Nigeria's ailing President Yar'Adua breaks silence

Nigeria's president, not seen in public since going into hospital in Saudi Arabia for heart treatment in November, has told the BBC he is recovering.

In his first interview since then, by telephone, Umaru Yar'Adua, 58, said he hoped to make "tremendous progress" and return home to resume his duties.

His long absence and speculation over his health have led to calls for him to hand over power to his vice-president.

A protest in the capital, Abuja, has urged an end to the political limbo.

HAVE YOUR SAY

It is really a great relief to kill the avalanche of rumours of his death

Bethel Uchegbu, Owerri

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The opposition has been demanding details of Mr Yar'Adua's health amid swirling rumours that he was critically ill - or even dead - and unable to return to power.

His adviser Tanimu Yakubu Kurfi told the BBC the president's enemies were behind the rumours.

Doctors said in December that President Yar'Adua was suffering from acute pericarditis, an inflammation of the lining of the heart. He is also known to have kidney problems.

Constitutional worries

Speaking to the BBC in a three-minute telephone interview organised by the president's office, Mr Yar'Adua said he was making a good recovery.

"At the moment I am undergoing treatment, and I'm getting better from the treatment. I hope that very soon there will be tremendous progress, which will allow me to get back home," he told Mansur Liman from the BBC Hausa service, speaking in both Hausa and English.

BBC Hausa has a large audience in northern Nigeria, where Hausa is the main language.

He said he was in constant contact with Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan, but gave no indication of when he might return to Nigeria.

"I wish, at this stage, to thank all Nigerians for their prayers for my good health, and for their prayers for the nation."

He also wished the Nigerian national football team success in the Africa Cup of Nations currently under way in Angola.

The BBC's correspondent in Nigeria's capital said the president's voice had sounded weak.

President Yar'Adua's silence until now and the fact he did not appoint Vice-President Jonathan to serve in his absence have led to fears of a constitutional crisis.

There is a perceived danger of a power vacuum in a country that only saw the end of military rule just over 10 years ago, the BBC's Will Ross reports from the capital, Abuja.

But analysts say a handover of power before the next scheduled election in 2011 - to Vice-President Jonathan, a southerner, from President Yar'Adua, a northerner - could disrupt the usual rotation between the regions that has governed Nigeria since the return of civilian rule.

There have also been complaints that important government business has been left hanging in the president's absence.

Is Yar Adua Dead

San Francisco, Jan 9, (THEWILL) - As earlier reported by THEWILL two weeks ago, Nigeria's President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua who had suffered a stroke at the King Faisal hospital is reportedly brain dead but the President's kitchen cabinet continues its aggressive ploy aimed at keeping the ailing Umaru Musa Yar'Adua in power at all cost. The president continues to lay helpless on a hospital bed in a VIP suite at the King Faisal hospital in Jeddah.

Last week the group floated a lie that the ailing President called three top government leaders including the Vice President. Inside sources say the President has not made any phone calls since his evacuation from Abuja. What happened was that someone placed a call from the President's phone to the three leaders but the caller did not have any conversations with the listeners.

A reliable source confided in THEWILL that the Vice President accepted that he got a call from the President just to protect the Presidency. Recall that Prof. Dora Akunyili, Nigeria's information Minister announced that the Vice President informed ministers at the Federal Executive Council meeting that the President called but said the VP did not give the details of their conversation. The fact is that there was no conversation in the first place hence he could not give them details.

The group has been putting pressure on some governors especially Kwara State governor and chairman of the Governor's Forum, Bukola Saraki, who is also nursing a presidential ambition to sell the dummy to his colleague that he had a word too with the President. Also recall it was Bukola who lied to Nigerians at the wake of the President's hospitalization in Jeddah that they met with him at the hospital, a tale which we have confirmed to be false.

The talk that the president is also recovering is another lie that the group has been feeding Nigerians through politicians especially the Nigerian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Alhaji Abdullah Aminchi. The ambassador has been singing the President's recovery like a broken record even before he was admitted at the hospital.

48 DAYS AND COUNTING, STILL NO PROOF OF LIFE
The kitchen cabinet continues to play its hide and seek with Nigerians over the President's health. On Wednesday an official of the King Faisal hospital told the BBC last that the President was no longer at the facility but ambassador Aminchi countered saying the President was at the VIP section of the hospital. The alleged signing of the 2009 Supplementary Budget is another scam that the group has been trying to sell to Nigerians without any success. THEWILL and a cross section of Nigerians have repeatedly called on the Presidency to show us proof to no avail.

Recall that in 2007 during his presidential campaign when the President collapsed and was speculated to have died, president Olusegun Obasanjo called him and put him on speakerphone to debunk the reports of his death, but the Presidency has refused to do the same because like we earlier reported the President is still in intensive care at the hospital.

The Obasanjo led PDP Board of Trustees is scheduled to meet this week to discuss his present condition.

The House of Representatives will also meet on Tuesday to deliberate on the president's health.

The PDP governors will also meet to deliberate too.

Whatever they decide, Nigerians must be told the truth; The President's brain is damaged and can no longer take decisions for Nigerians.

Things you didn't know about FACEBOOK

Did you know...

- That FACEBOOK was launched on February 2004 by the Harvard drop out Mark Zuckerberg (who was 19 years old). By the end of the month more than half of the undergraduate population at Harvard was registered on the service.

- that in June 2008 Mark Zuckerberg paid a 65 million dollar settlement to close a long- running legal battle concerning whether Mark stole the FACEBOOK idea from his former room mate [R].

- That FACEBOOK has more than 250 million active users (active at least once a month) and more than 900 employees [A].

- that 100 million users log on to Facebook at least once each day.

- that on this planet more than 3 billion minutes are spent (or wasted) on FACEBOOK - every day.

- FACEBOOK is only a low security web service. This means that you should never use the same password for your FACEBOOK account as you use for more important services (e.g. webmails or netbanking).

- that FACEBOOK leaves quite a few cookies in your browser which enables other Internet sites to identify your FACEBOOK identity. (If your browser does not accept these cookies you won't get access to your FACEBOOK account).

- With more than 10 billion private photos FACEBOOK is the no. 1 photo sharing application in the world. Agreeing to FACEBOOK Privacy Policy means that you waive all your rights, as they can use all your photos freely [A,B]. (Nobody knows whether this claim would be legal in court).

- That from 2004 to 2009 FACEBOOK has reserved every right to register and keep all kind of your private information – even for profiles now eliminated [B]. FACEBOOK now claims the terms has been changed (however there are reasons to be very critical).

- that the general counsel of FACEBOOK, Ted Ullyot, is a former attorney of CIA, famous for neglecting privacy issues in CIA’s war against terrorism [P].

- that FACEBOOK "does not guarantee that User Content you post on the Site will not be viewed by unauthorized persons” [B].

- FACEBOOK is informed about your activities from over 40 big Internet sites that have partnered with Facebook [E].

- that a private FACEBOOK photo has ended up in a newspaper iin a article about the sex industry. Even though the woman felt offended the Danish court decided that nobody could be blamed (as the FACEBOOK privacy claims every right to sell private photos).

- That more than 100 administrators of the biggest Facebook groups have organized in a secret lodge (called SLfA).

- That the owner of FACEBOOK Mark Zuckerberg has rejected offers in the range of $975 million to hand over Facebook. If FACEBOOK is sold, all registered private information will be handed over to the new owners - probably even after you have deleted your profile. It means you have no control who will end up with your personal data.

- October 24, 2007, Facebook has agreed to sell a 1.6% stake of the company to Microsoft for $240 million. This means Microsoft, as an exclusive third-party has access to all personal FACEBOOK information [M].

- How come? Because in cyberspace private information is hard value – and all kind of private data is recorded on FACEBOOK.

- That Mark Zuckerberg, founder and owner of ca. 30% of FACEBOOK is the world's youngest billionaire (worth 1,5 billion Dollars) [N].

- that the FACEBOOK Term of Agreement is changed almost every month without informing the users about it

- that FACEBOOK is assigned to the legislation of California. The national Danish institutions have found that the FACEBOOK privacy is intimidating Danish privacy legislation (www.fs.dk).

- that after heavy public debate Mark Zuckerberg (owner) admitted that FACEBOOK receives personal information from other Internet sites without users permission (even after the user has deactivated his FACEBOOK account!) [E,F].

- that most people tell FACEBOOK their email and mail login password when they make a FACEBOOK profile. This e-mails addresses are kept by FACEBOOK (even for persons with no FACEBOOK profile).


- that quite a few criminal groups in Cyberspace have organized in Facebook. E.g. http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=31424954380

- that the Government in Iran deactivated Facebook one week before the election June 2009 to try to keep the public opinion under control.

- that adding your mobile phone number to your FACEBOOK profile increases the risk of mobile spamming

- that in the past year 1,000 applications were officially shut down by FACEBOOK administration for privacy violations. Be careful with FACEBOOK applications [K].

- that 50% of all Danes are active on FACEBOOK

- that eg. the Danish Federal Bureau of Investigation had advised people in certain positions (eg. police officers) to delete personal information on FACEBOOK. Personal information can easily be misused [J].

- that, even though FACEBOOK claims to have high security standards, two MIT students were able to download over 70,000 Facebook profiles, using an automated script [F].

- that the normal state of the laws has little effect in cyberspace. This means that if somebody starts e.g. a FACEBOOK campaign claiming that you are a paedophile, drug dealer etc. normal civil rights will usually not protect your reputation.

- that a big number of FACEBOOK profiles are professional fake. Think twice before accepting a friend request from a stranger [I].

- that people with strange sounding names (e.g. Leboe' or 'Allien') can have their FACEBOOK accounts deleted without any further explanation - although these names mean nothing in the local language.

- that Facebook removes photos uploaded by mothers breastfeeding their babies; accounts have also been deleted for this reason [F].

- that in the near future your Facebook account may hold not only all of your photos, but your movies (streamed to your HDTV), home movies, and music files. This means that cyber privacy becomes an even more important issue in the future.

- that by using FACEBOOK you are an essential part of the global cyber economy. Personal information about you is being transferred between partners you probably never heard about [F].

- that recently a number of serious viruses which attempt to infect users by promising free videos have been tracked (October 2008). Be careful and don't follow strange links [H].

- that psychologists have introduced the diagnosis FAD (Facebook Addiction Disorder) as a new kind of addiction disorder [Q].

- that professional hackers are stealing users' Facebook profiles [S]

- that everyday pictures are deleted by the FACEBOOK administration with no other reason than "violation of terms of agreement". The reasons for such censoring is never explained to the user [G].

- that you can buy up to 5.000 new FACEBOOK friends from a private firm named uSocial. The price is 7,6 Cent per friend [Y].

- Take care of strange emails wanting to know your passwords (a method called phising). A Spanish FACEBOOK group with more than half a million members has recently been stolen this way. The FACEBOOK administration refuse to get involved. The group is now used for commercial purpose.

- that by "posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise" (FACEBOOK terms of agreement)

- that many big groups (this one included) have deactivated the discussion board because of the increasing spam flow from automated scripts. So far FACEBOOK has never tried to make a kind of spam filter (e.g. like Google).

- that you are very welcome to contact the group administrators if you got any interesting information about FACEBOOK. (Only information with references are accepted).


Most information has been marked with a letter. Click on the link to see references:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=75473250419

Nigerian Opposition Worry Over President Yar'Adua's Health-VOA

Nigerian official says President Umaru Yar'Adua, known to have a chronic kidney problem, traveled to Saudi Arabia for a Muslim pilgrimage and a medical checkup. Nigeria's opposition wants the presidency to "come clean" on President Umaru Yar'Adua's health. The Nigerian leader is in Saudi Arabia for medical examinations. The main opposition Action Congress urged Nigerians to, as it put it, "pray fervently for the president's good health so he can face the tough task of governance."

The party is also seeking clarity on the state of the president's health, saying the presidency should come clean on the issue.

Mr. Yar'Adua, known to have a chronic kidney problem, traveled to Saudi Arabia Monday night for what his spokesman said was for a Muslim pilgrimage and a medical checkup.

Abuja-based political analyst, Maxi Okwu, says most Nigerians are concerned about the government's handling of the issue.

"The president of Nigeria is a public figure and all that concerns him should be in the public domain," said Okwu. "But since Umaru Yar'Adua became president they shrouded his obvious health problems in mystery. He has a health condition which he shrouded in mystery, which can only happen in a sort of caricature democracy we practice here. Some time ago, he disappeared for two weeks."

This is President Yar'Adua's third visit to the Middle East country in as many months for medical treatment, raising fears about his fitness to lead Africa's most populous nation. His supporters and the government have said Mr. Yar'Adua is in good health and fit to rule. Already, there is talk the president is likely to run for re-election in 2011. Okwu says this may not be in the best interest Nigeria.

"They should seriously advise him against going for second term in the interest of himself and in the best interest of Nigeria," added Okwu.

Before taking over from Obasanjo in 2007, Mr. Yar'Adua was a little-known governor of the northern state of Katsina. His health has been a source of constant speculation in the Nigerian media.