I.M.F and the Stimulus of Destabilization

from left; Sanusi Lamido Sanusi (Nigeria's Central Bank Governor), Christine Lagarde (M.D International Monetary Fund) and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (Nigeria's Finance Minister and co-ordinating Minister for the Economy) Look who's smiling.

by Michael .O. Dibiaezue.

Looking at unfolding events in my country Nigeria, today, I ask how it is possible for a President in full view of our collapsing security situation to go ahead and impose policies that do nothing but aggravate an already frightening situation. Surely, something has gone terribly wrong with decision making in our country. There has to be overpowering reasons for this and they are what I intend to explore through this write-up.

In 2005, the US National Intelligence Council (NIC) announced to the world that Nigeria will break up by the year 2015 if it continued on its then socio-economic path. In May 2008, the official homepage of the United States military (click here) described a war-game scenario playing out in which "The Nigerian government is near collapse and rival factions are vying for power in that troubled part of the world"" It added "The exercise centers around realistic threats to ongoing peace around the world, like the potentially negative effects of globalization, competition for energy, demographic trends, climate change and natural disasters, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the existence of failed or failing states that could be havens for terrorists." In other words, the prospects of Nigeria collapsing with rival factions vying for power are very realistic threats to our nation according to the US government.

In February 2008, Vice Admiral Moeller, in a presentation at an Africom conference held at Fort McNair, declared that protecting "the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market" i.e. the West, was one of Africom's "guiding principles" and specifically cited "oil disruption," "terrorism," and the "growing influence" of China as major "challenges" to U.S. interests in Africa. Dwelling on Moeller's statement, clearly reveals Africom's intended purpose and its relationship to war exercises such as Unified Quest 08. Not just that, it showcases America's intolerance to growing spheres of influence and competition. To lump influence and competition alongside terrorism and oil disruption is to underline the fact that America considers them an act of war which is exactly why Africom views them as challenges.

This attitude and the several programs being foisted on African nations in furtherance of these American policies have led to a very negative drain on the African economy. According to Daniel Volman of the African Security Research Project, under the Direct Commercial Sales Program (DCS), the US State Department granted licenses for the sale of police equipment (including pistols, revolvers, shotguns, rifles, and crowd control chemicals) by private U.S. companies to African governments. In the financial year of 2008, American firms were expected to deliver more than $175 million worth of this kind of hardware to Algeria through the DCS program, along with $2 million worth for Botswana, $3 million for Kenya, $19 million for Morocco, $17 million for Nigeria, and $61million for South Africa.

The question that needs to be asked is why it becomes US policy for private US companies to sell $17 million worth of crowd control chemicals and guns to Nigeria or an excess of $300 million of these equipments to select African countries whose citizens live on less than $2-$3 a day, instead of desperately needed medication and infrastructure? Leaders of these African countries will no doubt be tempted to apply these equipments to the suppression of their people and when they refuse to abide by Western dictates for whatever reasons, will be hauled before the ICC at The Hague for killing their citizens.

One will find all across Africa today, several programs put in place for the direct enrichment of the US Military/Industrial Complex. (1) The Flintlock 2005 and 2007 are Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) exercises to provide training experience for American and African troops. The Flintlock 2007 exercises involved forces from Algeria, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Burkina Faso, France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. (2) The Joint Task Force Aztec Silence (JTFAS) is charged with conducting surveillance operations using the assets of the U.S. 6th Fleet (such as the spy plane P-3 Orion) to share information, along with intelligence collected by U.S. intelligence agencies. In February 2008, the U.S. 6th Fleet conducted seven days of joint maritime exercises (known as Exercise Maritime Safari 2008) at Nigeria's Ikeja Air Force Base with the Nigerian Navy and Air Force.

There are also (3) the Trans-Saharan Counter-Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP) which links the United States with eight African countries: Mali, Chad, Niger, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria. (4) The East Africa Counter-Terrorism Initiative is a training program similar to the TSCTP, and is a multi-year program. (5) The Africa Contingency Operations Training and Assistance Program (ACOTA) has Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia participating. (6) The International Military Education and Training Program (IMET) militarizes African youths by training them in the art of war. (7) The Foreign Military Sales Program ensures the sale of US military equipment through the direct supervision of the US government which provides loans to finance these purchases by African governments. (8) The African Coastal and Border Security Program (ACBS) provides specialized equipment such as patrol vessels and vehicles, communications equipments, night vision devices and electronic monitors and sensors to African countries.

Setting aside the colossal sums of money paid by our governments in hosting and participating in these programs, Nigeria and most African countries risk laying bare all their defence and security secrets to elements that may or may not align themselves with America's goals. Modern aerial surveillance planes, like the P-3 Orion, are capable of acquiring and storing huge amounts of data, including photographs of vast swathes of land mass. Rogue elements within the US military may be persuaded, as they have been on numerous other occasions, to sell our defence and security secrets to unknown parties. It is also important to note that whereas these exercises expose virtually the whole of Africa's land mass to prying eyes, the same cannot be said for those Western nations that share in the exercises.

These exercises and programs can best be described as a platform for advertising and marketing American military hardware and crowd control equipments, a market place if you like, which in turn result in the wasteful drain on the Nigerian and African economies. To be sure, there is no point to training people and conducting exercises if the equipments they are trained to use are unavailable to them. Another thought is these exercises provide the pretext for mapping out terrain and for participating foreign nations to test their new ships and weapons with a view to assessing their adaptability and performance on the African continent. The only ingredients missing for persuading African leaders to buy military hardware and crowd control chemicals are the destabilizing stimuli of war, social unrest and conflict. These stimuli can occur as a result of foreign interference or the imposition of unbearable living conditions.

The Niger Delta resistance and the Boko Haram insurgency are clear examples of these destabilizing stimuli at work. No matter the reasons for their occurrence, fact is that government by virtue of these uprisings will be seriously inclined and persuaded to invest in materials and equipments that help quell them. Needless to say, these kinds of purchases are a drain on any economy seeing that they do not add positive growth to a people's economic quest.

On December 2011, another kind of destabilizing stimulus was put to play in Nigeria. The Managing Director of the IMF, Christine Lagarde arrived Nigeria to meet with President Jonathan. Her primary mission was to order him to get rid of fuel subsidy. The issue here was not the unbearable conditions this directive imposed on Nigerians but the freeing up of funds to more quickly enable us service our debt to her organization. The dictates of IMF's conditionality ordered funds accruing from the removal of subsidy and elsewhere to be placed with a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) and invested in Western markets, the implication being that such funds were unworthy of investment in the Nigerian economy.

Bearing this in mind and noting well that such SWF belonging to the Libyan people was confiscated not too long ago by Western powers, it becomes unrealistic to expect that our SWF, a condition put in place by the IMF, would be applied to lifting the socio-economic yoke of the Nigerian people whereas our debts remained unpaid and I.M.F cash-strapped. My educated guess is that the promises of the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment programme (SURE) will never materialize for want of funds elsewhere applied.

Finally, we come to the issue of subsidy itself. It is a misnomer for government to brand what is by all practical definitions a petroleum tax as subsidy. Essentially, the pump price of fuel at our filling stations, when refined locally, is determined by the sum of a series of costs. They are exploration, development, operation, refining, distribution and marketing costs. Figures available for 2005 and at that year's exchange rate of 130 Naira (N) to the dollar, show that exploration costs came to $.025 per barrel or N.02 per litre, development cost $4 per barrel or N3.27 per litre, operation costs $7.05 per barrel or N5.74 per litre, refining costs $21 per barrel or N17.17 per litre, distribution costs were N2.45 per litre, marketing costs N5.87 per litre bringing total costs for the pump price of a litre of fuel in Nigeria to 24 cents or N31.50 per litre. With pump prices at N65, it means government makes a profit of N33.50 on every litre of fuel sold at the pumps i.e. a profit in excess of 100%.

As long as crude remains extractable from our soil not much will happen to change these 2005 projections, aside from distribution costs. Government's inability to fix existing refineries (which enabled production and delivery costs of a litre of fuel to reach our pumps at 24 cents or N31.50) has now allowed for the kind of fraud we see today in the fuel importation business and has culminated in the emergence of a cabal that hold both government and citizens hostage. This situation is what has made removal of "subsidy' mentionable and has led to the intolerable position Nigerians find themselves today. So, even here, we also see that government's decision to obey Lagarde and remove subsidy amounts to the application of a destabilizing stimulus.

That fuel subsidy could be so arrogantly removed on New Year day without feeling or recourse to Nigerians or their representatives at the National Assembly, speaks of the fear our leaders harbor for International bankers and the degree of control these bankers exert on our lives through their influencing of government's policies. It is in fact, a showing of how sovereign nations are targeted and ripped opened by the lecherous fingers of international financial institutions .

Having said this much, we need to now look at the bigger picture. What we have is the Ambassador to US (a foreign power to which our government has thrown open our borders and country; one that has not come bearing gifts but to educate us on how to kill ourselves [Africans] and present us with the means to get it done at economy-wrecking prices) campaigning and pledging support for the removal of subsidy. Standing shoulder to shoulder with the US, is the I.M.F that has ordered our government to impose conditions which will result in untold hardship to the masses of my country. In other words, our government is being ordered to abdicate its primary responsibility to the people and trash its very reason for being.

It does not take an Einstein to figure what the outcome will be and that result clearly manifests today in the social upheaval that rages. I find it curious that the US government should scare and startle Nigeria with its break-up prediction and turn around to hold war game exercises with it, as the catalysis (i.e. the I.M.F's directive on fuel subsidy removal) to accelerate and bring about such prediction are activated. Observing that the US is I.M.F's foremost patron and financier, it would not be stretching the imagination to think that these actions were premeditated. Considering all this therefore, would it not be true to say that the U.S, Christine Lagarde and the IMF, by their support and directive on the removal of fuel subsidy, have instigated the protests, riots and strikes sweeping across Nigeria today?

There is not a shadow of doubt in my mind that these unfolding events have been brought about by the interference of foreign entities (aided by their agents in government) in the affairs of another sovereign state and that they had been carefully planned for one end; the destabilization or break-up of my country. If President Jonathan abandons us to carry out the instructions passed to him, he will be given the tools and equipments with which to fight us on the streets by this same foreign power while funds will be provided for their purchase by the same shylock financial institution that wish us all dead. If he does not, more destabilizing stimuli will be applied to bend his will. This may come in the form of our being blacklisted and isolated. Sanctions may also be applied in various forms to make us croak and surely, a bad name will be given to that dog.

What Jonathan must do is to look inwards. He must get himself a good pair of scissor and set to work trimming the unsustainable size of government. He must also go to the National Assembly and cut their coat to size. He must let the political class know the party is over. The subsidies of security votes, inflated contracts and ghost workers must go. The subsidy on corruption and unaccountability must also go. Our refineries must be brought back to life and more built. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) must be seriously diminished and overhauled. Our manufacturing sector must be rehabilitated and tools for effective production put in place, the power sector would be a good place to start.

Government must be made to do some work and now would seem a pretty good time to start. War games and exercises coupled to the purchase of oppressive instruments for use on the citizens of my country will only disenfranchise him politically and out him as a dictator. To conclude, one final question for Christine Lagarde. How would the French react if the price of fuel were to more than double on New Year day? Would Nicholas Sarkozy still be sitting pretty on his political throne?

A letter from Ayo Obe; Re: The Fuel Subsidy Removal Protests for Dummies

Dear Friends both near and far,

E ku subsidi o! Lagos and other cities remain at a standstill on Day 3 of the nationwide strike.

I hope everybody been able to see this piece which captures a lot of the issues on this matter: you can find it by clicking on this link http://www.naijablog.co.uk/2012/01/fuel-subsidy-removal-protests-for.html

Apart from the bit about the generator - I've withdrawn from that particular vicious cycle of fuel, service, repair, service, fuel, repair - and my limited hustling skills, I recognised my life in that third paragraph! I'm also sending it around because of this propaganda by the FGN that those protesting are being teleguided by the CPC. Granted, Pastor Bakare used intemperate language in raining death curses on President Jonathan (quite uncalled for) but as the writer of Fuel Subsidy Removal Protests for Dummies says: "Would it be acceptable to citizens of affluent countries that the price of petrol doubles overnight without any warning?" Would they need to be teleguided to rise up in protest? The reality is that Labour and the political parties, including CPC, are behind the curve on this matter!

Here is the content, and if you make it to the end of the piece, a link to my regular Wednesday column, though I also wrote about this last Wednesday.

"Monday, January 09, 2012
The Fuel Subsidy Removal Protests for Dummies
On the first day of the indefinite general strike organised by a coalition between two of the largest unions in Nigeria – the TUC and the NLC – and a cluster of smaller unions and social media-based activists and organisations, some external observers have expressed surprise at the intensity of resistance the “Occupy Nigeria” campaign has mounted against the removal of the fuel subsidy on January 1st and the size of the mass demonstrations taking place. From an outside perspective, it might seem like a dust-devil has been whipped up without why in the desert. In case there’s still any confusion, allow me to explain why there is so much anger and resistance.

The answer begins with a question: would it be acceptable to citizens of affluent countries that the price of petrol doubles overnight without any warning? Perhaps Jeffrey Sachs would be alone in his view, or perhaps he only prescribes a certain type of medicine for African countries. Perhaps the view from Sachs' brain is that Africans can get by on generic drugs long past their sell-by date.

Aside from Sachs' development fantasies, the lived reality of citizens of the Nigerian state is that it provides little or no security, no infrastructure, no education and no employment opportunities (apart from mostly McJobs in the civil service). Everywhere in Nigeria, the basic elements of civilised existence have to be taken care of house-by-house, compound-by-compound. You must sink your own borehole for water, buy, install and fuel a generator for power, hire security guards to keep the wolves from the door, pay school fees to ensure your kids get a half-decent education because the public school system is in perpetual meltdown. And to earn enough money to get through the day, you must hustle.

The breakdown of a standard tax and political representation based social contract between citizens and the state in Nigeria is almost entirely a result of the past few decades of the so-called ‘resource curse’. Earning billions of dollars each year from crude exports, the Nigerian government has no need to rely on tax from individuals or local companies; tax and royalty payments from the international oil companies (as well as historically, loans from international financial institutions) have been sufficient to fund the annual budget at all levels of government. For the past few decades, cheap fuel has therefore been the only form of social contract between ordinary Nigerians and the state and the principle lever to control inflation during times of rising oil prices. With most Nigerians subsisting on US$2 or less, subsidised fuel has also been a survival mechanism, making life only just bearable.

It was therefore highly surprising to Nigerians to find out that the fuel subsidy had been removed on January 1st and that the price regulating body under the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) – the PPPRA – had more than doubled the price of petrol overnight. No one had been given warning. The expectation was that the subsidy would be removed at the earliest in April. The strong suspicion is that following on from Christine Lagarde’s visit to Nigeria in late December, the government had accelerated its plans. From the views of key government figures, it’s easy to see how Nigeria acceded to IMF pressure with little or no resistance. The Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has repeatedly stated that removing the fuel subsidy would only hurt the affluent car-owning population, forgetting how central the price of fuel is to almost every basic aspect of life here. Meanwhile, the Governor of the Central Bank, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, has stated that removal of the subsidy would only have a short-term inflationary effect. With opinions like this, the IMF was walking into an open door.

Given the state of the global economy, it is little surprise that the IMF is in favour of insisting on reducing debt wherever it can. However, the IMF also appears to be suffering from institutional amnesia; what is happening in Nigeria is in some respects a re-run of the Structural Adjustment Programme in the 1980s, and President Ibrahim Babangida’s short-term attempts to resist austerity measures. As we will recall, “IBB” ended up creating his own austerity package, which was more severe than that proposed by the IMF. The Nigerian economy quickly tanked, resulting in mass suffering among Nigerians. Fundamentalist strains of evangelical Christianity mushroomed forth from the barren earth. Unlike the World Bank, which is increasingly taking political-economy factors seriously in its analysis and its programmes, even today the IMF and its high-priesthood consultants views the world from the numerical altar of macro-economics. The technocratic nature of the IMF means that the organisation is in fact programmed to forget the past.
During the recent fuel subsidy debate on local Nigerian TV station Channels, Mrs Okonjo-Iweala was keen to state what she referred to as ‘facts’. At no point has anyone in the executive effectively challenged former Petroleum Minister Tam David-West’s querying of whether there is a subsidy in the first place, or whether the landing cost of imported fuel has been artificially padded. Given the findings ofthe recent KPMG report into the NNPC, it seems that facts about the oil sector in Nigeria are thin on the ground.
The defence offered by the Finance Minister during that same debate is that the savings from removal of the subsidy would be spent on a palliative capital-spending programme – the Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment Programme (SURE). Nigerians have raised a number of critical objections to this proposal and the timing of subsidy removal.

Firstly, given the glut of money in state coffers in the past few years and the lack of any successful infrastructural development (for instance in power and transport), there is little guarantee that the SURE programme would be implemented or successful, rather than go the way of all initiatives in the past. The government of Nigeria has not been able to significantly raise the amount of power generated, nor has it been able to achieve the low-tech objective of revamping the dilapidated railway network, still less has it been able to improve standards in public education and healthcare. What then would be different about the SURE programme?

Secondly, while most Nigerians are probably not ideologically opposed to subsidy removal (and targeting the corrupt ‘cabal’ of fuel importers who benefit from the subsidy), they are utterly opposed to the timing, given the insecurity in the land raised by Islamic militancy in the North and the potential for renewed militancy in response in the Niger Delta. A phased subsidy withdrawal, as has happened elsewhere, would have been the preferred approach.

Thirdly, the idea that removing the subsidy equates to ‘deregulation’ and the equivalent private sector boom as witnessed in the past decade in the telecoms sector is highly suspect to most. For the downstream oil sector to be deregulated, there has to be new legislation in place. The Petroleum Industry Bill, which separates the functions of a national oil company, regulation and policy-making, would need to become law. We have been waiting since the previous minister of petroleum for the PIB to be passed. At present, the NNPC is the epicentre of corruption in the oil sector in Nigeria, and has to broken up into its constituent parts for the private sector to be given space to grow its role. In addition, Nigerians would want to see a much higher percentage of crude oil refined locally, rather than the current reliance on imported fuel, to ensure a favourable local pricing policy that does not depend on state subsidy. Without any of these key deregulatory building blocks in place, removal of the ‘subsidy’ now is simply terrible timing and does not inspire confidence among a people who long ago lost their faith in government.

Finally, if savings are urgently required from the annual government budget, most Nigerians would argue that the first place to cut costs is that of the price of running government itself. As the Governor of the Central Bank pointed out last year, the National Assembly consumes 25% of the Federal overheads budget; the cost of running the President’s office has been widely publicised in recent weeks (including a billion naira food bill). It is rare to see a member of the executive - down to director-generals of government agencies most Nigerians have never heard of - travelling without a sizeable convoy of expensive cars. Nigerian government delegations to international conferences and gatherings are often by far the largest, with a supersized retinue of special advisors, assistants and staff for the first-wife in attendance, there to collect their allowance and have access to shopping opportunities overseas.

As it is, most Nigerians are poor, and will simply not be able to survive with any comfort on US$2 a day and a doubling of living costs. That the government of Nigeria didn’t foresee the massive level of resistance happening today is quite bewildering. It shows a complete disconnect and disregard for Nigerians. However, where there is the greatest danger, there is greatest hope. Nigerians have never been so united in years – last week, in the unofficially renamed Liberation Square in Kano, Christians guarded the space as their Muslim co-protestors prayed. In return, last Sunday, Muslims guarded Churches as others prayed inside.

What we are witnessing with Occupy Nigeria is a generational transfer, as young, social-media enabled activists gradually take over the baton from unionist stalwarts. Nigeria's young population is increasingly letting go of the deferential attitude of their parents generation. In the south at least, young Nigerians are beginning to ask questions of the religious leadership that has been complicit with the status-quo. At long last, there is accountability pressure building up in the system.

In the short term, following on from the next few days of protest and shut-down, it’s hard to imagine anything other than a policy reversal, and a planned withdrawal being announced, in step with a clear programme of projects that must be delivered before any further withdrawal of subsidy is implemented (citizens monitoring a re-drafted SURE programme for instance). Even at this very late stage, President Goodluck could become a hero of the process. Come what may, underlying events this week a deeper shift is at work: a new generation of Nigerians well versed in events to the north in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya is demanding that the terms of the social contract in Nigeria are re-written, in favour of increased accountability in political leadership."

For those who haven't seen it, here is my Wednesday column: http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=73440:obethe-kids-are-alright&catid=38:columnists&Itemid=615

All the best,
Ayo

About Ayo Obe

Nigeria; AFRICOM'S next Libya?

Nigeria; AFRICOM'S next Libya?

On a recent trip to West Africa, the newly appointed managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde ordered the governments of Nigeria, Guinea, Cameroon, Ghana and Chad to relinquish vital fuel subsidies.

Much to the dismay of the population of these nations, the prices of fuel and transport have near tripled over night without notice, causing widespread violence on the streets of the Nigerian capital of Abuja and its economic center, Lagos.

Much like the IMF induced riots in Indonesia during the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, public discontent in Nigeria is channelled towards an incompetent and self-serving domestic elite, compliant to the interests of fraudulent foreign institutions.

Although Nigeria holds the most proven oil reserves in Africa behind Libya, it’s people are now expected to pay a fee closer to what the average American pays for the cost of fuel, an exorbitant sum in contrast to its regional neighbours. Alternatively, other oil producing nations such as Venezuela, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia offer their populations fuel for as little as $0.12 USD per gallon.

While Lagos has one of Africa’s highest concentration of billionaires, the vast majority of the population struggle daily on less than $2.00 USD. Amid a staggering 47% youth unemployment rate and thousands of annual deaths related to preventable diseases, the IMF has pulled the rug out from under a nation where safe drinking water is a luxury to around 80% of it’s populace.

Although Nigeria produces 2.4 million barrels of crude oil a day intended for export use, the country struggles with generating sufficient electrical power and maintaining its infrastructure. Ironically enough, less than 6% of bank depositors own 88% of all bank deposits in Nigeria. Goldman Sachs employees line its domestic government, in addition to the former Vice President of the World Bank, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who is widely considered by many to be the de facto Prime Minister.

Even after decades of producing lucrative oil exports, Nigeria has failed to maintain it’s own refineries, forcing it to illogically purchase oil imports from other nations. Society at large has not benefited from Nigeria’s natural riches, so it comes as no surprise that a severe level of distrust is held towards the government, who claims the fuel subsidy needs to be lifted in order to divert funds towards improving the quality of life within the country.

Like so many other nations, Nigerian people have suffered from a systematically reduced living standard after being subjected to the IMF’s Structural Adjustment Policies (SAP). Before a loan can be taken from the World Bank or IMF, a country must first follow strict economic policies, which include currency devaluation, lifting of trade tariffs, the removal of subsidies and detrimental budget cuts to critical public sector health and education services.

SAPs encourage borrower countries to focus on the production and export of domestic commodities and resources to increase foreign exchange, which can often be subject to dramatic fluctuations in value. Without the protection of price controls and an authentic currency rate, extreme inflation and poverty subsist to the point of civil unrest, as seen in a wide array of countries around the world (usually in former colonial protectorates).

The people of Nigeria have been one of the world’s most vocal against IMF-induced austerity measures, student protests have been met with heavy handed repression since 1986 and several times since then, resulting in hundreds of civilian deaths. As a testament to the success of the loan, the average laborer in Nigeria earned 35% more in the 1970’s than he does in 2012.

Working through the direct representation of Western Financial Institutions and the IMF in Nigeria’s Government, a new IMF conditionality calls for the creation of a Sovereign Wealth Fund. Olusegun Aganga, the former Nigerian Minister of Finance (and ex-Goldman Sachs employee-who ran Goldman Sachs' hedge fund consulting services in London) commented on how the SWF was hastily pushed through and enacted prior to the countries national elections.

If huge savings are amassed from oil exports and austerity measures, one cannot realistically expect that these funds will be invested towards infrastructure development based on the current track record of the Nigerian Government. Further more, it is increasingly more likely that any proceeds from a SWF would be beneficial to Western institutions and markets, which initially demanded its creation.

Nigerian philanthropist, Bukar Usman, prophetically writes “I have genuine fears that the SWF would serve us no better than other foreign-recommended “remedies” which we had implemented to our own detriment in the past or are being pushed to implement today.”

The abrupt simultaneous removal of fuel subsidies in several West African nations is a clear indication of who is really in charge of things in post-colonial Africa. The timing of its cushion-less implementation could not be any worse, Nigeria’s president Goodluck Jonathan recently declared a state of emergency after forty people were killed in a church bombing on Christmas day, an act allegedly committed by the Islamist separatist group, Boko Haram.

The group advocates dividing the predominately Muslim northern states from the Christian southern states, a similar predicament to the recent division of Sudan.

As the United States African Command (AFRICOM) begins to gain a foothold into the continent, with its troops officially present in Eritrea and Uganda, in an effort to maintain security and remove other theocratic religious groups such as the Lord’s Resistance Army, the sectarian violence in Nigeria provides a convenient pretext for military intervention in the continuing resource war.

For further insight into this theory, it is interesting to note that United States Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania conducted a series of African war game scenarios in preparation for the Pentagon’s expansion of AFRICOM under the Obama Administration.

In the presence of US State Department Officials, employees from The Rand Corporation and Israeli military personnel, a military exercise was undertaken which tested how AFRICOM would respond to a disintegrating Nigeria on the verge of collapse amidst civil war. The scenario envisioned rebel factions vying for control of the Niger Delta oil fields (the source of one of America’s top oil imports), which would potentially be secured by some 20,000 U.S. troops if a US-friendly coup failed to take place.

At a press conference at the House Armed Services Committee on March 13, 2008, AFRICOM Commander, General William Ward then went on to brazenly state the priority issue of America’s growing dependence on African oil would be furthered by AFRICOM operating under the principle theatre-goal of “combating terrorism”.

At an AFRICOM Conference held at Fort McNair on February 18, 2008, Vice Admiral Robert T. Moeller openly declared the guiding principle of AFRICOM is to protect “the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market”, before citing China’s increasing presence in the region as challenging to American interests.

After the unwarranted snatch-and-grab regime change conducted in Libya, nurturing economic destabilization, civil unrest and sectarian conflict in Nigeria is an ultimately tangible effort to secure Africa’s second largest oil reserves. During the pillage of Libya, its SFW accounts worth over 1.2 billion USD were frozen and essentially absorbed by Franco-Anglo-American powers; it would be realistic to assume that much the same would occur if Nigeria failed to comply with Western interests. While agents of foreign capital have already infiltrated its government, there is little doubt that Nigeria will become a new front in the War on Terror.

World War 3 has begun

World War 3 has begun

The Pentagon has already declared World War III and President Barack Obama and the Congress never even carried out their constitutional duties to approve the use of American military power for war.

One might reasonably conclude that the United States has outsourced war. Presently, World War III is being conducted on two continents – Asia and Africa – with two others – Europe and South America – looming on the horizon. Today, wars are crafted by the upper one percent of wealthy elitists who, using non-governmental organizations, television networks, non — profit “think tanks,” and public relations firms, can declare war on nations without a whimper from elected public officials.

Symmetric warfare is no longer an option for the global elites. World Wars I and II severely affected the investments of many of the global elite families as a result of the destruction of cities, factories, railways, seaports, and other infrastructures. The Korean, Vietnam, the Arab-Israeli, and Iraq wars were messy affairs that also adversely affected markets and destroyed valuable infrastructures. The Cold War never developed into a hot nuclear war because of the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD), which ensured that a nuclear first strike by either the West or the East would result in total annihilation of both sides, along with the rest of the world. Even a western military attack on China would have had disastrous results for the attackers, especially since China could retaliate with a nuclear counter-attack and wipe out the U.S. Seventh Fleet and its East Asian naval bases, including Okinawa and Guam. A new type of warfare was required by the elites: asymmetric warfare – the use of unconventional warfare tactics, including information warfare, by proxies, non-state actors, agents provocateur, and fifth columns.

Largely financed by hedge fund mega-tycoon George Soros and his Central Intelligence Agency interlocutors, our present asymmetric World War III was field tested just like any new product. The “themed” revolutions were market-tested first in Serbia, and then in Ukraine, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan, to oust problematic governments that did not want to get on board with the dictates of the unelected and unaccountable real controllers of the financial and political destiny of the world.

Pro-western and pro-European Union governments, comprised of a number of individuals who were funded by Soros and other non-state operations established by the global elites, for example, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Bilderberg Group, the Trilateral Commission, Freedom House, U.S. Institute of Peace, and others funded and supported by the Houses of Rothschild, Rockefeller, Mellon, and others saw to it that new governments took root in Belgrade, Kiev, Tbilisi, and Bishkek. These new governments were not elected but took power as a result of themed street rebellions, a new manifestation of unconventional warfare.

No longer did armies, navies, and air forces have to face each other across battlefields and battle zones and theaters of warfare. One merely had to embed fifth columnists and provocateurs inside a targeted nation’s capital city, media, political party apparatus, and “civil society” infrastructure to bring about the defeat of the government outside the normal political process and replace it with a new government beholden to the desires of the central banks and global oligarchs.

The beginnings of the asymmetric world war began in Belgrade, Serbia when Otpor – a Serbian resistance movement dedicated to overthrowing the Slobodon Milosevic regime – launched the first “themed revolution.” Otpor’s symbol was a clenched fist, an emblem that would reappear in the future in other capital cities from Kiev to Cairo. Otpor received massive funding from a network of western contrivances, including George Soros’s Open Society Institute, the neo-conservative-infiltrated U.S. National Endowment for Democracy, and various European Union-funded NGOs that were intimately linked to Soros’s “democracy engineering” operations.

The playbook used for Otpor in Serbia and by similar organizations in toppling the governments of Georgia in the Rose Revolution, Ukraine in the Orange Revolution, and Kyrgyzstan in the Tulip Revolution, was developed by University of Massachusetts professor Gene Sharp, the founder of the Boston-based NGO, the Albert Einstein Institute, which helped train Otpor activists in civil disobedience and popular resistance campaigns designed to overthrow governments, those democratically-elected and those not. Albert Einstein Institute-trained provocateurs launched popular resistance campaigns around the world aimed at replacing governments unwilling to acquiesce to the dictates of Western elites. Internal opposition forces, all acolytes of Sharp, for instance Kmara, which helped install the pro-Western and pro-Israeli Mikheil Saakashvili in Georgia; Pora in Ukraine that propelled pro-NATO Viktor Yushchenko into the presidency; and KelKel in Kyrgyzstan that replaced Askar Akayev with the corrupt Kurmanbek Bakiyev.

The domino effect of the themed revolutions saw Serbs helping to overthrow the Georgian government, then Serbs and Georgians flocking to Kiev to oust the Ukrainian government, and Georgians and Ukrainians being directly involved in the insurrection in Bishkek. The neo-conservatives and Sharp had borrowed a page from the Communists and the international proletarian movement that saw Communist cadres fight against capitalists and fascists in foreign civil wars, for example, the Spanish Civil War and conflicts in Africa and Southeast Asia.

Sharp was an alumnus of Harvard University’s CIA-linked Center for International Affairs, also abbreviated “CIA,” which is not coincidental. Harvard and the CIA of Langley, Virginia have long maintained a close relationship. In fact, Sharp was never interested in ensuring the will of the people to map out their own future but was putting into practice the theory of asymmetric warfare – the vanquishing of enemies through the use of proxy internal forces without the requirement for invading foreign armies and the massive death and destruction associated with such action.

Many of Sharp’s tactics have been seen in practice in many asymmetric warfare targets. These include the creation of a perception of a successful movement, even if there is not one. The use of western-controlled news networks like Fox News that showed a video clip of anti-austerity Greek rioters in Athens falsely depicted as anti-government protesters in Moscow and Al Jazeera’s use of a video erroneously showing a U.S.- and Saudi-backed bloody crackdown of pro-democracy protesters by Bahrain’s security forces as the bloody repression of protesters by Syria’s government are examples of Sharp’s propaganda and disinformation tactics.

Cultivating foreign support is another key element of Sharp’s asymmetric warfare tactics. The virtual control exercised by Soros over Human Rights Watch after the multi-billionaire hedge fund kingpin donated $100 million to the group is a case in point. The human rights NGO was at the forefront of hyping “atrocities” committed by the Qaddafi regime in Libya but remained largely silent on Libyan rebel atrocities committed against Libyan and African blacks, as well as Qaddafi loyalists. In so doing, Human Rights Watch had a powerful accomplice in the International Criminal Court, which tended to look the other way when CIA- and Saudi- and Qatari’ supported Libyan rebels were committing the massacres.

Another Sharp tactic is to seek change outside the electoral system. This tactic was evident in the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine, where election results were rejected, and in the recent Russian parliamentary election, where Soros- and U.S. neocon-financed election monitoring groups like Golos rejected the outcome of the election and used shills like former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to call for the nullification of the election. Interference following the Sharp and Soros methodology can also be seen in the presidential candidacies of Russian oligarch and New Jersey Nets basketball owner Mikhail Prokhorov and the backing by western propaganda outlets like the Christian Science Monitor (now derided as the “Christian Zionist Monitor” after its takeover by interests who favor a neo-imperialist U.S. foreign policy) of Moscow street protest veteran Alexei Navalny.

Sharp and Soros are on the same page in calling for the internal opposition forces’ use of the Internet, fax, and social networks like Facebook and Twitter to advance their agendas.

In the next phases of World War III, the asymmetric warriors of the Pentagon and their adjunct non-state actors will continue to turn up the heat in the Arab World, with the revolutions in Libya, Syria, Tunisia, Yemen, and Egypt, after a somewhat shaky start that saw the advancement of Islamist groups, being brought under more western and NATO control. Russia’s presidential election and a turndown in the Chinese economy, with growing village-based dissent among China’s growing middle class, will present further opportunities for the promoters of World War III. The sudden death of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Il has also resulted in a call for an expansion of social networking operations, most notably by the CIA- and Soros-infested Washington Post, inside Asia’s hermit kingdom.

Myanmar, China’s restive provinces of Tibet and East Turkestan, Lebanon, Iran, Algeria, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Nepal, Belarus, Ecuador, Bolivia, Pakistan, Laos, and the two Congos also present opportunities for the World War III architects. Those who seek to extend American and global elitist control over the entire planet will not rest until every acre of land comes under the firm control of the oligarchs of Wall Street, the spymasters of the CIA, and the globalist business cartels and families.

Frustrated Nigerian Announces Own Suicide on Facebook... then takes life.

Frustrated Nigerian Announces Own Suicide on Facebook... then takes life

His last posting on FB reads:

My xmas gift 2 u all is d news of my death. By d time u are reading this story i should ve being dead somewhere. Pple say i should get a job, save b4 achieving my enterpreneural dream. How do get a good job i can save from without my B sc result dat delsu has wickedly refused 2 issue me. I ve had failure in all aspect of life. I invested 10yrs for a Bsc yet Umukoro, Oboreh n Odirin ate it up. Any biz i run always fail usually due 2 DUEX EX MACHINE. Some say i need deliverance cos day say am cursed. Last month getting married was aborted though am an expecting father. I hate God 4 allowing d demons 2 continuously destroying my hardwork. @ this point i want 2 appreciate some pple. Mudiaga my elder bro, Pawon & Nehi my only true friends 4 always understanding me. Lastly my Unborn child ( omoovie ). Please show my unborn child Omoovie when born in 2012 some love, kindness n favour in anyway u can. I took the best decision cos i don't want to see my child suffer 4 me not 2 b tempted 2 take other persons' life. Did u say am a coward? 9ja, what a pple dwelling there. What are u doing 2 help that person that is stil alive?

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?...509589&sk=wall

Daino Ovie-Richy died on Christmas day, 2011. He was from East Ethiope in Delta State and was a 2009 graduate of Business Administration from Delta State University, Abraka. He was 30 years old and an expecting father. May his young soul find solace in God's place.

A Letter from Nigeria's children to its President

A Letter from Nigeria's children to its President

Child killed by a bomb at a Catholic church in Madalla, Niger state, Nigeria.

Dear Mr. President: We should say Merry Christmas but we are not your goverment, we are not in the business of deception. After almost ten hours of gathering your thoughts to speak on the bomb blasts that rocked the nation yesterday, you still fell short of your own very low standards.

What did you intend to say when you said Bomb Blasts are a burden we must live with? Why do you bother to budget over a trillion for security if we must live the burden of insecurity? How come you are still a president? We do not blame you, we blame our older ones who were stupid enough to think that where you come from and your religion was all you needed to be a competent president.

They are crying now. We all cried yesterday on the darkest Christmas day of our short lives.

While we cried and left Christmas postponed for another year, we watched as you danced your life away like there was no tomorrow. Is it true that all you care about is the fact that you are the president so whatever can happen should happen. Last night we prayed for you. We prayed that the white men should be able to make common sense so that we can budget for it and then you will have it in abundance. As it is, it is obvious sir that you are grossly lacking in common sense.

If you weren’t, you would never come out to tell a mourning nation that it should get ready to live with the burden of destruction and insecurity. That was utterly insensitive and even the dumbest of our mates, fellow Nigerian children would never descend that low to an unprecedented level of cluelessness.

>Nigeria's grinning President and his Vice amidst his Christmas greeting splatter

We understand this is not a sane country, if this was a sane country, your ilk will not be in a job. Your security chiefs, yourself and your cabinet would have been throwing resignation letters left right and centre. But then, here is a place where people are satisfied with just being in positions, that they are clueless about what to do in such positions does not matter.

Mr. President, Boko Haram defeated you in 2011. What plans are you making for 2012? Do you realise they have since improved while your security tactics remain stop and search? Do you realise they are far more coordinated than ever before? Have you thought of engaging more intelligence in curbing this menace instead of just mere brute? Yes, you have issues with concentrating for long, why not budget for a concentrator? That way you are conditioned to at least focus on being the president of Nigeria instead of our national chief chef? You are wondering where that came from? It came from cassava bread sir. You chose the menu for 2012 but we hope you realise that Boko Haram certainly has a menu.

Please Mr. President, they will look to attack again in the New Year, do what you have never done before, get your security chiefs to prevent that by all means. Contrary to your assertion, we are not prepared to live with the burden of bomb blasts. Get yourself to work and stop excusing your inability to deal with Boko Haram on the premise that they are a necessity. What is that? If you cannot lead and be a president, help yourself and resign. Please take your vice-president along. You are a twin set of incompetence.

This letter has been written with kind words, not because we are in the mood to be nice to you but because we are children and respect is a value we want to live with but our lack of it sometimes is a burden you must live with as long as you force us to live with your Boko Haram burden.

We wrote you a letter on subsidy yesterday but we figured it would be better to send this before you get our other letter. As long as your cluelessness reigns supreme in this country, we will always remind you of our angst and stake in this nation. It is not by force to live in Aso Rock. So if you must, do the right things, say the right things and learn to get the basic things right.

The Bomb Blasts darkened our Christmas but your response dampened our mood even further. This is not the way to lead a people. If you need help, we will nominate one of us to offer you words of wisdom for free. As it is, you look overwhelmed by the mere job of providing security for Nigeria let alone the other duties you swore to carry out for Nigeria.

Action point: Sack yourself sir, and take Arc. Namadi Sambo along. It is a good place to start.

Signed:
Association of Conscious Nigerian Children (ACNC)

Culled from Sahara Reporters

An Addendum: I was lucky to read up some interesting stuff at Aangirfan's site that threw more light on the goings-on in my country Nigeria. It is also amazing to learn from Aangirfan, that in countries such as Indonesia, millions of Muslims are protecting Christians and churches there. It would appear from all of this, that there is a pattern emerging in which Christians and churches are being targeted and destroyed world-wide. It is exceptionally reassuring that Indonesia provides us all with an example of what to do in situations such as my country today finds itself. It shouldn't only be Muslims protecting churches but Christians protecting mosques too, there is a good dose of those ever willing to commit these kinds of mayhem to be found in both religions. I am linking these stories up here for your continued reading as I find them most enlightening and worth reading.

SPOOKS BOMB CHURCHES AT CHRISTMAS

MOSLEMS PROTECTING CHRISTIANS AT CHRISTMAS

Much love...

Much love...

Much love to all our treasured readers this festive season with our very best wishes for a prosperous and hate-free New Year.

When Financial Armageddon comes knocking

When Financial Armageddon comes knocking

The writing is on the wall. If you can’t read it, then you’re going to have a problem – very soon. It was in early 2009 that we first warned our readers of the coming wave of riots and social unrest that would envelop the globe. Nearly three years on we’re seeing a progressive increase in tension among those affected by deteriorating economic conditions and the trend towards social unrest seems to be accelerating. Absolutely nothing has been resolved in terms of the economic and financial woes facing the world, despite the literally trillions of dollars of wealth in the form of credit and monetary easing that has been committed to the crisis.

As the economic paradigm shifts and hundreds of millions of citizens from the world’s advanced economies are thrown into poverty (including 100 million from the U.S. alone), the situation is getting critical. So much so that what once existed only in the realm of conspiracy theory and alternative news web sites – that governments, especially in the U.S., are planning for large-scale economic meltdown and social unrest – is now a foregone conclusion in political circles.

Europe, as we discussed in 2009, is now coming unhinged and we have the real possibility of not just a collapse in the sovereign debt of a single nation, but the entire European Union and their beloved currency. This is not just some far-out possibility. The collapse of Europe now seems more likely than ever, and governments and regulatory agencies all over the continent are calling for immediate preparations, planning and strategies to deal with the imminent collapse of sovereign debt of individual countries, European banks, and the Euro monetary system that is the glue holding it all together.

“It’s in our interests that they keep playing for time because that gives us more time to prepare,” the minister told the Daily Telegraph.

Recent Foreign and Commonwealth Office instructions to embassies and consulates request contingency planning for extreme scenarios including rioting and social unrest.

Greece has seen several outbreaks of civil disorder as its government struggles with its huge debts. British officials think similar scenes cannot be ruled out in other nations if the euro collapses.

Diplomats have also been told to prepare to help tens of thousands of British citizens in eurozone countries with the consequences of a financial collapse that would leave them unable to access bank accounts or even withdraw cash.

…

The EU treaties that created the euro and set its membership rules contain no provision for members to leave, meaning any break-up would be disorderly and potentially chaotic.

If eurozone governments defaulted on their debts, the European banks that hold many of their bonds would risk collapse.

Some analysts say the shock waves of such an event would risk the collapse of the entire financial system, leaving banks unable to return money to retail depositors and destroying companies dependent on bank credit.

The Financial Services Authority this week issued a public warning to British banks to bolster their contingency plans for the break-up of the single currency.

Some economists believe that at worst, the outright collapse of the euro could reduce GDP in its member-states by up to half and trigger mass unemployment.

…

“When the unemployment consequences are factored in, it is virtually impossible to consider a break-up scenario without some serious social consequences,” UBS said.

Source: Telegraph

Underestimate this events at your peril. Similar events played out in Europe in the early 1930′s, and we experienced a decade’s long depression here in the United States, followed by five years of world war – and that’s when we were a creditor nation without hundreds of trillions in debt and liabilities.

The collapse of Europe, as we have argued for several years, is imminent. If it so happens that Europe does collapse as we forecast, and capital flees to the safety of the US dollar (thus boosting the dollar’s strength and causing a stock market meltdown) than we urge readers to consider the repercussions that will be felt in America. Within a period of a few months to a few years a similar scenario will play out with our own sovereign debt and currency. And, when the world’s reserve currency goes into meltdown mode, all bets are off.

There’s a reason governments the world over are preparing contingency plans. They know it’s coming, and they know it will be pandemonium. There is, as we noted two years ago, No Way to Avoid Financial Armageddon.

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst -

* collapse of purchasing power due to hyperinflation
* interruptions to the normal flow of commerce
* disruptions to food supplies
* political upheaval
* increased violence
* riots
* the militarization of Main Street
* and the potential for failure of our domestic utility grid.

We realize these are extreme potentialities and many might suggest we take off the tin foil hat, but the same was true when we and others forecast a collapse of Europe, civil unrest and government contingency planning three years ago. That has now been actualized.

The next leg of this crisis will take hold in the United States in due time. Don’t wait until it’s too late. Start thinking about money during a collapse, bartering items, post-collapse trade skills, and creating a solid preparedness foundation.

This is made in America?!!!

This is made in America?!!!

Go figure America!!!

A sinister bill has quietly been introduced, so expansive in scope and dangerous in nature that it makes the PATRIOT Act look like the Bill of Rights...

If these provisions are enacted, it would give the federal government the explicit power to imprison civilians, including American citizens, indefinitely with no charges or trial.

This would include individuals apprehended both inside and outside of the United States, meaning that this could give the federal government the ability to openly detain American citizens for their entire lives without so much as a single charge.

While the federal government already murders American citizens abroad based upon the decision of an unlegislated secret death panel within the National Security Council, this would be the first time since 1950 that Congress has explicitly authorized indefinite detention of Americans without charges or a trial.

This provision includes people who had absolutely no role in the attacks of September 11th, 2001, or any hostilities whatsoever and would mandate military detention of certain civilians.

This includes civilians arrested within the United States who would otherwise be outside of military control while also transferring all responsibilities to the Department of Defense.

Instead of the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division, National Security Division, or the United States Attorneys, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Prisons, the Marshals Service and/or the state attorneys general handling the prosecutorial, investigative, law enforcement, penal and custodial authority, the Department of Defense would handle it all.

That means that all control would be taken out of the hands of civilians and put into the brutal grip of the American military, essentially this would mean a military takeover of our so-called justice system.

All they would have to do is classify you as a terrorist, no need for actual charges or participation in hostilities; you could be locked up indefinitely for any reason or no reason at all if the Department of Defense saw fit under this NDAA.

The Roads To War And Economic Collapse

The Roads To War And Economic Collapse

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

November 23, 2011: The day before the Thanksgiving holiday brought three extraordinary news items. One was the report on the Republican presidential campaign debate. One was the Russian President’s statement about his country’s response to Washington’s missile bases surrounding his country. And one was the failure of a German government bond auction.

As the presstitute media will not inform us of what any of this means, let me try.

With the exception of Ron Paul, the only candidate in either party qualified to be the president of the US, the rest of the Republican candidates are even worse than Obama, a president who had the country behind him but sold out the American people to special interests.

No newly elected president in memory, neither John F. Kennedy nor Ronald Reagan, had the extraordinary response to his election as Barack Obama. A record-breaking number of people braved the cold to witness his swearing in ceremony. The mall was filled for miles distant from the Capitol with Americans who could not see the ceremony except as televised on giant screens.

Obama had convinced the electorate that he would end the wars, stop the violation of law by the US government, end the regime of illegal torture, close the torture prison of Guantanamo, and attend to the real needs of the American people rather than stuff the pockets of the military/security complex with taxpayers’ money.

Once in office, Obama renewed and extended the Bush/Cheney/neoconservative wars.

He validated the Bush regime’s assaults on the US Constitution. He left Wall Street in charge of US economic policy, he absolved the Bush regime of its crimes, and he assigned to the American people the financial cost necessary to preserve the economic welfare of the mega-rich.

One would think such a totally failed president would be easy to defeat. Given an historic opportunity, the Republican Party has put before the electorate the most amazingly stupid and vile collection of prospects, with the exception of Ron Paul who does not have the party’s support, that Americans have ever seen.

In the November 22 presidential “debate,” the candidates, with the exception of Ron Paul, revealed themselves as a collection of ignorant warmongers who support the police state. Gingrich and Cain said that Muslims “want to kill us all” and that “all of us will be in danger for the rest of out lives.”

Bachmann said that the American puppet state, Pakistan, is “more than an existential threat.” Bachmann has no idea what is “more than an existential threat.”

However, it sounded heavy, like an intellectual thing to say for the candidate who previously declared the long-defunct Soviet Union to be today’s threat to the US.

Unfortunately for Americans and the world, the US electorate lacks the intelligence and awareness of their plight as denizens of a police state to elect Ron Paul, the last defender together with Rep. Dennis Kucinich of the US Constitution. Nevertheless, there would be a silver lining in one of the Republican morons being elected president of the “world’s only superpower.” Once the rest of the world realized that a war-crazed idiot had his or her finger on the nuclear button, the rest of the world would organize and close down the Washington horror before it destroys life on earth.

Any sentient American who watched or read about the Republican presidential debate must wonder what there is to be thankful for as the national holiday approaches.

The Russian government, which prefers to use its resources for the economy rather than for the military, has decided that it has been taking too many risks in the name of peace. The day before Thanksgiving, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said, in a televised address to the Russian people, that if Washington goes ahead with its planned missile bases surrounding Russia, Russia will respond with new nuclear missiles of its own, which will target the American bases and European capital cities.

The President of Russia said that the Russian government has asked Washington for legally binding guarantees that the American missile bases are not intended as a threat to Russia, but that Washington has refused to give such guarantees.

Medvedev’s statement is perplexing. What does he mean “if Washington goes ahead?” The American missile and radar bases are already in place. Russia is already surrounded. Is Medvedev just now aware of what is already in place?

Russia’s and China’s slow response to Washington’s aggression can only be understood in the context of the two countries experience with communism. The sufferings of Russians and Chinese under communism was extreme, and the thinking part of those populations saw America as the ideal of political life. This delusion still controls the mentality of progressive thinkers in Russia and China. It might prove to be a disaster for Russia and China that the countries have citizens who are aligned with the US.

Belief in Washington’s trustworthiness even pervades the Russian government, which apparently, according to Medvedev’s statement, would be reassured by a “legally binding guarantee” from Washington. After the massive lies told by Washington in the 21st century–”weapons of mass destruction,” “al Qaeda connections,” “Iranian nukes”–why would anyone put any credence in “a legally binding guarantee” from Washington. The guarantee would mean nothing. How could it be enforced? Such a guarantee would simply be another deceit in Washington’s pursuit of world hegemony.

The day prior to Thanksgiving also brought another extraordinary development–the failure of a German government bond auction, an unparalleled event.

Why would Germany, the only member of the EU with financial rectitude, not be able to sell 35% of its offerings of 10-year bonds? Germany has no debt problems, and its economy is expected by EU and US authorities to bear the lion’s share of the bailout of the EU member countries that do lack financial rectitude.

I suspect that the answer to this question is that the failure of the German government’s bond auction was orchestrated by the US, by EU authorities, especially the European Central Bank, and private banks in order to punish Germany for obstructing the purchase of EU member countries’ sovereign debt by the European Central Bank.

The German government has been trying to defend the terms on which Germany gave up control over its own currency and joined the EU. By insisting on the legality of the agreements, Germany has been standing in the way of the ECB behaving as the US Federal Reserve and monetizing the debt of member governments.

From the beginning the EU was a conspiracy against Germany. If Germany remains in the EU, Germany will be destroyed. It will lose its political and economic sovereignty, and its economy will be bled in behalf of the fiscally irresponsible members of the EU.
If Greeks will not submit to the tyranny, why should Germans?

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts is the father of Reaganomics and the former head of policy at the Department of Treasury. He is a columnist and was previously an editor for the Wall Street Journal. His latest book, “How the Economy Was Lost: The War of the Worlds,” details why America is disintegrating.

Los Angeles highway collapses into ocean

Los Angeles highway collapses into ocean

Talk about crumbling infrastructure!

Neo-colonization of Africa; President Mugabe appeals to China and Russia

Neo-colonization of Africa; President Mugabe appeals to China and Russia

PRESIDENT Mugabe has appealed to China and Russia to provide leadership in international relations and protect smaller states in view of the blatant attacks they face from the United States and Europe.

At a meeting with Acting Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great People’s Hall here yesterday, President Mugabe said small countries were beginning to wonder whether international law offered adequate protection from the Anglo-Saxon alliance’s expansionist agenda given what NATO did in Libya and threats posed to Syria and Iran.
“Is international law now dead? Are international relations as governed by the United Nations Charter now dead? Are Europe and America allowed to act so unlawfully with impunity that smaller states feel intimidated and unprotected by international law.

“Countries like China and Russia must provide both leadership and protection,” President Mugabe’s spokesman, Mr George Charamba, quoted him as telling Mr Xi.
The Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces said there was now pessimism among smaller states that international law can not protect them.

He told Mr Xi the attacks were made in pursuit of exploiting resources found in these small nations and had become so glaring.
“Nature has disbursed its resources in its own ways to different countries with some countries richly endowed while some are not,” Mr Xi said.
“Even us who do not have oil feel no less menaced as these rapacious countries are looking for other resources,” President Mugabe said. He enumerated Zimbabwe’s minerals such as gold, diamonds and platinum and said even its rich fauna and flora made it a target.

“All this (Zimbabwe’s wealth) is envied and we need protection. We rely on good friends like you to protect us and you have done that in the past. We do not lose confidence in you and please don’t lose confidence in us.”

Mr Charamba said Mr Xi told President Mugabe that China would not abandon its allies.
“In spite of external disturbances China will never forget its friends,” Mr Xi reportedly said. He hailed President Mugabe for personally taking the lead in cultivating relations between the two countries after Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980.

Mr Xi also accepted an invitation from President Mugabe to visit Zimbabwe and noted that it will be fulfilled at a mutually agreed time. A few years ago China and Russia scuttled US and EU attempts to have the United Nations Security Council legitimise their illegal sanctions they have slapped Zimbabwe with.