Ojifo-Raphael

Ojifo-Raphael: LET’S CHANGE OUR PARADIGM A speech made in Univer... : A speech made in University of Port Harcourt by OJIFO RAPHAEL UNDIANDEYE, Students’ Union Government Presidential Aspirant, February 2...

A speech made in University of Port Harcourt by OJIFO RAPHAEL UNDIANDEYE, Students’ Union Government Presidential Aspirant, February 2014. THE CHANGE WE’VE ALWAYS HOPED FOR, IS NOW! Dear Friends, We have reached an inflexion point; a moment in our history where our fingerprints on the ballot would determine the future of our government; a moment in which our footprints, on the sands of this university, would determine the future of national and continental leadership. Student’s leadership is undeniably the trustee of societal leadership, and as such, ought to be given premium, not just by those out there, but by us in here. For this very reason, we must not fail to lay our hands on worthy causes which should drive our leadership. It is very clear (and history guides us accordingly) that whatever informs the leadership student’s offer today is that which will certainly drive the leadership they will offer tomorrow. If leadership at this stage of our studentship, is c...

A speech made in University of Port Harcourt by OJIFO RAPHAEL UNDIANDEYE, Students’ Union Government Presidential Aspirant, February 2014. HOPE IS ALL WE NEED NOW! Fellow Comrades, I am speaking to you today because, everywhere in the world today, students’ leadership is determining the direction of national and state development. The national space we live in today is a country of over 150 million people with over 200 universities. It is the second largest economy on the African Continent. Upon independence, it had a per capita income that was larger than that of several Asia-pacific countries and a preferred investment destination. It has always had the potential which is trying to materialise (at best) and hardly materializing (at worse). Nigeria is richly endowed by providence. She is strategically positioned and blessed with a high spectrum of human and material resources and not plagued by the numerous natural disasters like draught, earthquakes, tornadoes, ...

A speech made in University of Port Harcourt by OJIFO RAPHAEL UNDIANDEYE, Students’ Union Government Presidential Aspirant, February 2014. LET’S CHANGE OUR PARADIGM Dear Comrades, Our union-government is experiencing the best of times, and it is in the worst of times. It is in an age of wisdom, it is in an age of foolishness; it is in an epoch of belief, it is in an epoch of incredulity; it is in a season of light, it is in a season of darkness; it is   in the spring of Hope, it is in the winter of despair; it is in the climate of Change, it is the in clime of harmful status quos; it is in the ambience of a needful Paradigm shift, it is in a situation of stagnation; it has everything before it, it has nothing before it; it is   going direct to Heaven, it is going direct the other way. In short, this period is a paradox; the nosiest of times, with the noise propagated by elements who insist that they be received for evil or for good; and the quietest of times, w...

A CRITIQUE ON PLATO’S POLITICS AND EPISTEMOLOGY Plato (428-348 BC) was an ancient Greek Philosopher whose interest spans through Metaphysics, Epistemology, Politics, Ethics, and Dialectics in his search for ultimate reality. He is known in several quarters to be a student of Socrates (470-399 BC) and an older contemporary and teacher of Aristotle(384-322 BC). In spite of his relation with ancient Philosophers, his individualism coloured his assertions in a variety of fields on peculiar grounds. While Socrates had little or no written materials to support his claims, Plato has got some extant publications. And while Aristotle wrote more materials than Plato, his paradigm was more of realistic, scientific, this-worldly, and pragmatic; Plato’s was idealistic, inspiring, other-worldly and perfectionist. It is, therefore from these paradigms I’ll make my critique. First and foremost, the absoluteness of any theory makes the grounds upon which it is examined, questionabl...

I have watched, with particular interest, the Presidential elections going on in the United States, and it appears history is about to repeat itself. In the last political dispensation, Senator John McCain, representing the Grand Old Party (GOP), made several attempts to malign the person of the then Senator Barack Obama instead of facing, squarely, the issues that tended to rumple the American society. Instead of majority of Americans nodding to his criticisms, as McCain had anticipated, they, rather, greeted it by effectively withdrawing their support from him, thus, giving Obama a greater chance of victory, which eventually became the case. From current events, it appears, history will be replicated in a larger scale as the parliamentarians of the GOP are, in the bid to discredit the Obama administration in what they regard as a failure to create employment for Americans, believed to be playing politics with available jobs, by making it artificially unavailable. Now, it is specu...

I have pressing questions that pertains to the sustainability of Nigeria's debt. While I research them out, I would like you guys to have a glimpse of them. (1) How does Nigeria's domestic and Foreign debt stock impact on her sustainability. (2) When does one know that a  State is heading for a debt trap; what are the indications? (3) How does the Eurozone recession, the slowing down of the emerging markets of the Asian-Pacific and snail-speed recovery of the U.S from her own recession impact on the price of crude oil in the Int'l market (as Nigeria is a leading African participant in petroleum trade; and on petroleum lies her mainstay)? (4) How does the above issues affect the Nigerian Economy? The reasons for these questions are these; The FG of Nigeria makes serious plans to borrow loans summing up to $7.9bn from the World Bank, the Islamic Development Bank and sundry financial institutions. Now let me take you back memory lane; Nigeria was granted debt relief in 2005 u...