THE RISK-TAKERS: THE HISTORY MAKERS.

  Risk-takers are those who do not care of laying their lives in the race of success. They are ready to give up their last breath in other to achieve a goal or to make an impact. Risk-takers are those who never give up in searching and finding treasures, no matter how the devil may quakes and aches. Treasures are hidden in the secret places, only the risk-taker find it.
   
 Leo F. Buscaglia says, “The person who risk nothing does nothing has nothing is nothing and becomes nothing. He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he simple cannot learn and feel and change and grow and love and live”

    Risk-takers are who are not fearful of every uncertainty; they take chances and gamble in hope of winning. The vision of the destiny maker lies in the risk he takes to create harmony in the life of each and every individual.

    Risk taker does not fear. Fear and doubt keep us from taking risk. They’re the two worst enemy of success of a great dreamer.
    Why are we so afraid of taking risk? Why are we not willing to leave the well-trodden path and do something that challenges us? The one that sleep too much will be poor. Wake up and do some good no two ways to success. Your success and history shall be determined by the product from the amount of input of risk that you take. Risk taker may not be a gain seeker but a history maker. 
   
What you should do is be willing to make mistake, anything you will ever do in life is risky. If you are not making mistake you are not going anywhere. Making mistake is part of taking risk and it is part of growing.
   
 A very nature of life requires risk taking. A small child would never learn to walk or talk without taking risk. You just have to hold unconventional position. Never be afraid to take on challenge. It take faith to make a strong man and fear to make a weak man. Always keep focused on your dreams and do something that force you to stretch well in all your pursuit.
   
Risk is the possibility of incurring loss or misfortune, so to be alive at all involves some risk. All exploration all growth is calculated. Calculating risk is where potential downside is limited but potential upside is unlimited. The pursuit of a desire will brings it reality the more you dig for treasure the more you’ll encounter.
    Learn to take risk with action. Action virtual for self-confidence.

By Adeniyi Adunola

NAFRC, LBS partner on vocational training for officers

NIGERIAN Armed Forces Resettlement Centre (NAFRC), Oshodi, Lagos is partnering with the Lagos Business School of the Pan Atlantic University (formerly Pan African University) to bequeath managerial entrepreneurship skills to officers under NAFRC scheme.
   The NAFRC Commandant, Air Vice Marshal M. A. Akinsanmi, who disclosed this at a press briefing yesterday, said the mandate of NAFRC is to equip retiring personnel of the Nigerian Armed Forces with relevant trade and vocational skills.
  According to Akinsanmi, the purpose of the vocational skills is to enable the retirees integrate into civil society and enjoy a productive and fulfilling life in retirement as they are now freemen. He said the officers need to be trained on what they can use as a means of living after retirement.
  The AVM noted that the centre has introduced managerial and entrepreneurship training programmes from which close to 200 officers have so far benefitted.
   “It is the training an officer received while in training that he uses to make a living when he becomes a civilian.    NAFRC is to gradate 113 personnel on the 14th June 2013. The trainees to be gradated are 50 from Army, 53 from the Navy and 10 from the Air Force,” he said.
  Akinsanmi debunked speculation that NAFRC is a dumping ground for officers, saying “if an officer’s retirement period happens to be while he or she is at NAFRC, so be it, but that does not mean it is the final bus stop.”

By Adeniyi Adunola and Adebisi Olonade

Employ agric to tackle unemployment, food problems, entrepreneur urges govt

The Federal Government has been urged to employ agriculture to tackle the problems of insecurity, unemployment, energy and food crises in the country, as well as generate huge foreign exchange through export of agro-allied products.
This advice was given yesterday by an agric expert/innovative technologist, Prince Adekola Okedele, promoter of an Italian firm FENCO Food Engineering Company in Nigeria and Managing Director of Prince Ades Oke International Ventures Limited, while receiving a top Italian technologist and Consultant, Dr. Paolo Scisciolo in Lagos.
Okedele said “It is on record that Nigeria was once a revenue earner from agricultural and agro-allied products: groundnut from the North, palm produce and rubber from the East and South South while the South West contributed foreign exchange to the national till.
Giving an example, Okedele said if the Federal government adopts the FENCO Food Engineering’s small, medium and large-scale food processing technology it could provide millions of job opportunities to jobless Nigerians.
Okedele a former Customs officer-turned agric expert, said FENCO Food Engineering Company had installed 330 food processing lines all over the world that could process Nigeria’s major farm produce such as tomatoes, pawpaw, millet, guava, pinapples, Mangoes passion fruits and citrus for food consumption, exports and preservation as well as help local farmers to boost their harvests.
He advised the government to experiment the project by establishing at least, two plants in each of the six geopolitical zones of the country, as suggested to officials of SMEDAN in Abuja during his technology demonstration at the instance of SMEDAN director-general on March 13, 2012, result of which we are expecting till date.
Okedele said that by now President Goodluck Jonathan should have commissioned at least 12 processing plants in the country, which could have generated millions of jobs to farmers and graduates if SMEDAN had taken our suggestions and recommendations very serious.
For instance in Nigeria, a tomato processing plant with a capacity of 600 tonnes per 24 hours would need about 330 hectares of land for plantation, with 1,000 direct workers in the farm daily apart from hundreds of factory workers to sustain the plant.
Prince Okedele said that setting up two food processing plants in each of the six zones would need 3,960 hectres of land and generate at least 1.2 million jobs opportunities for Nigerians.
On energy, Okedele said, FENCO had supported its programme with another Italian company, Cipriani, to produce one megawatt of energy in container to power each plant.  This new Italian technology on power-renewal energy programme is worth supporting by the government and private sector if the country is to solve the acute electricity problems in the country, he said.

By: Adeniyi Adunola

Reverse Alamieyeseigha’s pardon, CAN, Catholics, others tell Jonathan

FUMING at what they consider as a mockery of the nation’s anti-corruption campaign , groups and the nation’s  leaders   have  urged President Goodluck Jonathan to reverse  the state pardon  the Federal Government granted former Bayelsa State Governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha .
   The Christian Welfare Initiative (CWI), an arm of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN),  wondered  why such a pardon should be granted someone who was convicted by a London court for corruption and financial embezzlement.
   In a statement in Lagos, the National President of CWI, Archbishop Magnus Adeyemi Atilade, described the whole act as being based on tribalism, nepotism and lack of the  fear of God, and a negation of Jonathan's perceived war against corruption.
   Atilade pointed out that the pardon granted to all the former military officers including Lt. Gen. Oladipo Diya could be acceptable to the generality of Nigerians on the grounds that the alleged coup for which they were convicted was questionable. But  they  said  that  the pardon for Alamieyeseigha could not be justified for any reason because of the large amount of money involved.
   According to CWI, Jonathan is indirectly endorsing corruption by this singular pardon of an ex-convict. The Christian body said if Alamieyeseigha deserved a pardon, all the gates of the nation’s  prison yards should as well be flung open for the inmates, both convicted and awaiting trial for presidential pardon because their offences were not as heavy as those of Alamieyeseigha who embezzled his state's money.
    CWI recalled that Jonathan was Alamieyeseigha's deputy when the former governor committed the offence for which he was convicted. 
   “It is therefore a height of nepotism and tribalism for the same Jonathan to turn round and grant pardon to his former boss. And this is not acceptable to Nigerians; he should rescind the pardon immediately because he is laying a gangrenous precedent for other future leaders.
  “Whether Jonathan knows the implication of what he did or not, it should be pointed out to him that the said pardon is a big dent on his government, and the honorable thing to do is to rescind the pardon for Alamieyeseigha now”, the CWI added.
    The Justice Development and Peace Commission (JDPC) (a non-governmental,  non-partisan organization and the main social-development arm of the Catholic Church), condemned the pardon.
    Addressing journalists at  the weekend on the state of the nation to mark JDPC Week at JDPC Secretariat, Sabo-Yaba, Lagos, the Executive Director of the Group, Rev. Father Emmanuel Fadele  lamented the position of  Nigeria  as 135th out of 176 corrupt countries in the world according to the  Global Corruption Perception Index.
“According to Human Right’s Watch, Nigeria lost $38b to corruption between 1999 and 2007; in 2010, the civil servants pocketed N450billion in the present administration alone while about N5 trillion could not be accounted for.  They loot mindlessly and mercilessly.
“Nigeria has organs like the EFCC, Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) and Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC)  charged with the responsibility of sniffing out corrupt people and dealing with them accordingly, but they work discordantly, pursuing ephemeral small thieves like internet scammers, cash couriers, pipeline vandals among others …
“The current EFCC website ‘celebrates’ successful conviction of a beggarly 19 out of 300 cases and none of these 19 is a high-profile criminal.  Two brothers, Ikechukwu and Avoaja received 91 years jail term for sealing N21 million while a John Yusuf, who admitted stealing N23.3 billion was sentenced to two years or option of fine of N75,000,” the group said.
   It recommended that to seriously fight corruption, anti-graft agencies should have defined functions and should be independent, fearless, impersonal, transparent above board and be focused.
  Also, a member of the House of Representatives and Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Bimbo Daramola  said that the pardon  was not well- thought out.
   But  the senator representing Edo South senatorial district, Ehigie Uzamere,  at the weekend, said that the Senate would further encourage  Jonathan to grant pardon to Nigerians who may have unjustly incurred the wrath of past governments in the country for political reasons.
  He said the United States  was ignorant of what led to the travails of Alamieyeseigha when it condemned the pardon granted to him by Jonathan.
   Uzamere spoke to journalists in Okada when the chairmanship candidate of the Action Congress of Nigeria in Ovia North East, Mrs Lucy Omagbon commenced her campaign.
  The Chairman of the Ikeja branch of the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) Monday Ubani yesterday  condemned the pardon as provocative .
   Ubani, who was reacting to the comment by presidential spokesperson, Dr Doyin  Okupe on the state pardon said the  anti-corruption fight of
the Federal Government was clearly in trouble.
   He said: “So far the explanations from the government aides are not only, watery but also provocative. The explanation of people like Dr
Doyin Okupe tells you that Nigeria is in serious trouble.
“He presented President Jonathan as an unrepentant monarch whose various infractions cannot be questioned by his subjects. Dr Okupe
needs to be educated that Nigeria is in democracy and her rulers need to exercise their powers in the interest of the nation” , he added.
   In a similar manner,  Lagos-based human rights lawyer, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa , who was perturbed by the state pardon said  although the
power  given to the president to grant pardon does not specify the categories of crime that may or may not merit state pardon, such pardon should not have come from a president that is  concerned with the fight against corruption.
 According to him, it is for the person exercising the power to work out the modalities or set out conditions under which the power will be
exercised.
   On his part, retired Commissioner of Police, Lagos State, Dr. Abubakar Tsav has said the state pardon was a mere charade to favour Jonathan’s  former master thus encouraging corruption in the country.
   Tsav who made the condemnation in an interview with The Guardian in Makurdi at the weekend stated that himself like many other Nigerians had continued to be disappointed in Jonathan’s unpopular policies and decisions.
  He maintained that the inclusion of the names of Diya and Adisa among others on the list was meant to deceive Nigerians and justify his nepotism; noting too that Diya and Adisa were already granted state pardon by Gen. Abdulsalami in 1999.
 Tsav    questioned  why  Jonathan did not include Almustapha’s  name on the pardon list.

From Alemma-Ozioruva Aliu  (Benin City), Terhemba Daka  (Abuja), Joseph Wantu  (Makurdi),  Bertram Nwannekanma,
Adeniyi Adunola  and   Isaac Taiwo (Lagos)

Jonathan urged to redress marginalisation of S’West

CHRISTIAN Welfare Initiative (CWI), a political arm of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), has expressed sadness and utmost concern over what it called the marginalisation of the South Western part of Nigeria by the Goodluck Jonathan administration.
  In a statement in Lagos yesterday signed by the National President, Archbishop Magnus Adeyemi Atilade, the CWI, said: “When we studied the figure of last presidential election in 2011 region by region, the South-West region overwhelmingly voted for President Jonathan. In fact, Jonathan won in five states of South-West convincingly and in Osun State, he was placed second with a little margin above Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN’s) candidate.”
  “With the analysis at our disposal, we are not happy with this marginalisation and we say without mincing words that the marginalisation is very unfair and uncalled for. We call that this anomaly should be corrected now for equity, oneness of Nigeria and fair play. President Jonathan should treat the matter with the urgency it deserves,” the Christian Welfare Initiative stated.
  It restated its earlier call on Lagosians that a Christian should be the next governor of the state come 2015 in the interest of justice and fair play, recalling that all the civilian governors who ruled Lagos State since its creation were Muslims, including Alhaji Lateef Jakande, Bola Tinubu and Babatunde Raji Fashola, the incumbent governor.
  The CWI also used the medium to call on the security agencies to checkmate the unwarranted killing of Nigeria farmers by the nomadic cattle herdsmen, who migrated from the Niger Republic to Nigeria. It called on the Federal and state governments to create ranches in the northern states for the herdsmen and stop them from coming to the southern states to destroy private farms.
  The CWI also urged the President to call the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, to order in his unguided utterances. “Let him face his national assignment as head of CBN or resign his appointment and join politics”, it stated

By Adeniyi Adunola