The United States Government on Friday described the April elections as a missed opportunity “to strengthen an element of its democracy through a sound electoral process.”
In a statement by Sean McCormack, Spokesman of the US Department of State, the US said the analysis of international observers was at variance with the submission of the Independent National Electoral Commission on the electoral process.
The statement said, “There are credible reports of malfeasance and vote rigging in some constituencies. The scope of violence that occurred also was regrettable. Overall, the process was seriously flawed. In spite of these significant shortcomings, the commitment of ordinary Nigerians to democracy remains noteworthy. We praise those Nigerians who adhered to the democratic process by exercising their right to vote.
The United States ,however said it was prepared “to work with Nigeria’s next administration in building upon our excellent bilateral relations and to continue promoting peace and security throughout Africa. We also look forward to helping it implement international recommendations for improving the preparation, administration, and conduct of future elections in Nigeria.”

FOR all intents and purposes last Saturday's gubernatorial and State Assembly elections were a charade, and their outcome unacceptable. They represented, not just a theft of the people's mandate but a subversion of their rights to freely choose their leaders.

After months of uncertainty Nigerians had trooped out in their millions to perform their civic responsibility in the state elections last Saturday. However, contrary to their expectation and the universally accepted norms of democracy, their aspirations were thwarted, their votes ignored and their choice candidates thrown out. Not surprisingly, this has generated massive outrage and violence across the land. The situation calls for radical measures to save the country from anarchy and collapse.

Months before the elections we had cause to draw the attention of the government and its agencies to the shoddy preparations made by INEC. In contravention of the Electoral Act the commission failed to release the voters' register to give Nigerians the chance to verify their names. In spite of the claims of the commission's chairman to the contrary, it was quite evident that the electoral umpire was finding it difficult to meet the logistic requirements of the election.

To make matters worse, the commission demonstrated its partisanship by taking action, including flouting court orders, and initiating court cases of its own, all of which conspired to advance the electoral fortunes of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The commission's actions raised the fears of Nigerians that the elections might not be free and fair. Still, Nigerians kept faith with the process, hoping that they would be allowed to exercise their civic responsibilities and that their votes would count.

Unfortunately, as it turned out, this was not to be. The election was manipulated. The sheer effrontery with which this was done was unimaginable assault on the psyche of Nigerians. Nigerians could not but wonder how their own government could conspire to steal their mandate so brazenly. Yet, even when all observers, both local and international, were asserting that the election was seriously flawed, President Obasanjo and the INEC chairman were audacious enough to claim that the polls went "fairly well". The fact that the country is currently engulfed in post-election violence, which is escalating by the day, appears to have been lost to the President.

It is quite evident that this government cannot organise any credible election either now or in the future. Nigerian voters by their actions in the last few days have lost confidence in the government, INEC and the security agencies, and rightly so. The conduct of the government and INEC in the last election has brought Nigeria to the crossroads of an emergency. The situation calls for radical solutions, although the options available to save the country from impending danger are now very few indeed. The usual, easy route is to advocate putting up with the charade, not rocking the boat in the guise of building democracy. But Nigeria today is beyond such simplistic postulation. Democracy cannot be built on injustice and deceit.

The first step is to cancel the gubernatorial and state assembly elections held last Saturday. The presidential and National Assembly elections should also be postponed for now. We are advocating this measure because the alternative offers little hope. For instance, to allow the election to stand and place the hopes of Nigerians in the election tribunals with the expectation that the results will be overturned would not assuage the feelings of aggrieved Nigerians whose mandate has been brazenly stolen and their rights trampled upon. In any case, this will require swearing in all those who have been elected fraudulently; and this may result in a long season of conflict. The situation in Anambra State following the 2003 gubernatorial election demonstrates the futility of this option.

The 1999 Constitution and the Electoral Act make it mandatory for the elections to be held on or before 28 April at the latest. Since Nigerians have now widely expressed no faith in INEC there is not enough time to dissolve the current commission and reconstitute another electoral agency to organise new elections. And it is hard to see how INEC, as currently constituted, can organise any credible election that will be acceptable. Thus holding new elections within the time frame stipulated in our laws is no longer a viable option.

There is also the fact that Sections 135 and 180 of the 1999 Constitution end the tenure of the current administration on May 29, election or no election. In view of these constitutional constraints, the only option left to save our nation is to invoke section 146 of the constitution. The tenure of the current administration at the federal and state levels will end on May 29 as stipulated by the constitution. Then, as stated in section 146, the Senate President should assume the office of president for 90 days during which he shall establish new agencies to organise credible elections that will be acceptable to the generality of Nigerians. A similar arrangement will be made at the state level.

As we have stated previously, the conduct of the present administration has placed Nigeria at the crossroads and only a radical solution can move the country back from the precipice. The President should recognise the seriousness of the country's current situation and act in a statesmanlike manner to save our country. Nigeria is bigger than any individual.

Nigerians deserve a country where their votes will count. They deserve a country where they can live at peace with their neighbours. They deserve a government that will promote their interests and respect their right to choose their leaders. We hope that in this period of emergency our leaders will act to save our nation from impending danger.

Ethiopian poet, playwright and author Lemn Sissay, 39, was raised by a white family in the north of England. Here he tells how his life often felt like an experiment.

When somebody takes a child from their native culture, that is in itself an act of aggression.

People will often say, love is all you need.

But that is not true. Love without understanding is a dangerous thing.

My mother came to England in 1967, which was a really high point in Ethiopian culture - Ethiopia was a prosperous place. She came during what was a comfortable time for Ethiopians.

But as she found out, it was not a comfortable time for race relations in the UK.

My mother, finding herself in difficulties, sought to have me fostered for a short time.

However, the care worker, who named me Norman after himself, told my foster family that it was a proper adoption.

I was with them for 11 years.

My mother and father

Although they were white I believed they were my father and mother.

I had seen black people in the street or maybe even said hello but until I was 17 years old I never actually knew another black person.



From this I picked up subconscious messages of a kind of lazy racism living in the north of England.

My life was a bit like being an experiment.

Like anyone looking back would feel about growing up in an alien environment - one which treated them as an alien.

I didn't have an afro comb until I was nine years old. My mother used to comb my hair with a metal comb that tore my head. When I was about nine, my parents took me to the doctor because they couldn't understand why my knees were grey.

I remember my mother often saying to me: "Don't look at me with those big brown eyes."

She probably never meant it negatively but it meant that I grew up with a fear of my own eyes.

Trojan horse

My parents were very religious. They told me that they had not decided to take me in, rather that it was God that had decided it for them.

When I was 11 they put me into care.

To them I had become a Trojan horse that symbolised evil. They said that I was bringing evil into their home, that there was this mighty struggle inside me and that God was losing.

To be honest I think it was because they had since had another child and were struggling to provide for us all.

They told me they would never write to me or see me again.

My foster mother contacted me only once to tell me that my granddad had died.

I had always thought that I was going to go back to them.

I knew on an intellectual level that I wasn't their child but on an emotional level I believed I was their child. I didn't know the difference between fostering and adoption.

I have got rid of my anger. It is something that you get through it.

I have been very lost. I've been very confused. But I've always searched for answers.

And the ultimate answer is that the buck stops with yourself.

Uneasy relationship

I met my proper mum when I was 21. It took me three years to find her.

By that stage she worked for the UN in the Gambia.

I travelled out to see her. It was difficult because I looked just like my father had the last time she saw him.

My real mother is a survivor, very strong and respected by the people who know her but our relationship is not easy but then it was never going to be.

To Western parents that want to adopt a child, I would say to people that money is not everything, wealth does not matter.

Don't tell me that you're adopting child to give them a better life.

Is that child then owing to you? And what do they owe? Shall they pay you back in emotions?

And that your view of other cultures and how they may be poor is your view - it says more about you than the place you're looking to adopt from.

Do you want the child because you want a better life for yourself?

I am not invalidating the love that you want to give but I am putting the rights of the child first.

Understand that it is your own experience that leads you to want to take a child from its culture, and display that child as your own in an alien environment.


Gold from the stone

Gold from the stone
Oil from the Earth
I yearned for my home
From the time of my birth

Strength of a mother's whisper
Shall carry me until
The hand of my lost sister
Joins onto my will

Root to the earth
Blood from the heart
Could never from birth
Be broken apart

Food from the platter
Water from the rain
The subject and the matter
I'm going home again

Can't sell a leaf to a tree
Nor the wind to the atmosphere
I know where I am meant to be
And I can't be satisfied here

Can't give light to the Moon
Nor mist to the drifting cloud
I shall be leaving here soon
Costumed, cultured and crowned

Can't give light to the Sun
Nor a drink to the sea
The Earth I must stand upon
I shall kiss with my history

Sugar from the cane
Coal from the wood
Water from the rain
Life from the blood

Gold from the stone
Oil from the earth
I yearned for my home
From the time of my birth

Food from the platter
Water from the rain
The subject and the matter
I'm going home again
Gold from the stone
Oil from the earth
I yearned for my home
From the time of my birth

Lemmy's story brought tears to my eyes.

Two French nationals taken hostage in Afghanistan have told how they fear they will soon be killed, in video footage obtained by a Canadian television network.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), which has broadcast only still images, has not explained how it had obtained the video - which is the first evidence the pair are still alive.

The pictures show a young woman saying in a weak voice that she was a French volunteer kidnapped by the Taliban 10 days ago, network officials said.

Both the man, Eric Damfreville, who confirmed his name, and the woman, known only as Salma, appealed for their lives to be saved.


The French government has confirmed the video shows two French aid workers who have gone missing in Afghanistan.



'No prisoner swaps'



James Bays, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Jalalabad, said: "The Taliban demands are that they want more prisoners released.



"They want three prisoners held in Kandahar released in exchange for a doctor who they will say they will execute in two days time.



"President Karzai has ruled out any future prisoner swaps so he has very little room for manoeuvre now."



According to CBC, the video also shows three Afghan men, blindfolded and shackled, who were the translators and driver with the French pair when they were taken.



Armed kidnappers



At the end of the video, a glimpse can be seen of heavily armed Taliban kidnappers.



The French aid workers, from the non-governmental organisation Terre d'Enfance (A World for Our Children), went missing on April 3 in the southwestern province of Nimroz.



Concerns over the safety of the hostages mounted after the Taliban said on Sunday that they had beheaded an Afghan reporter whom they kidnapped with an Italian journalist a month ago in the southern province of Helmand.



The Taliban said it executed Ajmal Naqshbandi because the government failed to meet their demand to free imprisoned Taliban fighters.



However, Daniele Mastrogiacomo, an Italian reporter, was freed in a hostage deal that saw five fighters released from Afghan prisons.



Karzai criticised



Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president was criticised for his controversial deal and has said that his government will not repeat the hostage trade with the Taliban.



Meanwhile, Jacques Chirac, the French president has demaned that Karzai support efforts to free the French aid workers, Karzai's office said Friday.



"President Chirac during a telephone conversation last night demanded the Afghan president's support to secure the release of two French nationals," Karzai's office said in a statement.



"The president in response assured that all relevant Afghan authorities will do their utmost to secure their release," it said.



The Taliban have also been holding five Afghan medics since kidnapping them in southern Kandahar province on March 27.



On Monday, the fighters threatened to kill at least one of the doctors unless the government entered talks.

culled from aljazeera.net

(Photo: The man confirmed his name as 'Eric' and the woman said she was a volunteer kidnapped 10 days ago [AFP)

At least 37 people have been killed and about 70 wounded in a car bombing at a bus station in the Shia holy city of Karbala in Iraq.

The attack on Saturday occurred about 200 metres from the Imam Hussein shrine, where the grandson of Islam's prophet Muhammad is said to be buried.

"The explosion was a huge one. It took place in a crowded area," said Khalid al-Daami, head of the Karbala's city security committee.

Among the dead were several women and children, he said.

Rescue workers could be seen evacuating casualties, including the body of a child carried away on a stretcher, in footage aired on state television.

Second bridge attack

Police fired into the air to disperse crowds of people and clear the way for more than a dozen ambulances after the bomb exploded.

Meanwhile, in Baghdad, the Iraqi capital, a suicide car bomb exploded on a major bridge on Saturday, killing at least 10 people, police said.

At least 15 people were wounded in the attack, which occurred on the Jadriyah bridge over the Tigris river.

The extent of damage to the bridge was not immediately clear.

The bombing was the second attack on a major bridge in Baghdad this week.

Eleven people were killed when a suicide lorry bomb collapsed the al-Sarafiyah bridge in northern Baghdad on Thursday.