Re:Russia's visit to Africa.

I am a British Nigeria and proud to be an African.

With regards to this visit to Nigeria by the Russian president I feel strongly that African countries are so gullible and ignorant about Russian politics.

This is a country that does not respect black people and the rule of law, to sign big contracts with such country is insulting. Europe and the US will be a good bet, the Niger Delta region will suffer more as a result.

The Russian regime is not about ethics and moral, the first super power to recognise and fail to condemn the oppressive Iran state.

I am not surprise that the African states chosen have something to offer, my advise to these non democratic African states is to aware of what is happening in Iran especially when you try to suppress people.

Africa will continue to be backward unless we learn from other developed countries, Brazil is a good example.

With all the intellectuals in Africa,we need to wake up and put an end to all non democratic,less ehical and corrupt African countries especially Nigeria.

Thanks Dola

It is obvious that you have a very strong personal agenda that is extremely circumscribed. Nations operate mainly on their personal interest, in other words what is best for themselves. Non of the countries you mentioned in the west are operating on the bases of pure philanthropy; all ecpect something in return. We in Africa must make sure we get the maximum in return. PERIOD. It makes no difference who we deal with. We must separate economic interest from the type of government we prefer. We must get away from stereotypes. Democracy is not a panacea in itself; any system with integrity, selflessness, common sense and the principle of "love thy neighbor as much as your love yourself " is better. We have not found that system .Let me remind you that there are many so called DEMOCRACIES including the great USA which lack these essential characteristics.So we need to stop proselytizing for the western hypocrites who tell us to, "do as I say not [necessarily] as I do".

Re:Previous Article by russ:

I do not have an agenda,currently live abroad and my politics is about fairness.When we talk about economic issues, morals and ethics come into play. The Europeans and the US are far from being perfect but a better alternative to the Chinese and Russians who fail to allow opposition within their political system.

We only need to look at Darfur,the Sudanese largest investor are the Chinese and they refuse to put pressure on the Sudanese government regarding the plight of the refuges.

With regards to Business partners, you are right that Nigeria should be able to trade with any country. My point is that as we do have alternatives to the Russian and Chinese with regards to our business aspirations.

These are the two major powers who find it difficult to criticize Iran because of the partnership they have with them..I must remind you that the EU has economic and diplomatic ties with Iran but they still came out to condemn the situation there.

African dictators will always have options and the issue democracy will be suppressed. All Africans should be able to have a voice with regards to their politics affliations.

Thank you

Mr British Nigerian

I think you have forgotten about the 2007 Africa-EU Smmit that took place in Portugal, allow me to refresh your memory:

The existing preferential trade agreements between the EU and the ACP countries was not compatible with WTO rules (it was was one sided guess who benefited from it hint it was not Africa). The Europeans sought to replace it with WTO-compatible Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) when they learnt about China's interest in Africa, however, in this instance the Africans were smart enought to reject the offer.

It is great that Africa has a choice of trading partners, China, Russia (the rouge EU country). We have traded with Britain, Portugal etc and what changes have we seen? You talk about Human Rights issues but have you forgotten about the killing during the Abacha regime of Saro Wiwa guess what company and country was involved, hint, name starts with "S" owned by the Dutch.

During Apartheid US and European countries freely traded with the Afrikans..

So yes the Europeans and US are not perfect but now we have options we need to let them know that we have the freedom to trade with who ever we want. They preach Human Rights but they themselves are guilty of breaching other people's Human Rights, look at the Iraq war and Guantanamo need I say more!!!

re:curious

You talk about Iraq war and guantanamo bay, without a doubt a serious breach of human right. I agree that Nigeria should be able to trade with any nation,my concern is with Shell atrocities in Nigeria, the Chinese and Russian will be worse for Nigeria.

http://www.zambian-economist.com/2008/05/chinas-impact-in-zambia-bbc-report .html.

I know this is a BBC report , we need to look at the companies we deal with before we enter into contracts.I still believe that there are companies around the world with ethics and morals that will benefit Africa and treat us like equal partners.

What we need to understand is that these countries need Africa with regards to our abundant natural resources.

That's my 2 cent.

The hausa/fulani have come up with a new and dangerous political game in the name of nuclear power. To make matter worse, they are teaming up with russia- a country with an appalling dictatoship to build a nuclear reactor. Why do we allow the russians to tap our resouces? The russians sold weapons of mass destruction technology to the communist north korea, they did the same to china, iran, These are countries ruled by dictators. The russian government suppresses freedom of press and arrest it's citizens with dissenting opinion. The russians have been actively involve in the east west division. We have nothing to gain from this communist country. Yar and his folks from the north are only trying to maintain the leadership of the country. We will never allow the north to dominate us. They should go and dominate their cattle. Nigeria is too big to be one. The hausa/fulani should be part of niger or have their own country and be ruled by dictators. It's high time we throw them out. We dont need these jihadist. Russia will never make nigeria another iran. They should keep their nuclear technology. They are not needed in our country. Putin and his stooge should know that we dont like them and dont want to do business with them. To hell.

Whoever is Karl Imom,one would suggest that you go back and learn more about Nigerian political History which unfortunately you may be lacking at this time.The Housa/Fulani collectively, are to be blamed squarely on the on the economic problems facing Nigeria today in the sense that the so called Northerners are not good economic managers and have not been. The record is there to show this fact.It is myopic for someone to claim otherwise.In a civilised society,a CEO of any company takes responsibility if his company fails to make the cut.I hope you're not telling the Nigerian people that they're not civilised enough to see what the so called Northern political gangs have done to our economy todate?However, one may not be fair to blame all our economic doom and gloom enirely on the Northerners but they should be really naive not to be responsible for 95% of the problems as they're the only being able region in Nation that have been shooting themselves into power by force and always suspend the constitution.Please Mr.Imom you may be part of our problem by not been honest and defending wrongs.

Another Ajaokuta in the making. 40 years from now, we will be wondering where the crude oil money went with nothing to show from the Nuclear deal. A nation that could not tap hydro-energy from the abundant Niger River now wants to build nuclear energy in a deal with the cunning Russians in particular. Give me a break. Yar and his Northern kin are merely playing real-politick to play up the East-West rivalry similar to the game Iran and North Korea play to boost their security position and hold on to power while the divided Ibo & Yoruba keep looking at each other with suspicion rather than unite with the Deltans to counter-balance the threat from the Hausa/Fulani's grip on the nation.

for those who criticize this move on the Russian and Nigerian to building a nuclear energy are crazy.we as Nigerian should open our eyes and see the big picture.i think we the citizen of Nigeria have to stop for once and actually help our FG to carry out the vision of our nation. that meant good road,school,electricity.and many other great things the nation needs.u criticize and never speaks out what dose that do for the nation of Nigeria.for Ur information a batter home makes a better neighbour,a better neighbour makes a better community, a better community makes a better nation so. it all start from heme.manner do not fall from heaven at list not any more.we should not sit back and watch. why this guys make the decisions alone, after all is our nation.a voice of a millions speaks louder its almost the sounds of a might rush of water which can not be quite so easily so my fellow Nigerians coming together as one nation to fight for freedom,liberty and justices. is called history that we all can be apart of.thank u and have a bless day

Russia , like any nation is out to grab opportunities for the betterment of the national economy first and foremost. If Nigerian leaders decide to play the fool and flounder the national wealth, Russia will normally welcome them . Ajaokuta was not Russia's failure.The massive corruption and power play between the North and Southern leaders was the reason for the huge cost and ultimate failure of the project. The vision was good for economic take off, the execution was hopeless and fraudlent. Princical actors ought to be in jail for future refrence.

It is mind bogging that this country has array of economists and academia from within, yet developement policies seem exceedingly dum. Ajaokuta and Capital territory of Abuja both revealed how brutal Nigerains can rob their own nation. What about the Nigerian Railway coporation which was contracted to India , the Nigerian Airways which was looted by managers who were trusted with the operation ? Or who in Nigera can claim ignorance to the arrogant and immense wealth of mambers of the Board of Customs and Excise. The country is simply lucky to have such imense amount of wealth such as oil that it can still stand as an economic entity today after such economic babarism by ruthless ledership.

The victim to all of these is the villagers and peasants, the school leavers as the gap between the rich and poor continue to escalate disproptionately.By all standards a government is worth nothing if it can not provide citizens with basic amenities such as clean water and and education within cost

I agree with the suggestion that we're in for another round of Ajaokuta this time in a new name of Nuclear project.

Inequality in western capitalist nations is often attributed to historical reasons , in Nigeria it is only attributed to unbriddled corruption and military indiscipline. We now have hopeless socio- economic devide that will eventually precipitate future calamity as currenly witnessed in the Riverine areas of the nation.

O Nwagwu is a Nigerian Scholar based in Toronto