The Nation Newspaper

Category: Olukorede Yishau

  • Is Trump coming?

    Is Trump coming?

    The United States’ economy is picking up under President Joe Biden. Unfortunately, the effect of the robust state of the economy in America’s election appears not serious. Or, what explanation can exist for Biden trailing behind his predecessor, Donald Trump, in the race for the White House? Since last October, Biden has trailed Trump in polls. Now, in the heat of the primaries and caucuses, things still look tight for Biden.

    What is certain for now is that Biden is the only one who can deny himself the Democratic Party’s ticket for the November election, and it is certain that the Republican Party ticket is already in for Trump. Many of those who earlier showed interest in the party’s ticket have pulled out of the race. Not just that they pulled out, they declared support for Trump and are going all out to champion his cause.

    Despite all the legal hurdles, these guys seem set to ensure another Biden/Trump battle. Trump faces over 90 criminal charges. The legal quagmire means nothing to North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum. Last December, Burgum ended his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination and endorsed Trump in January. This was after six months of campaigning with a promise to lower inflation, push America to be energy independent and secure its southern border.

    Like Burgum, ex-New Jersey Governor Chris Christie also pulled out from the race. He did in January, a few days before the Iowa caucuses and backed Trump.

    Another hopeful who dropped out in January is Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. He endorsed Trump, thus entrusting him with his quest to “reverse the decline” in America.

    Trump also has the support of Conservative talk radio host Larry Elder who ended his quest for the presidential nomination in October 2023. He was running on the promise to secure the border and combat criticism that the United States is systemically racist. He also sought to counter what he described as “epidemic of fatherlessness”.

    Others who have run out of the race are Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, Michigan businessman Perry Johnson, ex-Vice President Mike Pence, Tech entrepreneur and author Vivek Ramaswamy, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez and ex-Texas Representative Hurd.

    Hurd didn’t endorse Trump. Known for his scathing attack on the former president, he pitched his tent with former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, a challenger for the Republican presidential nomination. Inflation, China’s global influence, artificial intelligence and children’s low scores in math, science and reading were his key campaign talking points. Now, he is hoping Haley will thrash Trump and get the nomination.

    Pence, who also dropped out of the race, once said Trump “should never” be president again because of the aftermath of the 2020 election. He was Trump’s deputy when the former president tried to undo Biden’s victory. Trump quickly re-christened him a weakling for not working against the greater good.

    With a Trump candidacy imminent, can Biden defeat him a second time? Or, are we set for another four years of Trump. His first four years were more troublemaking and less troubleshooting. He made troubles with almost everyone. His friends were white supremacists and those who benefitted from his policies. African-Americans felt left at the back. Europe didn’t get along with him. He treated Africa as a shit hole and dealt with the Chinese like lepers. Immigrants were objects of misgiving and mimicry. Mexicans were treated with disdain and he began walling them off. He also separated children from their mothers in an inhuman immigration policy. 

    In those four years, the rule was: Cross Trump and get tongue-lashed. Reporters had their fill. News conferences were avenues for the immediate past president to thrash the media for a perceived wrong. CNN, to him, meant fake news. New York Times, Washington Post, and others were despicable. Even Fox News that started as an ally ended as a traitor. For Trump, there were no permanent friends. The only thing that was permanent was his interests and once you were against his interests, you automatically switched camp and were dressed down in the worst language possible. Pence can testify.

    Trump also eroded core alliances such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, provoked traditional partners and pampered autocrats such as Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Never had America seen such an era, and it could take some time for such a mistake to be made again. Some say the mistake can never happen again. But, with democracy, never say never. Even ‘fools’ at times appeal to the majority and get the coveted crown.

    In a lot of ways, White supremacists had a field day. So free were they that they threatened fire if their man was not re-elected and taking over the Capitol was the height of their madness. They wanted the heads of Pence and Speaker Pelosi and others they considered traitors. They broke glasses and desecrated the hallowed chamber. Reports suggest that dozens of law enforcement officers, active-duty military members, and veterans participated in the global giant’s moment of shame. Now, the Capitol has a high wall and the National Guard is out to keep the dogs of war away.

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    It will be unfair to write off the Trump years totally. He was not all bad news. He is credited with overhauling the U.S. judiciary, especially with the appointment of three Supreme Court justices and the fast-tracking of the appointment of more than 200 federal judges. He is also respected in some quarters for pushing through massive tax cuts for corporations, expanding the economy faster than it was under Barack Obama, and crashing unemployment to a record low— before the economic gains were washed away by the Coronavirus. He also normalised relations between Israel and four once-antagonistic Arab neighbours, and he condensed U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, but like a commentator noted all these were “dwarfed by what Trump got wrong”.

    My final take: From now till November, America is going to dominate global news. Except something unexpected happens, Trump and Biden will be the main characters in this book that America has just started writing and the twists and the turns will be unprecedented. Neither of them will have it easy.

  • Ayo Deforge’s dream

    Ayo Deforge’s dream

    Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards – Søren Kierkegaard.

    Martin Luther-King’s dream was about black people becoming truly free. It is a different kettle of fish for Ayo Deforge, a Nigerian writer based in Nice, France. Her dream was to become a published novelist and she didn’t plan to shoulder the responsibility solely. But, after waiting for years for her manuscripts to become what creative writer and academic Maik Nwosu described as ‘republic of letters’, she decided to look beyond traditional publishers for her dream to come through. The result is ‘Tearless’, a novel set in Lagos and Paris and a bit in London.

    She plans to release others such as ‘Under The Rain’, ‘Swept Away’ and ‘Captive’.

    ‘Tearless’ is narrated by Lami and it follows her and her dysfunctional family. Her story tells us that the past and the present are Siamese twins difficult to separate. We also discover that because we cannot choose our parents and siblings, cohesion isn’t always guaranteed in a family and circumstances, such as sickness and death, often lead to schisms that cause irreparable damage and everlasting pains.

    In this beautiful read spiced with the right dose of suspense, we learn that “friends become family and family become strangers. It happens all the time. Family is important but you can’t always force it.”

    Even the choices we make of our own volition, such as who we marry, don’t come with warranties.

    Lami’s father, the one she and her four siblings (Wale, Lara, Fola and Tutu) call Papa, has a tsunami-like temper which sees him constantly throwing their mother out from their flat after beating her up. Lami’s father’s nastiness increases when his wife becomes terminally ill. He fails to take proper care of her only to cry the loudest when she eventually dies.

    The mother’s death does nothing to assuage his craziness thus leaving the family fractured.

    Despite all, Lami finds a way to continue with life. Her study of French helps her in navigating life and with dear friends like Ada and Nico, she is able to find meaning in life.

    However, the past refuses to be dumped in the trash can. It keeps clouding her thoughts and dreams and insisting on being settled. Year in year out, things remain the same without any signs of closure.

    Deforge’s switch between the past and present allows us to see how both are intertwined and how, despite our best efforts, separating them, most times, is never successful. This literary technique also gives us context and necessary background to current happenings.

    Deforge examines grief and how denial can be a coping mechanism for the grieving.

    “Running changes nothing; it won’t make it go away. Face it, challenge it, change it if you can, accept it if you can’t,” Nico urges.

    She also examines the role of family members in grief management, especially the mostly nonsensical advice they dish out. The politics of condolences is given ample space and the picture of how grief is exploited induces ache. The story is, on another level, an exploration of how we miss and long for loved ones when differences keep us apart. This is explored using the strained relationship between Lami and Fola, her younger brother with whom she used to wrestle for the left-over food in their mother’s food flask.

    “I was thinking about my little brother, how close we used to be as children, and how far apart we’ve grown from each other now,” Lami tells Nico.

    Deforge also x-rays darkness but not in the same manner as Jumoke Verissimo in ‘A Small Silence’.

    Unlike Prof in Verissiomo’s book, whose love for darkness is by choice, darkness overwhelms Lami and brings out what she prefers hidden. There are times sleep offers her respite from the darkness that comes with switching off the light.

    It will not be out of place to say the book centres on fatherhood, but in this case, the absence of proper fatherhood and how an abject father figure can leave a child in trauma all the way to adulthood. It also tells of how motherhood, when well-played, stays in the mind of children long after the mother is gone.

    Ayo Deforge writes sweet, delicate and layered prose. Like a good painter, she makes her emotional scenes so intense a reader’s heart may pound so loud the person sitting close by could hear it and eyes may bulge and Adam’s apple bob. When she writes about grief, she makes the reader feel it; with the right diction, she brings pictures alive and delivers cinematic effects.

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    ‘Tearless’ is, in some sense, a Lagos Island novel. It shows that part of Lagos in its glory and shame; the picture that emerges is that of heaven and hell situated side by side. The author’s portrayal of places such as the Oluwo International Fish Market in Epe, Bar Beach shortly before it gave way to Eko Atlantic and Eko Hotel and Paris shows deft craft and a painstaking eye for details.

    Her description of Banana Island’s roads with “no loose stone, no pothole, not one litter” and sundry details match my encounters with one of the world’s most-expensive real estate.

    The mess that Makoko is on the Lagos cityscape also receives its due. It also paints a sincere picture of the fall of Dolphin Estate once considered a posh precinct but now reduced to a slum in Eti-Osa, one of the richest local government areas of Lagos.

    “Each block of flats had parking areas right in front, and instead of cars, rickety kiosks had been erected in many of these places. Women sold provisions, some sold foodstuffs and some sold cooked food. Others were shops for dressmakers, hair stylists, video cassette hire and shoe repairers,” the narrator observes.

    This is also a Paris novel, with London making a cameo appearance. Deforge makes us “see Paris and die”.

    With vivid diction, she makes us feel we know this city of love like the back of our palms. Deforge is a painter, but one that paints with words. She makes you see what she is writing instead of reading it. Her scenes can be felt because she takes you there with appropriate syntax.

    My final take: We can try to run away from our past, but it always has a way of catching up with us. So, for us to have a good tomorrow we need to be careful about what we do today which will eventually become our past.

  • America in six books

    America in six books

    America is a behemoth. This monstrous creature has fifty arms and each with its own peculiarities. The country is heaven, the country is hell, depending on which side it decides to show to you or which side you choose to face.

    America, an amalgam of components capable of being countries on their own, is a nation that has tickled the fancy of African writers in the Diaspora and they have captured it in different lights.

    The brilliant writer, Sefi Atta, is one of those who have captured this giant of a nation. In Atta’s ‘The Bad Immigrant’, the America that emerges is a bully, a country that values conformity over merit, a country where an immigrant’s academic prowess is no guarantee of success, a self-appointed defender of the universe, a nation always looking for trouble overseas, a nation which runs away from race issues yet confronts it every day, a nation united and divided in equal measures and a nation that will always have to watch its back because of the enemies it has created for itself.

    Set in New York, New Jersey and Middlesex, it follows the Ahmed-Karims and America. Through the eyes of Lukmon, the narrator, we glean race relations between blacks and whites, between Africans and African- Americans. Racism, we see, is a reality, which many an American still deny but denial or not, it leaves the country divided.

    We get so much insight into American lives, including how the people, at times, give so much personal information to strangers. We also see their ignorance, not just about things outside their shores but also about things within their shores. The craze for Ivy League degrees as pathways to success is also x-rayed.

    The book brings to mind a number of major events in America’s history such as Hurricane Katrina, the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers and The Pentagon, the 2008 recession, the emergence of Barack Obama as the first black president, the killing of Amadou Diallo and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s  2009 Christmas Day underwear bomb attempt.

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    America was home to Bisi Adjapon, the author of ‘Teller of Secret, before she decided to return to Accra. While her ‘Teller of Secrets’ is set in Africa, her latest, ‘Daughter In Exile’, takes on America and the America that we see is one that doesn’t reveal its complete picture to the rest of the world. The novel strips the artifice off America, with Lola,  the protagonist, wondering: “Why didn’t Americans tell the truth about how hard life was in America?”

    The novel lays New York bare. Without the razzmatazz of Manhattan, we see its challenge with homeless people. Seeing someone sleeping in a bathroom is one of the shocks the protagonist has in New York.

    We also see how growing up in Africa and America are poles apart. In Africa, children are taught that only prostitutes and bush people chew gum noisily. In America, there is nothing to it. We see racism and we see what is undoubtedly black-on-black prejudice; or how best do we describe a family with Haitian roots rejecting an African?

    We are also treated to the role of the Church in the life of immigrants. The author subtly examines faith, the belief in the existence of God, and sundry matters.

    The ignorance of many an American about Africa, how they assume the worst of the continent, how they wonder how we’re able to speak English, how they assume Africa is a country, and such ridiculous notions also get some space.

    The novel shows that Africans, at a certain point, will realise that no matter how long they have lived in America, they will always be Ghanaian, Nigerian, or wherever they’re from.

    Like Atta, America is still home to Chika Unigwe. In her ‘The Middle Daughter’, she shows us that America is not ‘all sheen and glamour’. When Mother and Ugo move to Atlanta, Ugo discovers that her vision of the United States is vastly different. She sees a city and a country that are as flawed and imperfect. We also see a bus station in Atlanta that smells like a public urinal and makes Ugo feel like she is in a wrong country. The book also shows us there are beggars in America who beg for leftovers from McDonald’s lunch. Also, we learn that the land of the free is not free from the homeless, cold callers, thieves and racism. Through the book, we learn that Atlanta gets so hot they call it Hotlanta and that it is home to so many Nigerians that one can easily forget it is in America. “It’s just like living in Nigeria, only with no power cut.”

    Akpan Uwem, who also lives in America, used his debut novel, ‘New York My Village’, to make us see a ‘funny’ side of New York, one of America’s most important cities. We see the glittering Manhattan and the author didn’t forget to show us that bedbugs are enemies this famous city has been unable to conquer. The narrator, Ekong, takes us to Times Square and Starbucks. We see racial prejudices and the racial politics of publishing and how racism is often masked with progressive rhetorics. One of the prejudices which we come across in this book is the claim that an African is not  conversant enough about American culture to edit American stories yet Americans edit African fiction.

    In her 2013 novel, ‘Americanah’, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie took on racism and other issues in America. Ifemelu, who moves to the United States to study, struggles for the first time with racism and the several varieties of racial distinctions. In America, Ifemelu discovers what it means to be culturally black. Using Ifemelu’s blog, “Raceteenth or Various Observations About American Blacks (Those Formerly Known as Negroes) by a Non-American Black”, Adichie reaches for the underbelly of race issues in America. The book shows that though America is a symbol of hope and economic mobility, it is also a symbol of disappointment and the American Dream is a lie to many who dare to dream.

    Unlike the other books, another America-based Nigerian author, Akwaeke Emezi downplays New York, the city that perhaps holds the ace as a setting for most American-centric novels. Emezi’s ‘You Made A Fool of Death With Your Beauty’ manages to dwarf sociology and focuses on the characters and their actions and inaction. The great city stays in the background for the characters to shine in all their glories and horrors. Even the beautiful Caribbean Island that is also a setting stays on the periphery. What shines all through are the characters and the plot. 

    My final take: America is good. It is, however, not heaven. It has its own challenges, many of which (like homeless people and shoplifters) it has learnt to manage because stopping them altogether hasn’t been possible. It has also been unable to answer the race question convincingly.

    Tomorrow is not promised

    From time immemorial, the rich have been unable to stop death with bags of cash. The poor’s parlous state has never been able to buy them more time from death. When it is time, it is time and the Grim Reaper will claim its own. Today is all we’ve got. In fact, this moment is what we’ve got. The next moment can be pregnant with death.

    Let’s make the best of today, of this moment. Tomorrow is not promised. Farewell to all 2024 has so far taken from us. Till we meet to part no more.

  • Politics and governance

    Politics and governance

    In the middle of March of 2021, Nyesom Wike, as Rivers State governor and presidential hopeful on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), described the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) as fourth-stage cancer. He likened the PDP to malaria and said he preferred to deal with malaria than being afflicted with cancer. Not long after he made this viral statement, Atiku Abubakar, who had a running battle with former President Olusegun Obasanjo when he served as his deputy, beat Wike to the PDP presidential ticket. And the heaven came down. Wike jettisoned ‘malaria’ and embraced ‘cancer’. Though he has not defected to the APC, his soul is in the APC in whose government he now serves as the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, a position ethnic politics is dragging with him.

    That was typical politics, where all that matters is interest. For politics, a son can battle his father. Cousins badmouth each other. Friendship of decades goes up in flames and associates see nothing to bond about anymore.

    In playing politics, it is not wrong to see red and call it green. It is fair to know that a particular policy, say deregulation or subsidy removal, is good for the economy but, in order to gain political advantage, paint a gory picture about it.

    It is not just about politics in Nigeria; even in advanced democracies such as the United States of America, politics is all about interest. Republican lawmakers will deliberately shoot down policy proposals from Democrats not because they are bad for the country but because supporting such will be electoral disadvantage for them. The politics of diplomacy is even worse. America and the UK have been known to take contradictory positions on similar issues depending on their interests in the parties involved.

    The way of international politics, better known as diplomacy, is painted well by the number of wounded American soldiers at the Water Reed Army Medical Centre, and the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland, United States. These soldiers have been involved in America’s military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and others. These operations, including other acts outside and within its territory, are often dressed as efforts to save the world. But, even by President Barack Obama’s admission, it is far from this noble garb. They are largely meant to make it have access to overseas economies, fossil fuels, mineral resources and the blue economy. Through all manners of treaties and deals, it has ensured easy markets for its goods abroad. You’ll be exhibiting naivety if you see the World Bank and such America-promoted financial institutions as Father Christmases out for global good because beneath this global good lies the need to champion what is in America’s interest.

    As much as possible, America has tried to play its international politics within the rule of law but, a lot of the time, it has fallen short of standard. Iraq is one of those. Its premise for invading this nation has proven to be a blatant lie, and that country is yet to recover from this. There are coups in Africa and elsewhere that bear its prints. What becomes Al-Qaeda today is not without American connection. Osama Bin-Laden, that it eventually killed during the Obama era, was once an ally. Osama and his likes are evidence of the disastrous outcomes of America’s international politics where all is fair in war.

    With institutions such as the World Bank, America regularly coerces developing countries to prioritise austerity measures, which earn these countries improved credit rating but drive down their people more into the cesspool of poverty.

    Back to Nigeria: When it was in the opposition, the APC gave the PDP a bloody nose, so bloody it eventually made it lose power. Lai Mohammed, who was APC spokesperson, never saw anything good in the policies, actions and decisions of the PDP government. He was skillful in discovering smoke where there was none. Subsidy removal, which the APC government has now implemented, was described in warped terms. But as ex-Ekiti State Governor Kayode Fayemi recently confessed, it was all politics, politics to decimate the enemy and take over from it. Now, we are told without subsidy removal, Nigeria’s ship will capsize.

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    Politics is simply a vehicle to governance, the system and processes by which societies establish rules to guide decision-making and ensure responsible conduct. Politicians intent on governing throw caution to the wind but when they eventually get power, reality dawns and they begin to tell us they are not magicians, that things are so bad they require time and that we must all sacrifice. These are things they rarely tell us when they are trying to supplant those in power. They just spend time painting those in power as nincompoops, as people unfit to govern. And when they get there, we hardly see much difference. They all are just playing politics at our expense.

    Governance is not a walk in the park. Over the years, Nigeria hasn’t got its priorities right. Electricity generation and distribution have been on the backbench, infrastructural development has been abysmal, and human development is nothing to cheer about. This general failure has forced some of the country’s best brains to leave; it didn’t start with the japa syndrome. It started way, way back– a development which decades ago forced the government to commission the famous ‘Andrew-make-you-no-check- out’ campaign. This failure that has promoted seeking of better opportunities elsewhere has given birth to an economy christened the japa economy. This economy is playing a vital role in blocking the failure of governance.

    A new World Bank data shows $20.5 billion was sent to Nigeria last year, which represents about 38 percent of total remittance inflows to sub-Saharan Africa. The new data indicates that inflows have steadily increased because the 2022 figure was $20.1 billion. This happened at a time foreign investors took out $186.8 million more from Nigeria’s economy than they invested in it. Remittance flows to Africa’s biggest economy have dwarfed foreign direct investment in recent years.

    My final take: Opposition politics is easy but governance is a different kettle of fish; governance is the real world while opposition politics is theatre with actors delivering lines from texts. The transition from opposition to governance is thus a rude awakening for the actors who now have to deal with real-life situations.  

  • Omoni Oboli’s new direction

    Omoni Oboli’s new direction

    His black trousers, cinched by a sleek belt, gracefully drape over the bedside drawer. Wearing an earring, hand chain, and a wristwatch, he peacefully sleeps on a bed adorned with a pristine white blanket. His head rests on the pillow, radiating an almost ethereal glow. Beside him lies a lady, covered in the same white blanket. As she awakens, a startled realisation grips her, prompting her to hastily wake him up. She questions, a mix of confusion and concern colouring her tone, about her presence in the room and the nature of their interaction. He is surprised by her enquiry. To him, she is the escort he had summoned to his room the previous night.

    “We did have sex”, he says casually and throws her off balance. More questions follow. 

    It is all in ‘One Night in July’, one of the latest movies of Nollywood actor and director Omoni Oboli.

    Omoni is on a rampage. Late last year, she began a journey, a journey that looks promising and may set a record hitherto alien to Nigerian film production on YouTube.

    After years of cinema releases in partnership with Inkblot Production, Omoni decided to open a YouTube channel and she has released no less than six movies that had not been exhibited elsewhere.

    The movies on her channel are cinema standard. Good stories, great pictures and actors who know their onions. The 45-year-old seems out to prove that on YouTube, technically-sound movies can do well and earn producers as much revenues as Netflix and Amazon Prime releases.

    So far, her dream appears to be coming true. Over 100,000 subscribers are now on the channel. ‘A Night In July’, within three weeks of release, garnered no less than three millions, eight hundred thousand views. It stars Uche Montana, Eso Dike, Tony Mezie, Jennifer Nnoruga, Adeyemi Habibat, and Martins Ogbebor.

    Her ‘The One Who Stole My Heart’ already has three million views and a sequel is in the works. Another one titled ‘Thicker Than Water’, in four weeks had one million, two hundred thousand views. Others such as ‘A Special Place’, ‘Dark Secret’, ‘Twisted’, ‘Another You’ and ‘Marriage of Inconvenience’ have also had good views.

    ‘A Night In July’, which is so far the most successful viewers-wise, follows the young lady who finds herself on a man’s bed and has no idea how she got into the room. Her woe is compounded when she discovers she is pregnant. Others treat sociological issues such as adultery, motherhood, entitlement mentality, and domestic violence.

    Omoni has always addressed topical issues in her production. Her cinema release, ‘Wives on Strike’, has a bunch of pidgin-speaking women and men whose acts make us laugh and also think. It has also a group of senators and the wife of one of them whose acts make us think and ready to stop the child-bride craze. The movie is not comedy for comedy sake. It is comedy for social change. It is comedy for re-evaluation of our social mores. It is a socially-responsible comedy. Omoni employed the trick of the rat, which usually fans its victims before attacking. Call it the carrot-and-stick approach to fighting against child-bride advocates and you won’t be wrong. You will laugh at the seeming jokes in the film while being hit unconsciously by the message: She is a child, not a bride! Omoni deploys creative coinages to describe acts which kids are not supposed to be exposed to. One very creative coinage is ‘janglova’, which means love making. There is also ‘kongea’, which means pent-up sexual passion.

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    The first time I took note of her prowess was in Kunle Afolayan’s ‘Figurine’. I consider her one of Africa’s greatest talents. She acts. Very well. She directs. Exceptionally. She writes amazing scripts. So well. She is a damn good mother. You need to see her with her kids to agree with me. She is an amazing wife. Her husband, Nnamdi, is never tired of celebrating this wife of his youth, who he captured young.

    Her never-say-die spirit came alive when she was told it was not possible for a woman to make it as a movie director. This woman who does not take no for an answer, except her heart is not in it, ignored the naysayers. So, she worked on being a successful director and today we all can see the outcome. To make a success of directing, she took a short course in digital filmmaking at the New York Film Academy. This was to enable her understand the technical details, instead of using on-the-job experience. She equally learnt from other filmmakers’ work, journeys, successes and failures.

    A major Influence on her career is Tyler Perry. This explains her love for taking on the responsibilities of writing, producing, directing and playing multiple characters. In ‘Being Mrs. Elliott’, she was writer, producer, director, dual roles actor and executive producer. Kunle Afolayan also influenced her.

    The next few months will show the fruits of Omoni’s new direction which already has caught YouTube’s attention and has led to a meeting between her and the platform’s managers.

    My final take: When we don’t give up on our dreams, they often come to fruition. The key is to continue to give our best to things we are passionate about. Never-say-die spirits have been the secrets of many successful people.

  • Not always greener 

    Not always greener 

    My major takeaway from Uwem Akpan’s first book, ’Say You’Re One of Them’, is that it is not always greener on the other side. 

    The story that drives this home is titled ‘Fattening for Gabon’, one of the novellas. In it, we meet Fofo, Yewa and the narrator, Kotchikpa. Yewa and the narrator are siblings. Fofo is their guardian. He became their guardian when sickness turned their parents into imbeciles and are left to the mercy of their grandparents. To give them a better chance at life, they were released to Fofo, who moved them to the border town he calls home. 

    Fortune suddenly smiles on Fofo and, by extension, Yewa and Kotchikpa, though they still live in a ghetto.

    Their guardian begins to acquire assets whose sources aren’t clear, assets said to come from the kids’ godparents. These godparents are unknown to the kids. They get to eat better food, wear better clothing and life looks beautiful and the future looks brighter than they have ever imagined since Fofo became their saviour. And they begin to envisage living in luxury and far away from the madding crowd in the ghetto. Fofo doesn’t help matter as he daily feeds them with tales of what lies ahead and they begin to pray tomorrow will come today. 

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    Paradise seems to have been moved to mother earth but from time to time the author drops hints that scream what you see is not what you always get.

    The suspense created with this technique keeps the story moving and moving and, in time, it becomes clear that it is not always greener on the other side. The choice of a child as the narrator helps to keep the kids ignorant of the weapons fashioned against them, which can be easily spotted by an adult.

    With time, certain things begin to happen that make them feel something is awkward, things like their guardian being ruffled up, like their guardian buying a cutlass and hiding it under his bed, like their guardian having a dagger with him when they go to church and more. The subsequent confession nails it all and fills the blank spots of the Gabon puzzle. The escape plot thereafter provides room for an exhilarating climax bound to keep a reader’s heart racing along with the rest of the tale. 

    The second novella, ‘Luxurious Hearses’, opens on a note of crisis and we see Jubril, a Muslim boy from the north disguising as a Christian fleeing south. This character, in a way, brings to mind Jangedi, a man whose finger was chopped off in Zamfara for stealing. In the story, Jubril suffers a similar fate and yet stands by his faith and defends his punishment. 

    Through the narration, we see the challenges facing Nigeria such as poor electricity supply, insecurity and fuel shortage. The backstory highlights challenges in the Niger Delta such as oil spills, respiratory diseases, rashes and more. 

    We see that the sentiment of those on the bus heading south is anti-Islam because of their experiences in the hands of fanatics, a situation that puts Jubril on the edge. His father being from a village in Delta means nothing in the face of the sentiment not just against northerners, but against Muslims. He was raised a northerner and a Muslim by his mother, who is both a northerner and a Muslim. 

    From the backstory we understand why Jubril is running to the south and chances are that whatever pity a reader might have had for him will evaporate like a gas in a leaking cylinder.

    We see how religion can set us against one another. Even blood ties mean nothing to fanatics. With this story, the author dissects religions and their complexities and how they often turn our lives upside down instead of making us better. 

    This storyteller looks at friendship from scary lens and makes us see the thin line between love and hatred and leaves us wondering how white can suddenly turn gray. He shows how people can capitalise on a crisis to settle personal scores and dress them in the garb of collective interests. It is also a study of dual identity and its pros and cons. We see the politics of being a northerner or southerner in Nigeria. We see the politics of oil and the claims of both northerners and southerners to the oil deposits.

    In Jubril’s case, he is both a southerner and a northerner because of his parents’ roots, but he is really not fully accepted by either. So, he finds himself in the middle, the middle of nowhere, no matter how he tries to fit in. It is a story whose climax says he who lives by the sword dies by the sword. 

    The first of the short stories, ‘An Ex-mas Feast’, shows us what lack can do to a family; how it can rob a father of his place, how it can make siblings and parents tolerate immoral acts from one another, and how life on the street is nasty and brutish! We meet Maisha, a twelve-year-old girl forced into prostitution through which she supports her poverty-stricken family, her ten-year-old sister, Naema, her eight-year-old brother, who is the narrator, and other members of the ghetto-dwelling clan. We see how Naema supports the family through the proceeds of selling her body to men old enough to be her father, men who see nothing wrong in sleeping with a child and men whose moral compass has lost focus. We see so many disgusting things, things that break the heart, repulsive things. 

    The short story titled ‘What Language Is That?’ is a clever examination of the evil the human race has wreaked through religion. It is largely about two young girls, one a Muslim and the other a Christian. They are best friends until a crisis in their land makes their relationship forbidden. Their parents struggle to explain why, suddenly, their sweet relationship has to end. The explanations make no sense. In the midst of the sudden hatred, these best friends find a new language to keep the flame of their affection for each other burning. 

    The author also rejigs our memories. Aside from the Biafran-Nigerian war, another crisis that will not be forgotten for a long time is the genocide in Rwanda. Though the country seems to be moving on, the scars remain. The author lays this bare in the short story titled ‘My Parents’ Bedroom’, about a couple and their children thrown into a battle not of their making and how they navigate this tortuous journey. This story raises posers: How can a child forget that his father is made to kill his mother because of tribalism? How can a child forget that his uncle led the men who abused her physically and emotionally? How is it possible to forget bodies falling from a ceiling where men and women are forced to hide from death? This story also let us in on the fact that Rwanda is not just Hutu and Tutsi or moderate Hutu and moderate Tutsi. 

    My final take: We need to rid our world of child trafficking, tribalism, and religious intolerance. We also need to end bad governance and man’s inhumanity to man. 

  • A huge pill to swallow

    A huge pill to swallow

    The ‘Justice Court’ is a Nigerian reality courtroom show that I watch regularly. It deals with all manners of issues. The episodes I enjoy the most are on paternity disputes. Every single one of these episodes, except the one involving a man named Mustapha, a 30-year-old man named Precious and his mother, has always ended with the mothers confessing after DNA tests show that they were guilty of paternity fraud. 

    Mustapha, a Nigerian living abroad, has for years been accused of fathering Precious. At a point, his accusers said Precious was born after Mustapha raped his mother. It got to a head when Precious sought out Mustapha on Facebook and wanted to know why he was denying him. Mustapha, according to his testimony, pleaded with Precious to convince his mother to tell him the truth as there was never sex between them. Precious got back to say his mother insisted Mustapha was his father. Soon an uncle of his started threatening Mustapha on the social media over the alleged rape and denial of paternity. Precious stepped in and cautioned his uncle, saying he was old enough to handle the matter. 

    Tired of the whole drama, Mustapha approached the Justice Court for a DNA test. On the day the result was released, Precious was in court, Mustapha joined via Zoom and Precious’s mother connected on phone. The analysis of the samples shows that the probability of Mustapha being Precious’s father was zero. Before and after this result was revealed, Precious’s mother insisted that the only result she would accept must involve Mustapha’s sample taken in her presence in Nigeria. Even when an official of the DNA lab explained that Mustapha’s sample was taken in his location, she said it was unacceptable. An angry Justice Funmi Asaolu told her off and advised Precious to accept the truth and continue the search for his father. She also told him he could double-check if he felt his mother was not lying. This raises the poser: Can a DNA test lie? The accuracy of a DNA test rests on the testing facility handling the samples properly. Mistakes are not impossible, but they are rare. 

    Last year, a radio programme known as Kokoro Alate and hosted by ace Ibadan-based broadcaster and Agidigbo FM proprietor, Oriyomi Hamzat, unveiled DNA tests which revealed that a woman, Toyin, committed paternity fraud with the four children she claimed to have had for her husband, Kola. Toyin faulted the DNA tests because she wasn’t there when the samples were taken. 

    On the video of the programme uploaded on YouTube, Kola’s tears keep cascading down his cheeks and the presenter keeps urging him to stop crying. 

    After the revelation, there was an attempt to give Toyin the benefit of doubt but she was nowhere to be found with the children. 

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    There have been more pathetic cases. In America, an innocent man was sent to jail for not paying child support on a child DNA test later showed is not his. 

    The case, which featured on ‘The Paternity Court’, involves Manser, who was jailed for five years for not paying child support for Sehr’s son, Dylan. The court conducted two tests and both showed Dylan could never have been Manser’s child.

    “Oh, man. Five years in prison,” Manser screamed after the result was revealed. 

    “She should be convicted of some crime,” he added.

    Defiant Sehr replied: “No, I should not.”

    The judge asked Dylan if he wanted to know his father and the 20-year-old answered in the affirmative. 

    The judge then asked Sehr: “Do you know his father?”

    And she shameless admitted: “I talk to him still.”

    Sehr didn’t feel any remorse and even claimed not to have disrespected Manser. The angry judge flayed up and said her action was a huge pill to swallow. That was the way Judge Asaolu felt when she cut off Precious’s mother when she kept insisting the only DNA she would accept must involve Mustapha’s sample taken in her presence in Nigeria. 

    My final take: Rape is bad. Paternity fraud is terrible. There are laws against rape. There should be laws against paternity fraud. It is unfair for a man to raise kids only for him to discover years later that they aren’t his after DNA tests unearth the truth. 

  • To the ones who blame God

    To the ones who blame God

    You need to get something straight: Our brains aren’t for decoration; they’re put there for us to use to change our circumstances, to change this world, and to resolve challenges. 

    In Elif Shafak’s ‘The Forty Rules of Love’, a character, Shamz of Tabriz, tells another character, Aladdin, that God is the best storyteller. It is a loaded statement. Looking at our world, it is not difficult to see the stories God is telling using you and me as the characters. God is not dictatorial in the stories He tells with us. He allows our leaders to play critical roles in our unfolding stories and we can see the results of that.

    Some people, some nations, some companies and some continents have beautiful stories to share with the world. Other people, other nations, other companies and other continents have tales of shame to entertain the world with: tragedies and tragi-comedies are all they have got to offer.

    Our dear Nigeria does not lack gold, it does not lack oil and gas, it has tantalite in abundance, and some of the best waterfalls in the world are within its confines. Scenic beauties, such as the Mambilla Plateau and Farin Ruwa Falls, friendly soils and a people ready to give their best are other resources Nigeria is blessed with.

    Do we need to talk about brilliant souls scattered all over the world and doing wonders in their adopted nations? Is there really any need to talk about a young population that understands the ins and outs of technology and can manipulate it to our advantage? Is there any need to point attention to the fact that when our average brains go abroad for education, they turn out in flying colours?

    But as blessed as we are with these brains, these beauties and these resources, we are also blessed with leaders who, at the sign of a headache, have taken the next available flight to London or New York for medical examination. We are also blessed with a political class that steals with their future generation in mind; we are fortunate enough to have men and women in positions of authorities all because they want to decorate their garages and wardrobes with the best in automobiles and jewelleries; and we are blessed with leaders who will tell us to pray over a problem or challenge we elect them to resolve.

    Imagine if prayers can end a situation where one of three Nigerians lives in poverty, which represents thirty-two per cent of the population. Imagine if prayers can stop thirty-seven per cent of children from suffering malnutrition. Imagine if prayer can make a thing of the past, half of the Nigerian population who use unsafe or unimproved sanitation. What if prayers can take Nigeria away from being 43rd on the sustainable development goal index? What about praying away the fact that poverty is concentrating in fast-growing countries like Nigeria and, by 2050, more than 40 per cent of Nigerians will still be under poverty’s jackboot? If only we can use prayers to get over our slot as the country with the second-highest number of deaths of children under the age of five? Alas, prayers cannot do all these!

    At a point, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says no fewer than 250,000 children in Nigeria die on their first day of life. The figure is the second highest in the world, according to the 2017 multi-indicator cluster survey. A child born in Nigeria today, no thanks to this situation, is likely to live to the year 2074, while a child born in Denmark is likely to live until the 22nd Century! The quality of life is a different kettle of fish. Most of these children regrettably die from preventable causes such as premature births, complications during delivery, infections like sepsis, malaria and pneumonia. Prayers cannot stop this, only policies and programmes can.

    Nigeria needs more investment to grow its economy at a higher rate to be able to lift 100 million people out of poverty. Prayer cannot do it. Nigeria is only growing at about two per cent and, if our country continues this way, there will be more people in poverty.

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    The investment we need is almost double what we have now. Nigeria must connect with people who want to invest in it. Agriculture, manufacturing and infrastructure are areas where we need investment. We should remain open for business until we have reduced poverty to the barest minimum.

    We must have at the back of our mind that the global market for foreign direct investment is highly competitive and, to tap into it, we must position ourselves strategically. We must change the perceptions that we are all about oil. We must tell people that Nigeria is also about tech, agriculture, services and manufacturing.

    We must take advantage of the fact that we are critically important as Africa’s largest economy. We must use our longstanding relationships with countries, such as the UK, the U.S. and others, to pull in the needed help. We must correct the notion that our economy is difficult to operate in. To make investors have confidence in us, we must respect agreements. Contracts must be sacrosanct, a situation where change of governments lead to policy somersault must be ended.

    If we fail to do the necessary things and continue to look up to God for miracles, we will wait till eternity. He has given us the brains to play a part in telling our story despite being the best storyteller. Prayers can only help to make our work better. Praying without doing the required work is a bloody waste of time. By doing the required work, we are playing our best in the shape our story will take.

    My final take: It is true God is the best storyteller, but this is not a role He plays with arrogance. He gives us brains and expects us to use this brains to introduce nuances in the stories of our lives. But, most times, we just fold our hands, expecting Him to do what He has given us the capacity to do. So, when we fail, we are the failures and God has absolutely no blame.

  • A mother’s tears

    A mother’s tears

    She was a teenager when she had him. He was named Ayodele Adeyi Adenegan. Twenty years later, on Sunday, December 10, 2023, he died in a morning fire incident in the second-floor bedroom where the fire originated. The fire did not spread to any other part of the house.

    The mother was away when the incident happened. Her octogenarian father and her other child, which she had years after him, survived without any injury. Efforts to get him out didn’t yield any result because his room’s door was bolted from inside. 

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    The Community Volunteer Fire Department put the fire out at 6:44 a.m., fourteen minutes after its officials responded. Arson investigators from the Fort Bend County Fire Marshal’s Office say the 20-year-old victim set the fire. And because of this conclusion, no insurance would be paid for the damage to the property. For a mother, property can be fixed but her son can’t return. He is gone for good. Her toil of 20 years, which began when she was not that old herself, has gone down the drain. 

    May God comfort her and may we not cry over our children. 

  • Gaza’s innocent lives matter 

    Gaza’s innocent lives matter 

    The world has sung one tune after the other. In the New Year, there should be a change in tune, and that tune should be: We must protect the innocent in Gaza. 

    The senselessness in Gaza didn’t start like a joke. It did with a bang and, some twelve weeks later, no less than 20,000 people are dead, leaving their loved ones in trying times. 

    Reports show that no day goes by without children being killed, maimed and traumatised. 

    What makes it the more painful is that the action of a few misguided ones is being used to punish millions of Palestinians as if they all are the terrorists who lit the fire. 

    The figure of those displaced is staggering: Over two million. Men, women, boys and girls who used to live in luxury are now internally displaced. They now eat what they are offered and not what they want. They now live in shelters where no human should stay. They now spend their days unsure of what tomorrow will bring. It is wishful thinking for them to believe everything good will come. The human suffering is too much. 

    Many of my colleagues have also fallen victims of this madness. The Israeli bombardment of Gaza, according to reports, has claimed close to 100 journalists. Their parents are desolate, their spouses inconsolable, their children crying and their friends and well-wishers are wondering what has hit them. It is a jungle out there. Real jungle. 

    Unfortunately, the anger, the outspokenness and the zest required to bring the madness between Israel and Palestine to an end are missing. The world, especially the world powers, has not acted as though we are responsible for one another. What we have seen instead is tokenism. 

    The United Nations (UN) hasn’t been able to achieve much. I believe this is not unconnected to its current structure, a structure that gives a few powerful nations curious veto powers to ride roughshod over the majority. 

    In September 2022, Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s immediate past President, spoke at the 77th UNGA in New York. He called for reforms in the UN. His plea was received and dumped in the thrash where previous pleas ended. 

    It is absolutely unfair that countries such as the United States, United Kingdom and Russia have permanent seats on this important UN Security Council, yet, the whole of Africa, a continent with several countries, doesn’t even have a single permanent seat.

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    The Council is composed of 15 members. The five permanent members are China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The ten other members are non-permanent. They are elected for two-year terms by the General Assembly. Over 50 Member-States have never been on the Security Council. So, they can only participate, “without a vote, in its discussions when the Council considers the country’s interests are affected”. 

    I don’t know any other name for unfairness if Africa’s exclusion from the permanent seats of the Council is not. This is a body that preaches democracy and its tenets but exclude a whole continent from its Security Council. This body also preaches equality. Where is equality in an arrangement that pushes out a whole continent when countries whose population are not more than just one African country (Nigeria, for instance) have seats?

    The UN Security Council passed a resolution calling for more aid and better access to Gaza, with the US and Russia abstaining. 

    The inability to get a ceasefire in Gaza is a further proof that the UN Security Council is due for reforms. The reforms should have taken place years ago. Member-States are demanding change, and the time to correct the wrong is immediately. Better structures are needed to meet the demands of the times. The world has outgrown the current system, which might have met the needs of the world in 1945. The world we have now is very different from the one the founding fathers lived in. 

    It is difficult for me to understand why a ceasefire is being shot down at the UN when innocent Palestinians are paying the ultimate price. 

    I have seen comments that suggest every Palestinian is affiliated to a terrorist group. That is the biggest lie ever told. The fraction of Palestinians with terrorism ties pales when compared with the innocent millions. There are millions of innocent Palestinians who just want a free country. They shouldn’t be punished because of the actions of a few misguided ones. Punishing them because of the bad ones is akin to killing a fly with a grenade. 

    Ordinary Israelis should also not be subjected to rape, kidnapping and death. 

    Hamas’s hostage taking and other acts aren’t justifiable under any guise. Israel’s acts against the innocent are reprehensible. Can two wrongs ever make a right? 

    A new year is here and the resolution we all should make is that we will speak for the oppressed in the Gaza region. We need to give these guys a New Year gift of peace. We can’t do it without the powers that be. The world powers need to resolve that warplanes aren’t speakers blaring out danceable tunes. Their tunes are sorrowful, their rhymes aren’t rhythmic and their voices aren’t desirable, and the time for them to go silent is now. It’s time to ceasefire to save both innocent Palestinians and Israelis. 

    My final take: We can’t deny that innocent Palestinians exist. We can’t. The global powers need to realise this and it is when this is fully realised and accepted that the journey to peace in that axis can begin. It is the terrorists that should be stopped. And in stopping the terrorists, the innocent on both sides of the war should not become collateral damage.