"The Great Egyptian Dream" Versus Nigeria's Failed "River Niger Dredging" Dream?

The successful dredging/expansion of the Suez Canal in Egypt reminds me of our River Niger dredging project which the past administration of the ousted "failed president" Good luck Ebele Jonathan, had in the past claimed to have been completed. Though, there are serious doubts/allegations from locals and their pundits that counter the claims of the completion of the dredging project as announced by the ousted PDP's government officials.

Considering the strategic economic benefits of successfully dredging, not only the River Niger, but also River Benue and all other inland-water ways, His Excellency President Muhammadu Buhari need to direct the appropriate authority to ensure that, the Project is actually completed and the economic benefits achieved. ‪#‎PMB‬ must request for a complete business and economic blue print of the project which should amongst other stuff include the ROI, lessons learned etc. ‪#‎PMBProjectWatch‬

Reading through the Suize Canal expansion business benefits, one cannot help but give kudus to the Egyptian authority that had, not only reduced the time for the project execution/completion from 3 years to 12 months – a fit proudly slated for Egypts’ and its allies’ celebration today.
Below is an excerpt from the project completion brief by the Egyptians authority of their ambitious Suez canal’s deepening and expansion project. Enjoy!

“Initial estimates suggested the new route would take up to three years to build, but Sisi set an ambitious target of 12 months to finish the project.

It has been touted as a landmark achievement, rivalling the digging of the original 192-kilometre (119-mile) canal which opened in 1869 after almost a decade of work.
The new section, built at a cost of $9 billion (7.9 billion euros) and funded entirely by Egyptian investors, runs part of the way alongside the existing canal connecting the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.

"It's an achievement for the people who managed to fund it as a national project and accomplished it through perseverance and hard work," Sisi's office has said.
It involved 37 kilometres of dry digging, creating what is effectively a "second lane", and widening and deepening another 35 kilometres of the existing canal.
It will cut the waiting period for vessels from 18 hours to 11.
By 2023 the number of ships using the canal will increase to 97 per day from 49 now, the government hopes.
Officials hope the new waterway will more than double Suez earnings from $5.3 billion expected at the end of 2015 to $13.2 billion in 2023.
”
‪#‎RiverNigerDredgingProject‬ ‪#‎RiverBenue‬

Ref urls:
1) Sisi to unveil 'new Suez Canal' as Egypt makes history
http://news.yahoo.com/sisi-unveil-suez-canal-egypt-makes-hi…
2) Egypt Opens New £6bn Suez Canal Waterway
http://news.sky.com/…/egypt-opens-new-6bn-suez-canal-waterw…
3) Upcoming unified Friday sermon to discuss ‘importance of Suez Canal’
http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2015/08/05/upcoming-unified-friday-sermon-to-discuss-importance-of-suez-canal/

Motor-Parks Lingering Security Challenges and Quick Wins For President Buhari’s Administration

For the umpteenth time, Nigerian masses, especially those living in the Northern part of the Country, had been witnessing waves of insecurity via senseless and reckless bombings and maiming of people in public places, such as Motor-packs, Schools and Marketplaces. However, to the chagrin of pundits, the Airports in Nigeria, mainly used by the elites, remains heavily guarded and protected by security operatives 24/7 - with various security gadgets – we congratulate our elites for attaining such fit and empathise with the common people, and pray that God Almighty would soon come to their aid, as well.

It would have been rather “business as usual”, had this lingered security vulnerabilities, in most of our nearly-dilapidated Motor-parks, Bus/Couch stations, which are often patronized by the average and down trodden citizens of Nigeria, still been operated, under the careless watch of the former “failed” and democratically-ousted administration of president Good luck Ebele Jonathan, under the PDP tyrannical regime of the “dark ages” of our recent past, keen observers would have little or no concern at all, in calling to the deaf and dumb ears of then rulers and looters, to restore the full security rights and dignity, which the Nigerian constitution had aptly, afforded every citizen of this great Nation.
But alas!
The bombings had continued to happen even after the assumption of President Buhari’s no-nonsense-leadership and the much expectations of the promise of Change, his party, the APC, had wooed Nigerian masses to vote them into power. Of course, the masses did vote APC, for they had believed and would continue to believe, that President Buhari would come to their aid, not only in protecting their lives and properties against senseless killers and murderers, but to also, put a big smiles on their faces via good use of their endowed natural and human resources, to bring about rapid development and prosperity in Nigeria.

With such high expectations, Nigerians are starting to become wary of security agent’s excuses, why would a fenced-vicinity, such as the Marketplaces and Motor-parks, continue to be a cheap-target for orchestrating/actualising criminal atrocities, without the government taking tangibly effective actions to reverse the trends of gory scenes in our Motor-parks. Discerning Nigerians are also starting to question the porosity of waiting, for four years of APC’s change through “good governance”, only after being bombed, maimed and or killed at the Motor-parks and or other public places. Obviously, that is not the change, the masses had bargained for, or was it?

With the sad records we had had so far, of hundreds of Nigerians killed in Motor-parks and Marketplaces via criminal acts of bombings, as had been witnessed repeatedly, in Kano, Bauchi, Gombe, Yobe and Maiduguri - to name a few places, which are all located in the North. And what concrete measure had we taken to stop such callous acts? Nothing! And isn't that unbelievably senseless and irresponsible? That was the reality I had personally witness at the Motor-park I visited last Sunday (2nd August 2015), in Karu Local Government of Nasarawa State, some 5-10 minutes’ drive from Abuja.

The Motor-park, popularly known as “tipper garage” which is situated, diagonally opposite the new Karu International Market, along the express road, connecting Masaka, Mararaba, Nyanya to Abuja city. This is a Motor-park, situated not far away, from the Nyanya Motor-park that was ravaged with explosives, last year - during the tenure of the PDP regime of the World certified “failed President”, Good luck Ebele Jonathan. Interestingly, the “tipper garage” Motor-park at Karu, serves mostly, people travelling to the Northeastern region, especially those travelling to Adamawa, Taraba, Gombe and Bauchi via Jos axis. I was at the Motor-park to accompany some of my Family members to book and board commercial vehicle travelling to Yola.

Is Provision of Security The Exclusive Rights of The Elites And Not Inclusive of The Masses?
This was the sterling question that keeps popping out of my mind, having noticed, the zero, zilch, zip, nada, nothing of security-presence at the Motor-park situated, stone-thrown-away from Abuja, the Federal capital and the seat of power of the most populous and largest economy in Africa. Not only there was no security presence, the people at the park, except for the few hawkers who wear a smile to probably woo customers to buy their hand-carried products, most of the people in the park, wear crossed and gloomy faces and their body languages, particularly, the facial expressions, speak volumes of the fear and uncertainty with which they stay at, or transit via the Motor-park. This is the situation, I have personally witnessed and confirmed via interaction with people at the park – who mostly, confirmed my earlier assertions/assumptions of fear of insecurity that dominated their minds. And we can rightly imagine how worse the situation could be in other Motor-parks that are located, far away from the FCT. Throughout my stay, from the time we’ve arrived, the Motor-park, some few minutes past six a.m., up until about 9:00am, when the second vehicle departed to Yola, we’ve seen no security presence, let alone scanning and or checking people and their luggage.

However, on our way back to Abuja city, we’ve seen the presence of soldiers on the road-sides, deployed to clear-off traffic build up along the express way – an excellent effort that must be commended and for which a lot of people plying the Nyanya express way had been commending the new administration for easing the unnecessary traffic jam, hawkers and other road-side traders had been bugging motorists on that route for quite a long time.

But as earlier mentioned, throughout my stay at the Motor-park in reference, I have not seen any security personnel; be it the Police, private security agents, DSS; let alone seeing sniffer dogs, scanners and or any other security gadgets, meant for safeguarding people, being used by anyone.
My curiosity and concerned was not just passive, I had to query and interview some of the Motor-park officials/workers. And the answer I got was the usual: “it is only God that is protecting us”!
Very faithful, submissive and powerful answer, I must reckon. For indeed God Almighty is the protector of all, including those who are paid to protect us. This fact was recently emphasised, when a delegation of well-wishers paid President Buhari a Sallah visit at the Presidential Villa, recalling the crowd of people trying to take a glimpse of him after observing his first Eidul Fitr prayers in Abuja, after becoming the first democratically elected leader, who ousted an incumbent President in Nigeria,
While it is highly commendable to become, constantly and faithfully conscious of giving credence and praises to God Almighty for His infinite grace and mercy, upon us; however, it is absurdly hypocritical to hide under God, to subtly express inexcusable excuses of (wittingly or unwittingly), perpetrating or promoting what God Almighty Himself and the entire civil societies had hate – i.e. injustice and criminal segregation of people based on class. That is subtly saying: the elites who use Airports deserved state’s protection, while those who use the Motor-parks do not deserved state’s protection. Isn't this the reality in Nigeria?

Is President Muhammadu Buhari Aware of This Sad Reality In Nigeria? 
This injustice must be corrected for our Government to be seen to be nurturing and promoting, a just, fair and egalitarian society - where all people would be cared for equally, so as to make them have a sense of belonging and equality before the law.

Since, the assumption of President Buhari’s leadership, barely two months ago, this would be my first article dedicated to pointing out a lingering and very dangerous insecurity loophole that must be addressed immediately. And this is in harmony with realists' cravings to discourage or stop what is deemed as injustice or corruption of some sort. And when good things are equally observed, then it becomes equally right to encourage such good acts, and many of my previous articles were focused on promoting the candidature and leadership aspirations of President Muhammadu Buhari, for, like many Nigerians, I believed in him and his capacity to lead Nigeria, fairly and justly and bring it the much needed peace and development - by God’s grace.

And of course, we are aware of the monstrous security challenges and the daunting tasks ahead of the PMB administration, in securing our Nation, particularly, the troubled Northeast. However, to most of us - realists and critical observers, it is unfathomable to excuse any Government who had resources and goodwill to protect our Airports and the elite class that patronized it, but failed to do so for our Motor-parks, which is patronized, mostly by the general masses. As reiterated earlier, these callous attacks in public places, were severally repeated, leaving a lot of innocent people killed and maimed for none of their fault, except being unable to travel by Air and or travelling by road was the only viable option they had. To all discerning people, we know that this injustice or inequality before the law is a continuation of the previous PDP administration’s tyrannical disservice that still remains, largely unchanged and unchallenged since PMB assumed power. Therefore, let the current administration of APC headed by PMB, reflect and act swiftly on the following posers. For it is high time for the masses of this country to start enjoying security at the Motor-parks and Marketplaces, like their elites do at the Airports, Supermarkets, Malls etc. Here are the posers:

• What is the moral, legal, economic and business justifications and or benefit of securing our Airports, while abandoning our Motor-parks?
• Aren’t we subtly, telling the World, that we indeed lack the moral-compass, political-will and business-sense to transform our Motor-parks into World-class travelling hub where passengers and stake holders are not only secured and comfortable, but also the Government and its partners could make equal or more money than are made in some Airports in Nigerian?
• And why can’t PMB challenges and tasks our business strategists to take up the challenges of transforming our Motor-parks and land transportation in general, and ensuring that they are fully supported and monitored?

Consequently, it is hoped that, the foregoing candid security, economic and business observations/posers inspired by our Motor-parks' predicaments, would achieve its aims of drawing the attention of the President and all other concerns to: firstly, consider the merits, justification/benefits and moral satisfactions that shall be achieved/enjoyed, when these security vulnerabilities, economic opportunities and people’s oriented service in our Motor-parks/marketplaces, are respectively and effectively reversed and explore for all citizens to enjoy and become more protected at such public venues that registers thousands of masses on a daily basis.

To this end, we do not need to remind PMB, that it is the masses that massively voted for him, unlike so many elites, who obviously had been against, he becoming the President of this great Nation.

Similarly, we do not need to remind PMB, as well, that it is the core responsibility of any Government to protect all its citizens irrespective of class, ethnicity or region. Nigerians voted-out PDP mainly, on failings to be just and fair to all Nigerians.

It is an indisputable fact that previous military regimes, as well as the PDP administration, had taken the Nigerian masses for granted. For instance, is it not a fact that previous government had in the past, awarded huge contracts, worth millions of US Dollars, to build and secure our Federal Airports? But had the past Government been able to secure our Motor-parks and make them impenetrable for terrorists to carry-in bombs and detonate same - set aside awarding contracts to build a World class, fit-for-purpose Motor-parks, in every state of the Federation, so as to make the masses feel cared for, instead of caring for the elites alone? Mind you, no one should go against the elite class, as we are also hopeful of joining them soon to enjoy all the eliteous (if i can coin that) joys they have been enjoying.

And by the way, we are very optimistic that President Buhari’s administration, shall not allow that ugly trends of insecurity to continue, being that road transportation, at present, is the major, affordable means by which Nigerian masses travel within the country to conduct their legitimate businesses and Motor-parks and marketplaces are where these journeys and businesses are initiated, enjoyed and terminated. As earlier mentioned, Nigerians had been bombed and killed not once, twice or thrice and quite substantial number of people died through carelessness and or negligence in providing basic security provisions. This is quite unnerving and it takes only a senseless government to do nothing in reversing the trends of insecurity in our Motor-parks and market places and we are hopeful that this would not continue and would be unacceptable to President Buhari’s regime.

Our Motor-parks Deserved More Than Security:
Provision of adequate security of course must be our first priority in our Motor-parks and Marketplaces, which is rightly, the essence of writing this article. And beyond securing our road transport hubs nation-wide, which PMB should consider as a quick wins for his administration’s first 100 days or so in office; so as to ensure that adequate security is provided in all our Motor-parks. For we have no any legitimate reason to allow any Nigerian to die from criminal acts, such as bombing, while at the Motor-park, just as there are no justifications for our elites to witness or suffer same calamities at our Airports.

As for the untapped, economic, business opportunities and political good will that could be harvested from designing and building World-class Federal Motor-parks nation-wide; PMB should immediately, start assembling bright business out-looking professionals to come up with a viable business plan of transforming or building new Motor-parks that are, not only safe and comfortable hub for travelers, but also a convenient World-class profitable partnership ventures that can benefits all investors (be it Government, Private and or Public Private Partnership).

Obviously, this is an area that PMB should consider as a quick wins for his Administration and that of his party - the APC.
Let our Motor-parks be safe, comfortable and convenient for masses to enjoy their travel experiences, which mostly begins and ends at the Motor-parks. And Nigerians would be more grateful for the wise choice they had made in voting-out PDP for APC and its great leader in person of the great President Muhammdu Buhari. A stitch in time saved nine.

Salihu Garba
3rd August 2015

Note
:
If you find this discourse worthy of sharing and discussing, please share and remember to tag your friend and use the following hash tags for wider rich
‪#‎QuickWinsForBuhari‬
‪#‎QuickWinsForAPC‬
‪#‎SecureOurMotorParks‬

To “Kill NNPC” or To “Kill Corruption”, Which Way Forward?An Insider’s Candid Perspective For The Attention of President, Muhammadu Buhari 

Even prior to the inauguration of President, Muhammdu Buhari, to date, the media is a washed with screaming, unpleasant headlines about NNPC. Few amongst these legitimate outcries were:

• “Buhari vows to probe ‘missing’ NNPC $20 billion”
• "Kill NNPC" - Governor, El-Rufai cried out loud!
• “Split NNPC into Two, IPMAN Advises Buhari”
• “Nigerians will not understand the corruption in NNPC – Buhari”

This article was originally titled: "To 'Kill' or Not To 'Kill' NNPC" to set a tune for an intellectual debate that would hopeful provides the Government of the day with quality superior arguments/options to aid in resolving the NNPC leadership and operational challenges.

As an insider who had been working in NNPC for over 23 years, as a trained change agent (business analyst and system builder) and as a Nigerian who cherished the freedom to patriotically utilize the privileges of being a good and active Citizen of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, particularly, in advocating and living good governance and leadership principles. And without sounding merely defensive for NNPC, I believe, like other Nigerians who had held an opposing views regarding this great Corporation, I have equal rights by law and by qualifications, to sincerely and respectfully, advise our great leader (PMB), whom I so much adore and cherish for being, not only incorruptible and astute, but also for being a great “level 6” leader and a statesman of the highest quality he has been, and overall - a model to be followed. In case you are wondering who or what a level 6 leaders are or means, please avail yourself of my previous article titled: “Level 5 Leaders, elixirs to General Muhammadu Buhari Quest to "fix Nigeria" ” which is available of on a Facebook page I dedicated to advising PMB's administration to contribute towards helping to build the great Nigeria we've all been craving to see. (The article's URL is: http://on.fb.me/1fHiVf0 ) You can also read the four agenda, I proposed for PMB to (amongst other strategic goals) charge whoever he would appoint to lead NNPC to see to their effective implementation.
(You may wish to read the four agendas here:https://www.facebook.com/salihu.garba/posts/10152959121122849 )

As for the motion to senselessly "kill NNPC", I hereby respectfully and confidently posited that PMB should not "kill NNPC", without first killing what had made NNPC and many other business organs of the Nigerian Government to be perceived as a kill-able institutions - and that is corruption!

Let the World know that NNPC, as far as Nigerian business organs are concern, is one of the best run organization, in terms of quality man power and systems. No doubt there are lot of waste and other operational issues that need to be addressed to make the Corporation more effective. PMB knows who are corrupt in the system and those giving the Corporation and Nigeria a bad name. These people should be made to face the music, so as to pave way for re-organizing, re-engineering and refocusing NNPC for better performance.

If we senselessly “killed NNPC”, without firstly “killing corruption” as PMB, memered during one of his campaign interview with Christian Amanpour of CNN and also “killing” the prevailing retrogressive culture of "national cake", we are going to end up (may be in another four years and after spending huge resources and energy) creating another National Oil Company that could inherit the same culture of corruption and impunity, being that the new company would invariably be run by Nigerians.
Our priority should be about building strong and sustainable Institutions – rather than painstakingly shopping for saintly people to run systems that had stale, weak and vulnerable processes, policies and poisonous-culture which could aid in subtly, corrupting even the most saintly professionals we could appoint to lead/manned them.

To this end, PMB should know that corrupt leaders who abuse and corrupt powers vested on them, happen to thrive in most of their fraudulent deals, mostly, due to Institutional decays which encourage the mind bugling-wholesale-corruption we’ve been uncovering recently, amongst which is the $6Billion alleged to have been stolen by only one minister in the last "failed" administration.

It should be known that when an institution is weaken by either outdated policies and procedures and or it lacks adequate qualitative corruption-prevention and corruption-resistant policies, processes and procedures - then that system would continue to suffer exploitation from corrupt individuals. We must rebuild and or re-engineer our Government's Institutions/MDA tenaciously and judiciously, so as to serve as a strong and lively guard and guide that would proactively prevent its leaders or any other employee from exploiting and or corrupting it’s perpetually re-engineered/updated and guarded systems' policies, procedure and processes.

When I said a system, I am referring to its professional/technical meaning (i.e. judiciously selecting and deploying the right caliber of quality people, guided with the right laws, policies; and assisted by a qualitative information technologies, business tools, machines, processes and procedures; which must all be synergised towards achieving the overall strategic goals of an Institution - be it of the oil and gas/power industry, armed forces, education, finance and other revenue generating organs).

Consequently, PMB needs to bring on-board, technocrats with adequate domain knowledge, skills and experiences, guided by professional business analysts and business modelers with extensive contextual knowledge of our specific business and economic peculiarities/needs and in harmonious perspective with international economic realities. These are the set of people that should be entrusted with the onerous task of holistically scrutinizing, analyzing and suggesting better ways our Government’s Ministries and MDAs can be effectively and sustainable rebirth, re-aligned and re-invigorated for greater value addition and or creation, and also making them highly corruption-proved/resistant, thereby eliminating or neutralizing the side effects of accidentally appointing people who might on the surface (as mortal beings) appear saintly, but then, as time passes by “display lack of conscience and patriotism” after assuming the position of leadership and running our vulnerable institutions/systems, as PMB often, rightly acknowledged in his interviews.

As a system person, I often site this example I am about to share, with my colleagues, as an epitome of building a corruption-free or fraud/corruption-resistant system.

Back in 2004-2007, when I was undergoing my studies in London, I used the students’ London “Oyester card” for my travels within London city. The smart card was customized with the eligible card holders’ name and passport-size photo printed on it. The card allows it's holders to “top-up” (add money) whenever they needed to. Also, the card is used, not only for gaining access and exiting, most of the train stations (within the city), it is also used to meter and record passengers travels and where about. This is achieved via the Oyester card’s readers installed at entry points of most of the train stations, and on Buses and trams too. How the system interacts was: a passenger “touches” the top of the card reader with his/her valid Oyester card, then the card reader beeps, flashing a green light, and then the gate/barrier bars slide-open or swing-open to admit or discharge passengers in and out of the station, respectively.

The ingenious fraud resistance/preventive aspect of the system’s process was consciously and deliberately built into the London Oyester card billing system.
Experience had indicated that some passengers using the smart travel card, might forget to, or deliberately avoid touching-in and or touching-out their Oyester cards on the card reader, thereby “beating” the billing system and denying the "Transport for London" company its due service charge for that fulfilled-journey. By this unusual incident of touching-in, but not touching-out, for instance, the Oyester’s card billing system might assumed that the passenger had not embarked on the initiated, but “uncompleted” journey, since it cannot determine the end-point of the journey, and in such case, the passenger had traveled for free – thereby invariably, denying the "Transport for London" its due services charge for the embarked journey. The solution to that system’s loophole which can deliberately or not, allow a passenger to intentionally or unintentionally defraud the London Oyester card billing system and its parent company, was to come up with the following two basic system's procedure (use case) modifications and enforcement:

1) When a passenger touches-in: the Oyester billing system should deduct the maximum (capped) amount for a whole day journey which was then about GBP3.5 for students and depending on the zone and period one is making his/her journey.

2) When the same passenger touches-out, at the point of arrival, then the system would calculate the correct amount for the fulfilled journey, in most cases GBP1.00 then, (depending on the zone and or peak-period or not) and refund the balance to the Oyester card –holder’s card account.

With these changes, the Oyester card system is able to cater for itself - by itself, against any intended or unintended revenue fraud that might be initiated by an eligible passenger.

This is just one out of many examples we can site on how near-perfect systems can be built – free from fraud or other means of corruptions.

I am of the candid view, that whoever cannot clearly mention the good side of an organization and be able to make a contrasting “like” for “like” analysis of its weaknesses and strengths, has no credible business in calling for its destruction.

NNPC, apart from the leadership challenges it has been facing which has been usually inherited from its parent-body - the Nigerian state and its top leadership, the corporation has crop of young and bright professionals from various fields/background, whose skills and pedigree are World class and un-matchable to other peers, working in other business organs of the Nigerian government. NNPC had fairly good systems and followed some World class practices in its internal operations and dealings.

It is therefore my candid believe that, when PMB harnessed the brighter human capital resident in NNPC (by appointing an astute level 5 incorruptible leader (driver) to effectively drive the entire oil and gas industry and the corporation in particular, with the right passengers (young leaders) positioned in their respective/right seats – then voila -- sustainable positive Changes shall continue to happen in NNPC.

Therefore, killing NNPC is not a good option as it might appear to those calling for its destruction. However, what is needed to get NNPC back on track as the greater engine for greater revenue generation (through efficient and sustainable productivity that ensures value addition/creation for achieving optimum developmental goals of the Federal Government of Nigeria), is restructuring and culture re-orientation of the industry and its work force, so as to position it, to become one of the leading World-class National Oil Corporation that is transparently run as a business, with less interference from politicians. Refurbish, the refineries, build new green refineries and enforce local contents laws.

Conclusively and instructively, as we have so far briefly analyzed, "killing NNPC" should not be a valid option, but killing corruption is surely the way forward for NNPC and for the Nigerian state at large. At the end of this debate, however, after diligently, considering all the superior/beneficial options, and if “killing” the Nation’s Oil Corporation and building a new one - from scratch happens to be the most appealing option, then by all means -- be it! And PMB, should follow suit in that regard, in the most ethical, justly and sacrificial manner that would ensure great tangible benefits to all Nigerians (of this generation and the unborn generations).

Be just, for being just is nearer to piety!

May God Almighty in His infinite mercy and grace continue to bless Nigeria, and Nigerians, the more!

Salihu Garba
29th July 2015

Originally posted on facebook:
Shorten url: http://on.fb.me/1fKjq7X
Absolute url: https://www.facebook.com/salihu.garba/posts/10153054815167849:0

Cost Reduction and Enhancing Efficiency in Governance Through Deployment of fit for purpose e-Governance system

The following was my contributory comments on Dr Aliyu Tildes face book page, discussing the topic "SNC: Decentralising the Federal Government" - the way forward. Maintaining status quo in the Nigerian governance structure (Centralise) with an over burden centre which often suffer when the top leadership is weak or should we opt for decentralising system and spreading/sharing the responsibilities of the centre to the various regional governance body. Enjoy!

and Dr as you rightly pointed out each of the system of governance has its merits and demerits.

Your analysis brings to fore the kind of expensive and a somewhat wasteful system of governance we're currently operating in Nigeria. And we can't afford to continue that way for a long time to come. The sets of executives and law breakers... oops! I mean to say law makers, we have at the center are virtually replicated in all the states and some government parastatals, ministries and departments.

The current structure supposed to serve as a form of decentralisation that should be able to deliver devident of good governance to the people, but it has woefully failed. Moreover, it is very costly and ineffective, as there are no prudent/efficient means we can benchmark their performance on governance and or how well our tax payers money/oil money has been expended on governance and on those politicians together with their various and numerous aids that included even a facebook (new media) special adviser/aid, this is in addition to sponsoring their often extravagant lifestyle etc-- all at the expense of citizens' common wealth of their state.

As an IT specialist, I can confidently attest to the fact that costs and inefficiencies associated with such costly and ineffective governance, can be greatly enhanced with the adoption of the right IT tools that would fit/serve our well defined dynamic governance structures, processes and procedures.

These governance information system should cover end to end the governance processes/procedures: from planing, defining top strategic trust/goal of the state, to breaking/cascading such goals to lower levels, assigning such goals' objectives to respective government institutions/units with appropriate KPIs set for both the outfits and their respective officials that manned/run them.
This is to enable evaluation and monitoring and measuring performance of each government units and the people responsible for running them. One may quickly ask: isn't what is currently obtainable in our manual or conventional system of governance and why would IT-the-right-way makes any difference?
Yes, to some extent, we could be operating such systems manually or conventionally.
However as with every manual/conventional system - records could be easily manipulated and or destroyed and we hardly can find or track any performance for the purpose performance measure and or reward  and cautioning of government officials etc.

With the right IT tools governance would be more transparent, engaging and collaborative. Citizens can be able to securely login and monitor first hand how their government is faring in terms of budget performance for all sectors. e.g. education, health, social welfare etc. It will engender transparency and openness in governance.

And with right content management system, document authoring (collaborative or individuals), endorsement and approvals to closing and archiving such official documents could all be achieved through effective workflow system. Digital signature such as Cosign can also come handy for Approval and authorisation of such digital documents or contents.

This IT systems can work in both centralised and decentralised system of governance.

Let me conclude by reminding us the objective of bringing IT perspective into this discourse, set aside that IT is the in thing in today's information age, my main focus is to highlight those benefits such as reducing the huge costs of governance that we may finally decide to run at the end of the day. And not only cost reduction,  when the right fit-for-purpose e-Governance system is successfully deployed and monitored, it will bring about efficiency, prudence, citizen satisfaction and timely delivery of governance products and services.

And Araba is still the most appealing goal to pursue for the North.


Salihu Garba
12th October 2013

How to Export (Save) and Import Blog Contents from Google's Blogger

I was about composing an article to be publish on my Blog, then suddenly, the need to safeguard those already published articles, crossed my mind. And this need raised some questions such as:


Question 1: And by the way, why would one need to back-up or import his hard worked Blog contents?
Answer: Of course we cant just afford to lose what we spent precious time and work hard to accomplish. And our audience too would not be happy if those contents made for them are gone.

Question 2: Isn't Google free hosting good enough, why would one bother to save or export his blog contents?
Answer: So many things could go wrong and before we know it our whole dedicated effort vanishes into thin air.

• One could make a mistake while working with the Blog’s configurations/settings tools and before we know it the entire Blog is deleted. 
• This could also occur purely from technical issues with Google systems and or 
• Other reasons unknown to users could also cause our Blog and its content to disappear - just like that.

In order to safeguard our blog contents, there are basically two methods one could use to achieve this objective. I.e.

1. Export/Import and 
2. Backup/Restore. 

Export would simply enable a user to export the contents of his/her blog i.e. only posts and comments made on those posts.

The exported contents is stored on user's hard drive in an xml format. And the Import function on the other hand, enables a user to Import the content of exported xml file unto a newly created blog or onto another existing blog of the user.

As for the Backup and Restore, they are similar to Export and Import, only that former is more effective/comprehensive as it made to back up one's Blog i.e. Contents + Themes (the style, looks and aesthetics of your blog).

This “How to” article would only focus on Exporting blog post and comments from your Blogger dash board. However, one could also catch the ideas behind using the other functions Import Back up etc.

To Export, its pretty simple: in about 3-4 simple clicks to one would have his/her Blog contents exported on to one's PC or tablets hard drive.

Step 1: Blogger Home Page: Click 1 and 2 as shown on the image below:

We can also click on setting from the view shown below:

Step 2: Click Other as shown on image below:

Step 3: Click Export as shown on green circle on image below:

Step 4: Download

Your exported file is saved on your hard drive. The file name format is somewhat like this blog-current-date.xml See image below:












Follow similar step to Import the xml file onto your new or existing Blog. You may need to select the Automatic publishing option from the Import prompt/menu otherwise your content would be imported but remain unpublished until you manually publish the contents.

That's it! I hope you've find this "How to Export (Save) and Import Blog Contents from Google's Blogger" post useful!

Salihu Garba
Business Analyst
19th October, 2013

I was about composing an article to be publish on my Blog, then suddenly the need to safeguards my already published articles crossed my mind. And by the way why would one need to back-up or import his hard worked Blog contents? So many things could go wrong and before we know it our whole dedicated effort vanishes into thin air. • One could make a mistake while working with the Blog’s configurations/settings tools and before we know it the entire Blog is deleted. • This could also occur purely from technical issues with Google systems and or • Other reasons unknown to users In order to safeguard our blog contents, there are basically two methods one could use to achieve this objective. I.e. Export/Import and Backup/Restore. Export would simply enable a user to export the contents of his/her blog i.e. only posts and comments made on those posts. The exported contents is stored on your hard drive in xml format And the Import function enables a user to Import the xml file unto a newly created blog or onto an existing blog of the user. On the other hand Backup and restore would enable a user to back up the entire Blog i.e. Contents + Themes (the style, looks and aesthetics of your blog). This “How to” article would only focus on Exporting blog post and comments from your Blogger dash board. And we can achieve this in about 3 simple clicks to have one’s whole Blog content exported on to his/her PC or tablets hard drive.

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