics and witnesses said.

Witnesses said clashes erupted on the evening in Mogadishu’s Shibis, Abdiasis and Bondhere neighbourhoods where several mortar shells fired by warring forces landed at residential areas, killing at least five civilians and injuring more than 35 others.

The shelling comes as newly deployed Al-Shabaab fighters take positions in the northern districts ahead of planned government offensives.

Almost the entire residents of those neighborhoods have vacated their homes for fear of being caught in the middle of the disarray.

The clashes come as top Al-Shabaab official declares jihad agsint the UN-backed Somali government and African Union troops.

Sheikh Mukhtar Robow Abu Mansur told hundreds of supporters gathered after Friday prayers in Nasrul-din mosque, located south of Mogadishu that his group has prepared well for the war and would launch as soon as possible.

“We have prepared our Mujahidiins for this war and we are urging you to join us in this religious undertaking because it’s your religious responsibility, are you ready?” he asked the crowd who replied with ‘Yes’.

The government, backed by AU troops has already announced its plans to take over the control of the country by force but has not yet stated when the full scaled onslaught will be launched.

Thursday, February 11, 2010
18:37 Mecca time, 15:37 GMT

Deaths in Mogadishu clashes

Al-Shabab fighters have been pushing to oust the Somali government from Mogadishu

Somali sources say at least 17 people have been killed and 61 more injured in fighting between government forces and opposition fighters.

Government forces fired mortars on Thursday at fighters said to have been positioned in the busy market of Bakara in the capital Mogadishu, the sources said.

“We admitted 61 wounded people from yesterday’s shelling,” a doctor at the Medina (City) Hospital told the German Press Agency DPA.

“Three of them died inside the hospital during treatment.”

Al-Shabab group, which recently announced it was joining al-Qaeda’s international jihad, is pushing to oust the weak Western-backed government and controls much of Mogadishu and south-central Somalia.

Civilians are often caught in the crossfire, and human rights organisations and aid agencies have called on both the government and armed groups to minimise civilian casualties.

Forces build-up

Ali Muse, the head of Mogadishu’s ambulance service, told DPA that 11 civilians died, while other witnesses said that another three had been killed.

The shelling came as forces built up in Mogadishu in advance of an expected government assault on al-Shabab’s positions.

Witnesses saw hundreds of heavily armed groups pour into Mogadishu on Wednesday, while the government was also building up its forces as it tries to extend its weak influence in Mogadishu.

Thousands of civilians have fled the city over the last few days in anticipation of heavy fighting.

The Horn of African nation has been embroiled in chaos since the 1991 ouster of Mohamed Siad Barre, the president, and the subsequent US invasion in 1992.

Official says top Al Qaeda leader in Somalia killed

The weak transitional government of Somalia claimed Tuesday that its forces killed Amar Ibrahim, a leader of Al Qaeda in Somalia and the Islamist group Al Shabab.

By Scott Baldauf Staff writer
posted February 10, 2010 at 10:23 am EST
Johannesburg, South Africa —

Somali government forces have killed Al Qaeda’s top commander in Somalia, a government spokesman said. The killing comes as the government is receiving newly trained Somali soldiers – fresh from boot camps in Ethiopia, Djibouti, Kenya, and Uganda – who have already begun the first forays of a major offensive to push Islamist rebels out of their strongholds in Mogadishu and southern Somalia.

Somali National Security Minister Abbdullahi Mohamad Ali told the BBC that government forces had killed a top Al Qaeda commander but declined to provide the man’s name. Somali state radio had earlier reported that the victim was Amar Ibrahim, a Jordanian national and member both of Al Qaeda and of the Somali Islamist group Al Shabab. The radio station, however, said Mr. Ibrahim was killed by his own bodyguards, not Somali troops.

Whatever the circumstances, this would be the second senior Al Qaeda commander to be killed in six months. US and Somali officials say that Mr. Ibrahim had replaced Kenyan-born Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, the man blamed for attacks on a Mombasa hotel and an Israeli airliner in 2002, after US Navy Seals killed Mr. Nabhan in a helicopter raid last September.

Most experts agree that foreigners still make up a tiny minority of Al Shabab’s forces – perhaps 200 from Pakistan, India, Yemen, Afghanistan, Lebanon, South Africa, and even a few white Muslims from the US. One regional analyst in Nairobi calls them a “force multiplier.” Some Somali military officials says the skills these foreigners brought with them pushed them quickly to the top of Al Shabab’s command structure – with Afghans teaching Somalis how to assemble and use suicide bombs, for instance.

Now some Somalis say that the foreigners – and particularly members of Al Qaeda — are in charge of Al Shabab. Shabab’s current leader is Fazul Mohamad, who comes from the Comoros Islands off of the east coast of Africa.

National Security Minister Ali told the BBC that the government would “provide evidence later” about who was killed. Some caution is warranted. Previous attacks by both US commandos and by Somali forces have initially been reported as successful raids on Al Shabab or Al Qaeda fighters, only to be corrected later as having resulted only in the deaths of Somali civilians.

Al Shabab has not made a comment about Ibrahim’s death.

Under Obama, more targeted killings than captures in counterterrorism efforts

By Karen DeYoung and Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 14, 2010; A01

When a window of opportunity opened to strike the leader of al-Qaeda in East Africa last September, U.S. Special Operations forces prepared several options. They could obliterate his vehicle with an airstrike as he drove through southern Somalia. Or they could fire from helicopters that could land at the scene to confirm the kill. Or they could try to take him alive.

The White House authorized the second option. On the morning of Sept. 14, helicopters flying from a U.S. ship off the Somali coast blew up a car carrying Saleh Ali Nabhan. While several hovered overhead, one set down long enough for troops to scoop up enough of the remains for DNA verification. Moments later, the helicopters were headed back to the ship.

The strike was considered a major success, according to senior administration and military officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the classified operation and other sensitive matters. But the opportunity to interrogate one of the most wanted U.S. terrorism targets was gone forever.

The Nabhan decision was one of a number of similar choices the administration has faced over the past year as President Obama has escalated U.S. attacks on the leadership of al-Qaeda and its allies around the globe. The result has been dozens of targeted killings and no reports of high-value detentions.

Although senior administration officials say that no policy determination has been made to emphasize kills over captures, several factors appear to have tipped the balance in that direction.

The Obama administration has authorized such attacks more frequently than the George W. Bush administration did in its final years, including in countries where U.S. ground operations are officially unwelcome or especially dangerous. Improvements in electronic surveillance and precision targeting have made killing from a distance much more of a sure thing. At the same time, options for where to keep U.S. captives have dwindled.

Republican critics, already scornful of limits placed on interrogation of the suspect in the Christmas Day bombing attempt, charge that the administration has been too reluctant to risk an international incident or a domestic lawsuit to capture senior terrorism figures alive and imprison them.

“Over a year after taking office, the administration has still failed to answer the hard questions about what to do if we have the opportunity to capture and detain a terrorist overseas, which has made our terror-fighters reluctant to capture and left our allies confused,” Sen. Christopher S. Bond (Mo.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said Friday. “If given a choice between killing or capturing, we would probably kill.”

Some military and intelligence officials, citing what they see as a new bias toward kills, questioned whether valuable intelligence is being lost in the process. “We wanted to take a prisoner,” a senior military officer said of the Nabhan operation. “It was not a decision that we made.”

Even during the Bush administration, “there was an inclination to ‘just shoot the bastard,’ ” said a former intelligence official briefed on current operations. “But now there’s an even greater proclivity for doing it that way. . . . We need to have the capability to snatch when the situation calls for it.”

Lack of detention policy

One problem identified by those within and outside the government is the question of where to take captives apprehended outside established war zones and cooperating countries. “We’ve been trying to decide this for over a year,” the senior military officer said. “When you don’t have a detention policy or a set of facilities,” he said, operational decisions become more difficult.

The administration has pledged to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; Congress has resisted moving any of the about 190 detainees remaining there, let alone terrorism suspects who have been recently captured, to this country. All of the CIA’s former “black site” prisons have been shut down, and a U.S. official involved in operations planning confirmed that the agency has no terrorism suspects in its custody. Although the CIA retains the right to briefly retain terrorism suspects, any detainees would be quickly transferred to a military prison or an allied government with jurisdiction over the case, the official said.

Military officials emphasized that terrorism suspects continue to be captured in Iraq and Afghanistan. But in Iraq, where counterterrorism operations must be approved in advance by its government and conducted with Iraqi forces in the lead, all prisoners must be turned over to Baghdad.

In Afghanistan, the massive U.S.-run prison at the Bagram air base is scheduled to be relinquished to the Afghan government by the end of the year. Its 750 prisoners include about 30 foreigners, some of them captured in other countries and brought there. But recent legal decisions, and Afghan government restrictions, have largely eliminated that option.

“In some cases,” the senior military official said, captives in Afghanistan have been taken to “other facilities” maintained by Special Operations forces. Such detentions, even on a temporary basis, have become more difficult because of legal and human rights concerns, he said.

Cooperation overseas

Outside the established war zones, senior administration and military officials said, how an operation is conducted and whether its goal is killing or capturing depend on where it is taking place and which U.S. agency is involved. American personnel have worked closely on counterterrorism missions with local forces in Indonesia, the Philippines and elsewhere, with those countries in the lead.

Al-Qaeda and Taliban havens in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the border are considered part of the Afghanistan war theater. The Pakistani government tacitly permits CIA-operated unmanned aircraft to target terrorist sites and militants up to 50 miles inside the country. Under an executive order first signed by Bush and continued in force under Obama, the CIA does not have to seek higher administration authority before striking.

But while U.S. Special Forces work closely with the CIA on the Afghan side of the border, any ground operation in Pakistan would require specific White House approval, which so far has not been granted. In addition to the difficulty such a mission would pose amid a hostile population in rugged terrain, the Pakistani government has drawn a red line against allowing U.S. boots on the ground, and the risk of sparking an anti-American backlash is seen as too great.

Beyond Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, potentially lethal operations must be approved by Obama or his designee, which can include the CIA director and the defense secretary. In Yemen, stepped-up military and intelligence cooperation with the country’s government, including the use of U.S. aircraft and munitions for raids against a list of targets suspected of involvement with terrorist groups, was approved by Obama late last year, and at least two lethal attacks have taken place in coordination with Yemeni ground forces. Any captives belong to Yemen.

The Somalia calculus

Somalia poses unique problems. In the vast majority of the country, there is no functioning government to approve or coordinate operations, or to take custody of captives. Under the Bush administration, the military conducted several White House-approved air operations against alleged senior terrorist figures fleeing south after the 2006 U.S.-backed ouster of the Islamic government there. But while military teams made quick forays over the border to the targeted sites, finding and identifying bodies proved difficult.

Nabhan, a 30-year-old Kenyan, had long been a prime U.S. target. A senior official in the al-Shabab militia fighting to overthrow the U.S.-supported transition government in Somalia and impose strict Islamic law, he was said to be the chief link between the main al-Qaeda organization and its East African allies. Wanted by the FBI in connection with the 1998 attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, he was also accused in the 2002 bombing of an Israeli-owned resort in Kenya and an attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner that year.

After tracking him for a while, the Special Operations Command thought it had established a sufficient pattern of activity to target him and had the time to plan for it. Several alternatives, including capture, were developed and assessed under military procedures for missions outside recognized war theaters.

Planners were asked for more details on the proposed force to be used, intelligence proving the target’s location and the level of verification, and operational details — including, in the case of capture, where Nabhan would be taken. Planned under U.S. Central Command, the operation was turned over to the U.S. Africa Command for implementation.

On the political side, the National Security Council received detailed versions of each proposed course of action. At that level, the senior administration official said, “there is an evaluation making sure you are able to prosecute the mission successfully . . . and minimize the dangers and risks.”

The Somalia calculus, several officials said, included weighing the likelihood that U.S. troops on the ground for any amount of time in the militia-controlled south would be particularly vulnerable to attack. Looming large, they said, was the memory of the last time a U.S. combat helicopter was on the ground in lawless Somalia, the 1993 Black Hawk debacle that resulted in the deaths of 18 soldiers.

“There are certain upsides and certain downsides to certain paths,” the administration official said. “The safety and security of U.S. military personnel is always something the president keeps at the highest level of his calculus.”

Femi Kuti Celebrates Grammy Nomination in Lagos

Sax and satire

By Akintayo ABodunrin
Nigeria Next
February 13, 2010 05:46PM

An enjoyable performance was what Femi Kuti treated fans to at the show to celebrate his Grammy nomination held at Tribeca, Victoria Island, Lagos, on Friday, February 5.

The show titled ‘Let’s Celebrate with Femi Kuti’ lived up to the hype by promoters who had played up the fact that it was the first solo performance by the Afrobeat heir outside the New Afrika Shrine in four years.

In the classic Afrobeat tradition pioneered by his legendary father, Femi’s concert was a mixture of music and ‘yabis’ (scathing social commentary). Nothing escaped the irreverent attention of the singer and instrumentalist who never mentioned the fact that he lost the Grammy prize to Bela Fleck at the Award ceremony held at Staples Centre, Los Angeles, on January 31. A good time was what the fun seekers comprising Nigerians and foreigners came for, and that exactly was what Femi gave them in about two hours.

Upcoming acts including guitarists Pure and Simple; keytarist Jaiye, singer Ibiyemi and guitarist Tosin were the opening acts on the night. Pure and Simple’s self composed ‘Just Like That’ was a moving jazz number while self-styled Nigeria’s number one keytarist, Jaiye, did songs including Ras Kimono’s ‘Rhumba Style’ and Danny Wilson’s ‘Mr. Ragamuffin.’ He also did Funmi Adams ‘Nigeria’ and Snoop Dog’s ‘Sensual Seduction’ on his unique keyboard worn around the neck and shoulders like a guitar.

Ibiyemi showed off her vocal prowess on the love song, ‘Don’t Leave Me.’ The high point of their performance was the free styling session where they all jammed together on stage.

Femi’s Positive Force Band opened with some of Fela’s evergreen songs including ‘One Day’ and ‘Army Arrangement’ before moving to songs by the headliner. They served the audience ‘Traitors of Africa’ and ‘What Will Tomorrow Bring’ until around 12.30am when their leader came on stage, to applause from the audience.

Political songs

A true son of his father, Femi started with the political song, ‘Truth Don Die.’ He displayed his skills on the keyboard and saxophone doing the number. Though visibly aging, the musician showed he has powerful lungs by the way he sustained his breath blowing the sax. “Ararara,” he called out to the audience. “Arororo,” regular visitors to the Afrika Shrine who knew the correct response to Femi’s unique mode of acknowledgement answered. “It’s good to be here with you tonight on the Island all the way from Agidingbin, Ikeja,” he began.

The artist, though, couldn’t resist throwing a barb at the audience he perceived as elitist. “Some of you are afraid and so won’t come to the Shrine to see what we are doing” he noted in jest. He touched on the lack of security in Nigeria, mentioning some of the dangers to peoples’ lives - including generator fumes and poor infrastructure. The leadership crisis and prevalent dishonesty among technicians didn’t escape his attention. “We have brains gan o (We are very brilliant) because leaders of this country have made us crooked,” he added for emphasis.

Femi and his three female dancers kept up the energetic display with his popular number, ‘Wonder Wonder’ and the risqué ‘Bang Bang Bang.’ He couldn’t resist being salacious as he slowed down the tempo to offer some advice. “I got my degree in 1994 when I got a professorship in Sexology. If you don’t know how to do it, the girl will be controlling you. You need to know what to do when you are with a woman o,” he joked.

He went political again with ‘Sotan’ (2004) condemning the state of affairs in the country. “Obasanjo ‘spoil’ Nigeria. My father told us about Obasanjo but we went in the rain to vote him in,” he began his critique of the former president,. “He told us he didn’t know Yar ‘Adua was ill, it was a ploy to remain in power,” said Femi in reference to Obasanjo’s widely reported denial of Umaru Yar’Adua’s ill health. He also decried the impoverishment of Nigerians and railed against Federal legislators. “Instead of fighting for us, they were fighting for allowance. They wanted to do gain-gain (enjoying benefits).”

Caustic tongue

Nobody escaped the musician’s tongue. He had something for his sister, Yeni, who brought him a list of artists in the house. “This your isepe (unclear) writing gan,” he said obviously because he couldn’t see the writing well. Femi however commended D’Banj, Ikechukwu, Asa and others at the show for always obliging him and his siblings during the annual ‘Felabration’ in honour of their father. Rumours of lingering rivalry between Femi and his younger brother, Seun, were doused somewhat, Seun was in attendance.

“Your N10, 000 finished 30 minutes ago,” began Femi around 2am as he prepared to leave the stage. “The gate fee at the Shrine is N500. Come to New Afrika Shrine, come and see what is happening.” He, however, bowed to popular wish and returned to the stage for some minutes more before his final exit.

Jonathan’s Installation Now Backed By Nigerian Law

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Jonathan’s Installation Now Backed By Law

From Alifa Daniel (Asst. Political Editor, Abuja)
Nigeria Guardian

ACTING President Goodluck Jonathan has had his elevation backed by “a force of law.”

This is sequel to a letter that was sent to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Alhaji Mahmud Yayale Ahmed, from the National Assembly.

The Assembly exalted Vice President Jonathan to Acting President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation on Tuesday.

The contents of the National Assembly letter were expected to be conveyed to the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Ignatius Katsina-Alu, the Executive Council of the Federation (EXCOF) and the Acting President.

The letter, which a legislative source said is tantamount to a law being passed by the National Assembly, is referenced NASS/C5/R/05/III/92 and dated February 10, 2010.

It came from the Clerk of the National Assembly (CAN), Mr. Yemi Ogunyomi, to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation.

Titled, ‘State Of The Nation And The Way Forward - National Assembly Resolutions, Of 9th, February, 2010′, it reads in full:

“On Tuesday 9 February, 2010, the Senate and House of Representatives adopted Resolutions on the State of the Nation occasioned by the prolonged medical holidays of the President, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, His Excellency, Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

“Members of the National Assembly noted that Nigerians fervently prayed for the speedy recovery of Mr. President and his early return to Nigeria.

“However, on 12 January 2010, Mr. President informed Nigerians through the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), that he was receiving medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, and would only return to Nigeria to resume his functions as President when his doctors so certify.

“Satisfied that this declaration by Mr. President amounts to substantial compliance with the provision of Section 145 of the Constitution of Nigeria 1999, the National Assembly resolved that:

(i) the Vice President, His Excellency Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, shall henceforth discharge the functions of the Office of the President, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation as Acting President; and

(ii) the Vice President shall cease to discharge the functions of the Office of the President when the President, Commander-in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation, transmits to the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives in writing, that he has returned from his medical vacation.

“Kindly convey these National Assembly Resolutions to His Excellency, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, the Chief Justice of the Federation for his information, and Members of the Federal Executive Council for compliance.

“Find attached hereto, the Votes and Proceedings of the Senate and the House of Representatives in this regard, please.

“Accept the assurances of my highest regards for your office.”

A knowledgeable source said last week that because the resolutions of both Houses of the National Assembly were similar, it could pass of as a law and be tendered as such.

The source said: “Perhaps unknown to both Houses, that is the way to give a force of law to their resolutions. Pass the same resolution and it has the same force as a law.

“But when you pass resolutions intermittently and they are not similar, the other arms of government can afford to ignore them and nothing will be done.”

The battle to be Vice President

By Elor Nkereuwem
Nigeria Next
February 14, 2010 12:23AM

Despite the jostle for an imagined vacancy in the office of the vice-president by cronies of ailing president Umaru Yar’Adua, Acting President Goodluck Jonathan could run a one man presidency until 2011, legal experts and political insiders say.

Highly connected sources, who spoke on conditions of anonymity, told NEXT at the weekend in Abuja that the friends of Mr. Yar’Adua, now notoriously called the ‘cabal,’ are actively seeking to insinuate a friendly party into the presidency.

Mr. Jonathan, who only became Acting president after 78 days of obstructionist politics by the cabal, has through some obscure arrangement, been allowed a 40-day window to select a deputy from a list of Yar’Adua loyalists. The five frontrunners for this job, whenever it becomes viable, are the governor of Katsina State, Ibrahim Shema; the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Yayale Ahmed; Aliyu Gusau, Nigeria’s former army and intelligence chief; and Sule lamido, the incumbent governor of Jigawa State, our source said.

But while the group continues to ignore the constitutional implications of their ambitions, lawyers argue that Mr. Jonathan does not have the powers to select a vice president as no vacancy currently exists for the seat.

According to the lawyers, while Mr. Jonathan now serves as the commander-in-chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, there currently exists no vacancy in the vice presidency, the position Mr. Jonathan occupied until last week when a resolution by the National Assembly declared him the Acting President of the country. The lawyers said that Mr. Jonathan will continue to run the presidency without an official deputy until 2011 unless the ailing president, Umaru Yar’Adua, ceases to be president as a result of his impeachment or permanent incapacitation.

“It is envisaged that the president is alive; it is envisaged that the President is not permanently incapable; it is envisaged that he is only temporarily incapable and so whenever he comes back, he becomes the president while Jonathan returns to the position of Vice President. So if the president does not come until the 2011 elections or whatever, there will be no Vice President, that office becomes permanently vacant,” said Bamidele Aturu, a prominent Lagos based human rights attorney.

A senior Advocate of Nigeria, Ricky Tarfa, described the scramble by the politicians for the office of the Vice-President is ‘an act of illegality and unconstitutionality’.

Vice-presidency for the North

In the miasma of events leading to the political arrangement that saw Mr. Jonathan become Acting President is an obscure pact that the Acting President should pick a deputy from a myriad of names, all northern elites, in the event that the vice-president slot does become open.

While it is not clear in what manner such a position will become vacant, politicians are frenetically pulling strings in Abuja, positioning themselves for the job.

Mr. Yar’Adua’s friends continue to push forward names of close allies and in a bizarre move, some have even nominated the wife of the president, Turai, for the No.2 position.

Sources say that the unconstitutionality of the selection of a vice-president is a matter which the absent president’s kitchen cabinet had not initially put into consideration.

“There now exists a renewed challenge in the wake of the Goodluck presidency,” our sources said, adding that there is the likelihood that Mr. Jonathan may remain as the Acting President until 2011, when the next presidential elections will take place, because of circumstances beyond his control.

Still, reluctant to lose their influence, Mr. Yar ‘Adua’s allies who have been worried that power appears to have slipped from the northern elites following the crucial memo from the National Assembly, continued their manoeuvres at the weekend, narrowing their options around Mr. Shema, the youthful governor of Katsina State and an acolyte of the ailing president.

Mr. Shema is believed to have the backing of the northern governors who, in a desperate need for political survival, threw their considerable support behind Mr. Jonathan’s presidency, effectively negating the Yar ‘Adua presidency.

The Shema candidacy

All this however comes with its own complications and embarrassment. Already, an intense political warfare is raging in Katsina, home state of Mr. Yar Adua. Political insiders suspect that political fratricide is destined to consume Mr. Yar Adua’s own three political godsons of whom Mr. Shema is the most prominent at the moment. The two others are Tanimu Yakubu, the economic adviser of Mr. Yar Adua, and Abba Ruma, his agriculture minister, both of whom are also eyeing the governorship of Katsina State.

If Mr. Shema ultimately loses it, People Democratic Party insiders told NEXT last weekend, the only reason will be because “he was marginalised these past 78 days and Tanimu and Ruma were closer to the first lady who never really wants Sherma for a second term as governor let alone something as high as the vice presidency.

Shema too, may be a victim of the principle of elimination by prominence since his early promotion as a candidate may be a strategy destined to sideline or even damage his candidacy” said our source.

There are other contenders however, and the name of the current secretary to the federal government, Mr. Ahmed had been promoted with the same fervour as that of Sule Lamido, the current governor of Jigawa. Both men are credited with experience and good judgement. Mr. Ahmed comes from Bauchi, which together with Jigawa shares the same zone with Katsina in the country’s geo-political zoning block.

Constitutionality or Unconstitutionality

Some lawyers however condemn not only the current quest for the vice presidency by the politicians but also the very resolution that has made Mr. Jonathan the Acting President.

“Mr. Jonathan can continue as Acting President till next elections or until either President Yar’Adua comes back or until after the elections, or until a court declares his emergence unconstitutional. Because the way he was appointed is not legal, strictly speaking, it’s not constitutional. The constitution was not followed, because no letter was written. The National Assembly said the broadcast on radio is deemed to be a letter. I do not know how you can do that, but they said the doctrine of necessity is a constitutional necessity,” said Charles Musa, another human rights lawyer.

Like Mr. Musa, the opposition Action Congress (AC), has also condemned the National Assembly resolution.

“Our party, the AC, believes in constitutionality and the rule of law, hence our stand is not determined by what is popular but by what is legal and Constitutional,” said the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Lai Mohammed.

The opposition against the constitutional propriety of Mr. Jonathan’s emergence is currently running askance with the popular mood. “If the opposition can just take time to read the currents well” said Hassan Ado Ibrahim, an Abuja policy analyst, “they will see that the currents are so strong that even our parliamentarians and the governors have read the trend so accurately, and have opportunistically grafted their own interest into the mix.”

Mr. Ibrahim believes that the Jonathan presidency will ride this wave of popular will long enough to make the question of a deputy needless, adding that “no one caused this problem anymore than the Yar’ Adua people who abused the intelligence of the whole nation for so long that they whipped up so much negative sentiments against their patron and their platform.”

He said, “from all indications the governors were genuinely angry that they got no access to the ailing president, and had no credible report on his status forcing them to switch loyalty to Mr. Jonathan” but added that they, “craftily yoked this objective grounds for outrage with their selfish desire to get someone that will sign off on the excess crude account which is their main motivation; and their selfish desire to change some of the people they had nominated to the federal cabinet.”

Additional reporting by Idris Akinbajo and Ifedayo Adebayo

Campaigning for Sudan Vote Begins

Saturday, February 13, 2010
18:14 Mecca time, 15:14 GMT

Campaigning for Sudan vote begins

Al-Bashir will be challenged by Arman who is counting on the solid support of the south

Campaigning for Sudan’s forthcoming election has begun, with 12 presidential hopefuls set to challenge Omar al-Bashir, the current president.

The exercise kicked off on Saturday, paving the way for the first multi-party poll since 1986. Al-Bashir seized power in 1989 in a coup in Africa’s largest country.

After being pushed back twice, the presidential election is set to take place on April 11, alongside legislative and regional polls.

A referendum on whether southern Sudan should become independent is expected in 2011.

Al-Bashir, who seized power with support from conservative Muslim groups, is facing off against 11 other hopefuls.

They include Fatima Ahmed Abdelmahmud, the first woman ever to aspire to the presidency, and Sadiq al-Mahdi, the two-time former prime minister whom al-Bashir ousted.

Al-Bashir is the world’s first sitting president facing an international arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of alleged crimes against humanity in Sudan’s western Darfur region.

Costly conflict

The UN says up to 300,000 people have died and 2.7 million fled their homes since the ethnic minority rebels in Darfur first rose up against the Arab-dominated Khartoum government in February 2003.

But the Sudanese government disputes the death toll, saying around 10,000 people have died.

Al-Bashir’s main challengers are Yasser Arman, a secular Muslim from north Sudan representing the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, and al-Mahdi, the former prime minister from the influential Umma Party.

Arman, 49, is counting on the solid support of south Sudan, while the 74-year-old Mahdi’s main support base is in the north.

But in a country without opinion polls and which has not held real elections in decades, the outcome of the polls is wide open.

Rallies banned

The opposition fear al-Bashir will use the levers of power, including the security forces, to win the vote.

Rallies have been banned, but the opposition plans to test the waters during campaigning to try and stage one in Omdurman, the twin city of Khartoum, Sudan’s capital.

Sudan has emerged from a devastating 22-year civil war that pitted the dominant Muslim and Arab northern Sudanese against the largely non-Muslim, non-Arab southerners.

A comprehensive peace agreement was signed with the south in 2005, ending the conflict.

But the most basic services are lacking in much of the remote and underdeveloped regions of Sudan, which has 41 million people.

Source: Agencies

Winter Olympics in Vancouver aim to win green medal from UN agency

The organizers of the Winter Olympics that kicked off this weekend in Vancouver are hoping to stage some of the greenest Games ever, thanks to a partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).