Category: Hannatu Musawa

Due to its implications and dangers, it would be difficult for anyone not to be concerned with the recent nuclear threats by the North Korean government and the tensions that have arisen between North Korea and America as a result. As one of the states once described by George Bush as the “axis of evil”, North Korea has for some time now insured its place as one of the biggest enemies to a super-power that has, in the past, enacted unilateral military action against its adversaries. But no matter how much one vilifies the actions of North Korea, looking at the situation from a third party view, America, itself, still doesn’t come out as the paragon of virtue in the whole kafuffle.

A well-known legal maxim which bars relief for anyone guilty of improper conduct in a matter urges one who comes to equity to come with clean hands. It operates to prevent any affirmative recovery for a party with unclean-hands, no matter how unfairly the party’s adversary appears. Granted, North Korea has come across as the main aggressor in this particular round of hostilities, but the truth is, as a nation that used its military might to illegally invade a sovereign nation within the last several years, it is hardly the time for America to try and pass itself off as the arbitrageur of righteousness. And even though the prospect of Kim Jong Un’s threats of missile testing and development of more nuclear technology comes with ominous implications, the perceived double standards of America, a nuclear power itself, telling another sovereignty to give up its nuclear technology leaves a lot to be desired.

America’s turgid jingoism, enormous exhibitions of patriotic vehemence and arrogance within the last decade very much exceeds the notion of moral equivalency and their call for North Korea to abide by International standards would be almost as hypocritical as Adolph Hitler calling for world peace. If the U.S ever represented the pursuance of freedom and protection of rights, then why did they ever keep secret prisons and torture cells, why do they, to this day, hold detainees without due process in Guantanamo Bay and why did they invade another sovereign country without a cogent, authentic reason other than on the impulse of a diplomatically spastic and a verbally dyslexic pea-brained former president? Had it been another country who had behaved in the manner America has in the last couple of years, America would have been the first and loudest to cry bloody murder. There is no doubt that America has somewhat redeemed itself in the eyes of the other 99% of the world since the exit of George. W. Bush from power and the election of an objective, fair minded Barack Obama, but the annoyance of America’s hypocrisy when it comes to their directive and bully tactics to other nations to give up nuclear weapons still soils its international image.

As the main nation to have used atomic weapons against an enemy during a war, America knows all too well the ease in which a nuclear power can destroy its enemy. But even though the world has been able to come to terms with the Hiroshima disaster, America must be aware that their most recent misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan has set a sorry example and arguably become the very engine to propel the development of nuclear weapons. During his tenure, when President Bush disregarded the UN and went to war in Iraq, he effectively opened the door to other war loving, international law hating leaders. But for the hostility and threats of isolation displayed by the American government against its enemies, it is likely that governments such as that of North Korea may not have been so steadfast in acquiring nuclear might. Any country believing that it would be exposed to American aggression similar to the groundless one conducted in Iraq in the last Gulf war might probably be ready to withstand international condemnation in order to develop nuclear weapons, if only to protect themselves from America. With the situation as it is now, it is quite unlikely that anyone on the receiving end of American wrath will unilaterally disarm and abandon its nuclear weapons technology. Especially given the example set where, even though Col. Muammar Qaddafi gave up Libya’s nuclear weapons development project, it didn’t stop him from being ousted from power and killed like a dog, with American help.

As a punishment for North Korean insolence, the United Nations are calling for sanctions. But as history shows, sanctions do not necessarily work on authoritarian regimes willing to allow massive human suffering. The consequence of sanctions affects the most vulnerable and helpless; it is highly unlikely that the threat of sanctions will deter the North Koreans from its nuclear path or achieve regime change.

In an ideal world, the United States should have the capability to prevent the kind of conflict we are witnessing between North Korea and the western world. America controls the whole planet through trade, aid, military capacity and with its vast influence; it should also have the ability to guide the world to peace. But the super power has a reputation for pursuing its interest in a manner that disregards anyone it perceives to be an international threat to U.S. geopolitical and economic interest. Had it chosen to approach the issue of nuclear possession from an even platform where the terms of possession is equal for all countries, then their argument would have been more convincing. But as it is now, what incentive does North Korea have in joining talks to give up itsnuclear weapons when their perceived enemies possess nuclear weapons? What is good for the goose should be good for the gander and until the entire world became weapons-free, no country has the moral right to point an accusing finger at another, especially if they possess nuclear weapons themselves.

It’s all well and good for the international community to denounce North Korea’s recent nuclear ambitions, but as long as there is a general support for the kind of American weapons development and testing we have witnessed within the last 100 years, then this is double-standards. Let’s not forget this isn’t year zero; many nations, including America, Britain, France, India and Pakistan amongst others have had huge piles of nerve gas and other chemical weapons for years. Until the whole world calls for the destruction of all nuclear weapons in every country and speaks up against the type of injustice we have witnessed America unleash on other countries, then none of these nations have a right to tell North Korea what it should and should not do. This effort to limit nuclear weapons technology to the current nuclear powers can only influence the kind of confrontation we are witnessing. If America or any of the western nations are interested in fostering peace and forming an understanding with countries like North Korea, one of their main prerogatives should be to de-arm the nuclear weapons they themselves have then try to develop some kind of dialogue.

The possession of nuclear arms by any country threatens everyone on the planet and the only defense against them is a realistic worldwide non-nuclear strategy that would involve a progressive disarming of all nuclear powers. The world needs cooperation, discourse and arbitration in order to destroy all nuclear weapons. But as long as select nations are allowed to keep their stockpiles of nuclear weapons, then this recent hue and cry against North Korea is akin to stopping the gander from acquiring what it sees the goose has. And although Kim Jong Un may be suffering from a twisted form of youthful exuberance, he will unlikely be willing to abandon his nuclear ambitions just because America and the western community said so.

Justice or peace? Basically that’s what it boils down to. Since the beginning of the offensive by Boko Haram, there has been widespread debate about how to bring the bloody onslaught to an end. With so many divergent voices lending themselves to the debate of whether the particular strategy developed along the lines of amnesty is appropriate, given the surrounding circumstance; it’s anyone’s guess as to which side of the pendulum president Jonathan will ultimately land on the matter.

There is no doubt, the section of Boko Haram and other extremists that ignite this debate are a mob of ignorant, depraved, erroneous, wicked and misguided zealots who have committed the most vile, heinous, evil and immoral crimes against innocent people; women and children whom have done absolutely nothing to them. And for that, under any structure or belief system, there has to be retribution. In any country of the world, criminal prosecution of those accused of committing crimes is a fundamental aspect of a victim’s right to justice. However, sometimes the notion of remedial justice for victims often has to be balanced against the need to deal effectively and progressively with the atrocities and not provoke or maintain further violence. In such a circumstance, a restorative justice approach incorporating amnesty, focusing on the normative rather than the punitive objectives of criminal law, may be the more appropriate model. And that is how the issue of amnesty for Boko Haram comes into the fray, since the current situation we are in could be said to lend itself to such an event.

From time immemorial, amnesty has been employed as a means of promoting settlement and advancing reconciliation in societies that have emerged from repression. But even though, it is a tool that was historically often utilized in conflict resolution, it was never entirely viewed as the best option; only a necessary one. When atrocities are committed with such impunity, as is the case with Boko Haram, and are merely dealt with by forgiveness and restorative justice, for the concept of human rights to have real legitimacy, they must connect up with retributive conceptions of justice. And a carte-blanche amnesty for Boko Haram, despite the atrocious mass murders and butchering they have subjected innocent Nigerians to, does not meet up with that standard.

Putting the issue of human rights aside, whether amnesty is the wisest course for the government to pursue with Boko Haram really remains a matter of debate and perception. Instead of examining the pros and cons of amnesty for Boko Haram on a large scale; instead of making arguments about setting bad precedents, previous amnesty agreements with Niger Delta militants and not negotiating with ghosts, I opt to examine what the adoption or rejection of amnesty really means; what it would represent. Perhaps, if we remove all our emotional and sentimental blinkers, and break down the implications of any amnesty deal to their very basic indices, we might have a better understanding of what the adoption or rejection of amnesty for Boko Haram really represents.

Fundamentally, in its simplest form, the adoption of amnesty for Boko Haram entails a choice between peace and justice. Peace and justice; two resolutions that inspire and give way to each other, would normally go together and complement each other. Ideally, any strategy adopted in this matter should incorporate both concepts. But when we are dealing with the kind of amnesty we are discussing within the backdrop of the atrocities that have been committed, the amnesty may only offer the best prospect for peace, not justice. Within this our particular impasse, unless Boko Haram surrender and offer them-selves up for trial and prosecution today, the two concepts certainly cannot be applied in a manner where they co-exist together. There is just no getting away from it, peace verses Justice must be brought to a direct point when we talk about amnesty for Boko Haram. And if there is a dichotomy between the two, as suggested in this case, and a single choice has to be made, what ought we to prefer?

I have my own personal views on the issue and find that, for me, it is a battle of conscience for the past against the present. The past, because for the victims and for the crimes that have already been committed, justice should be served. The present, because the innocent people existing within the eye of the storm deserve some reprieve, deserve peace. But a third facet of this reasoning, the most important one, is the future. Given a singular choice between the concept of peace and justice, which option has the ability to actually change the status quo and provide the most stable and secure future for Nigerians?

History shows that in countries which have emerged from repressive regimes and trials where crimes against humanity were committed, the peace deals that sacrifice justice often fail to produce the expected peace in the long run. Whereas justice creates a structural change in society that fundamentally alters the conditions allowing for conflict, peace deals simply return societies to a state of non-war; particularly one that allowed for the widespread crisis in the first place. One would be hard pressed to find a case where a system that prefers justice ever leads to a return to that conflict. Therefore in that sense, peace should never be preferred to justice, only to allow it to inspire justice.

On the other hand, while international and national criminal trials promote justice, the quest for justice can be a long winding road and can exacerbate divisions and may even hinder the achievement of peace. Usually, those who face the potential for prosecution may be reluctant to lay down arms, giving way for the violence to continue. Instead, amnesties for perpetrators are often thought to promote peace and reconciliation, though it is sought at the expense of retributive justice.

It is essential for the government upon pondering their decision on whether to give amnesty to Boko Haram to gauge the views of the population most affected by the violence rather than instigating plans based on the views of politicians and dogmatists. The communities, the families, the businesses residing in the red zones, those that have been targeted, hounded and slaughtered should have the first-refusal to make an input into the decision government makes about amnesty. It is their views that should count first and foremost. Unless the government and security agencies have concrete plans to ensure the security of every family living in the target communities, it is their cries, their anguish and not those of the naysayers not directly affected by the violence or those politicizing and tribalizing the issue, which the government should take into account, in addition to providing full reparation to all the victims and their relatives.

Any initiative that the government eventually applies in regards to amnesty for terrorists should ideally balance the demand for justice against the need for peace and reconciliation. And while the lack of amnesty for Boko Haram can provide accountability and amnesty can provide stability, it is clear that the attainment of both is almost impossible. A choice has to be made on the resolution the government will adopt.

So as we continue to unravel this morbid, dark drama that Boko Haram has visited upon us, we can be certain that the choice is not about which group of criminals deserve amnesty and which don’t, it’s not about a perverse allegiance to ethnicity or religion, it’s about what we are willing to sacrifice; Justice for the cause of peace or peace for the cause of justice?

Over to you President Jonathan Sir… So what will it be; peace or justice?

It is an important teaching in Christianity that God is not mocked; whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

We cannot escape the consequence of our actions; everything that we do as participants in this interconnecting community has repercussions and one way or another it comes back to us. Much like this principle and the law of Karma, in nearly every religion and culture there is a fervent belief that the total result of a person’s deeds and actions during the successive phases of the person’s existence determines the feedback fate issues that person within their life time or in the hereafter. It is further taught, ‘if we sow a thought we reap an act, if we sow an act, we reap a habit, if we sow a habit, we reap a character and if we sow a character, we reap a consequence.’

At this point in time, nowhere should this message be reiterated than on our very own doorsteps where few people in the corridors of power are determined to garner us towards a most debauched consequence. Despite the outcry that continues to follow our recent irrational and derisible presidential pardon of criminals and kleptomaniacs, notwithstanding the embarrassment of the exposure of inept government representatives who have to clarify the simplest questions from ‘their oga on the top’, in spite of the plethora of blunders by this administration, reports have been made of secret plans by a select few in the corridors of power who are devising a very dangerous scheme to remain in power by using the tool of terrorism.

Recently, reports were made of an alleged plot to unleash a terror attack in Lagos. The ink had barely dried on that report when it was revealed that nine suspected terrorists were arrested in a building in Lagos which belongs to a state government. Although the state government has dissociated itself from the suspected terrorists arrested in its building, the arrest of the alleged terrorists in that particular building has fueled the conspiracy theory that Boko Haram has become a franchise under which government fifth columnists are operating to further disrupt Nigeria and prompt a national crisis likely to break up the country or force Nigerians to elongate the tenure of this administration come 2015. If these reports are true, despite the brink of disaster from which Nigeria has often come from, then the consequence Nigeria finds itself in is truly pathetic and indeed sad; very sad.

Although our country is situated on top of a smouldering volcano that is ready and rearing to erupt at any given moment, some of these signs point to definite elements within government and around the president that are determined to unscrupulously elongate their inhabitancy of power while damming the consequence of their actions. The more they use their calling to lord over the next cause of action to divert Nigeria away from a future; the more they plot and plan on how to fragment the country using the tool of terrorism, the closer they advance us toward the trigger that might commence the great explosion. While this great explosion may just be the end result they scheme for, do they not care about what will happen to the almost 160 million Nigerians already existing under pressure? No; because they have completely become victims to a world where the intense lust for power and money fully possesses its pray, so much so they no longer bother to camouflage their voracity, guile, and self-serving actions. And to be able to satisfy the worldly desires of a few, Nigeria and her helpless children are again being short-changed by the intrigues of those who swore to protect them. The amount of spin few in the corridors of power are running in order to achieve its alleged aim moves faster than that of a tumble dryer. Anyone who doesn’t comply is chewed out like a discarded piece of bubble gum and anyone who speaks against it is threatened, stalked and victimized like a sub-human entity.

In the past, government officials who tried to double deal this country by either illegally elongating their tenure in power through trickery, misusing their power or milking the coffers for what it is worth have received their comeuppance in the most unfortunate of ways. But despite the numerous failed administrations serving as an example, we are again being besieged from within by tyranny, graft and disloyalty by a select few who carry out secret meetings and come to secret agreements that they earnestly, “Between them and God”, know is not in the best interest of the majority of people of this country.

The power hungry packs who are advocating desecrating the fragment of the liberty we gained in the past are the true enemies of the people of this nation. By turning Nigeria into a business venture and a power podium they have betrayed the dreams of our past and the hopes of our future. By planning to disregard common sense and behaving as if the millions of us who have a stake in this country don’t exist, they create and contribute to the disaster we find ourselves in. By steering our country for purely personal ambitions, members of those few in the corridors of power stand before us guilty as people who acted to disorganise Nigeria. If in the coming months those who are in power succeed in bringing forth anymore anti Constitution presidential pardons, more anti-people and anti-Nigerian policies or terrorism conspiracies to further divide the country, history forever will judge them reproachfully as those who were willing to pawn the future of their children, grandchildren and great-great grandchildren.

With decades of power mismanagement in this country, one is compelled to wonder whether we are fated thusly. Is the giant of Africa perpetually condemned to an eternity of a greedy gaggle of few government officials who mortgage our nation, disdain the interest of the population and bleed Nigeria dry? This would appear to be our reality.

If those we had previously relied upon to take us to the Promised Land continue to short-change and fail us, then maybe the masses of Nigeria as a collective need to take the requisite action into their own hands. Our hindrance is that we are a nation divided and in denial, we suffer from grave memory loss and are incredibly easy to manipulate. People still look at freedom fighting with suspicion along ethnic and religious lines. Igbo, Hausa, Yoruba, Gwari, Shekiri, Irogbo, Nupe, Eleme, Birom, Langtang, Auchi, Fulani, Calabari, Tiv, Ogoni, Igbirra, and all the other 234 tribes of Nigeria; our struggles as humans are one and the same and unless we realise and embrace this, then our torture will continue.

We tend to also fantasize that a messiah will emerge and the seas will part open into two in order for Nigeria to be saved. Maybe the solution lies not within the direction of a messiah but within the strength of the masses of a nation that claims one in every five Africans. If we consider the effect of the Ukrainian, Tunisian, Libyan, Egyptian and Georgian peoples past resolve when the insult of their governments became unbearable, we begin to realise the power of a people when they stand together as one. Tyranny begets uprisings, when the government’s tyranny reaches its zenith any more than it has now and the majority population realise they are constantly staring at empty food bowls, empty government coffers, rigged elections, alleged government induced insecurity, wicked governmental intrigue, the situation may spew and the next mass action may really become mass.

For those determined to flog this country off so that you can remain in power or spill the blood of innocent Nigerians in order to split the nation up, lest you forget your actions all have consequences. Make no mistake you cannot get away with the bad choices you make for your nation, because history is recording everything you do. If you sow badly in this season, you will reap worse in another, no matter how long it takes. Even some of the greatest forces in Africa; Idi Amin, Mobutu Seseseko, Haile Salasi, once bred the radiant rule of Monarchs. And for some time their might nurtured their supremacy and reign over their countries but in the end, they faced karma and all three ended up victims of the consequences of their actions. None was even allowed to die in the nation he once commanded.

Therefore, next time the ‘freemasons’ in the government corridors secretly meet to allegedly fuel terrorism and sow the seed of ruin for Nigeria, they should be mindful not to be deceived; “God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap… For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.”

May God expose those who scheme to destroy the future of 160 million people!

I have watched many crime shows and horror movies, mostly because I struggle to understand what could possibly possess

someone to commit atrocities against another human being. The trail of death and violence that has characterized several communities in the north and last weekend’s massacres in Maidguri and Kano are so shockingly unimaginable one is almost lost for thought when trying to contemplate what could possibly be running through the minds of people who decide to slaughter others so brazenly.

The memorials of the slain that now sully several Northern towns provide only small glimpses into the collective insanity that has gripped the society. It deeply saddens one to think of the horror and pain the victims and the families of these spates of violence have gone through. As for the people who can easily take another’s life, and be so pompous to think that that life had no value or light in this world, and that their existence was worth destroying are an abomination of our species.

With all these suicide bombings and mass murder, it is almost impossible to imagine how the perpetrators, who are no better than barbarians, could have turned into such cold blooded butchers. There is no doubt that a fragment of our society has completely lost its humanity. That loss happened the moment we stopped fighting foreach other and started fighting witheach other. And within that fight, came the madness that we see unfolding before our very eyes.

For how much longer are we supposed to take this violence that has submerged our society? How long can we take the things that we are not supposed to take? Northern Nigeria today has become like the body of a chronic substance abuser. The body is not naturally made or prepared to take any external, toxic substances. It is not natural and is against natural justice. And as the substances and drugs continue to be forced into the body; that body will eventually stop to function properly and the mind will give way to madness. Sooner or later what the body would be left with will be the shadow of a junkie; a mad man aimlessly roaming shoddily on a winding road to nowhere.

Yes, our reality is as simple as that! You see, the simplicity of madness is this; There is good in the world and there is evil. There is light and there is darkness. There is hope and there is despair. And we all get to decide where to stand. The barbarians within us that tread the road of malevolence and wickedness choose to stand on the side of evil, darkness and despair. They choose to slaughter and main other people’s children, wives, husbands, fathers and mothers despite the fact that they have children, wives, husbands, fathers and mothers of their own that they wish to keep safe. They choose to indict reasonable minded, objective and innocent people in the community because of the association of guilt that Nigerian ignorance attaches to tribe, ethnicity and religion. The barbarians chose the dark side and as a result obliterate the essence of our mortality.

From neighborhood communities, to social networks, to communal gathering, our lives have become ravaged by crimes against humanity, overtaken by fighting against the evil chain of hatred. We don’t all have to stand exactly the same. We can stand in different ways, with varying opinions. But we should stand against the hatred that is ripping our societies apart. At this point, Nigerians no longer have a choice but to take that stance so we can show the barbarians within us where the majority of us stand.

Even for those who do not ascribe themselves to the violence enacted against fellow Nigerians, as long as they are part of keeping the chain of hatred strong, then they are part of the problem, because hatred is where it all starts. In the movie ‘Star-Wars’, one of the characters, Yoda, in advising his pupil against fear, anger and hatred said, “Fear leads to anger, Anger leads to hate, Hate leads to Suffering”. He was correct because when one has fear, there’s the instinct of fight or flight. When they choose to fight, it manifests itself in a form of anger; anger then leads to hate in some form. Hate turns to suffering very quickly and when one has all these emotions running high, they suffer or strive to make someone else suffer. Hating one thing could easily turn into hating many other things and that’s the vicious circle within which the barbarians and extremists within our society exist. That’s the vicious circle that those within us will find ourselves as long as we continue to nurse hatred against each other. So long as we have a desire to salvage what little strain of humanity we have left, the choice of the overwhelming majority must be one where we break the hatred chain and stand together against this madness.

Every day we speak about the lack of justice in Nigeria, breach of rights, corruption, rigged elections and the cost of living. But how can we even talk about rights, democracy, politics, aesthetics and philosophy when we are murdering our neighbours’ children and training our children to kill our neighbours? The hatred we preach and the violence under any circumstances is unjustified and impure. It reduces us to something less than human; puts us on a slippery slope to the pit of destruction and damnation. More worrying is the lingering effect that the present activities will have on the next generation who will invariably be the product of a civilization which produced and dwelled in violence, hatred and destruction. That generation will be molded with a consciousness of partial rationality and twisted moralities.

What is happening today in Nigeria is indicative of the fact that we have lost control of our lives and we have traded on the road of self-destruction. As the cost of living in Nigeria continues to rise to something that is beyond the reach of the ordinary Nigerian, the cost of life plummets to absolutely nothing. The mass death of our neighbors and kin is now such a daily occurrence; it has become the natural order of our present existence. And as the insane and barbaric murderers continue to be guilty of mass murder, let the rest of us not be guilty of murdering rationality, liberty, equality, morality, natural justice, understanding and purpose. We must give way for our conscience and mortality to get back that purpose of humanity that we were all created with.

Our children are yearning for peace, looking for peace, and are in desperate need of peace. Yet, we cannot have peace while our communities are in pieces, shattered and battered. The violence has got to stop! It is totally unacceptable, it is an obscenity and completely out of order. It has become the grave evil of our time and all good people in Nigeria have a duty to be rational, understand and work together in order to eradicate it. No matter what one community has done to another, there can be no justification for violence in any form. Responsible and respectful communities handle their disagreements with understanding and patience, not rage and violence and that is what we have to strive to get back to.

The leaders in the affected communities, especially in Northern Nigeria have to provide a common ground where all identifiable factions of any communal clash can share their opinions and needs in a civil exchange that can ultimately lead to an acceptable outcome for all. At the very least, the communities involved should keep in mind that compromise and understanding is necessary to make their community a place worth living in.

The kind of terrorism we have just witnessed in Kano and Maiduguri is unforgivable, extremely despicable & vicious. One feels strong resentment. And as one lends their thoughts & prayers to the families & friends of those killed & injured in the bomb explosions in Kano, Maiduguri & all over Nigeria, one prays for God to punish & roast the perpetrators of these heinous crimes.

I have watched the scariest and goriest horror movies imaginable and I still don’t have an understanding as to what could possibly possess one human being to commit terrible atrocities against another human being. And even though many of us will never be able to understand the way the deformed mind of murdering barbarians operate; we each have a duty not to allow ourselves to be part of the vicious circle that leads to the obliteration of the essence of our mortality.

Reports from Mississippi of a child who contracted HIV from her mother at birth but who is now free of it must be the best news we’ve heard in a while. Apparently, scientists and Doctors on a quest to cure HIV may have stumbled on a breakthrough in the fight against the disease. While this latest advance does not mean that the cure for AIDS has been discovered, it is progress that will no doubt open up new avenues at the very least for scientists to explore and help improve the treatment of babies infected at birth.

The baby in question was born with the disease because her mother had not been tested in early pregnancy, thus had not been put on antiretroviral drugs. By the time doctors had realized that the mother was HIV positive, it was too late to implement the prevention package that would have prevented transmission of HIV from mother to child. Shortly after her birth, she was given a strong cocktail of antiretroviral drugs. The drugs are thought to have hit the virus so hard and so early that the disease all but disappeared. Although tests show that the baby no longer has HIV, scientists are careful not to label it a complete-cure but instead call it a functional-cure since traces of the virus, though inactive, still remain in the baby.

This is brilliant news for everybody across the globe but especially good news for our continent, which has been brought down to its knees by HIV and AIDS. While we often hear folk tales about people being cured of HIV and AIDS with traditional concoctions, there is no cure for HIV and AIDS and the only fully cured patient recognized worldwide is the Berlin-patient, Timothy Brown. He was considered cured of HIV and leukemia five years after receiving bone marrow transplant to treat his leukemia from a rare donor naturally resistant to HIV.

From the time HIV and AIDS descended on our world, it has devastated generations and decimated our continent especially. The grim reaper of all afflictions, HIV and AIDS has never discriminated against its victims as it overwhelms each with fevers, night sweats, swollen glands, chills, weakness, gross weight loss, chronic diarrhea, constant colds, headaches, sore muscles, sore joints, stomach aches or skin rashes. Scientists have long maintained that there is a small group of individuals who have a genetic resistance to HIV, develop AIDS very slowly or never at all. These unique individuals seem to possess a genetic difference which prevents the virus from attacking certain immune receptors. In all our bodies, the group of cells and organs known as the immune system are meant to protect us by fighting viruses and infections. What makes HIV so vicious is that it attacks the immune system itself and has the additional ability to rapidly mutate in order to evade additional defences. This effectively leaves the body vulnerable to HIV and other infections.

For many of us in these parts of the world, the horror of HIV and AIDS has become all too real. Almost every household knows someone who has died or is suffering from the disease. In Nigeria, the spread of the disease that first appeared in 1986 is so fast that Health Organizations have rated us the 3rd most Aids vulnerable country. And it’s no wonder because over the last three decades Nigeria’s healthcare system has deteriorated so badly due to political instability, corruption and a mismanaged economy. The entire country lacks basic healthcare provisions and trained medics robbing Nigerians of access to basic prevention, care or treatment services.

The 1996 HIV and Aids Emergency Action Plan (HEAP) programme established, was ab-initio lacking due to low spending on the plan and due to the government not consolidating its efforts. For example when over 600,000 people required antiretroviral treatment, only 17,000 received it. If the government was at any time focused in its efforts to curb the spread of the disease, it should have tackled the numerous fonts that facilitate the spread of HIV. This would include organising coordinated national blood supply systems, regulating the licentious activities of long-distance truck and commercial drivers, sanctioning harmful traditional practices, introducing safety regulations in barbers/salons and clamping down hard on commercial sex workers. Although the world’s oldest profession is illegal in Nigeria there are millions of active commercial sex workers, with a high percentage being HIV positive. Since the vast majority of them do not use any form of protection, our legislature needs to implement stringent laws to curb this practice and the enforcement agencies need to enforce the laws vigorously.

Attitudes are shaped by knowledge and experience, therefore those with knowledge about HIV and AIDS must try to reach out about sexual health, abstinence, HIV and other means of contracting the disease. It won’t be easy because culturally and religiously our private society makes discussion on certain topics taboo and since the society generally regards immoral behavior as being the main cause of the epidemic, stigma may prevent people living with the virus to willingly participate in discussions.

Our government can articulate its policy on HIV and AIDS more effectively by supporting NGOs, matching words with sustained action and commitment, sensitizing the society using the media, the religious communities and the performing arts. If we consider Uganda’s example, the success-story of the African fight against HIV, it’s clear that the epidemic is beatable. The success in Uganda was the result of a broad-based national effort backed up by involvement of religious and traditional leaders, NGOs and a firm political commitment that introduced same-day results for HIV tests, support for victims, distribution of protection tools, self-treatment kits for infections and sex education programmes all across schools and rural areas.

Undoubtedly Africa has borne the brunt of this disease. The West brands Africa as the original habitat of the virus. Though many are skeptical of this theory, the question of where HIV comes from still remains. One of the numerous theories regarding its origin is the hunter-theory, where HIV was thought to have passed to humans through the consumption of monkeys and bush-meat in Central Africa. The big anomaly with the Out-of-Africa theory is why was the first identified case of HIV in the West and not in Africa? While AIDS was identified to have killed a patient in the US in 1980, it did not appear in Africa until 1982. It is pure logic that with the population, polygamy and procreation present in Africa, had the disease first come to Africa before going to the West, it would have ravaged the continent long ago. When one considers the trend of its spread in Africa, one will notice that HIV and AIDS made its preliminary impact on the African continent in the countries which have a higher percentage of western tourism, suggesting that it was brought into Africa by Westerners already infected.

Another theory states that in the early 70s when the hepatitis B vaccine was developed in chimpanzees, it was tested on thousands of homosexual men who signed up as guinea pigs in the US. Even though scientists have downplayed any connection with HIV and the vaccine, over 20% of the men who volunteered for the experiments were discovered to be HIV-positive. Further theories suggest that three of the earliest known instances of HIV infection were much earlier than thought. The first was thought to be a plasma sample taken in 1959 from an adult male living in Central Africa, the second was found in tissue samples from an American teenager who died in St. Louis in 1969 and the third was found in tissue samples from a Norwegian sailor who died around 1976. A 1998 analysis of the plasma sample from 1959 has suggested that HIV was introduced into humans around the 1940s or the early 1950s. The problem with this theory is the unanswered question of why it did not spread then and if it didn’t spread, how did it appear a decade later in an individual situated on the opposite part of the world? The spread of HIV and AIDS could quite conceivably have been induced by a combination of many different events. The origin of HIV has puzzled everyone ever since the illness first came into light but most would probably agree it is important to understand the actual source of the virus in order to fight it. In the early days of the epidemic, disease control scientists were alleged to have traced the AIDS trail to Patient-O, a promiscuous Bi-Sexual Canadian flight attendant named Gaetan Dugas who was thought to have given HIV to multiple male and female partners globally, who then in turn transmitted it to others and rapidly spread the virus to locations all over the world.

It is likely that we will never know how, when and where HIV actually originated from but what we do know is that it is a ruthless killer that humanity and each and every one of us must strive to contain.

The case of the baby girl has buoyed hopes for millions and if scientists can better understand and replicate what happened in her treatment, it could allow them to establish a cure for new-born babies infected with the disease. Real excitement is justified by this discovery, but in spite of the feat, we must keep in mind that there is still no cure for HIV and AIDS and any practical applications as far as the latest discovery are most likely a long way further down the line.