Nazir Ahmed Hausawa, a.k.a Ziriums, is the first son of eleven children. Hausa-Fulani by tribe, he was born in the conservative state of Kano in northern Nigeria. He was inspired by his Dad, an Islamic gospel artist, to enter the world of hip-hop and was later influenced by western rap artists such as Eminem.
Nazir grew up in a society whose elite leaders felt they could do anything they wanted in the name of religion, while everyday people didn't have access to good schools, hospitals, roads, and security. People who spoke up were often imprisoned. He feels that rap / hip hop culture is the only weapon left to express himself freely and communicate the situation in Nigeria to the world. Nazir raps in Hausa and Fulfulde and wants to set an example to youth today so that they can wake up and preach against violence and enlighten society.
Nazir’s debut album is set to drop in 2010. He is currently managed by intersection Entertainment [I.E] in Abuja. His first single of the album ‘This is me’ video was directed by Korex of Intersection DMA.
The recent death of four Federal Civil Service pensioners while waiting to collect their terminal benefits in Lagos State once again brings to the fore the government's criminal neglect of our senior citizens.
According to the Campaign for Democratic and Workers' Rights (CDWR), the incident brought to 179 the total number of pensioners who have died in similar circumstances in recent years. One of the latest victims, who retired from the Nigerian Postal Service, NIPOST, slumped and died while protesting the non-payment of the retirees' 49-month pension arrears. The three others lost their lives during a verification exercise. What makes it so painful is that the tragedies were clearly avoidable.
Indeed, the tales of woe of most pensioners are heart-rending. And for those still alive among them, there seems to be no light at the end of the long tunnel. Recently, a NIPOST retiree wept openly on television because of his inability to pay the school fees of his children. The kids have since been forced to withdraw from their tertiary institutions. As one retired teacher lamented: "They have made things difficult for us, as if we are not citizens of this nation. I do not know if it is a crime to be old or a retiree. There is no respect for the weak in Nigeria." We share this pensioner's grief on the blatant betrayal of trust suffered by those who have served this nation meritoriously. Another retiree lashed out: "We are yet to see any former state governor or president do verification before his unwarranted and unjustified pension, gratuity or severance package was paid!" A sound, if caustic, point: indeed, herein lies the irony and injustice of it all. Those who received peanuts while in service, who had no access to pillage the national till, are denied their rightful benefits even when they retire and left in the cold.
There is no doubt that the implications of sentencing ex-employees to a retirement of hardship and wretchedness are grave for the nation. Those still in service are inadvertently made to feel that honesty, diligence and hard work do not pay. In this environment, the temptation to engage in sundry sharp practices becomes harder to resist. This has contributed in no small way to the pervasiveness of corrupt practices in today's civil service.
In a bid to avoid this pitfall the Olusegun Obasanjo administration passed the Pensions Act of 2004, with the salutary aim of helping to wipe the tears off the faces of retired workers. The concept was to make both employers and their workers contribute a percentage of the employees' monthly earnings to a Retirement Savings Account, RSA. For this also the Nigerian Pensions Commission (NPC) was established. As at August 2009, about 3.8 million civil servants across the country had signed into the new pension scheme. An estimated N1.2 trillion is said to have accumulated in pension fund accounts since then. Also, 26 pension fund administrators and seven pension fund custodians were put in place to ease the disbursement of their entitlements. But late last year, the Pension Commission raised the alarm that poor contributory culture and corruption were rearing their ugly heads in the implementation of the new scheme. As at mid-2009, only 10 states out of 36 had enacted the pensions fund law. To worsen matters, the Commission alleged that "most employers [were] deducting 7.5 percent pension contribution; yet they fail to remit same to the pension fund" - a criminal act.
Subsequently, there came a serious allegation of fraud made by the Joint Workers Association for Good Governance against a top manager of the Nigerian Social Insurance Trust Fund, NSTIF. He was alleged to have diverted a whopping sum of N1.6 billion of the pension assets, in addition to his alleged refusal to transfer over N200 million to the Trustfund Pensions Plc.
That such allegations of monumental sleaze keep recurring while the supposed beneficiaries of the pension funds are subjected to dehumanizing bureaucratic bottlenecks, such as recurrent 'verification' exercises, leading to the preventable death of many retirees, is unacceptable. It is a cruel society that will persist in treating its elderly citizens so shabbily. We call on the Goodluck Jonathan administration to do a critical review of the implementation of the current pension system, so as to determine what constraints are frustrating its benefits to retirees. The case of pensioners who retired prior to the coming into effect of the new Pensions Act deserves special attention to ensure that old malpractices are not being perpetuated. The anti-graft bodies should take measures to expose and prosecute any criminals, however highly placed, converting the sweat innocent ex-workers into their own private gain. Furthermore, state governments that have not done so should urgently enact and enforce the new pensions law within their own domains. Above all, the process of pension disbursements should be streamlined and simplified to reduce the incidence of pensioners dying while waiting in vain.
Let the Nigerian government borrow a leaf from Chile. There the president, Michele Bachelet, signed a pensions scheme into law in 2008, intended primarily to benefit the poorest of workers. The Pension Basica Solidara covered the 45 per cent of lowest earners in 2008 and has since been reviewed to cover 60 per cent by 2011. In addition, the government paid 60,000 pesos per month to the beneficiaries that same year and upped it to 75,000 pesos per month in 2009. Currently, Chile boasts of five competent private fund managers, with assets worth $100 billion.
In the absence of any form of social security buffer here in Nigeria to cushion the misery of the aged, jobless, disabled or otherwise severely handicapped, let those Nigerians who sacrificed their productive years in service to the nation be paid their retirement benefits as and when due.
Greek giants Olympiacos have joined the hunt to sign Nigeria international midfielder Sani Kaita. There are speculations too that English Premier League side West Ham are another likely suitors seeking the signature of the Kano indigene.
After loan spells in Russia in the past two seasons, Kaita still has a contract with French side Monaco, but he could well be on the move again, either to his preferred destination England, where West Ham have made enquiries; Olympiacos in Greece or Spain, where he has interested Espanyol and Sevilla.
"We're only waiting for a concrete offer from the interested clubs before we really know where he will be playing in the new season," disclosed one of Kaita's representatives, Tijjani Babangida, to MTNFootball.com.
"Kaita's preferred choice is England and he can get a work permit because he has featured in more than 70% of Nigeria's matches in the last two years."
Defensive midfielder Kaita hogged the headlines for the wrong reasons during the 2010 World Cup when he was sent off for a touchline tangle with a Greek player.
There will later be death threats against him after Nigeria lost the match 2-1 to further narrow their chances of making it to the knockout stage of the tournament in South Africa.
The relative stability in power supply in the country may soon be disrupted as electricity workers under the aegis of the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) have directed their members to embark on indefinite strike action from Monday.
The workers are protesting against the Federal Government's planned privatisation of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) and failure to pay the workers accrued benefits amounting to over N69 billion.
The news of the imminent strike came hours after fire gutted the old Ijora Power Station in Lagos yesterday, destroying electrical equipment worth millions of naira.
The workers are protesting non-payment of arrears of monetisation from 2003 to date, balance of 150 per cent salary increase and casualisation of PHCN workforce.
Vice-President of Lagos/ Ogun Zone of NUEE, Mr. Mbang Obol Ntukube, said the government and PHCN management reneged on the agreement reached in May to address their grievances within four weeks.
Ntukube noted that the workers had since submitted their account details to the management but no payment was made.
On the possibility of negotiating with the government over the weekend to avert the strike, he said the workers are tired of holding talks with the government.
"We are not meeting with them again. What kind of meeting? They keep on wasting PHCN resources in holding meetings. Is it not government that is paying? It is from PHCN resources. You know what it costs to meet at Sheraton. We go there to meet every day at the expense of PHCN. We won't meet again; we want payment," he said.
Ntukube disclosed that Lagos/Ogun Zone was in total support of the actions of the National Secretariat of NUEE against the privatisation of PHCN and warned agents of privatisation to steer clear of PHCN installations, as the workers cannot guarantee their safety.
On the allegation that the workers are not doing enough to improve electricity supply, Zonal Organising Secretary, Mr. Richard Kedee, said without the efforts of the workers, the whole electricity network would have collapsed over long years of neglect. He pointed out that the workers cannibalised old equipment to repair new ones.
Both the NUEE and the Senior Staff Association of Electricity and Allied Companies (SSAEAC) had earlier insisted that there was no going back on the July 25 deadline handed down to the management of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) to address their grievances.
Meanwhile, THISDAY gathered that yesterday's fire incident at the old Ijora Power Station was caused by welders working for an advertising agency, which was mounting a billboard at the top of the gigantic building.
It took the intervention of the men of the Lagos State Fire and Safety Services, Nigeria Ports Authority, Police and the Federal Road Safety Commission to put out the inferno.
At the time of the incident, the power station was not transmitting electricity as it had been abandoned over the years.
British Nmachi Ihegboro has amazed genetics experts who say the little girl is not an albino.
Dad Ben, 44, a customer services adviser, admitted: "We both just sat there after the birth staring at her."
Mum Angela, 35, of Woolwich, South London, beamed as she said: "She's beautiful - a miracle baby."
Ben told yesterday how he was so shocked when Nmachi was born, he even joked: "Is she MINE?"
But as the baby's older brother and sister - both black - crowded round the "little miracle" at their home in South London, Ben declared: "Of course she's mine."
Blue-eyed blonde Nmachi, whose name means "Beauty of God" in the Nigerian couple's homeland, has baffled genetics experts because neither Ben nor wife Angela have ANY mixed-race family history.
Pale genes skipping generations before cropping up again could have explained the baby's appearance.
Ben also stressed: "My wife is true to me. Even if she hadn't been, the baby still wouldn't look like that.
"We both just sat there after the birth staring at her for ages - not saying anything."
Doctors at Queen Mary's Hospital in Sidcup - where Angela, from nearby Woolwich, gave birth - have told the parents Nmachi is definitely no albino.
Ben, who came to Britain with his wife five years ago and works for South Eastern Trains, said: "She doesn't look like an albino child anyway - not like the ones I've seen back in Nigeria or in books. She just looks like a healthy white baby."
He went on: "My mum is a black Nigerian although she has a bit fairer skin than mine.
"But we don't know of any white ancestry. We wondered if it was a genetic twist.
"But even then, what is with the long curly blonde hair?"
Professor Bryan Sykes, head of Human Genetics at Oxford University and Britain's leading expert, yesterday called the birth "extraordinary".
He said: "In mixed race humans, the lighter variant of skin tone may come out in a child - and this can sometimes be startlingly different to the skin of the parents.
"This might be the case where there is a lot of genetic mixing, as in Afro-Caribbean populations. But in Nigeria there is little mixing."
Prof Sykes said BOTH parents would have needed "some form of white ancestry" for a pale version of their genes to be passed on.
But he added: "The hair is extremely unusual. Even many blonde children don't have blonde hair like this at birth."
The expert said some unknown mutation was the most likely explanation.
He admitted: "The rules of genetics are complex and we still don't understand what happens in many cases."
The amazing birth comes five years after Kylie Hodgson became mum to twin daughters - one white and the other black - in Nottingham.
Kylie, now 23, and her partner Remi Horder, now 21, are both mixed race.
Even so the odds were estimated at a million to one.
The Sun told in 2002 how a white couple had Asian twins after a sperm mix-up by a fertility clinic.
Yesterday three-day-old Nmachi's churchgoing mum Angela admitted that she was "speechless" at first seeing her baby girl, who was delivered in a caesarean op.
She said: "I thought, 'What is this little doll?'
"She's beautiful and I love her. Her colour doesn't matter. She's a miracle baby.
"But still, what on earth happened here?"
Her husband told how their son Chisom, four, was even more confused than them by his new sister.
Ben said: "Our other daughter Dumebi is only two so she's too young to understand.
"But our boy keeps coming to look at his sister and then sits down looking puzzled.
"We're a black family. Suddenly he has a white sister."
Ben continued: "Of course, we are baffled too and want to know what's happened. But we understand life is very strange.
"All that matters is that she's healthy and that we love her.She's a proud British Nigerian."
Queen Mary's Hospital said: "Congratulations to Angela and her family on the birth of their daughter."
