Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:41 am Post subject: Our Governors And U.S. Visa
Our Governors And U.S. Visa
Daily Champion
[EDITORIAL]
29 July 2007
The United States of America [U.S.A.] has set new conditions which governors and other high-ranking officials in Nigeria must henceforth meet before they could be granted visa to enter that country. As part of the requirements for the embassy to process their travel documents and grant them visa, governors and other high-ranking Nigerians must obtain clearance from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC].
They must also limit their entourage during the visit to not more than two aides. Hitherto, governors were used to going on either personal or official overseas trips with large retinue of aides who were paid estacodes in foreign currencies, at their states' expense.
President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua who has been worried by an upsurge in the number of governors, who have informed him of their plans to travel abroad, has approved the new measures by the American embassy.
However, the new measures will not apply to trade delegations. But, the sources of funding of such trips must be established and cross-checked by the American embassy in Nigeria to ensure that state funds are no longer frittered away, as in the past, on personal, useless and frivolous overseas trips or on projects that would not contribute to the development of the states affected. Where the trips are to be paid for with government's funds and the outcome of the trip would not benefit the state in terms of infrastructure and human development, the request for visa would be turned down.
The EFCC had made a case to the American Justice Department in Washington D.C. on the need to monitor the activities of governors from Nigeria visiting the U.S and to put in place new safeguards to boost EFCC's anti-graft war. In enlisting the American government's help, the EFCC believed that most of the trips by Nigerian governors were for frivolous, personal reasons, unrelated to state matters and should therefore not to be paid for by the states. It also believed that such trips provided veritable avenues for possible diversion of public funds.
It would be recalled that the former Minister for Finance, Mrs. Nenadi Usman, when she was Minister of State in the same ministry, accused state governors of committing money laundering offences by their illegal diversion of public money into their own personal accounts overseas. Between 2003 and 2007, two governors were arrested overseas for money laundering, while some of the former governors are still being investigated for possible money laundering offences. To make matters worse, governors of poor states such as those from non-oil producing areas have been indicted by the EFCC for money laundering offences.
We commend President Yar'Adua for approving the new measures aimed at checking governors' penchant for frequent overseas trips. We believe there is a great deal of work for the governors to do at home and that frequent overseas trips are distractions to any serious governor's schedule of duties. As such, governors must learn to face the onerous task of governing their people and giving them exemplary leadership. That was what they were elected into office to do. Therefore, governors should stay at home and govern their people properly and effectively. Indeed, the task of socio-economic transformation of the states and improving the standard of living of the people is not an easy task. They all require a lot of strategic planning and execution.
Unfortunately, most of the governors are yet to come to terms with the task of giving their people the dividends of democracy. Many of them enjoy the camaraderie of office, but lack the mental capacity and alertness needed to move their states forward in development. Instead of facing the task of giving their people good governance, they embark on jamborees around the world in search of accomplices in corruption and safe havens for the public funds they have stolen and for the funds they are yet to steal.
Of course, without an accomplice within and outside the country, it would be hard for governors to stash stolen money in personal accounts overseas. This is where the cooperation of friendly countries, especially U.S, Canada, Japan and all EU countries becomes handy in the country's war against money laundering especially by political office holders and their cronies.
It is sad that at a time when governors are complaining of empty treasuries, they still find it expedient to embark on jamborees to foreign lands, the United Kingdom and the U.S, in particular, supposedly for official reasons. That the governors are still crazy about frivolous overseas trips even when they are living witnesses to the series of trials of their colleagues who allegedly laundered public money in their private accounts overseas is, to say the least, unpatriotic and uncharitable of them. If anything, such governors have thrown their self-worth away in exchange for useless trips overseas.
In the present circumstances, we support the stiff conditions set by the American embassy for granting governors and other high profile Nigerians visa to the U.S. We urge other friendly nations to take a cue from the American example and support Nigeria's war against corruption.
Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:58 am Post subject: Curtailing the Excesses of Governors and Others in Power
Curtailing the Excesses of Governors and Others in Power
Quote:
there is a great deal of work for the governors to do at home and that frequent overseas trips are distractions to any serious governor's schedule of duties. As such, governors must learn to face the onerous task of governing their people and giving them exemplary leadership. That was what they were elected into office to do. Therefore, governors should stay at home and govern their people properly and effectively.
It's about time their extravagant and unnecessary trips are curtailed. As stated above let them stay home and DO the work they have been appointed to do. No one forced them into office, they contested to serve in official capacities, so let them deliver their promises to the citizens of Nigeria and be effective and patriotic leaders rather than officials in name only who spend most of the official time pursuing personal errands, amassing government funds for personal use.
Let them serve their citizens and remember that they are in office to serve, not to exploit or oppress. They were not elected to enrich themselves at the expense of the masses, neither were they appointed to loot government and export government funds to foreign nations, bettering the economies of those countries at Nigeria's expense.
While their activities are being curtailed, their medical check-up trips should also be curtailed and permitted only when necessary. Let them use the medical facilities available in Nigeria, maybe then, they'll realize that they need to better the services back home and Nigerian citizens can finally benefit from good medical services, en masse, rather than it being available for the selected few who have financial access, if and when they either choose or are incapable of travelling abroad.
_________________ May we be strengthened with the ability, willingness and capabilities to be good ambassadors of Nigeria contributing to its uplifting, rather than its detriment. - Cxsm
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