The Nation Newspaper

Category: Olukorede Yishau

  • Still a hard economic moment in America

    Still a hard economic moment in America

    It is the view of a store manager in Houston. An artist in New York shares the same view. And an IT professional in Austin feels the same way. All over America, it is a widespread feeling of pessimism about the economy. The New Year knocking at our doors has not assuaged the feeling, neither has some progress made been enough to shake off the grim feeling. An Associated Press Vote Cast shows that during the midterm elections, voters called economic conditions “not so good” or “poor”.

    The outgoing year has been one of uncertainty for the world. The almighty America is not immune to the wavy situation. Days before the year ends, no one is sure of what to expect in the New Year. A Wall Street Journal Survey indicates a huge dose of pessimism among households across America.

    Until some weeks ago, the average cost of petrol across gas stations in America was $3.5. Diesel is still over $4.2. Petrol has since come down to less than $3 in most cases.

    Petrol was not the only commodity whose price went up. Water and some other essentials recorded sharp increase.

    The truth is: Many Americans aren’t having it good. They have not had it good for some time. The economy is not buoyant. Inflation is crazy. The threat of a recession looms large. But, as the Big Brother, America is still doling out cash to save the world.

    The US Federal Reserve on December 14 offered another rate increment in its battle against inflation. The 0.5 percent hike has raised the cost of borrowing during the holiday season. The hike is the seventh this year. It shoots up the rate banks charge one another for overnight loans to between 4.25 and 4.5 percent. This is the highest in fifteen years. The annual inflation rate of two percent has not been seen since 2021. The hikes intend to reduce inflation which in June was 10.2 percent, which was a first in forty-five years.

    The situation has ensured Jerome Powell, chairman of the U.S Federal Reserve, has his hands full. He sure has more work to do and rate hikes, he said, are ongoing. The housing market is on a lull because of inflation and high interest rates. There was a 30 percent drop last month in Houston. The November record is the lowest this year. Sales of homes in Houston are reported to have fallen for eight consecutive months. Last month, the mortgage rate for a 30-year fixed loan was upped by over 7 percent.

    The sad point, Powell admits, is that no one knows where the economy will be next year or more.

    A survey by McKinsey and Company shows increasing pessimism among the people.

    According to the survey: “While 19 percent of American households are spending less on groceries, for those making less than $50,000 annually, 23 percent say they have cut their grocery budget. By contrast, just 12 percent of those making more than $100,000 annually have cut back.

    “With cash buffers from the stimulus checks running low among low-income households, Americans are increasingly resorting to drawing down savings and running up credit card debt. Twenty-four percent of respondents saw a decrease in their debt payments or savings, a 4 percent increase in the past six months. The rising interest rate environment and increased reliance on debt financing may increase financial difficulties for American households in 2023.”

    Read Also: Macroeconomic Review… 2022: Flickers in the dark

    Economists believe the crisis facing the American economy is not unconnected to the over $1 trillion stimulus cheques issued to cushion the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The cheques are said to have helped America dig out of the pandemic faster than its global peers. Now, it is payback time. The Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) said the U.S. economy grew by 5.5 percent between the fourth quarter of 2020 and the fourth quarter of 2021. The GDP grew by 2.3 percent over 2019 levels before the United Kingdom, and the other G7 members climbed to zero.

    Though it is good fuel prices have declined, goods inflation has subsided with consumers dining out and traveling, and car prices have declined, the picture remains blurred.

    In the jeopardy that the American economy is, the Russia-Ukraine war has been mentioned because of its effect on the supply chain. What specific role the war has played in it has not been clearly articulated. America has invested billions of taxpayers’ dollars to tame Russia and protect Ukraine’s sovereignty. Higher oil and fuel costs are factors driving up inflation as a fallout of Russia’s onslaught against Ukraine.

    Against all odds, President Joe Biden remains optimistic. He says the economy is strong. Among others, he points at the healthy pace of hiring, especially the 263,000 jobs in November. Unemployment rate remains steady at 3.7 percent.

    He says: “This morning (December 13), we received some welcome news, in my view — and I think the view of most economists — on the economic front, news that provides a reason for some optimism for the holiday season and, I would argue, for the year ahead. And we learned last month’s inflation rate came down, down more than experts expected.”

    In a world where inflation, he adds, is rising at double digits in many major economies around the world, inflation is coming down in America.

    The new report, he observes, is the fifth month in a row where annual inflation has fallen in the United States and inflation outside of food and energy also fell. He however admits that prices are still too high and a lot more work has to be done.

    On when he expects prices to get back to normal, he only offers hope. “I hope by the end of next year we’re much closer, but I can’t make that prediction. I just — I’m convinced they’re not going to go up. I’m convinced they’re going to continue to go down,” he says.

    My final take: The rich and big also cry. I align with those who believe that escaping recession in 2023 will be a miracle that will score the Biden administration high among Americans.

  • I remember you, Biyi Bandele 

    I remember you, Biyi Bandele 

    In November 4, your last cinematic effort debuted on Netflix, days after it had limited cinema runs in Nigeria. While I was seeing it and throughout that day, your name, your face, your dreadlocks, your smile, your books, everything I know about you kept coming to my mind. 

    I remembered your adaptation of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’. I remembered the controversy it generated with the Censors’ Board, which felt uncomfortable with a scene on the Biafran war. I also remembered how I was pained to see a vendor hawking pirated DVDs of the film inside a traffic gridlock in Maryland, Lagos, and how I screamed at him and wished him evil. 

    I remembered your role in Netflix’s first Nigerian original series, ‘Blood Sisters’. I remembered ‘Burma Boy’. I remembered ‘Yoruba Boy Running’, your last novel based on the life and times of Bishop Ajayi Crowther which will be published posthumously. I remembered how you used to call critics ‘awon pundits’. I remembered what Toni Kan wrote about you as ‘Fabu master’. I remembered Jessica Craig’s piece on your death, which detailed her journey as your literary agent among others. I remembered Olongo publisher Kola Tubosun’s evocative article on your passing. I remember your novel, ‘The Sympathetic Undertaker: And Other Dreams’, which tells a story of a man who readers would think had a brother only to find out at the end of the novel, edited by respected Adewale Maja-Pearce, that the brother existed only in his sick mind. I remembered culture activist and writer Molara Wood’s piece on your outstanding life and times.

    I remembered ‘Fifty’, that movie you made for Mo when she turned fifty. I remembered what ace columnist Tunde Fagbenle wrote about your time with him as a reporter in a magazine he published in London. I also remembered your daughter’s terse statement announcing your passage. And I remembered Britle Paper’s tributes to you, which featured 100 writers. I was just remembering things about you. 

    The melancholic music, which accompanies the Elesin Oba’s story, perhaps put me in a reflective mood. As I watched on, it occurred to me that you must have striven to retain much of the source material in this tale of interrupted tradition. 

    You chose to name yours ‘Elesin Oba: The King’s Horseman’ instead of the original ‘Death and The King’s Horseman’ given it by Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka; it tells the story of a Yoruba chief in British-occupied Nigeria whose plan to commit ritual suicide is resisted by the colonial authorities, you left no one in doubt that this was a celebration of, as well as elegy for, cultural autonomy.

    The play Soyinka wrote, which you made into a film for Mo Abudu, was about real events in Oyo Kingdom during World War II. At the time, Nigeria was still a colony of the British. The Alaafin just died and one of his chiefs, the Elesin, was supposed to die and accompany him on the night of his burial. The chief was a known womaniser and since he was on his last days, he decided to enjoy the frills and trills of the female folk. He did it to the extent that he demanded to marry a virgin already betrothed to the son of the Iyaloja. He was obliged. And this was what gave enough time for the colonial administrators to try to control what they didn’t understand. 

    The colonial administrator of the kingdom saw no sense in the tradition and arrested Elesin to stop him from performing the death ritual. This angered the people of the kingdom who heaped the blame on the chief’s questionable appetite for women, as well as his loss of focus and ‘greed’. They blamed him for allowing the ghost of the Alaafin hover instead of resting. 

    Your choice of Odunlade Adekola as the Elesin Oba is, to me, a brilliant one. Shaffy Bello as Iyaloja was also a good one. The district officer, Simon Pilkings, was well delivered by Mark Elderkin. Deyemi Okanlawon played Olunde, the Elesin’s medical doctor son, brilliantly. I can’t but smile at what you made Brymo do both in acting and soundtrack. 

    Read Also: When Toyin Kolade remembered mum

    I love the fact that right from the start of ‘The King’s Horseman’, tradition and spiritual beliefs are celebrated. I cannot but be grateful to you for retaining the dialogues, which show the clash of cultures without portraying one as superior to the other.

    I love the dialogues between Olunde and the district officer’s wife. I love Olunde’s queries on the West’s penchant to condemn what they do not understand, his comparison of ritual murder and mass murder, his stance on the Colonial authorities holding a party when World War II was raging and lives were being lost on the war fronts and so on. 

    And, lest I forget, I will always remember these lines from Olunde to the district officer’s wife: “You forget I have now spent four years among your people. I discovered you have no respect for what you do not understand.”

    It is sad you are not around to answer questions about Elesin, but I am consoled by the fact that years before your heart (all of a sudden) ceased functioning, you began the journey of not dying, of being alive forever, of being forever remembered and studied. You wrote a book, then another, and then another. You wrote scripts, plays, and directed movies and took great street photographs. You touched lives. And so death will be shamed in the end. It has only taken the body, one of the things that make up life. Every other thing remains because you wrote yourself into eternity. 

    You were a great writer, director, photographer, playwright, screenwriter and was, in the main, an all-round great man. 

    I end this on a note that your last film emphasizes that no culture is superior to the other. What is barbaric to one race is some other people’s way of life, which they can refine with time if they no longer feel comfortable with. 

    Rest on, kindred spirit. Till we meet to path no more. 

  • Oluwatobiloba Adelaja: A visual artist making a difference

    Oluwatobiloba Adelaja: A visual artist making a difference

    Photography, the art of capturing memories, is a big deal. So big that the Photographic Services Global Market Report indicates that the industry hit $36.42 billion in 2021, up from 2020’s $32.92 billion.

    This all-important industry helps to preserve history and legacies worldwide. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation with over 200 million people, is a major player in this billion-dollar industry. With its diverse ethnic groups, cultures, and languages and being one of the continent’s most culturally rich nations, cultural preservation is one area that needs attention and will continue to need attention.

    Photography is key to ensuring that cultural preservation receives much-needed attention. With Nigeria being home to an ocean of photographers, it will be assumed that archiving cultural and artistic legacies shouldn’t be an issue. However, not all photographers understand how to archive cultural and artistic legacies using the photographic lens.

    One photographer who stands a shoulder above the ocean tide is Oluwatobiloba Daniel Adelaja. He hasn’t just captured countless images; he’s crafted enduring moments—photographs that preserve art and culture and tell the timeless stories of a people.

    When Adelaja lifts his camera, he is part artist, storyteller, and quiet observer. His lens doesn’t just capture an image but brings it to life, framing what’s in front of him and what it feels like to be there. With his eyes trained to see invisible details, such as how shadows play against light, fleeting expressions, and the texture of places, he captures the essence of life and time that cannot be repeated.

    When he lifts his camera, he isn’t just looking; he’s listening. He understands that every subject has a story, whether a sunlit mountain, a bustling city street, or the worn lines on a person’s face. Patience becomes his silent partner, allowing him to wait, sometimes for hours, until the moment unfolds naturally, revealing its essence. He seeks authenticity over perfection, believing that beauty often lives in flaws, unplanned, and spaces between moments.

    These qualities are visible in the projects he has embarked on to preserve Nigeria’s rich heritage, in which he shows that his craft is a silent contract to preserve and honour his subjects’ truths.

    Adelaja’s mark is emblazoned on Nigeria’s Centenary Celebration, where he coordinated a team of photographers under the helm of Dayo Adedayo Photography. He guided the documentation and meticulous archiving of the event, and his legacy is now housed within the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL).

    When it was time for the Ogun State’s fortieth anniversary, Adelaja was called on as Project Coordinator and Assistant Photographer for its Pictorial Book. Ogun’s legacy, the birthplace of two former Nigerian leaders—Olusegun Obasanjo and Chief Ernest Shonekan—infused the occasion uniquely. Rising to the moment, Adelaja poured his skill into every page, ensuring a seamless flow between layout, proofreading, and production. Overcoming the challenges of constant revisions and coordinating among graphic designers, clients, and printers, Adelaja steered the project to completion. Each photograph he brought to life in that collection stands as a tribute, not just to the state but to a legacy shared and preserved.

    The pictorial book Ogun State: The Gateway State: A Visual Portrait takes us through the state’s history and antiquities in ways that words cannot really capture.

    Between October 20, 2011, and January 7, 2012, Adelaja helped Replica Digital Photo Centre to pioneer a competition to grow talents in photography. He undertook this assignment with passion. He has since remained dedicated to using his expertise to nurture emerging talents and redefine photography in Nigeria. 

    In 2013, he participated at the Bayelsa International Jazz hosted by Ayoola Sadare of Inspiro Productions in conjunction with the Bayelsa State Tourism Development Agency. As a facilitator, Adelaja organised a photography Masterclass and exhibition to showcase the history of Jazz music in Nigeria as part of the Jazz festival. Through his dedication to preserving culture, Adelaja helped to document the HEADIES Award, the biggest Afrobeats Award in the World, at the Cobbs Centre in Atlanta in 2022.

    My final take: Adelaja, over the years, has demonstrated uncommon passion for his craft and he possesses the quality of a star whose light will shine beyond the shores of Nigeria. 

    Adelaja, over the years, has demonstrated uncommon passion for his craft and he possesses the quality of a star whose light will shine beyond the shores of Nigeria
  • Don’t bury me in a golden casket

    Don’t bury me in a golden casket

    Celebrate me, now when I dey alive

    Appreciate me, now when I dey alive

    No be say when I leave this life

    You go dey fake am for my wife

    Celebrate me, now when I dey alive

    Appreciate me, now when I dey alive

    No be say when I leave this life

    You go dey fake am for my back

    Gimme-gimme, wetin I deserve

    If I suppose dey, no put me for reserve

    No go wait ‘til I kpai

    Before you gimme meat pie

    —Patoranking

    Dr. Onyeka Nwelue, poet, novelist, essayist, publisher, and filmmaker, is at home with taking controversial stands on issues. He believes the concept of referring to Africans and people of African descent as Black is a misnomer because, rightly so, their skin is not black—some of them are even fair in complexion. He also doesn’t believe Caucasians are White because, rightly so too, their skin is not the white we were taught right from our cradle. For his stand on this issue, he has faced backlashes but, like a stubborn goat, he has refused to give up and he will only give up when he is six feet below and interred in an Oxford cemetery when his time is up.

    When people’s times are up, funeral services are held for them, where people dress gaily, get drunk on alcohol, eat free, sumptuous meals, and merry, most times, on money borrowed or saved over a long period of time. This is another issue about which Dr. Nwelue is passionate. Years before his father passed, his position on elaborate burial was public knowledge. He shared it in tweets, Facebook postings, Instagram posts, and elsewhere. His father died some months back and was buried a few weeks ago. Nwelue, as agreed with his father, didn’t attend the burial. That is not all. In the last few weeks, he has taken on his father’s people for what he considers exploitations associated with funeral rites.

    Celebrated writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie had her own issue with the Catholic Church over the refusal to bury the dead because they didn’t contribute financially to the church. Unlike Chimamanda whose approach was ‘civil’, Nwelue’s has been nothing but militant. His anger seethes through every of his post. In a post on October 20, Dr. Nwelue tweeted: “The kind of energy my people invested in burying my father, I never saw it when he was alive. People expected me to be grateful to them for killing cows, cooking rice, and wearing aso-ebi, to give him a befitting burial. People who hadn’t seen him or called him in years. Mtchew.” He has another instructive tweet: “When someone dies in Igboland, people will travel thousands of miles to pay ‘final respect’ to someone they never cared about when alive. I have seen it happen firsthand. If you need money now that you are alive, you won’t get it until you have died.”

    He also has this caustic one: “Dear African parents, make sure you leave some money behind for your children so that when you die, they will muse it and do that your stupid ‘befitting burial’ for you. You can’t be poor and ask them to kill cows when you die, when you didn’t have farthing.’

    Parents who do not have farthing tell their children and family of the kind of burial they want when they are dead. It matters not to them that these are people struggling, and not living. And, like an average African, kids whose parents tell this kind of thing considers them sacrosanct. They see it as their ‘last wish’ which must be obeyed.

    Read Also: Customs intercepts jerry cans of petrol concealed in 2 caskets

    My attitude to funeral services is pivoted on a Yoruba saying that burying the dead is the most important thing and that everything else is just noisemaking. Some days ago, I had a chat with a friend whose father has been dead and buried for months, but his children and family members are still planning a ‘final burial’. What ‘final burial’ means is an elaborate party, where friends, foes and those in-betweens are invited to come and wine and dine to ‘celebrate the life of the deceased’. These ‘final burials’ are sometimes held in big football pitches, large halls, or on the street after a permit has been obtained from the local government to shut down the street from vehicular movement. The renting of the halls does not come cheap, the football fields are pretty expensive and the permit from the local government is not free of charge. The drinks, the food, the aso-ebi, the tables and chairs at the venue, the security guards, and so many things around the event are victims of the commercialisation of death. Like the friend I was speaking about, funding these expenses are difficult. Most times people who find it difficult to fund the education of their children and give them the basic things of life forced themselves into debt all in the name of giving their father or mother or brother or sister or aunt a befitting burial. And months after, they are still in debt to the persons who supplied drinks, to the caterers, to the textile traders and so many other people.

    In some extreme cases, bodies are left in the morgue for months while the children are raising money for a ‘befitting burial’. There are instances where the children even either have to build a house from the scratch or complete the one being built by the deceased in the village before the burial will hold. Town unions, community associations and religious bodies even help to add to the burdens of those left behind by the deceased. I have even seen instances of overseas parties by children living abroad for their parents who died in Nigeria.  I first read it in Chika Unigwe’s ‘On Black Sisters Street’. Now, I have seen non-fictional ones.

    My final take: I do not believe in elaborate funeral services, I do not believe in keeping people in the morgue for months, I do not believe in golden caskets, and I do not believe in immersing yourselves in debts all in the name of giving the deceased a befitting burial. No burial is more befitting than covering the body with sand six feet below or cremating the body. I believe in burying the dead immediately except in special cases. Like Patoranking, I believe we should celebrate, appreciate people and give them what they deserve when they are alive and not fake it at their back.

  • Ground rent waivers for park operators

    Ground rent waivers for park operators

    The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) has granted a ground rent waiver for park operators in the territory, to cushion the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on their businesses.

    The park operators would enjoy 75 per cent and 25 per cent waivers for 2020 and 2021, respectively.

    The Director, FCTA Department of Parks and Recreation, Mrs Riskatu Abdulazeez, stated this in a statement by Maria Okonkwo, Assistant Chief Executive Officer, Information, yesterday in Abuja.

    Abdulazeez, who spoke at a stakeholders’ meeting with the Association of Park Operators, revealed that the government didn’t review the price of ground rent, adding that the approved charge was N10 per square metre.

    She said the essence of the meeting was to inform and collaborate with the operators on the commencement of the ground rent collection exercise.

    According to Abdulazeez, the department is set to streamline all the activities in parks and gardens in the city. She urged operators to fill out data forms adequately and clearly, to enable it to build a database.

    The statement also quoted some members of the association as appreciating the government for the gesture.

    The operators urged the government to look into the collection of ground rent arrears and extend the waivers beyond two years.

    They also identified alleged multiple taxations by the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) as one of the obstacles militating against their operations.

  • Just the other day: A note to you

    Just the other day: A note to you

    Just the other day you were soaked in tears, inconsolable. Your cheeks were wet with the oceans gushing out of your eyes. Reason: You saw Ladele, the boy who used to depend on you academically in secondary school, he was cruising a Hummer, and his designer shirt and trousers, pair of shoes, and timepiece complimented his glowing skin. When you returned home, you decided to cry yourself a river because you still earn N25, 000 as a teacher in a private school seven years after graduating from the university as the best in your set. You have a point to feel bad about your situation, but have you taken time out to find out if there are other mates of yours who are bedridden, who are battling mental health challenges, who are roaming the streets hawking sachet water. Be thankful for your lot. Many are in worse situations.

    Just the other day you looked at divorce statistics and fear gripped you. It looks as if everybody is jumping off the marriage ship. Because of this, you have been wondering why you should get married. Your situation is compounded by the fact that daily you hear about husbands beating their wives, you hear about husbands cheating on their wives and vice versa, and you hear about husbands abandoning their wives for younger girls. So, what is the fuss about marriage? But, you need to calm down and be objective. Yes, some marriages are crashing, and violently too, but you need to be sincere: Are more marriages surviving than the ones crashing? Are there couples having swell time? Are there couples who will marry each other again if they come to this world again?

    Just the other day you looked at your life and shed tears because the target you set for yourself remains unachieved. You in no time become depressed, you began to make irrational decisions and you assured yourself that you were doing well. Deep down, however, you know you are not well. You need to take stock of your life and see other things you have achieved and thank your stars and your God for how far you have come. This is no time to be ungrateful.

    Just the other day you thought the best thing you should do is to end it all. You have tried every trick in the books and nothing has changed, so you were convinced it was time to go back to your creator. But, please, take a look around and you will be shocked that some of the people you envy had once thought of ending it all too until they decided to give it a second chance. Now, things have so changed for them that the last thing on their mind is death. Now, they want to live and live and live to enjoy the fruits of their labour.

    Just the other day you wanted to empty the accounts of your boss and disappear with his cash, but you were caught and now you are in and out of the court answering for your sin. The situation would have been different if only you had been careful. What really do you need that huge amount for? A palatial mansion with state-of-the-art automobiles, butlers, and all? Look around you, yesterday’s mansion is today’s home for reptiles, yesterday’s state-of-the-art automobiles are today’s relics and yesterday’s mansion is today’s fallen walls.

    Just the other day you felt the only way was to lie your way to success. In your curriculum vitae, you claimed to have been detained at non-existent Kalakuta Prison, you claimed to have been tortured and you claimed your parents were killed before you fled. It never occurred to you that you would become popular because of your craft; it never occurred to you that fact-checkers would point out that there was no Kalakuta Prison. So many things just did not occur to you. Now, you live with the reality that fraud lined the road that took you up when your craft is actually good enough to take you there.

    Just the other day you sat with a man and told him he was the only friend you see in your place of work, you made him feel good about himself and he was grateful to God that he was appreciated. Then minutes later you led a campaign against him, advising his subordinate to rebel against him for reasons best known to you. Yet, you are a deacon in your church and it should have occurred to you that instead of what you did, you should have spoken to him as a friend and passed the same message that you went to pass behind his back.

    Just the other day you told yourself that this was the last time you were going to backbite, that you have now realised you were gaining nothing from it. But, now you are back on the beat biting the fingers that feed you and feeling cool about it. Now is the time to stop.

    Just the other day you had tears in your eyes crying for opportunities missed and most likely never to be regained. When you had money, you neither helped nor facilitated anybody’s rise. You spent only on one person: yourself. From one five-star hotel to the other, you moved. From one holiday resort to the other, you junketed.  You thought taking care of yourself meant wasting money on hard drugs, champagne, designer suits, and, of course, women. Dollars were rolling into your accounts regularly through endorsement deals and others, and you blew them all on the wrong things. Now, you are alone, dry, dying and screaming had I known. Your story should be a lesson to many, but several people have gone past caring and they have chosen to remain on the path of perdition.

    Just the other day, you told yourself that the New Year would be different, that you would not procrastinate again, and that you would make positive change. Are you pursuing that path? Search yourself.

    My final take: The New Year is here, the much-awaited 2022, the year the Lord has made, and now is the time for you to be called a new name, time for you to turn a new leaf, time for you to see the good of all as more important than your individual success, and time for you to realise that if you are the only one in this world, there will be no one to talk to. Humanity matters so work for its triumph.

  • Dear young Nigerians, you can’t ‘japa’ without a passport

    Dear young Nigerians, you can’t ‘japa’ without a passport

    On Tuesday, I came across a trending hashtag #GoodbyeNigeria while scouring the internet. It was about young Nigerians who had emigrated from Nigeria and were sharing airport selfies taken on their way out as well as selfies of them landing in their new location. Scrolling through goofy pictures with even goofier captions was funny to me. However, there was a residue of sadness because, despite the air of frivolity, there was something deeper, an acute sense of loss. After all, the other name for emigration is brain drain.

    News reports from a week or so ago informed us that 353 Nigerian doctors moved over to the NHS this year, enriching Britain’s health care industry. The story is the same in other sectors, especially ICT and Fintech. Nigeria is constantly losing its best and brightest and now young too, to other countries who place a much higher premium on human life and dignity of labour.

    But it is not all gloom and doom. While we may lose our young and able physically they are not completely lost to us. Many are still contributing to Nigeria’s economy via remittances. According to the World Bank, diaspora remittances for the past three years came to $24.31 billion in 2018; they dropped to $23.81 billion in 2019 before falling to $17.21 billion in 2020. To put it in context, remittance inflow made up four per cent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2020. That is huge because this year, oil, Nigeria’s mainstay, has contributed 9 per cent of GDP. In Africa, Nigeria is only second to Egypt in terms of diaspora remittances. Egypt notched up $30bn in 2020.

    A recent article in Vanguard noted that “there is an estimated population of 1.24 million Nigerians living abroad, many of them highly skilled professionals. It is a well-known fact that Nigerians are the single most educated emigrant group in the United States. They have a median income of $68,658, which is well above the national median of $61,937.”

    So, we may laugh and make fun of Nigeria while we look at those who have made the transition from the Global South to the Global North but like the flautist who must pause to blow his nose, we must pause to reflect on why young people are leaving and what the future holds.

    Young people are leaving because they are disenchanted with the country where they are not guaranteed jobs after graduation and where if they get jobs, they will earn a pittance. They are frustrated by a country where insecurity is the order of the day and life has become brutish, short, and cheap. They have lost hope in a country where the youth leader is 65 years old and those in leadership have been recycled since 1966. The young are tired of living in a country where a Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) operative can stop you, arrest you, and throw you in jail just because you look a certain way. They have abandoned all hope in a country where operatives can barge into your hotel room and drag you away in the nude because they are “looking for yahoo boys”.

    But as you, Dear Young Nigerian, begin to plan your escape, thorns and hurdles are sprouting in your path. The government, it seems, does not want you to japa. The government does not want you to take selfies in Canada. They want you to stay here with us and deal with SARS and EFCC as well as bandits and kidnappers.

    How do they plan to do this? Well, let us look at a recent article by an online journalist who published what he called an expose on the reasons behind the acute scarcity of international passports.

    Some of the reasons he adduces should be cause for concern for every young Nigerian with aspirations to seek the Golden Fleece abroad. The government, according to him, may be averse to all the migration going on.

    “Several factors were blamed for the baffling inability of Africa’s most populous country to provide passports for its citizens. Chronic corruption at the NIS; disputes between the NIS and a private contractor responsible for printing booklets; scarcity of forex to pay for security printing materials; even an alleged unofficial government policy to stem brain drain by making passports hard to access – all these have variously been blamed for this state of affairs.”

    Is there a deliberate government policy to stop Nigerian youths from migrating abroad? No one is sure but sometimes by adding two and two one can sometimes arrive at something more than four.

    In the article, it is established that the CBN does not allocate forex to Iris Smart Technology Limited (ISTL), the company entrusted with printing Nigerian passports and has revolutionised Nigerian passports through innovative technologies like biometrics as well as polycarbonate technologies and have won commendation from International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). Through ISTL’s proactive approach, Nigeria became the first African country to issue a smart e-passport.

    In denying the printing company access to forex, is the CBN acting out a script that is intended to ensure that in seeking alternative sources for forex, ISTL will encounter delays which ultimately impacts delivery times?

    But there is another poser: Does the CBN’s reason for withholding forex from ISTL have any historical angle? The Mint, Nigeria’s security printing company, had always printed the Nigerian passport but that changed during Olusegun Obasanjo’s tenure when on a visit to Malaysia, he stumbled on their passport and directed that Nigeria upgrades from Machine Readable Passports to Biometric and chip-enabled passports. ISTL emerged winner in a competitive bid that featured Nigerian and foreign companies akin to what just transpired with the eNaira bid which threw up Bitt Inc. winner.

    The Mint is incapable of printing these enhanced e-passports and frustrating ISTL could lead to a two-year wait for new passports. So far, ISTL has discharged its duties diligently but its inability to get forex from the apex bank is capable of leading to a return to the status quo, and ISTL may relinquish its subsisting contract and walk away.

    Dear young Nigerian, they say when two elephants duel it is the grass that suffers. If the debacle goes for arbitration, all your plans to seek better education and other opportunities abroad will remain in abeyance for the next two years or more. And with the dollar nudging N600 like a tongue teasing a rotten tooth, only God knows how impoverished you will all be in two years.

  • Let’s castrate fake drugs’ merchants

    Let’s castrate fake drugs’ merchants

    By Olukorede Yishau

    Drugs are supposed to bring succour to their users. But some ‘manufacturers’ adulterate them to make cheap money, keeping agencies such as the National Agency for Food, Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Customs Service, Immigration Service, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) on their toes. These men smile to the bank almost daily, yes, and just for selling fake, sub-standard and adulterated drugs. But the people whose money swells their bank accounts often die a painful, quick or slow death or suffer irreparable health challenges.

    There are instances where drugs bought at genuine pharmaceutical stores have turned out fake because distributors order a counterfeit of genuine drugs, mix them with the original and sell them to unsuspecting pharmacies.

    Welcome to the world of fake drugs manufacturers and dealers. They operate from dingy corners and package their products in such a way that it is difficult to tell they are from merchants of death.

    In the early 2000s, statistics showed that over 40 percent of anti-malaria medicines in circulation in the country were counterfeited. It dropped to 15.7 percent in 2005. But three years later, it rose to an unprecedented 64 per cent. It has not quite reduced significantly.

    For instance, Lonart, a popular anti-malaria drug, once lost 40 per cent of its market because of counterfeiting. At a point, the company launched a DS Mobile Authentication Service (MAS), through which consumers can detect counterfeited Lonart.

    Asian countries such as India and China account for the bulk of drugs used in the country. It has also been found out that the bulk of the counterfeit drugs in circulation also originate from these countries. Cocaine barons are believed to have diversified into the importation of fake drugs, which they believe is less risky and equally profitable.

    The situation is giving relevant agencies sleepless nights. Of recent, law enforcement agencies have intensified efforts to checkmate drugs adulteration and counterfeiting. Arrests have been made; seizures were effected; stores and warehouses of unwholesome drugs sealed up, and tonnes of killer drugs burnt. But the devils have not given up.

    Some years back, three Cameroonians were arraigned at the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt, for allegedly selling unregistered and fake Chinese medicines in Abakaliki, the Ebonyi State capital. Penda Geougs, Nana Patrice and Andrea Capoel were arraigned on a four-count charge of importing, selling, distributing and being in possession of unregistered, fake and counterfeit drugs. They were operating an illegal clinic at St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Abakaliki, where they also dispensed and administered fake Chinese medicines to unsuspecting members of the public. Six bags of assorted fake drugs labelled in the Chinese language were confiscated from them. The offence contravenes Section 1(1) of the Food, Drug and Related Products (Registration etc) Act Cap F33 LFN 2004, and is punishable under Sections 6 and 7 of the same Act, and also violates Section 1(a) of the Counterfeit and Fake Drug and Unwholesome Processed Food (Miscellaneous Provision) Act cap C34, LFN, 2004 and punishable under Section 3(1)(a) of the same Act.

    NAFDAC continues to shut drug stores all over the country for alleged sale of fake drugs and involvement in other unethical practices. The officials, assisted by security operatives, use Tru-Scan to detect fake drugs. Tru-Scan is an invention by the US military which scans imported products at the Ports and releases them on time without compromising their quality.

    Makers of fake drugs in Nigeria have gone haywire and have forced officials of regulatory agencies to keep moving from one village to the other, town to town, to sensitise sellers and consumers on the need to combat counterfeit in our society.

    Counterfeiting is becoming more dangerous. It is like a balloon filled with water that, when pushed on one side, goes in and waits for you to remove your hands before bouncing back even stronger. The situation has also put other agencies such as Customs Service, Immigration Service, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) on their toes.

    Customs has developed a system that allows it to know the content of a container even before it arrives. Once it knows the content is pharmaceutical in nature, it allows NAFDAC to inspect it. But somehow, these men who need to be castrated when caught are still bringing in their products of death or making them locally.

    Smuggling is a destroyer of the economy, robs the nation of her revenue, hence affects the provision of social services to the entire community, and can destroy people’s health through the importation of expired, fake, and other drugs. But the agencies fighting drugs counterfeiting are handicapped. NAFDAC, for instance, has a serious financial constraint. The agency operates with few old Peugeot 504 cars, with one or two for each local government area. These vehicles because of their age often break down.

    My final take: For now, the merchants of death still beat the system to line their pockets with what observers have described as blood money. So, agencies such as NAFDAC and Customs still need to do more because only through this can we beat these evil men to their game and save lives.

  • You can beat cancer like  Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu 

    By Olukorede Yishau

    To many, breast cancer means death. But is this really true? Enquiries show that there are two sides to it. For many, they get over it after medical attention and live normal lives. Others, who develop ‘complications’, groan under its jackboot. It is believed that one of every twelve women and one of every 100 men will have breast cancer.  

    Starting from the first day of next month, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and many Non-Governmental Organisations across the world will start creating awareness about breast cancer. October is set aside worldwide as the awareness month for breast cancer. Here, one of those involved in creating the awareness is the wife of Ondo State Governor, Mrs. Betty Akeredolu-Anyanwu.

    She is a cancer survivor. She defeated cancer and is teaching other women how they can too through the Breast Cancer Association of Nigeria (BRECAN).

    It all started for her one day while taking a shower and she felt what she described as a lump on her left breast.

    “All sorts of thoughts came to mind, mostly negative. Immediately, my mind raced to breast cancer. Of all my years of knowing and hearing cancer, I never thought I would become a sufferer. I was terrified,” she said.

    She  withdrew from all her social activities, lost some weight and did not summon courage to go for a clinical confirmation until she came upon a television show discussing, “How to Change Your Life”.

    “I remember they featured the mother to the Baldwin brothers, and showed pictures of her while she was going through cancer. After watching her amazing transformation from a sick woman to the beautiful one on television, I made a promise to myself to be a survivor.”

    Diagnosis showed her cancer was at its early stages. She was referred to a surgeon who removed the lump. She felt it was better to have one breast than none at all. That was several years ago and she is alive and kicking.

    Also alive and kicking is Oluwakemi Oyegbile, who has shown that breast cancer does not mean death. She said a few years ago when her doctor diagnosed her and told her she had breast cancer, she felt bad. “It was really traumatic. I asked Why me? Is this the end? I felt terrible and worried thinking it was the end of my life. I cried the whole day and wondered what I’ve done wrong to deserve this? I asked God why he allowed this to happen to me. I was distressed and felt very bad.”

    In an interview with the UN Radio in New York some years back, she explained that the toughest part of the experience was the mastectomy. She said: “Going through the treatment was another ordeal; the chemotherapy, radiotherapy and all were stressful. I had to spend a lot to undergo the treatment. However, I was happy that my own was in situ, meaning it could be treated. It served as a source of hope that it could be treated.”

    Rahama Sani, a social worker at the Bayero University, Kano Teaching Hospital, in 2005, had a successful mastectomy, but four years after, the cancer resurfaced and spread to her vertebrae. She had another round of treatment and so far, she is not showing signs of going down that terrific road again.

    While there are survivors, the dreaded disease has also claimed many precious lives.

    A survivor, who suffered a relapse, said: “At the moment, I am going through agony words cannot explain. My condition is deteriorating day in, day out. I cannot predict what will happen next. I am dying by installments.”

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    She has had to start treatment all over again. The cost can be killing.

    The Federal Government needs to establish a comprehensive cancer centre in each of the six geo political zones in the country. With these centres, treatment will be much cheaper and everything needed to treat cancer will be available and subsidised.

    It is indeed a shame that Nigerians have to travel abroad to obtain medical treatment. Several patients undergoing treatments have to queue for hours at teaching hospitals, others sleep there, while some arrive early to have radiotherapy treatment. The radiotherapy machines in our government hospitals have gone comatose because of persistent power surge and poor maintenance culture.

    It is killing for a patient to travel long distance on our death trap roads to Lagos, Abuja, Benin or Zaria for radiotherapy treatment.

    When cancer is detected and treated early, you have a chance of surviving it. But if you leave it for too long, there is really very little or nothing the doctors can do other than offer palliative care. If the breast poses a threat to one’s life, why not remove it so it will not spread to the other breast or the other organs of the body. Losing a breast is traumatic but it is better than losing one’s life. There are prostheses available to regain your self-confidence.

    To the men, please encourage the women in your life to go for screening, because when the Big C “hits”, it humbles one and affects everybody. Much as cancer is an individual disease, it is also a family disease in the sense that everybody will be involved in saving the loved one. Everyone’s routine will change.

    It is important to go for mammogram as a woman if you are over 40, and back it up with breast ultrasound scan which is not age restricted; also imbibe and inculcate the monthly breast self-examination steps.

    My final take: As the breast cancer awareness month nears, women should not wait until they have symptoms before going for yearly routine checks for breast cancer, cervical cancer, including pap smear and ultrasound scan. Post-menopausal women in particular should go for routine self-breast examination, a mammogram test and a pelvic ultrasound scan to check the ovaries.

    They should never forget that when breast cancer is discovered early, it can be defeated the way Mrs. Anyanwu-Akeredolu did several years ago and now she is hale and hearty and serving Ondo people to the best of her ability.

  • Onyeka Nwelue’s ‘Strangers of Braamfontein’

    By Olukorede Yishau

    At the beginning of Onyeka Nwelue’s ‘The Strangers of Braamfontein’, a nameless girl, who acts as if the world was created for her, is killed in Johannesburg. The last person seen with her is Caucasian, who the author deliberately describes as Pink man. In her apartment, the murderer leaves behind blood and brain matter splattered on the wall of her small sitting room. After this murder, the story jumps into Emerald Escorts, a facility famous for housing Nigerians. It is not impossible that at this stage a reader may begin to wonder if there is any relationship between the girl and the Nigerians in Emerald Courts.

    It is one of the many things you are likely to wonder about this book that is seemingly Nwelue’s most entertaining so far and this will keep you turning the pages. And on the pages, you’ll meet Osas, a Nigerian from Edo State, who flees to South Africa and expects the country to favour him at all cost. He gets employed at De Bliss Grub, whose owner is the devilish capitalist who is happy not paying his employees.

    Through Osas, we are introduced to Chike, an Igbo guy, who will change the course of Osas’ life and also grow envious of him. Osas later meets Papi, a drug lord who values money more than human life. He helps Papi deals ruthlessly with his many enemies and he does so with a brutal touch that queries his humanity. The creed seems to be: The enemy needs to die for life to continue.

    The author writes about characters that are gory, raw, lusty and murderous. It is difficult to find a saint on the pages of this book. Even unintentional incest finds space on this beautiful piece of art. The book also sheds light on sex trafficking.

    Nwelue tells us without fear or favour about post-Apartheid South Africa, where the after-effects of white supremacy are grim and terrible. His lines shock and excite in equal measures. It is really horrific and better imagined than experienced. He unveils a nation soaked in violence induced by drug wars, and prostitution syndicates, aside from actual armed robbery. Nowhere is sacrosanct for rivals to hunt each other. Territories are marked. Criminals from different countries have jealously-guarded territories and one camp is not expected to cross the other to operate and when that happens, blood is bound to flow.

    The author also references Xenophobia, homo-phobia, anti-Blackness and all kinds of themes that seem to give the impression that it is for these vices that South Africa is called the Rainbow Nation instead of the fact that it is a diverse nation where tongues and skin colours differ.

    In this book, unfaithful lovers, corrupt policemen, bad citizens and minions without scruples roam like angels expelled from heaven.

    Nwelue shows that South African Immigration officials are not immune to corruption. He uses Osa’s arrival at the O.R. Tambo International Airport to draw attention to this anomaly. The airport scene also paints a picture of how visitors get easily and regularly robbed.

    One thing you’ll find about this book is that it gives the feeling of sitting in a cinema, with popcorn and drink to boot, watching a well-made movie. This perhaps cannot be divorced from the fact that the author is also a filmmaker. It’ll be good to see this as a Netflix series soon.

    The structure of this novel also adds to its appeal, the syntax is top-notch and the suspense and flashbacks help set the book apart as a true thriller. This bloody immigrant tale is peopled by nationals of Nigeria, Togo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Congo who see in the Rainbow Nation the opportunities their home countries cannot provide. Of course, there are many immigrants in South Africa that are good ambassadors of their countries, but those are not the ones that interest this author so you’ll not find them on this page-turner. The ones here like blood, not because they are nurses and doctors who help bring babies to life but because they have to spill blood to remain alive. When they discuss how to kill a fellow human being, they do it with so much ease that you wonder if blood flows in their veins. A case in point is when Chike is telling Chamai to kill a man.

    ‘You no dey fuck this one.’

    ‘You’re going to kill him,’ Chike says flatly, a cruel smile on his lips.

    Not every criminal in this book set out from his or her country with the intent of becoming a bad ambassador of his or her nation, some are actually forced to commit murders. It is like a case of getting killed if you don’t want to kill.

    There are also social commentaries in this work. The author does not flatter politicians. He deals them blows that if done physically they will spend days in intensive care units. He holds them accountable for plundering their nations and forcing their citizens into other lands in search of greener pastures.

    Nwelue has written a very important work, one that has put the immigrant experience in South Africa in a perspective never seen before and it is also a warning to the political elite that things cannot continue the way they are. The blatant stealing of the commonwealth must stop, the book seems to silently scream. This is a book that will make you wonder why Africans consider themselves strangers to themselves, especially when together on the continent.

    This book is unashamedly Nigerian with Pidgin English running through almost all the pages and actually adds to its originality and a true representation of the characters it is depicting. Aside from Pidgin English, there is also an abundance of street lingos.

    There are so many scenes that are memorable; one of them is in chapter fourteen. In that chapter, which has so much cinematic appeal, Nwelue says so much with fewer words, but the image he is painting is so vivid it can be touched. The scene where a Buccaneer man guns down Big Maskotoe, an Aiye man, is grisly. His death coming when he has just concluded talks on how to kill Osas adds to the momentousness of this scene.

    On a final note, Onyeka Nwelue’s ‘The Strangers of Braamfontein’ is heavily peopled with characters as dark as the night who are cohabiting in a brutal place where death is cheap. Raw, gritty, fast-paced, this is not a book you can glance through because it will force you to keep turning the pages. It will make you shiver with trepidation. It is such a searing read. This is a book to love.