News
Al-Qaida: Clinton Blasts Pakistan
US Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton is suggesting that Pakistan’s government has squandered chances to kill or capture al-Qaida leaders.
She made the remark in an interview yesterday with Pakistani journalists during a trip to the city of Lahore. She later flew to the capital, Islamabad, for talks with army chief and additional meetings.
Clinton said al-Qaida has used Pakistan as a haven since 2002. She said she finds it hard to believe that nobody in Pakistan’s government knows where the leaders of Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network are hiding.
She also said she finds it hard to believe that Pakistani authorities couldn’t “get them” if they wanted to.
Clinton said that Pakistan had little choice but to take a more aggressive approach to combating the Pakistani Taliban and other insurgents that threaten to destabilize the country.
With the country reeling from Wednesday’s devastating bombing that killed at least 105 people in Peshawar, Clinton engaged in an intense give-and-take with students at the Government College of Lahore, insisting that inaction by the government would have ceded ground to terrorists.
“If you want to see your territory shrink, that’s your choice,” she said, adding that she believed it would be a bad choice.
Dozens of students rushed to line up for the microphone when the session began. Their questions were not hostile, but showed a strong sense of doubt that the U.S. can be a reliable and trusted partner for Pakistan.
Clinton met with the students on the second day of a three-day visit to Pakistan, her first as secretary of state. The Peshawar bombing, set off in a market crowded with women and children, appeared timed to overshadow her arrival. It was the deadliest attack in Pakistan since 2007.
Clinton likened Pakistan’s situation — with Taliban forces taking over substantial swaths of land in the Swat valley and in areas along the Afghan border — to a theoretical advance of terrorists into the United States from across the Canadian border.
It would be unthinkable, she said, for the U.S. government to decide, “Let them have Washington (state)” first, then Montana, then the sparsely populated Dakotas, because those states are far from the major centers of population and power on the East Coast.
Clinton was responding to a student who suggested that Washington was forcing Pakistan to use military force on its own territory. It was one of several questions from the students that raised doubts about the relationship between the United States and Pakistan.
During her hour-long appearance at the college, Clinton stressed that a key purpose of her three-day visit to Pakistan, which began Wednesday, was to reach out to ordinary Pakistanis and urge a better effort to bridge differences and improve mutual understanding.
“We are now at a point where we can chart a different course,” she said, referring to past differences over an absence of democracy in Pakistan and Pakistani association with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
As a way of repudiating past U.S. policies toward Pakistan, Clinton told the students “there is a huge difference” between the Obama administration’s approach and that of former President George W. Bush.
“I spent my entire eight years in the Senate opposing him,” she said to a burst of applause from the audience of several hundred students. “So, to me, it’s like daylight and dark.”
Although Clinton said she was making a priority of engaging frankly and openly on her visit, she declined to talk about a subject that has stirred some of the strongest feelings of anti-Americanism here — U.S. drone aircraft attacks against extremist targets on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border.
The Obama administration routinely refuses to acknowledge publicly that the attacks are taking place.
“There is a war going on,” she said, and the U.S. wants to help Pakistan be successful.
The drone attacks have killed a number of Pakistani civilians, while also reportedly succeeding in eliminating some high-level Taliban and other extremist group leaders.
At the same time, though, the U.S. has been providing Pakistani commanders with video images and target information from its military drones as Pakistan’s army pushes its ground offensive in Waziristan, U.S. officials said earlier this week.
Also sensitive is the way the U.S. has handled millions of dollars in aid to the Pakistani military. The U.S. in recent months has rushed helicopters and other military equipment to the country as Islamabad has launched its counterinsurgency offensives in Swat Valley and South Waziristan.
The administration sped the delivery of 10 Mi-17 troop transport helicopters starting in June, and in July sent 200 night vision goggles, nearly more than 9,000 sets of body armor, several hundred radios and other equipment.
“We’ve put military assistance to Pakistan on a wartime footing,” Lt. Col. Mark Wright, a Pentagon spokesman, said Thursday. “We are doing everything within our power to assist Pakistan in improving its counterinsurgency capability.”
This year the Pentagon plans to spend more than $500 million on arms and equipment for Islamabad as well as training Pakistan’s military in counterinsurgency tactics. Still, Pakistani officials last month complained that Congress attached too many conditions to the surge in aid.
Before flying to Lahore from Islamabad, Clinton visited the Bari Imam shrine, named after Shah Abdul Latif Kazmi, a 17th century Sufi saint who died in 1705 and later came to be known as the patron saint of Islamabad. A suicide bomber struck the shrine in May 2005, killing a number of people.
News
Let’s Approach Regional Development Issues Differently – Fubara …As S’South Govs Host Fubara To 50th Birthday Celebration
Rivers State Governor, Sir Siminalayi Fubara, has sued for a change in the current approach adopted by South South Governors in their pursuit to achieve holistic regional development and economic prosperity.
The governor insisted on de-emphasis in vested individuals’ political interests while looking at the bigger picture of achieving enduring regional integration that will strengthen unity of purpose to change the trajectory of development in the region.
Fubara made the appeal during the meeting of Governors of South-South States, under the auspices of BRACED Commission, at the Bayelsa State Government House in Yanagoa on Tuesday.
This was contained in a statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Nelson Chukwudi.
BRACED is an acronym for Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Edo and Delta.
He said: “I want to appeal that if we have to succeed in this drive, we need to keep our political differences aside and understand that the struggle, as at today, is for posterity, for the development of our region.
“It is really sad that in Niger Delta that is the economic base of this country, the construction of a road that you tagged ‘East-West Road’ could be an issue, that we need to beg, protest, and complain to get it fixed. I don’t think it is proper.”
Governor Fubara stated that it is not that the federal authorities do not understand that Niger Delta needs the road but quickly added that they have seen that even the people of the region do not take themselves seriously.
The governor said the moment Niger Delta people stopped playing to the gallery, and place value on themselves, outsiders will have no option than to accord the region and its people due regard.
Fubara said: “On my part, I want to say this: This is not the first time we are meeting. For me, I followed the course of the region meeting in a forum that we tagged “BRACED Commission.”
“BRACED Commission is also one of the bodies that was constituted at that time to support and work out development strategies for this region. But what I am seeing today is just limiting this meeting to only BRACED COMMISSION.
“We need to widen the scope where other leaders of the region should be part of the discussion of the development of the region, and I think this is the direction that will help the region.”
Reading the Communique of the meeting, the new Chairman of the Forum of Governors of South-South States, and Governor of Bayelsa State, Senator Douye Diri, said they support the Federal Government Tax Reform Bills, and urged President Bola Tinubu to extend the Value Added Tax (VAT) sharing percentages to oil and gas derivation.
He stated the Forum’s request to the Federal Government to urge relevant stakeholders and agencies to extend remediation of polluted environment ongoing in Ogoni land to other impacted communities and States in the region.
Governor Diri also said that the Forum resolved to establish a structural regional security network to enhance safety and security, foster stable Niger Delta region conducive for economic growth and prosperity.
Highlight of the event was the hosting of Governor Fubara to a surprise 50th Birthday celebration by the Governors of South-South States at the Government House in Yenagoa.
News
Fubara Lauds Tinubu For Setting Up Education Load Fund … Vows To Ensure Rivers Benefit Maximally From Scheme
The Rivers State Government has applauded President Ahmed Bola Tinubu for conceiving the idea of setting up the Nigeria Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) which has opened up opportunities for youths to acquire tertiary education irrespective of their financial status.
Rivers State Governor, Sir Siminalayi Fubara, gave the commendation while playing host to a delegation from NELFUND who came on an advocacy visit to the Government House in Port Harcourt on Tuesday.
Represented by his deputy, Prof. Ngozi Nma Odu, Governor Fubara said in developed countries it is common for people to go through school with loans which they sometimes pay all throughout their lives, noting that “for us, it is more accessible and more friendly because you would be required to pay back the loan two years after your National Youth Service.
“It is a win-win situation; it is a situation where the youths in Nigeria should not say because my parents are poor or passed away I cannot improve on my educational growth. This offers them a golden opportunity and I am glad you came for this advocacy.”
The governor urged NELFUND to intensify its advocacy to let the people know how they can benefit from it, adding that it is more important when talking about vocational institutions.
“If you look at the developed countries it is people that went to the vocational schools that make so much money, because it is pricey to get somebody to do anything, we need to instil this into our people, our youths, because people sometimes tend to look down on people that went to vocational schools, it should not be,” he said.
Fubara expressed delight with the NELFUND programme and assured that the State Government would do whatever it can to ensure Rivers State benefits maximally from the scheme.
In his remarks, the Managing Director and Chief Executive of NELFUND, Dr. Akintunde Sawyer, informed the governor that they were in Rivers State to seek the support of the State Government towards the loan, stressing that President Tinubu has directed them to ensure no Nigerian student who has the ability and desire to get educated at tertiary level is denied the opportunity due to lack of funding.
He explained that the scheme provides interest-free loans to students who apply, adding that these loans are not repayable until two years after their Youth Service when they must have gotten a job.
A British-Nigerian politician, Florence Eshalomi, has been appointed as the United Kingdom’s trade envoy to Nigeria.
Her appointment makes Eshalomi the second Nigerian to hold the position.
Confirming her appointment on X on Tuesday, she wrote: “It is an honour to have been appointed as the United Kingdom’s Trade Envoy to Nigeria.
“I’m looking forward to building on my close ties with Nigeria to promote a strong and flourishing economic relationship between our two great nations.
“I am looking forward to strengthening the UK’s relationship with Nigeria to explore shared growth and opportunities for both countries.”
Announcing the appointment in a statement on Tuesday, Jonathan Reynolds, the UK’s Business and Trade Secretary, said the decision was aimed at attracting investment into the UK and boosting economic growth.
“I’ve launched a new team of trade envoys who will use their experience, expertise, and knowledge to unlock new markets around the world for British businesses, attract investment into the UK, and ultimately drive economic growth,” Reynolds said.
Eshalomi, 44, is an MP representing the Vauxhall and Camberwell Green constituency.
She holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Political and International Studies with Law from Middlesex University.