Very good morning to you, and thanks for joining us on the run-up. My name is Nyamgul Agadji, and I'm glad to also have here with me Mr. Bayo Oluwake. Good morning and welcome to the program, sir. Good morning, Nyamgul, and good morning to us. Zizwa, it's nice to be here. It's a very good thing that NIDAVOS is traveling, and I hope that a lot of people with very urgent needs are not traveling on air today, because the news reaching us, I don't know if it has been resolved as we speak, is that the staff of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport have been going on strike, or are on strike, because activities that have been grounded. The staff of Nigerian Aviation Handling Company, PLC, NACO, began a strike action over salary increment today, January 23. The striking members had met with their management on Sunday, January 22, that's yesterday, while the deliberations yielded no tangible results, hence the proceeded with the strike this morning. And I'm just wondering, Bayo, whether problems in Nigeria always have to get to the point of strike, because I know a lot of people might have urgent things, and because you know that internal flight, the highest will be like one hour, you just schedule whatever you have somewhere else, maybe in Abuja, or maybe in Kano or somewhere, knowing that you can go today, only for you to get to the airport, and the staff are on strike, you cannot move, activities are grounded. Why do we always have to resort to strikes? That question is a recurring one, and I'm not too sure that I or any other person outside of those in government will have an answer. I think that strikes are a legitimate weapon to press home certain demands. The question is always, at what point do you initiate a strike? And I think this is where the debate usually lies, but I don't think anybody will disagree that strike is a legitimate weapon, with which to advance or to pursue the collective interest of a professional workforce. Having said that, those who initiate strikes, of course, want to do it at a time when it will have maximum impact, and that is what might explain what has happened today, where people who probably shall look to travel at certain times will find that they are unable to do so because of the impact of a strike. I would wish that the incoming administration would reflect deeply on this particular phenomenon, because we have suffered tremendously from it, especially in the last three years, and trying to create an atmosphere that will engender dialogue and rapprochement, rather than an atmosphere that will be dependent on action being taken only after strikes have been initiated. Yeah, like you said rightly, someone outside government may not be able to answer this question, and that includes you and I, but it just goes to say how people in government possibly think, because, for instance, today we're still hearing problems between ASU and the federal government, and it's not because there were no dialogues, but because there were dialogues, and they came to a conclusion. Since 2009, that's 14 years, 2009, so now, till now, these things have not been concluded, and so when you deliberate, and it gets to a point where you have resolutions from a deliberation, and then these resolutions are not kept, they are not implemented, then how can we even blame the people who are on strike? But this brings me to another issue. Just this morning, Konwa, which is a breakaway faction from ASU, is also demanding that they pay them some of the monies that they were supposed to pay them and they have not paid, and ASU, on the other hand, is also demanding that they be paid, even for the months that they supposedly did not work. So now, ASU is talking about the fact that they are being threatened by the federal government, that they might be scrapped, because there's a Konwa now with federal government registered to more or less fight ASU. But instead of Konwa being the solution, it's now like it's a duplicity of the problems for government. So does it give you any worry, any cost to worry as to how the reasoning of people in government is?  Why do they think the way they think? I don't know if you've had a taste of government to know how the bug bites when you go into government. Well, I was briefly in government, but not at the federal level. You were not at the federal level. Now, what I would say is that, you see, when these things happen, in my humble opinion, we oftentimes don't get the whole picture of what is happening. We get the picture that each of the parties wants the public to get, and that's what goes into the media. And I also think, I mean, if I digress, for instance, sometimes you hear the sports association in Nigeria come out and say a particular embassy has denied our athletes or the visa to any of these are to enable them to participate at an international event.  In other words, the stipulated number of days within which you have to apply for your visa application process to become completed. So I just use that as an example, because I know that does happen from time to time to the question of a party that is negotiating with another party. It is sometimes what the parties want us to know that we know. And to that extent, to be quite honest and with great respect, it's sometimes very difficult to engage in proper analysis of what is happening. For me, what is not in doubt is that, and I don't want to revisit this, because I have said before the program, there are so many issues involving our education system. ASU is just one symptom. And when we are talking of ASU, we're talking of universities, and when we are talking of universities, we recognize that universities are owned by three different categories of proprietors. You have the federal government, you have the state government, and you have private institutions. And then you want to negotiate with one of those three to gain an agreement that will be binding on all the three. So for me, from a democratic standpoint, I find that quite interesting and intriguing, but I will not go for that because these are very emotive issues and very sentimental issues. The only ally to that would be the question of how you go and strike and almost entirely destroy the career of a generation of students. Regardless of how legitimate your things are, I believe that in the 21st century, and if we are intellectuals, we should be able to find other ways to drive over our funds. Now, this does not, in any way detract from your question, which says that even Konoa that has been established is already having some issues. And I think we will continue to have these issues unless, at the negotiating level, in my humble opinion, all the owners of universities are involved in the negotiation. Because if I own a university and you go and agree with another party and you expect me to comply and to pay what I probably will not be able to pay, we will keep having a protracted problem. You will be going around in circles. You have already some state governments threatening at the point that they are not going to be able to pay their own universities what the federal government was about to reach with us. So, there are so many issues. I'm not saying these are the main reasons and I'm not saying that's a reasonable point. I'm just saying that today all parties to any kind of dispute must come first of all in an open and transparent way and try to address these things in a holistic manner rather than this piecemeal approach, which will keep seeing us going around in circles. But I hope it won't be like France where the unions totally control everything. Well, the key statement is that transparency that you're talking about. Let's just get to that point where government will be transparent enough so that anybody who is lying against them or trying to blackmail the government or the information will be in public glare. All of us will know about what is going on. And now, when government tells you they have consulted widely, you begin to ask yourself who did they consult? Because we've seen a lot of things that the consultation led to pronouncements that they made and the real quarters that consultations should have been made will come out and deny. For instance, the presidency has said that the Mohammed Buhari, the president of Nigeria, did not give any sanction for the increment of PMS in our country. But it went ahead and it is being increased in very many quarters. They talked about removal of subsidy last year and the president said he knew nothing about that and so many other things. And you tell us that you've consulted and who did you consult? You didn't consult the authorities that should be consulted. You didn't consult the people that should be consulted. And then you're talking about consultation. I just hope that we'll get to that point where we don't have to use our flashlights to look for the information regarding anything that is happening in our policy. And also, I hope that we get to the point where we don't have to have a gridlock on our roads in Lagos anytime the president visits. I don't know how it is in your own axis, but this morning when I came to work very early, I think everybody had a travel advisory that yesterday, so they moved very early. So I said 5.30, 6.00 o'clock that the roads are usually a bit free. Today it was clocked. Was it the same thing in your axis?  I'm stuck where I am. But I mean, this also speaks to some of these things we keep talking about on the run-off, hoping that whoever comes in or the next set of elected leaders are keeping all of these things in mind and are going to be doing something about it. I think we need to begin to call the respective agencies of government to order. And I mean the media. If the presidency said it did not issue an increase, a directive or support the increase in the cost of PMS, premium motor spirit, which is known as petrol. That for me, as somebody who analyzes things, that for me will be correct. But did the Ministry of Petroleum issue that directive? So the Ministry of Petroleum is part of the government, is an arm of the government. So the presidency might say we didn't issue any directive, but it's silent on whether the Ministry of Information did. So we should ask the Ministry of Information, did you issue that directive? As the media, we need to ask the Ministry. Because if they said the government has not issued the directive, then that's serious. But it says the presidency did not issue the directive. This could be correct or it may not be. But did the Ministry of Petroleum resources issue the directive? So the spokesperson of the Ministry should tell us, the minister of state, Mr. Timmy Greer-Silver, should tell us. So we as the media, we really need to interrogate those things and we need to go beyond that. Okay, the presidency has made a statement fine. But we go beyond that. So who might have issued that directive? Because the petrol stations will not dare increase the pump price. We know that this is Nigeria. You don't increase the pump price. There has not been an official condition for you to do so. Because it's related to subsidy and subsidy is paid by the government. So you cannot unilaterally sell at the price and then demand that subsidy be given to you for that price. You get what I'm saying? Okay, well, I am glad at least that in all our cry on the run-up and other programs that we do, talking about the fact that we need to have pride in our own thing. And we talked about the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs that that should have been a Chatham House. And we talked extensively about that and said there was absolutely no need to go to Chatham House by anybody because it wasn't really to talk about a foreign policy which we are supposed to address today, part of it. And some people, I'm glad to hear, are beginning to recognize the fact that we have something really, really good in Nigeria and they want to go to the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs and give us what they think is in their heart that they can use to make Nigeria better. So we're encouraging every other person anytime you have to talk to Nigerians, look for an Nigerian outlet that you can talk to us and we will be happy to listen to you. But today, our focus is not on the things that we've just talked about. We've talked about the fact that some people are on strike and they shouldn't always be that today. And a few days after, we will be focusing on foreign policy and the new government. Foreign policy, as we know, implicates how a country projects its cloud, influence, leverage, soft or hard, power at the global stage in a manner which meets its singular national interests or interests, or indeed the collective national interests of their light states. Nigeria undoubtedly occupies a central place in the economic community of West African states we know as Ekoas. Nigeria's capital houses both the headquarters and the parliament of Ekoas and this is understandable because over 50% of the Ekoas population live in Nigeria.  Nigeria's GDP is larger than that of the combined GDP of all other Ekoas states put together. Today, like I said, we will be assessing Ekoas relevance to Nigeria in an era of dwindling national economy with a new government coming. We're hoping after February 25th we're going to have a new government that we'll be waiting to be sworn in on May 29th. But we'll take a quick break now when we return its foreign policy and the next government. Stay with us. You're welcome back. It's still the run-up. We said we're going to be talking about the foreign policy and especially as it relates to Ekoas and Nigeria relationship. The Nigerian federal government has paid 100,324,011.33 dollars to the economic community of West African states, that is, Ekoas, as a community levy for last year. Despite Nigeria's larger-than-life financial contributions to Ekoas, the country and its citizens have not benefited immensely, or at least that is how it seemed to be. How can the new government better Ekoas contribution to Nigeria? And already you know that I have here with me Mr. Adebayo Oluwake. Even though he's been on the program all the time, today he is here as the Principal Research Fellow African Resource Development Centre. Once again, I'd like to say welcome to you, Mr. Oluwake. Thank you, Ambul. So you're giving me two hearts. I'm wearing two hearts. Okay. Yeah. Let's begin with Ekoas. You know, Ekoas came to being economic community of West African states. We were hearing about that from when we were little. So let's begin to just find out why it was formed. Let's begin with that. Okay. Ekoas, the economic community of West African states, was established in 1974. The principal architects of the formation of Ekoas were General Yasinbe Ayadema of Tugu and General Yakubu Governor of Nigeria. Now, some analysts have suggested that the formation of Ekoas was a result of, was a culmination of the actualization of the experiences of Nigeria during her unfortunate civil war. And what do they mean by that? During the Nigerian civil war, France, that was then led by President Charles Tugol, wanted all Francophone countries to recognize the Republic of Diatra. And he would acknowledge that at that time, and maybe reasonably up till now, the metropolitan French power has significant influence over its former colonies. And so people expected that all those former French territories would immediately recognize Diatra. Strangely, it was only Kondroboa, under the late President Huffabwaini, who recognized Diatra. The rest of the Francophone countries totally refused, and rather supported the indivisibility of the Federation of Nigeria and its territorial integrity. That was a big lesson for the Nigerian political elite, and they never forgot that. And not a few people have suggested that had the Francophone countries gone ahead to recognize Diatra, the outcome of the Nigerian civil war might have been completely different. And so at the end of the war, the government of Nigeria took steps to consolidate relationship with our neighbors. And it is within that spirit that an economic integration plan, which is expressed in ecobas manifested. And President Yasinpe Ayadema was a very prime supporter of that movement. And then we saw the emergence of ecobas. Don't forget also that before ecobas was established, there had been a union of Francophone West African states, which had been existing, and which was largely also predicated on the common currency, the safer common currency of the Francophone countries, which was backed by France. So some people even suggested that, okay, despite the fact that the Francophone countries supported Nigeria, then nonetheless, ecobas had no future because the Francophone countries would pay more allegiance to the survival of their own union and the common currency that was tied to that. But today we know that it's a complete different scenario. So this was what led to the establishment of ecobas. And the idea was to bring proper to harness the commonalities between us as people of the same subregion. Incidentally, we have cultural and ethnic ties despite the artificial colonial boundaries. And I think those two have actually manifested more and have strengthened ecobas. I will just quickly add, you asked a question at the beginning as to whether Nigeria, despite paying over 100 million dollars, as its own community deals for last year, have actually benefited from ecobas. I would say that all ecobas countries have benefited significantly from ecobas. And we need to, I mean, we need to begin to look at what we mean by that. Ecobas is the first political union or union of states in recent time to introduce free movement of persons. Many people will not know that ecobas introduced free visa movement even before Schengen. Even before Schengen, ecobas already had its community citizens to travel to each other's countries and stay for three months without the visa. And that has simply been followed up with the ecobas passport. So this is not the focus of the discussion at this moment, but I can tell you that there are so many, many, many benefits that ecobas has provided for its community citizens. And ecobas today is recognized as the most integrated union of its type in the world. And ecobas is the first sub-region in the world to launch a pacific resolution of conflict by deploying its own peacekeeping force. And not only that, the peacekeeping force of ecobas became the very first peacekeeping force in the world to actually deploy peace enforcement operations. What the United Nations regards as chapter seven operations. At the time ecobas deployed changed from white helmets to green helmets in Liberia to drive the NPFL out of Mongolia, which was peace enforcement. Even the United Nations peacekeeping system had never, had never ever deployed a chapter seven mission. So the UN itself came to understudy the chapter seven deployment of ecobas forces when they converted from white helmet operations to green helmet operations and forced the national patriotic point of Liberia away from Mongolia to Banga. But even before then at the very deployment of what was called operation liberty, which was which saw Nigeria's NNS and Bay deploying to one extricate tract refugees in Liberia. The ecobas operation when that was deployed in 1990 was the first ever peace enforcement operation in the world. So it's going to be inaccurate to suggest that ecobas has done so well in many things, but there are also a lot of areas that people need to focus in. Okay, like you said, the focus of this discussion is to actually look at the gains of ecobas and what the next government should do and all that. But, you know, as we say in our, in our Anthem, the hero, the labor of our hero's past shall never go in vain. Now the thing is sometimes we lose sense of history. We don't know the struggles that were put into a particular thing, the formation of a particular thing to give us some kind of peace that we have right now. For instance, when Goan talked about the three ours that give birth to NYSC, some people may lose the sense of history, why that came to be for reconciliation, for rehabilitation, and every other thing. So until, yeah, until they hear what really happened. Now in the formative years of ecobas, there must have been, like you were talking about the Francophone countries, not recognizing Biafra and all that, but there may have been some, some rivalry between the Anglophone countries and the Francophone countries until they came to a consensus where we have the kind of ecobas that we have now. Okay, so can you throw more light on if there was any kind of rivalry between these countries that made us to arrive where we are now? We are absolutely spot on young group. There were rivalries and very acute rivalries of that. You know, the arrowhead of, if you like, the arrowhead of opposition to the formation of ecobas was called the Boa, under President Bufun Gwaini. Okay, and fortunately for those who were pushing for ecobas, they also had a very influential in Francophone West Africa, and that's the late President Ahmad Secuturi of Guinea. You see, President Secuturi of Guinea was very pragmatic, and this could be a function of the way Guinea itself became independent, because when Ghana became independent, Guinea also requested France to grant it independence, and then President Strasbourg was very annoyed, you know, that Guinea wanted independence. And I won't go too much into history, but chance to go was somebody who emasculated the parliament in France, because usually whenever he wanted something passionately done, being a war hero who was very well respected by the French people, he would say let's go and have a referendum, and he would always win the referendum, and he would make the French parliament irrelevant. So President Chance de Gaulle reported it to Secuturi and said let us have a referendum, and let's see if your people will even support you for independence. Strangely, Chance de Gaulle lost that referendum. President Secuturi won, and so Guinea became independent, and when Guinea became independent, France removed all the infrastructure it had put in Guinea, telephone poles, electrical lines, everything was occluded. But guess what? Ghana came to the rescue of Guinea. Ghana replaced all of those things, and so Guinea forged a very close relink with Anglophone West Africa, okay? And over the years, when you look at the foreign policy orientation of Guinea, especially on that present Atman Secuturi, it was always in the direction of Anglophone West Africa. So Secuturi successfully checked with Guinea, and consolidated the support of President Atman, who is also from French Togo, you know, to support the initiative that General Gohan was pushing. And so Iqours was able to overcome that initial, you know, acute rivalry, which could have scuttled this formation at infancy. So, I would say pragmatism prevailed, you know, rather than Anglophone or Francophone West Africa. But the reality was that the rival is there. Okay, we'll go into specifics about the journey so far of Iqours. But in your opinion, in which administration, let's go to administrations now, since the return of democracy at least, in which administration do you think Iqours has played the greatest role? Either Iqours playing the greatest role in Nigeria or Nigeria playing the greatest role in Iqours, as the case may be, because we need to begin to see our relationship with Iqours, what it can bring to Nigeria, so that when the next administration is coming in, they will do more or it will do more to make sure that this relationship continues and even taken a notch higher. Yes, I think that to be quite honest, I think all the leaders of Iqours countries, when they came to realize the potential of that so- that we call the regional economy community, right? When they came to see the potential of Iqours, okay, they all began to give their support. But the crystallization of that came during the Liberian Civil War. In 1990, the focus was on the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The United Nations and everybody was focused on that. Yet we had this deadly civil war unfolding in Liberia, where citizens of West African states were being killed in huge numbers. And we had a refugee influx into Guinea, refugee influx into Ghana, and you remember very well, we had the Ohu refugee camp in states in Nigeria, which was also a huge influx of Liberian refugees into Nigeria. So the international community was not going to come to Liberia because they were fixated on what was happening between Iraq and Kuwait. And West African leaders stepped up their game. And all the things I told, I said earlier, in the inception of the program, about the achievements of Iqours, even despite the initial difficulties and shortcomings and weaknesses of Iqour, which is the Iqours monitoring group, it still went ahead to do some start-up events. Now, I think during the presidency of President Babas on job, and you and I discussed this last week on one of the editions of the program, the presidency of President Babas, President Tabun Baki of South Africa refined the African Union, so to speak. But we're talking about that today. But what I'm mentioning this is because within the spirit of the integration of the African continent, which is the very basis of Nepal, the new technology for Africa's development, we saw Iqours being directly initially, because it was during this period that the Iqours passport came out. It was during this period that the Iqours not of justice was established. It was during this period that the Iqours parliament was established. And it was also during this period that the Iqours central bank was established. So these achievements and successes came and Iqours, actually because it already had a track record, it already had a structure, was always able to implement faster than the other regional bodies, right, you know, faster than the Southern African Development Community, or the East African Community, or even the Central African Customs Union in Central Africa. So Iqours used its framework, its experience, its track record, and its core of skilled technocrats who have been drilled and trained over the years to be able to actualize all these things faster. Even the Iqours passport we are talking about, Iqours was the first subregion in Africa to have a community passport. So I think this happened between 1999 and 2007. The leadership of the subregion within that period all played a significant role. And let us not forget the role also of Captain Thomas Sankara, head of state of Bokina Faso, who also was able to mobilize because of his youthfulness, out of the box approach, was actually able to inspire a lot of youths in the West African community and had his own perspective and ideas about how Iqours could move faster. So I think this period could be regarded as the, there's a word I'm looking for now, you know, the real cool period, if you like, in the language of today's young people. I think this would be the real cool period of Iqours. You know, you had the traditionalist Iqours leaders and how they were doing things. I had the young Thomas Sankara, the Jerry Rollins, you know, approach to doing things. And when all of those were married together, we saw Iqours moving so rapidly. So I think this would be the golden years. Now that's the face I was looking for. This would be the golden years of the economic community of West African states. But do you think now that it seems as if feet have been dragged when it comes to relating with Iqours, it is hindering our progress here in Nigeria? Do you think, because some people will argue that there's a thin line between trying to work as a communion and then letting external influences come into your policies and everything that you're doing in your country? Do you think a divorce from Iqours or just a relationship that is not that strong with Iqours will lead to an underdevelopment of the component countries, especially like Nigeria? Absolutely, absolutely. I'm a firm believer in Iqours, not just Iqours, I'm a firm believer in integration approaches, not just in Africa but all over the world. And if you look, why are we talking of the European Union today? Because when you come together, you can actually bargain better. You can deploy your resources, you can deploy your advantages, and you can negotiate from a stronger position. But if you're negotiating in the international arena, you know, singularly, you are not as strong as if you would be able to do so, if you could do so multilaterally or even bilaterally or trilaterally. So if you come back to Iqours, you would find out that if you talk about social integration, don't forget that most of our Iqours citizens are the same. If you look, you have houses in Nigeria, you have houses in Benin Republic, you have houses in Ghana. If you look at Yoruba's, you have Yoruba's in Nigeria, you have Yoruba's in Benin, you have Yoruba's in Togo, you have cousins of Yoruba's up to Côte d'Ivoire, okay? If you look in the east, between Aqaibom and Cross River, they have relatives in Cameroon, in Central Africa, although Central or Cameroon is not an Aqours country. I'm just using this as an illustration. So we had all suffered from colonially imposed boundaries. Many Nigerians will not know that as early as 30 years ago, if you wanted to travel to Benin Republic by air, you might have had to, first of all, fly to Paris. But these are things that Iqours has abolished, the construction of the road through Seme and through Ota, Idiruku, into Benin. The Idiruku road had been there for a long time, but Seme, but that was the first modern highway, which caught the distance. Even if you are going all the way to Ghana, many Nigerians used that road. These are some of the benefits for our citizens to see their relatives. People in Badakri, they have relatives in Benin Republic, they have relatives maybe up to Tobu. So Iqours was able to ensure social integration at the cultural and ethnic level. If you look at economics, not many Nigerians would know that we have a lot of companies in Ota Axis, manufacturing pharmaceuticals. And these companies actually manufacture pharmaceuticals, not only for Nigeria, but for the entire Iqours region. If you buy their produce, and I will mention their names, if you buy the products of these drug manufacturing companies, you would see that the inscriptions on those packets are in English and French. It is because they produce, not just for Nigeria, but they produce for the entire Iqours region. And so that is one of the benefits here. We harness economy of scale. If you can do something better in one Iqours country, there's no need to replicate in others. Just produce there and yourself. And the Iqours protocol allows for that. And I think it was the abuse of that Iqours protocol that some few years ago led to Nigeria closing its borders in an attempt to enforce respect for that protocol. So there are a lot of benefits. Then if you talk of peace and security, Iqours was the first. What the South Africans, Southern Africans have not only been able to do in Mozambique to deploy a community military force into Mozambique. They were able to do because of the Iqours experience. Iqours deployed into Liberia, Iqoumog 1, deployed into Sierra Lone, Iqoumog 2, deployed into Côte d'Ivoire, Iqoumisi. And this is interesting because not only did Côte d'Ivoire want to, not only did she wanted to frustrate Iqoumog, she also wanted to frustrate Iqoumog. But guess what? Côte d'Ivoire itself, you may have the talks between President Alassane Watara and former President Laurent Baku, Côte d'Ivoire itself became the beneficiary of Iqoumog. Iqoumisi was established. That is Iqoumog's mission in Côte d'Ivoire to go and maintain peace in Côte d'Ivoire, which had in the years past of course Iqoumog and Iqoumog. And then you had Iqoumog in the Gambia, which is the most recent when President Yaya Jami, who had lost that election and conceded, changed his mind and decided he was not leaving. And then Iqoumog deployed Iqoumog, Iqoumog's mission in Gambia. These are all pacific instruments that no other subregion in the world has been able to deploy in its frequency and given the scope of its impact. So Iqoumog has had all these benefits to its own citizens. But like I said, there are many, many areas where Iqoumog should also be moving. For example, innovation, technology. Okay, Bayo, just a moment, Bayo. I'd like us to just take a short break. It is said that if you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go with others. So that means standing alone is not beneficial at all because sometimes, all the time you need someone and some other people to be there with you. That possibly is the role that Iqoumog is playing in the subregion. But when we come back, we'll just look very closely at what the next administration needs to do specifically, how to grow that relationship with Iqoumog for the benefit of Nigeria. Because we're talking foreign policy and whatever will be beneficial to Nigeria is what we are looking at. And also what will be beneficial to Iqoumog because Nigeria is the giant of Africa and is like the perpetual leader of Iqoumog. So we should be looking out for our brothers as well that may not be as big as we are. But we'll take that very short break and when we return, we'll talk on that. You're welcome back. It's still the run-up and we're talking foreign policy today. We zeroed in on Iqoumog as a group. And we're looking at how we can tap into that and even exploit it, if I may use the word, for the benefit of Nigeria because foreign policy has to do with what you intend to get by relating with every other person, every other country, whether in Africa, whether in the world, what benefit will it have to us or for us. And we're looking at Iqoumog today and what the next government must do to oil that relationship and take even Iqoumog as a whole to the next level. I still have Mr. Adebayo Loa K, Principal Research Fellow, African Resource Development Center here with me, and we're talking just that. So, Bio, let me come back to you. The next government, God willing, May 29 will have the next government. I don't even want the election to go into a run-up or a, what do they call it, a tie that they will have to do. But I'm calling the run-up. Yeah. Let the run-up remain at the run-up level in plus TV Africa. But right now, what must the next government do? Because if we are saying, when I asked you the question of when you thought the golden age, that's the word you used, was, and you said Obasanjo's time. Obasanjo's time was so long ago. We've had administrations in between. So, the next government should make sure that we get back to the golden age and maybe surpass it to whatever age is more than the golden age, if that is possible. So, what are the issues, what are the things to be looked into as we go into the next political era, as it were, when we get to that point? Okay. I think first of all, and this is a very good question. Thank you. I think first of all, you need a layer of intelligence. You need a core of intelligence who can advise the government. Okay. We, we, it's strange, and this is very strange. We have the best under the military. I know many who don't want to hear that, but it is factual. The Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, under the Murita Laoban Sundari administration, was the architect of the, what later came to be the dynamic foreign policy, which saw the, the, the liberation of several Southern African states. So, what that means is that you need an intellectual component of actually everything the government is going to do. And for foreign policy, there can be no exception. So, the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, the various political science and international relations, the partners of the universities, they need to be encouraged, they need to be empowered, they need to be motivated. So, actually engage in research to come up with policy papers that will guide that government based on what the orientation of that government is foreign policy wise. That's the first thing the next president needs to be doing. The second thing is that we have seemingly, we have seemingly given much more to echo us than our community partners. Okay, some might argue and say, well, it is because you are the biggest, you have the biggest population, you are more endowed. True. But I believe that our community partners can also be needed to give more. Not the way President Trump tried to get native members to, to give, you know, but in some sort of a sort of democratic and win-win, you know, orientation to get them to do more for the South region. And then the next president needs to be looking at how can we in concrete terms better protect the interests of our community citizens within the echo us arrangement. And what am I saying this? We've had issues of Nigerian small scale business people, entrepreneurs being harassed in some countries in the echo us sub region, right? And especially with Ghana, and this is, this is a fact, as I think we can actually mention that there was a very big issue with Ghana and both governments were talking. But the truth is if you talk to many Nigerian small scale entrepreneurs, they would tell me that they do not feel protected by our political elites within the echo us when they are doing business in the echo us region. So the next president of Nigeria really needs to look at what exactly are those problems that often arise between our small scale enter entrepreneurs across echo us region and then find ways of resolving those problems so that they do not keep recurring, you know, and if we have to say to our community partners, look guys, we've done XYZ. If you keep doing this to our people, we are sorry, we are just not going to be, there are ways you send such messages in diplomatic terms. So I believe the next president really needs to be looking at those. And lastly, the capacity industrial capacity utilization of Nigeria, which has gone down so much, you know, our factories in Nigeria were producing for West Africa, you know, we have the largest concentration of factories. And when our factories go down, we lose the market we have built up in the echo us region. And if our factories are coming up, we may not be able to get that again. We have had businesses in Nigeria that reportedly relocated outside of Nigeria to other echo us countries. I would expect that since we have the largest market, the next president of Nigeria should ensure that he can create the environment for those businesses to return to Nigeria. And not despite that, still ensure that other echo us states can benefit from their products and services. Okay, thank you very much. We'll have to put a stop to it at this point so that we can bring the news. And after the news, if there's areas to clean up, we are going to clean up. Thank you very much bio for now. We're going to take this break and bring you the news at midday. And after that, we will round off the program. Stay with us.


Hello, everybody.  They call me Superhost Miss Kithinji and on set I am joined by... Rich girl is Jackson. Edibu Tita is my name. Ian official. All right, now this is where all feelings are represented. Today's topic of discussion is about Valentine's. The red month, you know where we get to celebrate love. We get to show our loved ones, you know, a lot of affection. On my side eye, I can see the men are looking at me some kind of way. So we want to discuss is celebrating Valentine's valids and also all other events that come with the relationships. Do we need to celebrate these things? What is Valentine's? Nisi kuya wapenzi ya wapenda now? Haya. Do you know how Valentine's came in? Tell me. No, you tell us. No, you tell me. Because what to celebrate with what I was doing. Valentine's, I think in a story in Skiyanga, kuna demflani alikwagam rogi. Nisi sasa heo na jubu. Kokeo na jubu. Nisi ni story ko. So de ma alikwagam rogi, I think ni kitambo kitambo. Njepi o alami wala kwa na believe na isoma vitu, before CC. Bidae wala kwa gaya. So I think ni kwa na celebriti yo haa. Ni kitumba wala ni kitu negative. Epi mimi iritsaki ni lidu. Valentine's ni ka kazi nia haluin haluini ewi. Eh, ni kituia satanix, hindi yo. Eh, that's why na kwa nga red juya damu, na juyaivo. That's why, Valentine's ni red juya damu, actually. So he namaik sense. Na na na na na na na. Na majami ni liyanzaku juya hen, ni liyanza kwa observu asifu patiwa Valentine's treat. We are moving away from these people What are your thoughts about celebrating Valentine's Day? Celebrating Valentine's Day is very important First because my love language is All occasions in our relationship should be special So that is starting from our anniversary I would want us to celebrate our anniversary If it is Valentine's Day, like wake me up With roses and chocolates Thank you very much Baby don't cook today, I got you And then you know you take me out Massage nini nini It should be a day where I would gift my man Definitely But if my man treats me Very special and I buy him my gifts nini Especially because my love language is gifts So that's a special day To actually show me how much you love me So it is very important to me For me it's a deal breaker If you don't celebrate Valentine's and these love occasions You are not my type And I do not want you Thank you I'm just curious What is your name? My name is Glatonas My name is Glatonas What is your name? My name is Hiki What is your name? My name is Kitiot What is your name? What is your name? My name is U.S.I.U. What is your name? My name is Klaasre What is your name? My name is Elewi What is your name? My name is Umpendao What is your name? Out Love language, roses, chocolates In the morning In there? What is your program? Ameyamka Fila was up on breakfast in bed Ya, exactly Aru jafuka sasa, but jafuka jiyo Badu kuna programming gini Ok, atongele watu enyoko kwa situationships Guys, we are talking about people who are in committed relationships Yes, if you are in a committed relationship as my man I expect you to celebrate with me Valentine's Day Because this is the day you get to show me affection You know we renew our love words And if it is my love language and you are committed to spoiling me As your girlfriend, as your queen You will definitely celebrate me And it's the small things that matter We are not even saying that So let's go to Maldives Ok, atu jakata kuenda But it is the small things that matter In celebrating your spouse Your girlfriend, someone you love As you say, small things The small things that matter Ki katwa deki on a choralain Hi Misi jwis, ya ukelu, ukelu, ukeli Akunas kuna shikangu anu singi zika na skwe Valentine's Nasi jwis shetani ni Misa moja na jipata ga Atani kwa pa?  Where am I kwa? Uka ni moa You invested in the wrong person You invested in the wrong person We are talking about committed relationships If this is your girl should be very appreciative As a lover boy I spoil someone every day Take care of them So I don't understand why it only happens one day You go an extra mile because you love this person If put it on you can make it Who said Valentine is a girl thing? It's not a girl thing It's a lover thing Two years ago What do you get? I have said Me if I I will always learn And probably my man's love language is not gifting and it is not occasion So that day it's a midday So him Usha iwi baya mo na ma gift What's the most expensive gift I did a whole birthday for him Like Kwa jahata Ah, tu biya Kwa jahata fact that kuna keki E ma nisi guna birthday Keki na na Keki na wimbo kwa Bluetooth He doesn't say we to write a birthday Jume kasa mu na No na I did a whole birthday na me baitu keki mo haja Me li kwa campus Nika sacrifice Nika sacrifice pocket ma ni mamangwa li kwa me ni pay 3,000 Kenyan shile So mamakon ga ni bidu birthday Mamakon dole fani o birthday Pesas ni mi li payo mi ni bidu bagi Angoja Uli sacrifice po sangapi 3,000 3,000 5 years ago 5 years ago 5 years ago Bidu mamakwa kupendi Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Nene Tamuwa kuhishawenu sa kawatazu pukaheri wa nere Ya Hawa naka kwa na na wa habi ©inatu yo za wuma wa ngecuhia wa kama Findu wikula kuhu kwa haizia Asa, k甚麼 kwa kumama ya k PlayStation kwa wha haizia kwa w كل kwa wala yukubise kwa wala kwa kwekubii kwa kwekubi kwa kwa kuseldja kama kukesu kwa kwa kusa kaku torso kolina kwa kuh unitsha kwa kuseldja kwa kwa kuseldja kwa kuseldja korwe y sneha So nalazimu umpea attention So bat attention Naka maa pia love language ya kaini gifting Then why not? In return, I've given you all that Do you guys put an extra effort when it comes to your men on Valentine's Day? Socks too? What's the most expensive gift you have? I don't have 18 prizes Socks are 50 Bob I've gotten something really good Let's not put prizes on it But I've got something really good Socks are 50 Bob Anyway, it's about the money It's about the small things Small things? Small things Small things I've got a box of small things Well, package The effort So come on, I've got something really good Trust me, I will appreciate it So you've got something really good Yeah, it's about money You love a person the way they want to be loved Butita, you don't love people the way you love I've got a box of small things I've got 2 weeks I've got a surprise for you So you've got a surprise Yes, at least I've got a surprise for you Nasi umpea attention So you've got a surprise So this Valentine I've got 2 ways to say it But you've got priorities I've got environmental day I've got a plan I've got a plan I've got a climate I've got energy Exactly my same thing I've got environmental day I've got a plan I've got environmental day I've got environmental day I've got environmental day I've got a plan That's how insignificant As a matter of fact I think Valentine's Day should be taxed Yes, because that is a special thing When you pay a gift you can't pay it for the information that you received You can't pay it for the file I've got a plan But I've got a plan I've got a plan It's a place You know something Love alone is not enough to save a relationship you need to spice it up Valentine's Day is spicing up your relationship Iike your doing things out of the norm I am used to me making breakfast But you on Valentine's Day you make up at 5 am and make me breakfast so it's the extra sacrifice that counts according to the dealer Kupa Holdon Kaka uza recently and exa in sach音 Ume titu wa bali ufizi valentine wa kwa beti kwa una kwa mapo Nifili apo SPM akun na nyota ya mapezi Apo SPM ten na nyota ya mapezi li Uma sayet ritu wa? Eee Kwa nu maangali a kando?   I'm not at TV yet, I'm sitting at 65 Um, where're you going after the misfortune, you are fine We're men who buy that effortlessly because they're valid We're men who get really sick Hey Liz Jackson, you guys on Valentine's Chiano ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya ya Please President Williamsいると, Tax Valentine's Please It's going to come to the men that live or not Thank you guys for watching a real life podcast right here on SPM Buzz Until next time, good bye from us


All right, Scott, you ready? All set. All right. I'll call them in in order at six, and at this point, you'll go to public comment. If there's anyone in the room who has any public comment, this is the time to make it. Yes, why don't you come up to the table and introduce yourself? My name is Al Sannickle. I'm with Allen Book Development. I'm not really a great public speaker, so I'm a little nervous right now. I put together a letter, and I'll leave you copies of it, but I wanted to take maybe three to five minutes to read it so that you could get it from my perspective. Maybe. Sure. I'll sit there, okay. And this is just a letter to try to explain to you folks that I really do want to work with the town on this form-based code stuff. And I know I've submitted a few letters, and I've been to a lot of the meetings, and I'm pretty involved in it, but anyway, make a long story short, I'll read it. Dear Select Board members, I would like to figure out a way to donate some land to the town of Williston for a park. Unfortunately, no one is really listening to me. Instead, the town of Williston is creating maps that take land from me. I want to work together with the town, and I do want the town to dedicate to me what land I own and what land I no longer own. I don't know if I read that right, but anyway, I'll let you read this letter afterwards. I think the town is more likely to achieve its own objectives more quickly and more economically by working with me, rather than spending its time passing more and more restrictions on land in the town of Williston. As you might have guessed, I am frustrated with the form-based code review process. I have a long record of working with towns to achieve a mutual, agreeable outcome. Over the past several decades, I have routinely worked with a number of municipalities in a positive and collaborative approach to development planning. My goal is to always find a mutual beneficial result for both parties. Unfortunately, I have not seen much collaboration in the form-based code review, and many legitimate questions and concerns for me and others have simply been ignored or cast aside in what feels like a rushed effort to adopt the latest plant fashion trend. While the town has listened to developers, it has not actually changed anything with how it is approaching the form-based code. Instead it is simply adopting and recommending of its paid consultant without change. To be clear, I am not opposed to either the form-based code or donating land to the municipality for a park as part of a development plan. In fact, in my collaborative work with the town of Essex at Saxon Hill Industrial Park, I worked closely with the town on a development plan that ultimately involved the donation of over 230 acres of land with connecting trails easements for a town park. The process involved a number of meetings to discuss and negotiate the future development layout of our property in a good faith manner that was beneficial for both the owner and the town. I take pride in my ability to work collaboratively with the municipalities and make, in my recent work with leaders in Essex speaks not only the respectful and professional way that we worked through the issues, but also to the goodwill and continued success of both parties following that negotiation. For it is the goodwill created by collaboration that fuels future success. But genuine collaboration seems to be missing from the form-based code review process. At no time has anyone from the town even reached out to me to say they would like to take 16 acres of my land and use it for a park, whether I was willing to cite that park in the prime upland portion of my property or whether there were any mutual benefit development goals that could be included in that conversation. That would have been the Vermont way to have gone about this. Instead, I first learned of a park being seen in, it labeled on a draft official map. After digging further, I also found it identified as one of the handful of unique natural communities in the town of the official map, allegedly due to the, to preserve the bur oak, a common form of oak which is the least, which is of the least concern for conservation value. And there's a website I put on here as well that you guys can look up and see bur oaks are the highest populated oak trees in the country. It is deeply troubling to me that the town would first use a completely made up natural community designed for disparage my property, and then designate 16 acres of the area as a future town park for these are not rare trees and this is not a natural area. It is a prime developable upland area that the town thinks would be a nice park, place for a park. And I kind of agree it is a nice place for a park. But anyway, I had, I had obvious questions about this process, including whether the town can actually do this. I asked my lawyers and it seems pretty clear to me that this conduct is a government, is a governmental property taking or the imposition of an unconstitutional condition on the zoning process. And yes, we could file a lawsuit and have a court determine the legal claims. But that is not how I do business, nor how I want to do business. Rather, my preference is to work with the town and to come up with a win-win solution. There are many good concepts in the form based code. However, there are a number of problems that need to be closer looked. For example, allowing development on only one side of a street is a waste of both natural and economic resources. Imposing design standards that cause the road to cost far more than a typical town road will drive up the cost of housing even further than it does now. And most assuredly, will put affordable housing out of reach. Designing a road layout with input from the public works and the fire department is simply without the, the fire department or public works is irresponsible. It makes no sense to codify an entire road layout only to find out afterwards that there are inadequacies for fire trucks, movements, emergency service accesses, snow plowing, turning movements, snow storage, stormwater, utilities and so on. As I mentioned before, it took me nearly 10 years to complete the development plan and layout of the Cottonwood property. A process involved countless hours of review with architects, engineers, town planning staff, development review board and state agencies, including Act 250. Cottonwood is a tiny fraction of the area covered by the form-based code. It is simply naive to think that you would be able to properly plan and layout a design that large in an area in a short time that form-based has been considered. So my request is, please slow down, do it right, collaborate in good faith with prop property owners, include input from the public works, the fire department and consider practical, economic and environmental implications of the code. I am hopeful that a more thorough vetting of the form-based code will create an archivable vision, an achievable vision we can all be proud of for years to come. And thank you for your time for letting me hear it. If you leave the copies for us, that would be very helpful. Yes, I'll leave you these copies for sure. We're going to be starting our deliberations on this on the 23rd of the month. Right. I just, I knew there was a short meeting tonight. There's only a few things on the agenda. I didn't want to tie you up on my plan. I'll leave. I'll take one copy. Good. Thank you. Good. Thank you very much. Thanks for coming. Thank you. So moving on then to the special town meeting warning and ballot form, Eric, just to give us a brief overview of what we're doing tonight on this. And we've discussed this at length in other meetings. Yep. For the board's consensus at its last meeting on July 19th, I've included for consideration a special town meeting draft warning with the article that would be placed on the ballot to enter into a communications union district to improve, to improve broadband access in the community. The special town meeting would occur on this election day, Tuesday, November the 8th, would be the loan article to be included on this general election ballot from the town. In addition, a public information hearing is included on the warning. I've tend to schedule that for part of the regular select board meeting on November the 1st of a week prior as part of the agenda. As a reminder, the ballot general electric election on general election ballot will be mailed by the Secretary of State's office to all nonchalanced voters or voters in the state at the board's last meeting it approved, including local articles on that for the request of the Secretary of State's office. The spellet form language was reviewed by the town attorney Bob Fletcher. That's included for your consideration this evening. Currently, my understanding is the towns of towns and cities, including South Burlington, Essex, Shelburne and Jericho will be asking voters the same question for entering into the CUD. And the city of Essex Junction is going to be considering this next week as well. So I think it's about five or half dozen or so communities considering this. The working group that I'm part of by the CCRPC is going to continue to meet. We're really pivoted its focus now to communications and outreach to voters on this question. As early voting will begin, I believe in late September or so 45 days prior to the general election. So for the board this evening to consider adopting the warning and if so, I would pass us on the town clerk to then transmit to get on the general election ballot prior to August 9th. Any questions for Eric on where we're at tonight? If not, then there's a motion suggested. I'll move to adopt the official warning for the public information hearing and special talent meeting vote by Australian ballot to be held on November 1 and November 8, 2022. Is there a second? I'll second. So any discussion on the motion? I'd be here if you say city of Essex Junction. Yeah. Jarring, isn't it? That's the last person. But the article seems pretty simple, pretty straightforward. You know, the town attorney in his review said the really substantial compliance with the general form of the law. It's really intent of the voters that significant in the question and we feel we've crafted the question with that. Okay. If there's no further discussion, then all those in favor of the motion say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right. I'm moving on to the appointment of the Cemetery Commissioner. Eric, just give us a brief update on this. Yep. And also before you start, I just want to. Could be a potential conflict of interest. I don't feel so, but I do do some cornerstone work for the commission from time to time and I can lose myself if that's going to be a problem with the board. So these are private lots that have already been purchased and the digging of the grave is done through the direction of the funeral homes and but your only thing you're doing is free plus the cornerstones. All right. I don't see a problem with that. I'm good. Yeah, thanks. So yeah, kind of brief item for the board to consider. The Harvey step down from the cemetery commission after many years of service this past June, we've advertised to try to find a new commissioner for over two months and unfortunately haven't had an applicant yet. As you know, the summertime is particularly busy for the cemetery commission and B has been helping out a bit and is willing to continue to help out for another couple months on hearing that I thanked her and also said, well, she'll probably be appointed to the cemetery commission if you're functioning in that role. So this is for the board to consider this evening, but the motion is to appoint B for the unexpired term through 2027. It would not, she would not serve for that full term and the understanding would be we'd still have advertised and hopefully have an applicant in the next couple of months to be considered and anticipate B is fine with this. I ran it by her anticipation either way, need to wind down by later this summer, but she wants to see the work through as they need a helping hand right now. Any questions for Eric? We are in this. Then there is a motion suggested also move to appoint B Harvey to the cemetery commission to an unexpired term through June 30th, 2027. Is there a second? Second. Is there any discussion on the motion? Hearing none, I'll close in favor of the motion to say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Moving on to manager's report. Just a couple quick items I'll touch on from my written report. As a reminder, as the chair mentioned, the August 23rd agenda item will have a deliberation on the form-based code on its following up on previous discussions. If I remember the board would be interested in any meetings with the planning, the staff before that, please let me know and we can set up a meeting. I know Jeff, you might be interested. Yeah, just let me know. We can get something on the calendar with Matt here shortly. And if others are interested, I'd prefer to do it together. We just need to award a quorum of the board. Avoid that. Yes. Two of you are interested, no way, but one of you are interested, we can do it. Yeah. Happy to facilitate that. That was actually going to help. Great, thank you. So that's coming up. And then I've included with your packet an opportunity, the legacies in town just put out the end of last week. They're launching a new initiative in partnership with Abundance Sun. It's a Vermont cultural transformation consultancy. It's going to offer municipal leaders an opportunity to participate in their ethical performance improvement campaign or EPIC is the acronym. I've included more information with the agenda to think about. It looks like a really good designed series to be looking at first the equity inclusion from policymaking and administration. They're going to have a cohort of up to 15 communities that can participate in this. There's an application process. It would involve a number of at least a half dozen meetings over the course of six to eight months. The town would need to have two people participate and commit to be part of that as part of the application. I'd certainly be willing to be one of those from the town should the board like to apply. The other person could be a member of the select board and also the board member is not able to or there's not capacity from the board. Erin Dickinson in the manager's office has also expressed potential interest. Looking for the board's consensus this evening if likely to prepare an application for you to consider at your next meeting. It includes a letter of support from the select board to authorize and should there be a member of the select board who'd like to be part of that application. We have to indicate that the two folks from the community would be involved. So if you'd like me to continue with that I can prep the materials for your next meeting. So our object tonight is to see whether or not a majority of the board wishes to go ahead and at least apply for the welcoming and emerging communities cohort. Any questions? No questions. 100% support the concept. We did something similar with the division I work with at DEC and it just isn't what surprised me is what I learned that I had no idea. I didn't you know and about me myself you know some of my whatever's unintended but certainly there. So this is highly supportive. I don't know if it's aimed at staff versus elected officials. Well and there would be an opportunity for a member of the select board to be part of that as one of the two. So between now and the next select for me we would need to need to know if there is interest on select work part. I'm interested. I don't know if I can commit at this this moment again and I would say to anyone you know these I was just surprised that how beneficial it was when I went into thinking how beneficial it's just going to be and it was very official. So I would I'm interested in taking another opportunity to learn more good. I just don't know if I can commit yet. Sure. Well that's the big thing of the time. Yeah. Sure. Any other comments? Looks like we have consensus to go forward at least for the application. So we'll look forward to that in the in our next meeting. Prepare that. Anything else Eric on your report? No, that's all I have to see. Then what other business we do have a liquor license application. And Eric if you'd like to introduce the folks that are here and we'll consider the application. Yep. This is a change in ownership and it's Roselle and Barbara. They're here. They're going to be the new ownership group for the Vermont taphouse and tap corners. They are I believe looking to take over the ownership by the middle of the month here. And so procedurally the board would need to approve a new liquor license. They retain the current license held for a first third and outdoor consumption permits for the facility. I checked with staff and staff has no no objections to their to their requests. So they're they're here to answer any additional questions the board has and to speak the trust. Thank you for our viewing public. If you'd introduce yourselves to us and then give us a brief description of what currently transpires at the facility and what your plans are to go forward. My name is Barbara Cody. I currently own the Shelburne taphouse. Go ahead. And my name is Roselle Tenna and I'm applying to own the Vermont taphouse. So we really don't really we're not going to change anything at the taphouse. And you know we just intend to take it over have a smooth transition for employees the community and you know the current owner is really anxious to move on and in his other endeavors. And so it's just a really great match for us and great you know we're super excited to go into the old Ponderosa building and be a part of the Williston community make it look nice and really give it some love and care and just keep we're very interested in keeping all people that are currently working there. Yeah, currently it's for on premises service only I resume not take out for alcohol consumption. Yeah, there's they they have a bar 35 taps. We would just keep what what they currently are doing and offering and they'll be outside consumption. Yes, there's currently exists. Yes, so we're always concerned about how you regulate that as far as service outside and kids perhaps being able to be there as well. Well, all the servers have to be DLC certified. They all have to take a class. I believe there are security cameras if not will make sure that they're there. So you know if you're inside the restaurant and you're a manager or where they're we can you know watch what's going on outside but all staff will be trained. The areas have to be enclosed. So their signage, you know, no alcohol beyond this point all those preventative measures or things that if they aren't already there will make sure that they are there. Thank you. Other questions? I guess one question is you said employees. It sounds like you're hoping to retain all the current employees as you take it over 100%. Okay. Okay. I'm just trying to think back to I don't remember Vermont taphouse ever being before us for having a violation. You don't have to answer that because you probably didn't think of that, which is just a sign about your employees likely doing a good job. And so it adds some confidence that they're the same ones who will be maybe having going through the training again. I don't know if that's required, but doing what needs to be done in terms of underage or inebriation. Correct. If there are more no more questions tonight, we're looking for a motion to approve the license. If I may suggest one for the board is having a motion to approve a first and third class liquor license and outdoor consumption permit for Ricky Rose LLC doing business as Vermont taphouse through April 30th, 2023. So moved. Well said. So we have motion being seconded. Any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor of the motion say aye. Aye. Good luck. Thank you very much. So that concludes our business tonight and we are adjourned. Thank you.


Hi, this is Mitch Mitchell. Thanks for watching. I hope a lot of people watch it. Oh, that was probably not gonna happen Anyway, you know this year I traveled a lot I was working in Memphis and I went to a lot of different cities that I'd never been to before and The one thing that kind of helped to keep me going throughout the entire year was being able to watch different YouTube channels And I enjoyed a whole lot of things this year There were some things that I liked at one point and then later on didn't like that There's some things that just truly kept me engaged for the entire year So tonight's video is going to be the top 15 either YouTube channels or YouTube personalities that I watched in 2014 that kept me entertained and you know taught me stuff and that I just thoroughly enjoyed now I'm not going to link to them in the video instead I'm gonna put their names again down below Along with links to their channel so that you know if you feel like checking any of these folks out you can But these folks really did it for me and I so appreciate being able to just mention something about these folks and You know, we'll see where this goes the first person. I'm gonna mention turns out to be probably the If not the top YouTube video person in the country One of the top people her name is Grace hell big and she actually won the webby this year for best YouTube personality Which is why I'm thinking she's the best and she released a book and she did a movie and she got an irreverent channel I mean, you never really know what's gonna come out of her mouth. She's a trained comedian You know college graduate and she's not even 30 and she's done all these things and you know, she's just been on these different TV shows She's traveled around the country doing live shows. She did a series this year where she went with someone else To different cities and they actually had the kind of a video a travel log and Just amazing energy my goodness. I wish I had some of that energy But then again, you know if I could not 25 years off I just might but grace how big is number one on my list and I'm sure there's a lot of people if you watch this We're gonna say. Oh, yeah, of course Grace is on the list second is Sight it's called thug notes. Now. It's moved over to another site called wisecrack But I discovered thug notes through someone else who posted something on Twitter and what this is this a guy he calls himself. Oh my god Shaggy sweeps or something like that. I can't remember but what he does is he gives kind of a hip-hop version of book reviews on Old-type literature. So he's done Dracula and he's done Fahrenheit 451. He does a lot of Shakespeare stuff. It's it's funny stuff and yet it's it's interesting his take on What these things are all about he doesn't just break down the story That's usually the first half of the video and then the second half of the video He gets into all the really deep stuff and it's it's great stuff. It is just a different way of looking at literature And so I really enjoyed that a lot number three in my list is the moth The moth happens to be a channel where they highlight stories I don't really know everything about the moth But what it looks like is that they go to different locations in New York City and they set up the mic in Different people get to go up and tell stories based on a theme of the night and I discovered this thing and I have just Really enjoyed hearing people tell their stories. I've always said I think that people enjoy hearing other people tell stories And some of these are really heartfelt stories and some of them are very touching and you know might make you want to cry I never cried, but they might make you want to cry and It's just unbelievable stuff.  What they do is they they have their take on it They're super huge foods I mean, you know, these are not foods that you could basically cook for yourself and sit home and Basically eat a meal and maybe wrap up leftovers. No These guys make Monstrosities, but it's great seeing them make these things And then at the end of the videos you see them eating as much of it as they can because let's fix the fact There's just no way anyone could ever eat all these things and when I link below I'm actually gonna link to one of their foods instead of the main channels just so you can see how one of these things go Number five on my list Guy named Andre and he does a site called black nerd comedy and I got to tell you the truth Last year when I first heard about him. I was a little disturbed.  I You have to kind of appreciate that a guy can actually laugh at himself And as I got into watching his channel and I'll tell you the truth I don't watch everything because I'm not a gamer and so I can't get into the you know Sonic or any of these other kind of games But he talks about older TV shows and cartoons and actually some of them I know some of them I don't but he kind of puts a fascinating bet on it and he will do Certain skits here and there with someone else. I'm gonna mention later on on the list And he's just a funny guy and he's associated with Lamar Wilson who I actually highlighted in a video last year and I just pretty much enjoyed him one of the coolest things he did was he went to one of the comic things this year and he met up with oh my god vanilla ice and he performed a vanilla ice song that vanilla ice did in one of the Turtles movies one Just watch this guy doing this and it just made me laugh so Congrats, you know Andre black nerd comedy next on the list a Site called Dane drops and this guy's name is Damon and this was referred to me by Someone I met on YouTube of all things and what he does is he goes basically to fast food places and he Samples foods and then he talks about him and he does it in his car And he's just got this flair and this drama about him that is just so funny It is a big guy this guy's like six five and got really big hands and whatever and when he bites into these foods You know talk about a man-sized bite. I don't think I've ever bitten anything like that but it's just fascinating watching him and Gotta tell you it's funnier when he hates stuff But I love to watch this guy and this is another young guy who basically has found his niche So he's got other people who do different types of food reviews. He's got a guy does snacks He has a guy does healthy foods. He's just added someone else to the site recently It's amazing stuff and he's a lot of fun and he worked his way into a TV show this year for food network So where'd it go next? Channel is a site called all-time tens and basically what this channel does is It finds a subject and it talks about ten things. You don't know About these things. So this year they did the Simpsons. They did murderers. They did Ways that the world almost died.  We hope you watch this Let us know what you think. So that's a little bit different, but I love watching, you know, they're take on it He's a you know, British guys Next on my list young lady named Rosanna Pansino and she does something called nerdy nummies and It was just a fluke I just saw this thing one day and I said wait, let's go check her out And she's another young lady and what she does is she cooks these foods or you know, she's a baker I guess pretty much and she based these foods based off of well pop culture stuff and a lot of it is Cartoons for instance. She did something about frozen. She's done Oh my goodness video game characters and whatever and it's great stuff seeing how she does all this and she shows You how to make it right then in there. She'll tell you recipes Over the last couple of months. She's been joined by her sister her older sister and they do these challenges These are some you know things I never heard of you know old guy never heard of these things But they take on these challenges and that's been pretty funny as well next we have Katie Wilson and She along with Andrea Blackner comedy sometimes do these skits together, but she does this thing where Basically, she'll talk about certain video games. She likes she'll talk about certain movies. She actually will portray things She's done some of the comic-con stuff. She's a former Disney kid. So she's got talent sometimes. She she talks about Being in certain photo shoots movie she's been in some movies and some TV shows very talented a pretty young lady and The most recent thing is she did this parody video of some song that I think is a Nicki Minaj song It's a shame. I don't know any Nicki Minaj songs But if that's what this is it's a parody of it called ugly sweaters and it's just the funniest thing But she can sing so it works out really well. So that's Katie Wilson next we have someone who I know has been around a good long time name is Philip DeFranco and He just had a son this year just to throw that out there But basically he does news and commentary his own spin on different stories And I know he's been out there at least two or three years But just the first year I've ever actually gotten to watch him and I appreciate his take on things very liberal kind of guy but he gives you know the opportunity for other people to express a different point of view and I have enjoyed watching it as a matter of fact as 2015 comes up one of the things I'm going to start backing off of is watching as much news because Maybe not necessarily the news is bothering me so much, but it's all the extra stuff that comes after it I just don't need as much hate in my life But if I pick up a few things from him at least I'll know kind of what's going on And I will have a better mindset about things. So Philip DeFranco You know talk about a guy who is basically found a way to make it real living off of stuff They've got a you know, he's got a full business. He employs a lot of people They market shirts and they just do a ton of things They have a site called source fed where you can get you know more news or entertainment types of things So it's really kind of cool Next on my list is a site called savvy sexy savvy sexy social by a lady young lady named Amy Schmidt Tower Say it and you know what you're gonna see the name down below if you can pronounce it better than me You're a better person than me You'd hope I could say but I can't and she's from Ohio and basically she is a social media Marketing person and I'm not saying that she actually you know markets herself but she helps other companies to market themselves and She puts out a video new video three times a week. She has a Podcast she has you know all the other kind of things and she gives really good information in relatively short pieces And it's been fascinating. She does a thing every April that she calls Veta Which is a video every day in April this year I didn't do that, but I what I did on my other channel is I did a video every day in June You know, hey, I got to do my own thing, right? So but she you know If you're looking to learn anything about Social media marketing and different things you can do and whatever you got to check her out Then we have my personality Neil deGrasse Tyson Now I've known who he is for quite a few years But this is the first year where I actually started listening or watching a whole lot of his videos his Seminars and presentations and he came to Syracuse and I was in Memphis of all things So I missed that but I got to watch the video of it and I'm telling you This is one very smart guy and it's because of him that I know that we can't actually have zombies Thank you for that But this is probably one of the smartest men in the world and You know you take that for what it's worth But he's just fascinating to listen to and he did his version of cosmos this year on Fox channel. Well, you know, they got to get something good every once in a while. Yeah, I said it And it was fascinating as well. So thank you for Neil deGrasse Tyson. He has a podcast series also and You know, you can find that online and he's got another channel that he's hooked up with where Sometimes he does some of these, you know, his own little interviews There's all little programs on these channels and so you can do some of that stuff So I really had a great time listening to him this year Then we have a site called screen junkies and what screen junkies basically does is it takes movies Well, they talk about movies They have a thing where they will call their take on You know different things like one I watched earlier today was their take on transformers fallen angels or falling stuff Whatever, I can't remember the name of it and I went to it But you know, he has their take on it they'll pull different things out of it and You know, most of the time he's beating up on these movies and that's kind of funny Actually, one of the ones I watched today where he's talking about Captain America Winner soldier. He actually finished off the thing by saying, you know, I can't I got it can't lie This was a good movie. It was a lot of fun He found some things just to nitpick on but I thought that was interesting And they also do some other things that regards movies and actors and different stuff like that. It was very entertaining things It's a good thing that I've seen a lot of the older movies I have to admit there's a lot of the newer movies I haven't seen but it's it's fun to watch either way and then another thing that's also related movies It's called how it should have ended and basically this is their take on a whole lot of movies and They change him up how they you know really could have ended for instance, they did Lord of the Rings and Basically if you remember the very last Lord of the Rings movie after he's after Frodo has thrown the ring in and he's out There on the rock, you know Surround about the volcano and the giant eagle comes with Gandalf on it and they did their take on it Where the giant eagle comes is wait you have access to giant eagles Why couldn't we have just flown here and saved all this time instead of whatever which is a good question?  Why'd you do it? He says I've saved the world I mean think about it.  I know you're not supposed to mess with time but you know sometimes they think you can make an exception as long as I still come but that's okay and Finally the final one. I'm gonna mention this another lady not as young as her others but she's still young her name was Marie Forleo and She does a video a week where she answers questions that people have written around on Tuesdays and Some of it is about marketing. Some of it is about business motivation and then she'll every once in a while do interviews and Interviews are usually longer. She's interviewed some very fascinating people Brendan Bouchard. He wrote the millionaire messenger and the charge both books. I've read and I've got the new book here Motivation manifesto, which I haven't had time to get to yet. She interviewed Ariana Huffington She was on Oprah. Although. I think that may have been a couple years ago, but still, you know, she's fascinating She's pretty she's intelligent. She's got a lot of good stuff to share Usually it's every Tuesday that she does a new video But she's got tons of videos out there from the last few years and her channel has been interesting to watch because I Went back and watch some of the old videos and you know what she started off doing videos Basically in her house sitting in front of a camera like I'm doing just kind of doing a video And then was able to progress from there as she started making more money And now she's got this full studio and these people dress her in fantastic clothes But you like seeing something like that at least from my perspective being an independent consultant because you like seeing that Someone who started out pretty much like you was able to transition into something much bigger You know I'm in a consulting group and there's nothing bigger than seeing someone who's been able to make that leap and having them come back and Talk to us about being where we were and then being bigger. So anyway, those are 15 Video channels personalities that I want to dimension I think that every one of these is different than what I did before and I've gotten into a little bit more depth last time I only did five and There you go. I think all of you people all of the folks who put this stuff together and all of the people who gave me hours of entertainment and stuff to do I Really appreciate it and in a weird way. It's encouraged me to keep making videos. Yeah, okay. I'm not as popular I'm not even close to as popular, but you know one day it could happen. Who knows right so anyway I'm Mitch Mitchell my blog as I'm just sharing. I hope that you watch the video I hope you checked all these people out and I hope that you have a wonderful Christmas because it's the only video I'm doing before Christmas. You take care. Enjoy