It's Saint Patrick's day and an armed hooded robber bursts into the Bank of Ireland and forces the tellers to load a sack full of cash. On his way out the door with the loot one brave Irish customer grabs the hood and pulls it off revealing the robber's face.
The robber shoots the man without hesitation.
He then looks around the bank to see if anyone else has seen him. One of the tellers is looking straight at him and the robber walks over and calmly shoots him dead.
Everyone by now is very scared and looking down at the floor.
"Did anyone else see my face?" screams the robber.
There is a few moments of silence then one elderly Irish gent, looking down, tentatively raises his hand and says, "I think me wife here may have caught a glimpse."
Thursday, 21 February 2013
Little Johnny... Nickels and Dimes
Little Johnny is always being teased by the other neighborhood boys for being stupid. Their favorite joke is to offer Johnny his choice between a nickel and a dime -- Little Johnny always takes the nickel.
One day, after Johnny takes the nickel, a neighbor man takes him aside and says, "Johnny, those boys are making fun of you. Don't you know that a dime is worth more than a nickel, even though the nickel's bigger?"
Johnny grins and says, "Well, if I took the dime, they'd stop doing it, and so far I've made $20!"
One day, after Johnny takes the nickel, a neighbor man takes him aside and says, "Johnny, those boys are making fun of you. Don't you know that a dime is worth more than a nickel, even though the nickel's bigger?"
Johnny grins and says, "Well, if I took the dime, they'd stop doing it, and so far I've made $20!"
Liar's Clocks
It's a slow day in heaven, so St. Peter decides to show a new Nigerian guy around.
St. Peter shows him all of the sights: the golf course, library, observation deck, cafeteria and a huge room full of clocks.
"What's up with those clocks, Peter?"
"Everyone on Earth has a clock that shows how much time he has left. When a clock runs out of time, the person dies and comes to the gates to be judged."
The guy notices that some of the clocks are going faster than others. St. Peter tells him that every time a living person tells a lie, it speeds up his clock.
The guy notices one clock in the center of the ceiling with both hands whirling around at an unbelievable rate.
"What's the story with that clock?"
"Oh, that," St. Peter replies. "That's Goodluck Jonathan's clock. We decided to use it as a fan."
St. Peter shows him all of the sights: the golf course, library, observation deck, cafeteria and a huge room full of clocks.
"What's up with those clocks, Peter?"
"Everyone on Earth has a clock that shows how much time he has left. When a clock runs out of time, the person dies and comes to the gates to be judged."
The guy notices that some of the clocks are going faster than others. St. Peter tells him that every time a living person tells a lie, it speeds up his clock.
The guy notices one clock in the center of the ceiling with both hands whirling around at an unbelievable rate.
"What's the story with that clock?"
"Oh, that," St. Peter replies. "That's Goodluck Jonathan's clock. We decided to use it as a fan."
Cab Driver Goes to Heaven
A cab driver reaches the pearly gates. St. Peter looks him up in his Big Book and tells him to pick up a gold staff and a silk robe and proceed into Heaven.
Next in line is a preacher. St. Peter looks him up in his Big Book, furrows his brow and says, "OK, we'll let you in, but take that cloth robe and wooden staff."
The preacher is shocked and replies, "But I am a man of the cloth. You gave that cab driver a gold staff and a silk robe. Surely I rate higher than a cabbie!"
St. Peter responds matter-of-factly, "This is Heaven and up here, we are interested in results. When you preached, people slept. When the cabbie drove his taxi, people prayed."
Next in line is a preacher. St. Peter looks him up in his Big Book, furrows his brow and says, "OK, we'll let you in, but take that cloth robe and wooden staff."
The preacher is shocked and replies, "But I am a man of the cloth. You gave that cab driver a gold staff and a silk robe. Surely I rate higher than a cabbie!"
St. Peter responds matter-of-factly, "This is Heaven and up here, we are interested in results. When you preached, people slept. When the cabbie drove his taxi, people prayed."
Devoted Wife
A devoted wife had spent her lifetime taking care of her husband.
When he was slipping in and out of a coma for several months, she stayed by his bedside every single day. When he came to, he motioned for her to come nearer.
As she sat by him, he said, "You know what? You have been with me all through the bad times.
"When I got fired, you were there to support me. When my business failed, you were there. When I got shot, you were by my side. When we lost the house, you gave me support. When my health started failing, you were still by my side.
"You know what?"
"What, dear?" his wife asked gently.
"I think you bring me bad luck."
When he was slipping in and out of a coma for several months, she stayed by his bedside every single day. When he came to, he motioned for her to come nearer.
As she sat by him, he said, "You know what? You have been with me all through the bad times.
"When I got fired, you were there to support me. When my business failed, you were there. When I got shot, you were by my side. When we lost the house, you gave me support. When my health started failing, you were still by my side.
"You know what?"
"What, dear?" his wife asked gently.
"I think you bring me bad luck."
After The Honeymoon
A couple returns from their honeymoon refusing to speak to each other. The groom's best friend takes him aside and asks what's wrong.
"Well," replies the man, "when we finished making love on the first night, I put a $50 bill on the pillow without thinking."
"Oh, you shouldn't worry about that too much," says his friend. "I'm sure your wife will get over it soon enough. She can't expect you to have been saving yourself all these years."
"That's not the problem, " the groom says. "She gave me $20 change!"
"Well," replies the man, "when we finished making love on the first night, I put a $50 bill on the pillow without thinking."
"Oh, you shouldn't worry about that too much," says his friend. "I'm sure your wife will get over it soon enough. She can't expect you to have been saving yourself all these years."
"That's not the problem, " the groom says. "She gave me $20 change!"
THE 45 DIFFERENCE
Q: What's the difference between a girlfriend and a wife?
A: 45 lbs.
Q: What's the difference between a boyfriend and a husband?
A: 45 minutes.
A: 45 lbs.
Q: What's the difference between a boyfriend and a husband?
A: 45 minutes.
Wednesday, 20 February 2013
Dead Again
A funeral service is held for a woman who just passed away. As the pallbearers carry the casket out, they accidentally bump into a wall.
They hear a faint moan. They open the casket and find that the woman is actually alive.
She lives for 10 more years and then dies. They have another funeral for her. At the end of the service, the pallbearers carry out the casket.
As they are walking, the husband cries out, "Watch out for the wall!"
Thursday, 14 February 2013
Singer Goldie Harvey passes on
I had just dropped oga off to work this morning and was enjoying the morning program on the radio when suddenly I hear one of the presenters say she had very very sad news. I was thinking oh, she's going to tell us her Val didn't go as planned but what I heard next totally ruined my morning.
Singer Goldie Harvey of the BBA 2012 fame died last night. I am devastated. I don't know her personally, and never met her but death as we all agree is unwelcome. Even more so when it's a young vibrant person in their prime. Goldie had so much going or her, she had just returned form the Grammys, we have been seeing her recently with Ciara and there are talks of a collaboration in the works between the two of them. For this to happen, is just heartbreaking!
Her record label Kennis Music released an official statement this morning and it says she had complained of a severe headache and was rushed to Reddington Hospital in Lagos, where she was pronounced dead upon arrival by the doctors.
This is so painful. Omg... She was such a life lover. One of those people who you can see that they are doing what they love and refuse to be hindered by people's opinions. Which in itself is greatness. To live free of restrictions, is one of the hardest things to do, especially in our part of the world where culture is held high.
Goldie was loved by so many and you only had to hear her talk about her mom, family and friends to know that. She was so motherly during her time at the BB and it was so clear that she was a caring person full of love and a gentle spirit. I can't even imagine what her family is passing through right now, this is so so sad. May God console them and give them strength to go through this. Parents should never have to bury their kids. :-(
Dear Goldie, we will indeed miss you. May your gentle soul rest in peace always.
The press release from Kennis Music below:
Goldie, 31, died on Thursday after she complained of a severe headache at her Park View residence shortly after her arrival from the United States where she went to witness the Grammy Award. She was rushed to her official hospital, Reddington, Victoria Island, Lagos, where doctors pronounced her dead on arrival.
We consider this period a gloomy moment for us and the entire Nigerian music industry in view of the circumstance Goldie passed away, the abundance of talent she has exhibited in her but eventful music career and the various opportunities her trip to the United States of America would have availed her. She is survived by her father, step- mother, brothers and sisters. We deeply sympathize with her family and fans all over the world and very grateful to all and sundry, especially, the vibrant Nigerian media for their concern and prompt reportage. We shall keep everybody informed as events unfold as we are still devastated by the sudden loss.”
Meanwhile, the remains of Goldie, who hails from Ekiti State has been deposited in the mortuary of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, Lagos. Goldie represented Nigeria at the Big Brother Star Game in 2012. Her latest effort, she described as three nawti singles from her forthcoming African Invasion album are “Skibo”. “Miliki” and ” Got To Have It,” are presently enjoying heavy rotations on radio and TV stations across the continent. Burial arrangements will be announced by the family. May her soul rest in peace.
Tuesday, 5 February 2013
2013 Reads
So,here are a few of the books I have on my radar for the first half of this year...
Half Of A Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Genre - Novel
Available in paperback, Amazon, Barnes & Noble
Synopsis
A masterly, haunting new novel from a writer heralded by The Washington Post Book World as "the 21st-century daughter of Chinua Achebe," Half of a Yellow Sun recreates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra's impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in Nigeria, and the chilling violence that followed.
With astonishing empathy and the effortless grace of a natural storyteller, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie weaves together the lives of three characters swept up in the turbulence of the decade. Thirteen-year-old Ugwu is employed as a houseboy for a university professor full of revolutionary zeal. Olanna is the professor's beautiful mistress, who has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos for a dusty university town and the charisma of her new lover. And Richard is a shy young Englishman in thrall to Olanna's twin sister, an enigmatic figure who refuses to belong to anyone. As Nigerian troops advance and they must run for their lives, their ideals are severely tested, as are their loyalties to one another.
Epic, ambitious, and triumphantly realized, Half of a Yellow Sun is a remarkable novel about moral responsibility, about the end of colonialism, about ethnic allegiances, about class and race—and the ways in which love can complicate them all. Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in paperback, Amazon, Barnes & Noble
Synopsis
Fifteen-year-old Kambili's world is circumscribed by the high walls and frangipani trees of her family compound. Her wealthy Catholic father, under whose shadow Kambili lives, while generous and politically active in the community, is repressive and fanatically religious at home.
When Nigeria begins to fall apart under a military coup, Kambili's father sends her and her brother away to stay with their aunt, a University professor, whose house is noisy and full of laughter. There, Kambili and her brother discover a life and love beyond the confines of their father's authority. The visit will lift the silence from their world and, in time, give rise to devotion and defiance that reveal themselves in profound and unexpected ways. This is a book about the promise of freedom; about the blurred lines between childhood and adulthood; between love and hatred, between the old gods and the new.
"At once the portrait of a country and a family, of terrible choices and the tremulous pleasure of an odd, rare purple hibiscus blooming amid a conforming sea of red ones" — San Francisco Chronicle
Now with a review like that, I just want to go out and buy the book already. I love reading about choices people make and consequences, it is like gaining the experiences without feeling the pain. I hope that doesn't sound too weird? Lol.... Mountains Of The Moon by I.J. Kay
Genre - Fiction
Available in paperback, Kindle
"A woman in her thirties is released from prison, with a new name and not much else. She begins to make a fresh start but the present is soon invaded by fragments from her past. Unsettling, hallucinatory and without precedent, Mountains of the Moon is the tragic account of a broken life, but, against all expectation, it amounts to something utterly beautiful."
A story about overcoming odds, i added this to my list when i came across it on Amazon and its rated 5 stars too. Murder At The Vicarage by Agatha Christie
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in Hardcover, Goodreads
Synopsis
"Murder at the Vicarage" marks the debut of Agatha Christie's unflappable and much beloved female detective, Miss Jane Marple. With her gift for sniffing out the malevolent side of human nature, Miss Marple is led on her first case to a crime scene at the local vicarage. Colonel Protheroe, the magistrate whom everyone in town hates, has been shot through the head. No one heard the shot. There are no leads. Yet, everyone surrounding the vicarage seems to have a reason to want the Colonel dead. It is a race against the clock as Miss Marple sets out on the twisted trail of the mysterious killer without so much as a bit of help from the local police."
This isn't exactly a new book, in fact its old, first published in 2006, but its the beginning of the 'Miss Marple' character series and having read a few of the sequels(Body In The Library,and A Murder Is Announced) I've always wanted to go back to see how it started. Kill Alex Cross by James Patterson
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in hardcover, Goodreads
Synopsis
Kill Alex Cross is faster, more exciting, and more tightly wound than any Alex Cross thriller James Patterson has ever written!
The President's son and daughter are abducted, and Detective Alex Cross is one of the first on the scene. But someone very high up is using the FBI, Secret Service, and CIA to keep him off the case and in the dark.
A deadly contagion in the water supply cripples half of the capital, and Cross discovers that someone may be about to unleash the most devastating attack the United States has ever experienced. As his window for solving both crimes narrows, Alex makes a desperate decision that goes against everything he believes – one that may alter the fate of the entire country.
Trying to keep up with James Patterson is just not possible and I gave up but now that Tyler Perry is playing Alex Cross,(I think that's just awesome by the way, never mind that so many people have their reservations about Tyler Perry being such a hard guy) I can't wait to pick this and catch up.
Half Of A Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Genre - Novel
Available in paperback, Amazon, Barnes & Noble
Synopsis
A masterly, haunting new novel from a writer heralded by The Washington Post Book World as "the 21st-century daughter of Chinua Achebe," Half of a Yellow Sun recreates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra's impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in Nigeria, and the chilling violence that followed.
With astonishing empathy and the effortless grace of a natural storyteller, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie weaves together the lives of three characters swept up in the turbulence of the decade. Thirteen-year-old Ugwu is employed as a houseboy for a university professor full of revolutionary zeal. Olanna is the professor's beautiful mistress, who has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos for a dusty university town and the charisma of her new lover. And Richard is a shy young Englishman in thrall to Olanna's twin sister, an enigmatic figure who refuses to belong to anyone. As Nigerian troops advance and they must run for their lives, their ideals are severely tested, as are their loyalties to one another.
Epic, ambitious, and triumphantly realized, Half of a Yellow Sun is a remarkable novel about moral responsibility, about the end of colonialism, about ethnic allegiances, about class and race—and the ways in which love can complicate them all. Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in paperback, Amazon, Barnes & Noble
Synopsis
Fifteen-year-old Kambili's world is circumscribed by the high walls and frangipani trees of her family compound. Her wealthy Catholic father, under whose shadow Kambili lives, while generous and politically active in the community, is repressive and fanatically religious at home.
When Nigeria begins to fall apart under a military coup, Kambili's father sends her and her brother away to stay with their aunt, a University professor, whose house is noisy and full of laughter. There, Kambili and her brother discover a life and love beyond the confines of their father's authority. The visit will lift the silence from their world and, in time, give rise to devotion and defiance that reveal themselves in profound and unexpected ways. This is a book about the promise of freedom; about the blurred lines between childhood and adulthood; between love and hatred, between the old gods and the new.
"At once the portrait of a country and a family, of terrible choices and the tremulous pleasure of an odd, rare purple hibiscus blooming amid a conforming sea of red ones" — San Francisco Chronicle
Now with a review like that, I just want to go out and buy the book already. I love reading about choices people make and consequences, it is like gaining the experiences without feeling the pain. I hope that doesn't sound too weird? Lol.... Mountains Of The Moon by I.J. Kay
Genre - Fiction
Available in paperback, Kindle
"A woman in her thirties is released from prison, with a new name and not much else. She begins to make a fresh start but the present is soon invaded by fragments from her past. Unsettling, hallucinatory and without precedent, Mountains of the Moon is the tragic account of a broken life, but, against all expectation, it amounts to something utterly beautiful."
A story about overcoming odds, i added this to my list when i came across it on Amazon and its rated 5 stars too. Murder At The Vicarage by Agatha Christie
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in Hardcover, Goodreads
Synopsis
"Murder at the Vicarage" marks the debut of Agatha Christie's unflappable and much beloved female detective, Miss Jane Marple. With her gift for sniffing out the malevolent side of human nature, Miss Marple is led on her first case to a crime scene at the local vicarage. Colonel Protheroe, the magistrate whom everyone in town hates, has been shot through the head. No one heard the shot. There are no leads. Yet, everyone surrounding the vicarage seems to have a reason to want the Colonel dead. It is a race against the clock as Miss Marple sets out on the twisted trail of the mysterious killer without so much as a bit of help from the local police."
This isn't exactly a new book, in fact its old, first published in 2006, but its the beginning of the 'Miss Marple' character series and having read a few of the sequels(Body In The Library,and A Murder Is Announced) I've always wanted to go back to see how it started. Kill Alex Cross by James Patterson
Genre - Fiction, Novel
Available in hardcover, Goodreads
Synopsis
Kill Alex Cross is faster, more exciting, and more tightly wound than any Alex Cross thriller James Patterson has ever written!
The President's son and daughter are abducted, and Detective Alex Cross is one of the first on the scene. But someone very high up is using the FBI, Secret Service, and CIA to keep him off the case and in the dark.
A deadly contagion in the water supply cripples half of the capital, and Cross discovers that someone may be about to unleash the most devastating attack the United States has ever experienced. As his window for solving both crimes narrows, Alex makes a desperate decision that goes against everything he believes – one that may alter the fate of the entire country.
Trying to keep up with James Patterson is just not possible and I gave up but now that Tyler Perry is playing Alex Cross,(I think that's just awesome by the way, never mind that so many people have their reservations about Tyler Perry being such a hard guy) I can't wait to pick this and catch up.
Recent Reads
One of the To-dos on my new years resolution this year was to read more literary works by Nigerian authors alongside the numerous westerns that I read like my life depends on it. Recently, no thanks to school work and life generally, I haven't been reading as many as usual and I kind of want to pick up the slack a bit. This is one that I read last year and enjoyed.
Lagos Life, London Living by Bobo Omotayo
(Hard cover)
Interestingly titled, it is a collection of 37 short stories based on the writer's experiences and makes for very easy reading (it as been tagged "Coffee-table" by the experts). For me, it is simply a delightful book written with wit, honesty, lots of satirical comic, illustrations and interesting photos. The writer definitely takes you on the narrated journeys.
Plot
The book covers his experiences in two very different but similar cities with slangs and colloquialisms from both documented.
(Hard cover)
Interestingly titled, it is a collection of 37 short stories based on the writer's experiences and makes for very easy reading (it as been tagged "Coffee-table" by the experts). For me, it is simply a delightful book written with wit, honesty, lots of satirical comic, illustrations and interesting photos. The writer definitely takes you on the narrated journeys.
Plot
The book covers his experiences in two very different but similar cities with slangs and colloquialisms from both documented.
Sunday, 3 February 2013
Pope appoints His Lordship, Most Rev Joseph Effiong Ekuwem the new Archbishop of Calabar
Reuben Abati: Of power-point technocrats, who open social media accounts and pretend to be voices of wisdom
by Reuben Abati
As part of our governance evolution, most people become public servants by accident, but they soon get so used to the glamour of office that they lose sight of their own ordinariness. They use the system to climb: to become media celebrities, to gain international attention and to morph into self-appointed guardians of the Nigerian estate.
A loosely bound group of yesterday’s men and women seems to be on the offensive against the Jonathan administration. They pick issues with virtually every effort of the administration, pretending to do so in the public interest; positing that they alone, know it all. Arrogantly, they claim to be better and smarter than everyone else in the current government. They are ever so censorious, contrarian and supercilious.
They have no original claim to their pretensions other than they were privileged to have been in the corridors of power once upon a time in their lives. They obviously got so engrossed with their own sense of importance they began to imagine themselves indispensable to Nigeria. It is dangerous to have such a navel-gazing, narcissistic group inflict themselves with so much ferocity on an otherwise impressionable public. We are in reality dealing with a bunch of hypocrites.
With exceptions so few, they really don’t care about Nigeria as a sovereign but the political spoils that accrue from it. And so they will stop at nothing to discredit those they think are not as deserving as they imagine themselves to be. President Jonathan has unfairly become the target of their pitiable frustrations.
Underneath their superfluous appearance, lies an unspoken class disdain directed at the person and office of a duly elected president of the country. It is a Nigerian problem, perhaps. In the same advanced societies which these same yesterday men and women often like to refer to, public service is seen and treated as a privilege. People are called upon to serve; they do so with humility and great commitment, and when it is all over, they move on to other things. The quantity surveyor returns to his or her quantity surveying or some other decent work; the lawyer to his or her wig and gown; the university teacher, to the classroom, glad to have been found worthy of national service. When and where necessary, as private citizens they are entitled to use the benefit of this experience to contribute to national development, they speak up on matters of public importance not as a full-time job as is the case in Nigeria currently.
What then, is the problem with us? As part of our governance evolution, most people become public servants by accident, but they soon get so used to the glamour of office that they lose sight of their own ordinariness. They use the system to climb: to become media celebrities, to gain international attention and to morph into self-appointed guardians of the Nigerian estate. They mask self interest motives as public causes and manipulate the public’s desire for improvements in their daily struggles as opportunity for power grab.
They are perpetually hanging around, lobbying and hustling for undeserved privileges. They exploit ethnic and religious connections where they can or join political parties and run for political office. They even write books (I, me and myself books, packaged as cerebral stuff); if that still doesn’t work, they lobby newspaper houses for columns to write and they become apostolic pundits pontificating on matters ranging from the nebulous to the non-descript. Power blinds them to the reality that we are all in this together and we have a unique opportunity to do well for the taxpayers and hardworking electorate that provide every public official the privilege to serve.
Unsatisfied with the newspaper columns, they open social media accounts and pretend to be voices of wisdom seeking to cultivate an angry crowd which they feed continually with their own brand of negativity. They arrange to give lectures at high profile events where they abuse the government of the day in order to gain attention and steal a few minutes in the sun; hoping to force an audience that may ‘open doors’ for them, back into the corridors of power. These characters are in different sizes and shapes: small, big; Godfathers, agents, proxies. The tactics of the big figures on this rung of opportunism may be slightly different. They parade themselves as a Godfather or kingmaker or the better man who should have been king. They suffer of course, from messianic delusions. The fact that they boast of some followership and the media often treats them as icons, makes their nuisance factor worse. They and their protégés and proxies are united by one factor though: their hypocrisy.
It is in the larger interest of our country that the point be made that the government of the day welcomes criticism and political activism. This is an aspect of our emergent democracy that expands on the growing freedom of expression, thought and association but there is need for caution and vigilance, lest we get taken hostage by the architects of odious disinformation. Nigerians must not allow any group of individuals to hold this country to ransom and no one alone should appropriate the right to determine what is best for Nigeria. The accidental public servants who have turned that privilege into a life-long obsession and profession must be told to go get a life and find meaningful work to do.
Those who believe that no one else can run Nigeria without them must be told to stop hallucinating. The former Ministers, former Governors, former DGs, and all sorts who have been busy quoting mischievous figures, spreading cruel propaganda must be reminded that the Jonathan administration is in fact trying to clean up the mess that they created. They want to own the game when the ball is not in their possession. They want to be the referee when nobody has offered them a whistle. They seek to play God, forgetting that the case for God is not in the hands of man. One of the virtues of enlightenment is for persons to have a true perspective of their own location in the order of things. What they do not seem to realise or accept is that the political climate has changed.
When one of them was in charge of this same estate called Nigeria, he shut down the Port Harcourt airport and other airports for close to two years under the guise of renovation. The Port Harcourt airport was abandoned for so long it was overgrown with weeds after serving for months as a practice ground for motoring schools. It was reopened without any improvement and with so much money down the drain, and the pervasive suspicion that the reason it was shut down in the first place was to create a market for a new airline that had been allowed the monopoly use of the other airport in the city.
Under President Jonathan, airports across the country are being upgraded, rebuilt and modernized; in less than two years, the transformation is self-evident. Perhaps the greatest hypocrisy from our see-no-good commentators comes from the one who superintended over the near-collapse of the aviation sector who is now audacious enough to claim to be a social critic.
For the first time since 1999, the Nigerian Railway Corporation is up and running as a service organization. The rail lines have become functional from Lagos to Kano; Ewekoro to Minna, and very soon, from Port Harcourt to Maiduguri, Abuja to Kaduna and Lagos to Ibadan. They couldn’t do this in their time, now they are busy looking for money that is not missing with their teeth. When questions are asked, they claim they invented the ideas of due process and accountability. They once promised to solve the crisis of electricity supply in Nigeria. But what did they do? They managed to leave the country in darkness with less than 2,000 MW; abandoned independent power projects, mismanaged power stations, and uncompleted procurement processes. The mess was so bad their immediate successors had to declare an emergency in the power sector. It has taken President Jonathan to make the difference. Today, there is greater coherence in the management of the power sector with power supply in excess of 4, 200 MW; a better conceived power sector road map is running apace, and the administration is determined to make it better.
They complain about the state of the roads. Most of the contracts were actually awarded under their watch to the tune of billions! They talk about corruption, yet many of them have thick case files with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, the courts and the police on corruption-related charges. One of them was even accused of having awarded choice plots of government land to himself, his wives, his companies and other relations when he was in charge of such allocations! Really, have we forgotten so soon?
These yesterday men and women certainly don’t seem to care very much about the Nigerian taxpayer who has had to bear the brunt of the many scandals this administration is exposing in its bid to clear out the Augean stable. They’d rather grandstand with the ex-General this, Chief that, Doctor this and ex-(dis)Honourable Minister who has no record of what he or she did with the funds the nation provided them to deliver results to protect our interest so that we don’t end up continuing to make the same wasteful mistakes.
It is enough to make you shudder at the thought of any of them being part of government with access to the public purse; but then we’ve already seen what some of them are capable of doing when in control of public money, authority and influence; and to that the people have spoken in unison – they have had enough. Nigerians are wiser and are now familiar with the trickery from these persons whose claim to fame and fortune was on the back of their public service.
Our point at the risk of overstating what is by now too obvious: We have too many yesterday men and women behaving too badly. We are dealing with a group of power-point technocrats who have mastered the rhetoric of public grandstanding: carefully crafted emotion-laden sound bites passed off as meaningful engagements. That is all there is to them, after many years of hanging around in relevant places and mingling in the right corridors, all made possible through the use/abuse of Nigeria. Our caveat to their audience is the same old line: let the buyer beware!
They have no original claim to their pretensions other than they were privileged to have been in the corridors of power once upon a time in their lives. They obviously got so engrossed with their own sense of importance they began to imagine themselves indispensable to Nigeria. It is dangerous to have such a navel-gazing, narcissistic group inflict themselves with so much ferocity on an otherwise impressionable public. We are in reality dealing with a bunch of hypocrites.
With exceptions so few, they really don’t care about Nigeria as a sovereign but the political spoils that accrue from it. And so they will stop at nothing to discredit those they think are not as deserving as they imagine themselves to be. President Jonathan has unfairly become the target of their pitiable frustrations.
Underneath their superfluous appearance, lies an unspoken class disdain directed at the person and office of a duly elected president of the country. It is a Nigerian problem, perhaps. In the same advanced societies which these same yesterday men and women often like to refer to, public service is seen and treated as a privilege. People are called upon to serve; they do so with humility and great commitment, and when it is all over, they move on to other things. The quantity surveyor returns to his or her quantity surveying or some other decent work; the lawyer to his or her wig and gown; the university teacher, to the classroom, glad to have been found worthy of national service. When and where necessary, as private citizens they are entitled to use the benefit of this experience to contribute to national development, they speak up on matters of public importance not as a full-time job as is the case in Nigeria currently.
What then, is the problem with us? As part of our governance evolution, most people become public servants by accident, but they soon get so used to the glamour of office that they lose sight of their own ordinariness. They use the system to climb: to become media celebrities, to gain international attention and to morph into self-appointed guardians of the Nigerian estate. They mask self interest motives as public causes and manipulate the public’s desire for improvements in their daily struggles as opportunity for power grab.
They are perpetually hanging around, lobbying and hustling for undeserved privileges. They exploit ethnic and religious connections where they can or join political parties and run for political office. They even write books (I, me and myself books, packaged as cerebral stuff); if that still doesn’t work, they lobby newspaper houses for columns to write and they become apostolic pundits pontificating on matters ranging from the nebulous to the non-descript. Power blinds them to the reality that we are all in this together and we have a unique opportunity to do well for the taxpayers and hardworking electorate that provide every public official the privilege to serve.
Unsatisfied with the newspaper columns, they open social media accounts and pretend to be voices of wisdom seeking to cultivate an angry crowd which they feed continually with their own brand of negativity. They arrange to give lectures at high profile events where they abuse the government of the day in order to gain attention and steal a few minutes in the sun; hoping to force an audience that may ‘open doors’ for them, back into the corridors of power. These characters are in different sizes and shapes: small, big; Godfathers, agents, proxies. The tactics of the big figures on this rung of opportunism may be slightly different. They parade themselves as a Godfather or kingmaker or the better man who should have been king. They suffer of course, from messianic delusions. The fact that they boast of some followership and the media often treats them as icons, makes their nuisance factor worse. They and their protégés and proxies are united by one factor though: their hypocrisy.
It is in the larger interest of our country that the point be made that the government of the day welcomes criticism and political activism. This is an aspect of our emergent democracy that expands on the growing freedom of expression, thought and association but there is need for caution and vigilance, lest we get taken hostage by the architects of odious disinformation. Nigerians must not allow any group of individuals to hold this country to ransom and no one alone should appropriate the right to determine what is best for Nigeria. The accidental public servants who have turned that privilege into a life-long obsession and profession must be told to go get a life and find meaningful work to do.
Those who believe that no one else can run Nigeria without them must be told to stop hallucinating. The former Ministers, former Governors, former DGs, and all sorts who have been busy quoting mischievous figures, spreading cruel propaganda must be reminded that the Jonathan administration is in fact trying to clean up the mess that they created. They want to own the game when the ball is not in their possession. They want to be the referee when nobody has offered them a whistle. They seek to play God, forgetting that the case for God is not in the hands of man. One of the virtues of enlightenment is for persons to have a true perspective of their own location in the order of things. What they do not seem to realise or accept is that the political climate has changed.
When one of them was in charge of this same estate called Nigeria, he shut down the Port Harcourt airport and other airports for close to two years under the guise of renovation. The Port Harcourt airport was abandoned for so long it was overgrown with weeds after serving for months as a practice ground for motoring schools. It was reopened without any improvement and with so much money down the drain, and the pervasive suspicion that the reason it was shut down in the first place was to create a market for a new airline that had been allowed the monopoly use of the other airport in the city.
Under President Jonathan, airports across the country are being upgraded, rebuilt and modernized; in less than two years, the transformation is self-evident. Perhaps the greatest hypocrisy from our see-no-good commentators comes from the one who superintended over the near-collapse of the aviation sector who is now audacious enough to claim to be a social critic.
For the first time since 1999, the Nigerian Railway Corporation is up and running as a service organization. The rail lines have become functional from Lagos to Kano; Ewekoro to Minna, and very soon, from Port Harcourt to Maiduguri, Abuja to Kaduna and Lagos to Ibadan. They couldn’t do this in their time, now they are busy looking for money that is not missing with their teeth. When questions are asked, they claim they invented the ideas of due process and accountability. They once promised to solve the crisis of electricity supply in Nigeria. But what did they do? They managed to leave the country in darkness with less than 2,000 MW; abandoned independent power projects, mismanaged power stations, and uncompleted procurement processes. The mess was so bad their immediate successors had to declare an emergency in the power sector. It has taken President Jonathan to make the difference. Today, there is greater coherence in the management of the power sector with power supply in excess of 4, 200 MW; a better conceived power sector road map is running apace, and the administration is determined to make it better.
They complain about the state of the roads. Most of the contracts were actually awarded under their watch to the tune of billions! They talk about corruption, yet many of them have thick case files with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, the courts and the police on corruption-related charges. One of them was even accused of having awarded choice plots of government land to himself, his wives, his companies and other relations when he was in charge of such allocations! Really, have we forgotten so soon?
These yesterday men and women certainly don’t seem to care very much about the Nigerian taxpayer who has had to bear the brunt of the many scandals this administration is exposing in its bid to clear out the Augean stable. They’d rather grandstand with the ex-General this, Chief that, Doctor this and ex-(dis)Honourable Minister who has no record of what he or she did with the funds the nation provided them to deliver results to protect our interest so that we don’t end up continuing to make the same wasteful mistakes.
It is enough to make you shudder at the thought of any of them being part of government with access to the public purse; but then we’ve already seen what some of them are capable of doing when in control of public money, authority and influence; and to that the people have spoken in unison – they have had enough. Nigerians are wiser and are now familiar with the trickery from these persons whose claim to fame and fortune was on the back of their public service.
Our point at the risk of overstating what is by now too obvious: We have too many yesterday men and women behaving too badly. We are dealing with a group of power-point technocrats who have mastered the rhetoric of public grandstanding: carefully crafted emotion-laden sound bites passed off as meaningful engagements. That is all there is to them, after many years of hanging around in relevant places and mingling in the right corridors, all made possible through the use/abuse of Nigeria. Our caveat to their audience is the same old line: let the buyer beware!
Maya Angelou's Black History Month Special
Alicia Keys is an award-winning R&B musician, actress and philanthropist. Keys has won 14 Grammy Awards and 14 NAACP Image Awards, has 5 platinum albums and is co-founder of Keep A Child Alive, a foundation that provides medication and support for children and families affected by AIDS. Keys has starred in several films, including Smokin’ Aces, The Nanny Diaries, and The Secret Lives of Bees. Alicia Keys most recent album, Girl on Fire, released in November 2012, debuted at the top of the charts and is her fifth number one album in the United States. In October of the same year, Keys released a mobile interactive storytelling app for children called The Journals of Mama Mae and LeeLee . Alicia Keys is also an author of a book, Tears for Water: Songbook of Poems and Lyrics, which was published in 2005.
Born in Harlem and raised in New York City’s Hells Kitchen, Keys cultivated her artistic talent from an early age, beginning to play the piano at age 7. Keys graduated from the Professional Performing Arts Academy at 16 as valedictorian of her class. Although she received a full scholarship to Columbia University, Keys decided to pursue her love for music and signed with her first label. Her first album, Songs in A Minor, won multiple Grammys in 2002, including Best R&B Album and Song of the Year for Fallin’.
In 2010, Keys married Kasseem David Dean, hip-hop producer Swizz Beatz and gave birth to their son, Egypt, October 2010. Jennifer Hudson
Jennifer Hudson is an award-winning performing artist. Born in Chicago and raised in the Englewood neighborhood, Hudson developed her soulful musical roots while attending church with her family. As a singer on a Disney cruise ship, she successfully auditioned for the third season of American Idol in Atlanta in 2004. Although Hudson came in seventh on the show, she went on to build a highly successful music and acting career. Her film debut in Dreamgirls, in which Hudson played Effie White, won her an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 2007. Her first album, Jennifer Hudson, sold over one million copies worldwide and won a Grammy for Best R&B Album. Jennifer Hudson’s most recent album, I Remember Me, released in 2011, is certified gold in the United States. Hudson performed at the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize Concert.
Jennifer Hudson’s 2012 book, I Got This: How I Changed My Ways and Lost What Weighed Me Down, documents how Hudson developed a healthy lifestyle while rising to fame. Hudson has appeared in many films since her role in Dreamgirls, including the movie Sex in the City and Winnie, in which she played Winnie Mandela.
Following the 2008 murders of three family members, Hudson founded the Julian D. King Gift Foundation in honor of her young nephew who was killed. Before school begins each year, the foundation gives backpacks and other school supplies to children in the Englewood area. Hudson also organizes an annual Toy Drive in Chicago, giving away thousands of gifts each Christmas to needy children across the Chicago area. Regina Taylor
Regina Taylor’s career spans film, television, theater and writing. Taylor has won recognition as an accomplished actress, playwright and director. As the first African-American actress to portray Juliet in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet on Broadway, she also received Emmy nominations and won a Golden Globe for her role as Lilly Harper in the television series I’ll Fly Away. Regina Taylor’s play Crowns, based on the book by the same name, is among the most-performed musicals in the United States.
Taylor’s other award-winning works as a playwright include Oo-Bla-Dee, Drowning Crow, and The Trinity River Plays. She most recently wrote and directed Post Black a monologue performed by Micki Grant, Carmen De Lavallade and Ruby Dee.
On television, she most recently starred in the CBS drama The Unit. Her performance as Anita Hill in television movies Strange Justice won her Peabody and Gracie awards. Taylor has appeared in such films as “The Negotiator,” “Courage Under Fire,” “A Family Thing,” “The Keeper, and “Lean on Me.”
In 2010, she received the Hope Abelson Artist-In-Residence Award from Northwestern University. Her work there includes creating a festival, The State(s) of America – The Regina Taylor Project, which asks students to use their own voices to tell stories of our time. She is also the National Spokesperson for the Ovarian Cancer Symptom Awareness Organization.
Taylor was born and raised in Dallas, Texas and currently lives in Chicago. Kofi Annan
Kofi Annan served two terms as Secretary-General of the United Nations (1997-2006), and spent more than four decades within the organization, winning the Nobel Peace Prize jointly with the United Nations for his work for peace and justice in 2001. Through the Kofi Annan Foundation, Mr. Annan works for increased peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights.
Annan’s 2012 memoir, Interventions: A Life in War and Peace, follows his rise through the organization and his peacemaking work through some of the late 20th century’s most brutal conflicts, in Bosnia, Rwanda and throughout the Middle East.
Born in Kumasi, Ghana, Annan attended university in his home country; in the United States at Macalester College, where he received his undergraduate degree, and at MIT; and in Europe. He joined the United Nations in 1962, working for the World Health Organization in Geneva. In 1990, after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, Annan helped more than 900 international UN staff and non-Iraqi nationals return to their home countries. From 1995-1996, he served as the Secretary-General’s Special Representative to the former Yugoslavia.
In 1997, Annan was chosen to be Secretary-General of the United Nations. In this role, he helped work to mitigate violence and unrest around the Middle East and Africa, advocated for stronger environmental and human rights standards, and began establishing the Global Aids and Health Fund.
Currently, Annan serves as chairman of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa and chairman of the Africa Progress Panel. In early 2012, he was appointed as the UN-Arab League envoy to Syria to end the civil war, but stepped down in August 2012. Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey is an unparalleled media personality, having produced and hosted the top-rated, award-winning The Oprah Winfrey Show. Winfrey founded Harpo Studios, a cross-platform media company and now leads OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network. Winfrey is one of the world’s most influential figures and one of the United States’ top philanthropists.
Winfrey makes her return to the silver screen in 2013, with her role in The Butler, a Lee Daniels film about the African-American butler who served in the White House for six United States presidents. Winfrey will also continue to lead as CEO of her television network OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network, which launched in 2011.
Oprah Winfrey was born in Kosciusko, Mississippi and graduated from high school in Nashville, Tennessee. She began her broadcast career at 19 as the first African-American woman and youngest anchor for Nashville’s WTVF-TV. She hosted shows in Baltimore and Chicago before launching The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1986. Harpo Studios, which produced the show, was created in 1988. The Oprah Winfrey Show went on to be the top-ranked talk show in history, remaining number one for 25 seasons. Winfrey and her program won more than 40 Daytime Emmy Awards, including seven for Outstanding Host and nine for Outstanding Talk Show. Having won many awards Winfrey and her show withdrew themselves from consideration for the award after accepting the Lifetime Achievement Award in 1998. Harpo Studios has launched several successful televisions shows, including The Dr. Oz Show, Rachel Ray, Dr. Phil, and The Nate Berkus Show.
Winfrey launched O, The Oprah Magazine, in 2000. The magazine has a circulation of 2.35 million readers each month.Oprah.com features many of Winfrey’s other projects, including the magazine and television network.
In June 2012, Oprah Winfrey reintroduced her popular book club as an interactive, multi-platform reading club that harnesses the power of social media, bringing passionate readers together to discuss inspiring stories. After being selected as the club’s inaugural book, Wild by Cheryl Strayed (Knopf) returned to the top of the New York Times Best Sellers list and spent six consecutive weeks at #1. The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis is the club’s second selection.
Winfrey is the recipient of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Bob Hope Humanitarian Award, the Elie Wiesel Foundation Humanitarian Award and in 2011 The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded her an honorary Academy Award with the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.
Winfrey began acting in 1985, when she played Sophia in The Color Purple, for which she received Academy and Golden Globe Award nominations. She also starred in Beloved, which Harpo Films, a division of Harpo, produced. Winfrey has supported the production of many movies through Harpo Films, including Tuesdays with Morrie, The Great Debaters, and Their Eyes Were Watching God. Winfrey also helped distribute Lee Daniels’ film Precious.
Oprah Winfrey has given millions of dollars to support scholarships and founded the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa. Winfrey started the Oprah’s Angels Network in 1998, raising more than $80 million that have gone on to support scholarships, schools, shelters, youth centers and homes around the world. Oprah’s Angels Network gave its final grants in 2010 in support of U.S. charter schools.
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