The Chinese Charming Train was in Nigeria for a 2-day state visit this week, straight from the United States and Morocco, and heading for Kenya. It was such a blessed spectacle to watch President Hu Jintao join the drumming during the airport departure ceremonies in Nairobi. He is a master drummer! Sheer delight.

Of course he had a successful sweep of his tour and must be very pleased with his country's global status, as well as his own rising stature as chief diplomat/salesman. But my particular vote today is for this artistic/cultural side of the great statesman. It is a sign and show of being rooted in the beauty of nature and culture, and sown to the finer aspects of the elevated spirit. Go to China and you will see what I mean. Culture immerses you. Ask Disney World China or MacDonalds or Google or Boeing!

It is why a reporter from an American television network recently asked: "where are the communists?" when he was confronted by the glitz, glamour and openness of Shanghai! Pray, it is why China is developing on its own terms, even as it is set to be the next superpower!

Nepal. And the lessons. If anything can be achieved without wasteful agitations and wanton bloodbath, let's do it. The good news of Palace climb-down was shattered by the military killings in the news today. Pity. But the Maoists' reprieve helped a whole lot. Good sense.

We congratulate and encourage the Nepalese on all sides for the emerging peace pact. Let no party hold back from peace, please. That beautiful compact nation should pull together, and start sensible benefitting from their rich and powerful neighbours - India & China!

When all be finally calm, there should be a Truth Commission to help reconciliation and closure. The security forces should be restructured and made more people-oriented. What we saw on global television was heart-wrenching. You could argue that they were doing their job. Fair. But things got complicated and commonsense should guide commamders in cases like this. It was a "People's Protest". The king cannot rule without a kingdom. Commanders everywhere must be circumspect, and must counsel their principals. The PEOPLE, in a modern world, have the last say. The final say. Nepal must learn this reality. Learn from Thailand!

You know what? I love Constitutional Monarchy! Let the Nepalese find the right model and patiently nurture it. Please, scrap not the mornachy. PLEASE.

Her Majesty is EIGHTY! May the people rejoice. This is a day of blessings and blues. I ask for no choice in them. Let's celebrate! Yes. The Queen is 80! Long live The QUEEN!!!

As I watched the world media fall over themselves to bring us the event, I sense a sensitivity that is absent in most other such coverage: DECORUM. There is a king near India that is being covered this day as well: DERISION. What a media-world apart!

At eighty, and with over fifty years on the throne of her forebears, this queen has put every step right. Huge landmarks. Tested. And tried. She bowed as the casket of Diana, her late very estranged daughter-in-law and the People's Princess, passed her at the state funeral. A decade ago. That footage, that memorable shot, shot the monarchy way up and re-cemented Elizabeth The Second as the People's Queen.

The Queen knows the world has changed. And she is as flexible as they come. Canadians and Australians, for example, can count on her understanding whenever they choose to go fully republican. The birthday celebrations have been remarkable in several ways, in particular as they portray Her Majesty as a healthy, dignified and measured modern-day monarch. The UK should be truly proud of her. So should The Commonwealth of Nations.

Happy Birthday, Your Majesty, and Long Live The Queen!

Let's thank the French Government for knowing its limits and bowing to public opinion recently. By scrapping the anti-youth (some suggest, anti-immigrant) labour law, which makes it easier for employers to hire and fire new employees, the authorities have finally shown that they know the meaning of "people power". Rightly so.

Regrettably, the doomed legislative intervention was not without some contextual merit - not least its goal of opening up the labour market, unshackling employers of labour and making France more competitive - but its core conflict was in the right of the electorate to choose. Lack of prior and adequate consultation, and the poor handling of the immigrants' riots some weeks earlier, killed the intervention and smeared its proponents. Chief losers? The president and his prime minister/heir apparent! The next elections will be a decisive one for Paris. Chances are that the staus quo will be dismantled....swept away. Alignments and realignments be afoot. Was this fiasco avoidable? Wasn't there another way?

Hey, politicians, there are a million ways to kill a pest!

Let someone tell the Nepalese authorities that peace is the way to go, not violence. It will be hard for the King to sustain the Monarchy without the people's wish or against their will. The way the current impasse is coursing, the end might be the King's end - in an "End Royale". Someone needs a retrace of steps, as a "Reteat Royale". It makes early sense rather than waging a multi-faceted war against virtually every segment of the country - politicians, students, women, lawyers, media, etc. If the regional powers don't intervene now, they should be prepared to offer long-term/permanent homes to the King and his followers (as refugees!) in a very short while from now. Nepal will save itself, sooner than later. And those police goons... I shudder. When it be over, let them know that there are reels of media rushes/tv footage as well as reams of newspapers/magazines for human/civil rights crusaders! All dictators better remember this reality. Fixed.

Can EU leaders please tell the Italians to put their house in order!? Why is the Prime Minister yet to end the stalemate by conceding defeat? What is wrong in working for the best image possible for Italy? How can the new government unite the country if this acrimony doesn't give way to "national interest"? Italy must show the way to third world politicians, not act like them! Remember the heroic acts by Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004? They protected US Democracy by not "fighting-to-finish". That was politics at its beauty. By the way, I wonder if they didn't fortuitously hand the Republicans a "poisoned chalice"! Key is they valued America and its image more than their own post and power. Patriots.

Knight Berlusconi is hurting us all. The side-show stopped them from joining the world and the Vatican in celebrating a momentous Easter: One year after the beloved Pope John Paul II, the first anniversary of the distinguished Pope Benedict XVI, and his own 79th birthday. What a way! Power shames much.

Let Italy rise, and arise. Now.

Corporate scandals are sweeping through companies, charities, countries and life-savings in unprecedented styles and sums. It seems we are now in the throes of Corporation Corruption, in tow with Political Corruption - where the players use State Power to grease Corporate Conduits, and vice versa. There is also the worrying trend of ex-politicians taking up juicy corporate positions and deals, which tend to smell compromising or conflicting of national interest. It's a fine line, alright, but one which must be revisited as an international convention matter - a UN Global Thematic. Extant cases under prosecution are bad enough; can we contemplate the incipience of unknown ones!?

The fallout is usually global. Most crisis-ridden corporations worth their news would almost certainly be multinationals. Most of the heinous corrupt practices in the international arena, in particular within developing countries, are midwifed and nurtured by transnational corporations. In some cases, acting even for home governments or their greedy officials and networks. The human rights community as well as Transparency International have been on these issues for long. Limited progress! If we listen to them and act, debt relief would have been unnecessary today.

The West, led by the United States, must now take the lead in this matter. It is commendable that they somehow get the corporate crooks and political fraudsters in their own domains. But the world is now a global village. The frontiers of fraud can hardly be confined to specific territories anymore. As the war against terrorism and drug/human trafficking has entailed, we must spread the dragnet worldwide. The West must ensure the speedy enthronement and successful functioning of the International Corruption Tribunal. Cutting off the global turf from corporate malfeasance will make home-grown anti-corruption crusades more potent and successful. The time to bite the bullet is now. Intransigence no more.

It is also time to start retooling the national mechanisms which facilitate sharp practices and frauds. Countries must now re-examine ALL laws and accounting standards to make them conform to corporate decency, morality and public good. They should be simplified and low-cost. User-friendly. We should, in this regard, further empower both stockholders and stakeholders to help police corporate and social responsibility compliance. Citizen-action should undergird public morality and family values. The world is drifting!

Finally, business, law and diplomacy schools must renew and revamp their curricula for approriate response to this Global Thematic. For example, the COST of peace and poverty should be a mandatory taught course in these institutions and their lower academies. Books and multimedia materials should be produced for his purpose under the auspices of UNESCO and its National Commissions. Research should be free and dispersed, perhaps under Common Licence.

Silence or indifference is no longer an option. The nauseating details of recent corruption scandals oozing out of the West taint its hitherto sterling image, and undermine its capacity to preach or promote transparency and accountability elsewhere. Action is the right and only option. Global Action.

The civil war in Chad is riding the waves of global news. Not for the first time. But now, it seems the rebels are closing in on the government and the seat of governance in Ndjamena, the capital city. President Idriss Deby insists he is incharge, and in control. But the carnage goes on. And the world looks on. Women and children are wasting and the poor masses find no hiding place.

Africa, especially West Africa, is a bad example of tolerance and civil harmony. The war in Sudan reminds us of the Rwandan massacres while the world stood akimbo. Rwanda became the world's worst theatre of genocide in modern times. Sudan is not faring well, today. And the world looks on. The DRC Congo and the Great Lakes region have troubled Africa for long. Angola sucked the continent so much in its own war. And dare we talk of Liberia or Sierra Leone, for which former president Charles Taylor of Liberia now stands trial at the war crimes tribunal? Cote d'Ivoire is unresolved. Guinea is tottering. And the world looks on.

All the talk of debt relief and the ambitious UN Millennium Development Goals are going up in flames before our very eyes. And the world looks on! Isn't a stitch in time worth its value and moral anymore? If the regions fail, is the UN Security Council only about Iran and Iraq? Can't the United Nations act, of its own accord? Is terrorism not finding home in the troubled zones of Somalia or sympathisers in Yemen and elsewhere? Can that not blossom in such other places, in particular war-torn countries? Isn't that more expensive and traumatic? Yet the world looks on.

It seems clear that all these crises are fuelled from both within and without the territories, and the continent. The more resource-endowed a country is, whether explored or not, the more likely it will descend into strife, and even more certain for a ferocious civil war to endure. Then the illegal and criminal exploitation of the territory's resources speeds on. Safe haven and offshore bank accounts will be bursting with investments. And the world looks on. Soon, as in Rwanda, there will be crocodile tears and recontruction grants, and debt relief, etc. The classic and regular "medicine-after-death" response of our hypocritical and incorrigible world.

Chad is the latest theatre. Its government accuses Sudan of plotting its overthrow through the insurgency, a charge flatly denied by Khartoun. Meanwhile, all efforts by the African Union (AU) and Nigerian madiators have yet to succeed. France, the former colonial ruler, has a presence there - obviously to protect its own interests and the current rulers. Chad has recently joined the oil exporting club! It routes its crude through Cameroon, its francophone neighbour.

Let's save time. I believe the Chadian crisis can be solved in one fell swoop if France, Nigeria, Sudan, Cameroon and the African Union agree on a joint action TODAY. If the AU decrees that no neighbour should harbour rebels, and mandates ECOWAS to enforce same, France can leverage the francophonie for the same purpose. Nigeria and Cameroon can provide the security
needed. And all parties will be compelled to commit to peace, or else...

It should be easy to kill the war in Chad. Human lives ( even in Africa!) must not be such free and wanton disposable. Haba. This war must be stopped. It should be done now. Today.

The Charles Taylor saga is now inevitably in the court of the War Crimes Tribunal. But the court of public opinion must have its say. Between the two courts, a million words may play, and many souls may speak. The debate, certainly in Nigeria, is robust and vibrant. Now, the media is agog with news, counter news and allegations with counter theories. Expected.

Summary: African leaders, through Nigeria, decided that Taylor be handed in for his day in court. But remember that he agreed to a deal when he relinguished power to take assylum in Calabar. The parties? African Union, United Nations, United States, European Union, among others. And he was escorted, presidentially, to Abuja by his Brother African Leaders. In fairness to the Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo had said then that he would only return Charles Taylor to his fatherland when there is an elected (and stable?) government in Liberia.

Summary: Nigeria, on behalf of Africa and the International Community, helped to stabilize Liberia through forces, funds, lives and limbs. Being a responsible regional power, it was inevitable. So did it in Sierra Leone, and other nations far and near. The ECOWAS subregion will be dead without Nigeria. But not acting is absolutely no option. Moral? Nigeria's say must match its pay. Then, as Taylor's host, its views must underscore all things Liberia, all clouds Taylor.

Summary: The US stood by as Liberia burnt, despite (at least) its historical ties to Africa's oldest republic. It left the burden to the African neighbours - meaning, Nigeria. From this success, it seeks an undue glory. Now, it pressures the new government and predicates its further assistance on the arrest and trial of Charles Taylor. Import? The poor people of Liberia should make Taylor priority rather than nation-building! Then risk polarisation and even instability!! Moral? America is crying more than the bereaved. But, wait, in all fairness to President Bush, he has never stopped criticising Charles Taylor, asking him to stand down, telling him to leave the country and give peace a chance, and pointedly calling for his trial for war crimes, among others. Indeed using these points as constituting a barrier to America's intervention in the Liberian crisis. Always.

Insinuations: The spiritual father of Charles Taylor has announced that his ward was a pun on the chess board of Nigeria, Liberia and America. He reports that Nigeria tricked Taylor in an escape scheme designed to satisfy the US. They took him to the distant North, travelling all-night, only to release and arrest him on false charges of "fleeing". The presidential spokesman has denied and dismissed the allegations. He insists on the earlier charges, characterising this tale as "figment of his imagination". No matter.

Now how do you comment on this saga which has assumed the status of a running show? Dicey. Which is why I've cast it as above. Okay, I have questions:

a. What is right or wrong in the decisions of African leaders? Should Taylor not face justice, and clear himself? Do we have no confidence in the UN Tribunal?

b. Is the US wrong in seeking Taylor's trial, even if it has its pound of flesh as part-motive? As the world's sole superpower and self-appointed policeman is it out of place?

c. Did Presidents Obasanjo and Johnson-Sirleaf trade Charles Taylor for a mess of White House porridge? Some dollars for Liberia and tenure elongation for Obasanjo?

d. Has Charles Taylor always thought of a future without accountability? Can and should African leaders grant him immunity and or forgiveness? Was he smart or naive, satan or saint?

e. Timing: Right or wrong? Fair on Nigeria? Fair on Liberia? Is Taylor really a top item, right now?

f. Is America hypocritical? With Gitmo and its untried detainees? With its partnership with undemocratic regimes around the globe in the name of national security and war on terror? And its refusal to sign up to the International Criminal Court?

g. Is Africa facing facts and capable of acting firm when it must? Can leaders rule or act with both impunity and immunity?

I believe that Mr Charles Taylor should use the though-disputed opportunity to clear himself, account to Liberians, and shame his distractors. Or pay for his deeds, if so-due. I regret that there is this avoidable early/hasty controversy and mutually contrived suspicions all round. Pity. The US should draw its due lessons from this crisis. The end may not always justify the means. Tough.

African leaders must work with their peoples through their parliaments. If the Taylor case had been so handled, its due process would not be this testy. Nor would the imputed motives. Is the issue rested? Not by a long shot. We wait.