An embarrassing age-related moment for Nigerian football, 40 out of the 60 boys penciled down as part of the Golden Eaglets contingent to prosecute the Under-17 African Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifiers in Benin Republic failed the mandatory Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) age test.
Coming just three weeks to the qualifiers, this means the coaching crew will have to race against the clock to pick a squad qualified enough to represent the country at the West African Football Union (WAFU) Group B qualifiers billed to kick-off on Tuesday, January 5.
Out of the 20 players who passed the tests, only five of them are part of the main squad and just two of the five are included in Coach Fatai Amoo’s preferred starting lineup for the competition. Most of the players the coach banked on did not scale through. (Compare with Ethiopia only five out of thirty-five). Surprisingly, among those affected were players from the National U16 team, some of whom were featured at an invitational tournament in Japan last year. As a consequence, they will vacate the team’s hotel in Abuja and head home with dashed hopes and dreams. These age-cheating incidents are worsened by the desperation of parents and agents to get their youngsters into the national team at this level of the game.
To prevent further embarrassments that might warrant the disqualification of the entire team by CAF, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has pegged Grades 1- 4 as the benchmark for the age test to ensure registered players stop being disqualified.
Nigeria’s Golden Eaglets, just like their Under-20 Flying Eagles counterparts, are drawn in Group B of the U17 qualifiers along with rivals Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire.
Age test (MRI) common trait between Nigeria & Ethiopia
The hard Brexit
The agreement reached under maximum pressure by the EU and the United Kingdom (UK) during the night of December 7th 2017 is full of ambiguity and hypocrisy. The main, though not insignificant, merit is to avoid the premature interruption of the Brexit negotiations, as well as to offer the main protagonists peaceful year-end celebrations. According to Paul Goldschmidt, the former Director, EU Commission and Member of the Advisory Board of Stand Up for Europe outlined, indeed, on the basis of this agreement, it appears that the UK must choose between one among the following four options:
The first one is negotiating the withdrawal of its notification under Art. 50 and retain full membership of the Union. The delivery of the withdrawal notice dated March 29, 2017, initiated an irreversible process of two years leading inexorably to the departure of the UK from the EU. This process can, however, be modulated under the terms of two agreements covering respectively the “divorce” and the “future relationship” between the parties; both need the unanimous approval of the Council and a majority vote of the European Parliament.
The second one is to leave the EU but retain membership of the Custom’s Union and the Single Market. This option is in contradiction with the previous undertakings of Theresa May. While it is in line with the commitments of the “divorce” agreement, it implies the subordination of the UK to the rules of the EU (rule-taker), the inability to negotiate separate trade deals with third parties, etc. Such restrictions should be welcomed by Ulster, Scotland, and Wales because the reversion of other EU powers would mainly benefit the British Government and Westminster.
The third option is to negotiate a Free Trade Agreement (CETA model). This option implies instituting border controls either at all external borders of the UK or between Ulster and the remainder of the UK. It is not possible to guarantee simultaneously the territorial integrity of the UK market including Ulster and the indivisibility of the market on the Irish island. Regardless, any FTA cannot confer on the UK the same privileges as those enjoyed by members of the Customs Union and of the Single Market.
According to Paul Goldschmidt, the fourth option is leaving the EU without any agreement (WTO model). Leaving the EU without an agreement covering the future relationship would be detrimental to both parties and carries with it the risk of judicial procedures which would jeopardize any harmonious future cooperation. It should be evident that this option is particularly dangerous in the current instable geopolitical climate which should, on the contrary, underscore the mutual benefits of a European continent speaking with a single voice in order to provide joint security and prosperity to its citizens.
Regarding the hard Brexit, Nicola Sturgeon, the SNP (Scottish National Party) leader, has promised to publish draft legislation for a second independence referendum before the upcoming election to the Scottish Parliament on May 6, 2021. Nicola Sturgeon hopes that Brexit, which goes against the will of the 62.0% majority in Scotland that voted to remain part of the EU in June 2016, will reverse the result of the 2014 Scottish Independence referendum. At the time, a 55.3% majority voted to stay in the UK.
Kallum Pickering, Senior Economist at Berenberg Bank in London stated that following a major shift in the polls that started shortly after Boris Johnson and the Conservatives won the landslide victory at the UK election on December 12, 2019, the most recent five opinion polls give support for Scottish independence a seven-point lead, with average support running around 49%. On that basis, one cannot rule out that Scotland could leave the UK in the coming years, even though such pro-independence polls seem to have a habit of narrowing in the run-up to referendum day.
However, actually getting there is hard for two reasons. First, not only are around 8% of Scottish voters still undecided. More significantly, with no guarantee that the second independence vote could end in a majority vote for leaving the UK, the SNP may well ride the wave of pro-independence sentiment to boost its support ahead of the Scottish election. Kallum Pickering noted that this would likely imply that the SNP would stop short of pushing hard for a second independence vote once in power at the national level, unless referendum polls shifted even further in their favor on a sustained basis. The SNP also has to think hard about what it wishes for. After all, a second failed attempt to go for Scottish independence would put the question to bed for a generation and partly undermine the case for voting for the SNP in the future.
Second, Scotland still needs the approval of UK parliament to hold a second referendum, unless a future devolution of powers to national governments from the UK parliament in Westminster allowed national parliaments to pass such legislation. Such legislation seems unlikely as long as the Conservatives are in power. While a landslide victory at the upcoming Scottish Parliament election scheduled for May 2021 could strengthen the hand of the SNP, a second referendum is unlikely ahead of the 2024 UK general election.
Tom Clifford, an Irish journalist based in Beijing stressed that in view of news that the UK´s prime minister Boris Johnson plans unilateral shifts that upend the Withdrawal Agreement with the EU, one has to wonder whether this is a Trump-style negotiating strategy on the part of the UK government. The idea to up the ante seems to be based in the hope that the EU will blink as the clock ticks down or a conscious approach by the UK to undermine the ongoing negotiations on the future relationship (and settle for the hardest possible exit from the EU single market) instead of reaching for a compromise is unclear.
As Denis MacShane, the former UK’s Minister for Europe noted, it seems odd, to say the least, that the UK could be about to undermine its commitments to Ireland with upcoming legislation after the UK had taken steps in recent months to prepare Northern Ireland’s border for exit day. It suggests the UK is trying to increase the pressure to get a deal more to its liking rather than going for a hard exit. Either way, the strategy does not raise the chance of a good outcome. With the costs of a hard exit falling disproportionately on the UK, the strategy could harm the UK more than the much bigger EU. For the UK and the EU to find compromises on the sticking points, level playing field, governance and fisheries, both sides must work to build trust. The UK’s actions are doing the opposite.
EU’s Betrayal of Allied Powers in Defence of Dark Axis Forces
The Queen of Sheba
According to the European Commission spokeswoman Ana Pisonero-Hernandez, support to Ethiopia will be withheld until five conditions for aid are met. The last of the five conditions warned that “Communication lines and media access to Tigray should be fully re-established.”
At the Second World War, Allied Powers confronted and gravely obliterated Nazi and Fascist Axis Powers headed by Adolf Hitler who fantasized to dominate the world. The war, however, claimed the lives of an estimated 75 million people, including some 20 million in the former Soviet Union alone. The world pays unparallel gratitude and tribute to Allied Powers for their bravery and sacrifices-that may continue for eternity.
Both powers deployed all armaments known to humanity without reservations resulting in a tragedy of biblical proportion. The United States, which was pre-emptively attacked at Pearl Harbor, dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that completely annihilated Japan, one of the Axis countries, which subsequently brought the war to an end.
Following the conclusion of the war, the victorious Allied Powers brought the ring leaders of the vanquished Axis Forces to justice by establishing what is known as the Nuremberg Trial which meted out punishments including death by hanging. They then engineered a Marshal Plan to rehabilitate the countries-of both Axis and Allied Powers-which were devastated by the war.
Except a few fringe entities, the world has overwhelmingly celebrated the winners and applauded the war-and the reconstruction-efforts. The Allied Powers were never a subject of denunciation or censure for the infrastructure demolished or the civilians they targeted, including those killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in their pursuit of the just war.
Fast Forward to 2020
On 3 November 2020, the TPLF Axis Forces attacked the Ethiopian Allied Forces of the Northern Command with a “thunderous” speed. Though the TPLF cabal first accused the Command as triggering the war, one of its top leaders, bombastically but foolishly, admitted it in a televised interview to the contrary. The leader further likened the cowardly assault-while the army was asleep-to similar such acts executed by Israeli special forces.
The cabal’s Axis forces massacred both the army and civilians indiscriminately, including the My-Kadra genocide which mostly targeted the Amharas. The fortunes of the war however quickly shifted as the cabal Axis Forces got routed by Allied Federal forces with a lightning speed. As it was being chased, the cowardly Axis Forces ransacked and destroyed infrastructure-air fields, schools, powerlines, communication towers, storage depos-and looted vehicles, equipment, banks-and gold bars.
The EU Directive
As one of the five conditions to release the suspended funds, the EU directed that “Communication lines and media access to Tigray should be fully re-established”. To be sure, the communication lines and the media were not only destroyed by the TPLF cabal but they were also criminally sabotaged in Mekelle as the CCTV footage of the Ethio Telecom has clearly proven.
The EU’s directive is utterly outrageous, if not truly bizarre and non-sensical, as it intends to penalize the Allied Forces for the acts of the vanquished Axis Forces of the cabal who wickedly dismantled, destroyed and looted infrastructure, equipment and facilities.
Just to be sure, Ethiopia sets its own development priorities in terms of where, how, why and to what extent it builds them within its own territories, without being lectured as to when and who gets electricity, water, roads, in this case, phone and communication services. It is something to help support a development effort of the country, but completely something else to arrogantly prescribe regional locations of service delivery and development in Ethiopia. The ugly head of this brazen colonial act, masquerading as social justice and development partnership, must be decapitated-and promptly.
Pisonero-Hernandez, further reported that the decision “does not affect EU humanitarian programmes on the ground or other development actions.” When a country is emerging out of a war, such a decision is simply strange-even probably unprecedented. One may also wonder if this is not in contradiction with the undue sympathy that the Axis Forces of the cabal continue to enjoy because such a decision seems to lack an understanding that a short Euro in Ethiopia is a short Euro in Tigray.
Oh, by the way, EU may wish to know that there are at least five times more Amharas currently and, at one point, 10 times more Oromos in the same situation as Tigrayans. EU should thus stop shedding crocodile tears on behalf of the cabal, its shenanigans and paid operatives.
In Conclusion
The egregious EU sanctions unjustly punish Ethiopia for waging a just war-a war which not only saved Ethiopia from total disintegration but a potential huge crisis in the Horn of Africa-with implications for Europe-and the world. The ugly face of injustice and double standard could not be starker.
The Ethiopian Diaspora is known to send some 4 billion dollars in remittances. That is comparable to, if not more than, the total development packages that the country receives. To put the amount that the EU withheld in perspective, this would mean a fraction of the remittances which could be effectively bridged by active mobilization of Ethiopians around the world.
The EU may wish to shove its funds-of today and the future-wherever it wants to. Ethiopia will never succumb to a threat when it comes to its sovereignty-and independence. No amount of pressure by EU or its member states or other enablers of the Axis cabal forces would compel it to bow to this blatant injustice.
As Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed recently stated in his speech to parliamentarians, Ethiopia’s development partners should make a clear distinction between hunger-and honor. Ethiopia has, in its history of thousands of years, always chose for the later-not the former.
The Queen of Sheba may be reached at QueenOf Sheba2020@outlook.com
Hunger, conflict and COVID 19
Few years ago, Swedish diplomat Jan Eliasson observed that unless we made peace with nature, we would never be able to solve the problems of global hunger. Jan Eliasson suggested to the community of food experts to consider the nexus of a sustainable food supply with the ongoing threat of climate change.
As the world observed World Food Day on October 16, it is pivotal to consider the challenges of eradicating global hunger in the context of the warming of our planet. Until 2014, the decades-long-decline in hunger in the world was one of the great achievements of progress, the world’s ability to grow enough food to feed billions of people. Hundreds of millions of people in Africa, Latin American and especially Asia were lifted out of poverty.
Today, that global progress is in jeopardy. Johanna Forman, a scholar-in-residence at American University’s School of International Service noted that, we ignore this reality at our peril. She stated that the ranks of the food insecure are increasing. In March 2020, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) sounded an alarm as the initial data on global hunger confirmed what we already suspected. More than 60 million undernourished people, up by 10 million people between 2018 and 2019, joined the ranks of the food insecure. In 2019, over 1.25 billion people experienced moderate food insecurity, and 750 million experienced severe food insecurity. The majority of hungry people worldwide live in countries wracked by conflict, 489 million people. The arrival of the COVID 19 pandemic only aggravates these pressures further.
Johanna Forman further stated that with ten years to go until 2030, the year the United Nations set as the target to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), we are now off track to achieve them. The SDG target of zero hunger by that date is no longer in reach. If the global community continues to keep the discussions about solutions to hunger separate from ways to tackle climate change, we will certainly lose the battle for survival.
The United States and China, the two largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, have taken irresponsible positions regarding ways to keep the earth’s temperature stable. So, what can citizens do to create a global grassroots movement that will help put the planet on a more hopeful trajectory to address hunger and the continued warming of the earth?
For this end, the young generation plays a key role in this battle. Young people are individually very much aware of the connections between agricultural production and climate. The young Swedish activist, Greta Thunberg, has inspired a generation to call out their governments and local communities to make changes in the way they manage food waste and generate energy that do not pollute the atmosphere.
Ford Runge, Director of the Center for International Food and Agricultural Policy stressed that mobilization requires the private sector to operate its own campaigns to use their businesses for good purposes. There are many multinational companies that are signing on to agreements to address their carbon footprints. This movement must now also be duplicated in both small and medium-sized enterprises. A new initiative, 10x20x30 intends to get 10 major retailers to enlist 20 suppliers to commit to meeting the 2030 UN Sustainable Development Goal to cut food waste by half.
Ford Runge argued that the technology sector has created a remarkable array of options for generating energy that will not emit carbon. It must now insist that these options for wind, solar and other forms of renewable energy generation are made available at low cost to all countries that are at risk of falling further back in feeding their populations. According to Ford Runge, there must be financial incentives that both sovereign lenders and the international financial institutions provide to those countries at the greatest risk especially small island states where rising sea levels threaten their very existence. This is possible if a target list of priority states starts the process of energy sector modernization.
The fossil fuel production companies talk a good line about transitioning to renewable energy. But they are still focused on further extraction of oil in spite of all the warning signs of disaster. The United States and Saudi Arabia, the two largest oil producers, could better serve the global community if they agreed to reduce harm to the respective energy sectors. This is where citizen mobilization could play a major role as investment dollars could be conditioned on an energy transition.
Johanna Forman stressed that food growing companies worldwide can become a positive force in each of the countries where they operate by providing a decentralized approach to agriculture. This would allow them to produce what the world needs to eat, while creating mechanisms to give those in the most remote parts of the world a way to reach markets. They can achieve that by guaranteeing these small farmers a means to sell their products locally. Big companies have the logistical capacity to help governments develop these types of decentralized approaches to their agricultural policies.
Dealing with food waste as a major issue in tackling the dual global hunger and climate change challenge. It needs to be tackled at the systems level rather than by looking at it as a piecemeal solution to reducing carbon emissions. According to Project Drawdown, if landfills were a country, they would be the third largest emitters of greenhouse gases, coming only after China and the United States. A global approach to landfills, while not easy to implement, could also help focus attention on food waste. This would create an enduring solution to one of the greatest offenders to the environment.
Observing World Food Day may give people around the globe a chance finally to consider how their own impact on the planet must be considered in light of the threats we all face. As Johanna Forman suggested, all United Nations member states must take responsibility to protect the earth. Now is the moment to act on this, for failing to act will be done at our peril. It is indeed a must to make peace with nature.
