The Nation Newspaper

Tag: around

  • Flying and perching around

    Dotun attended the school’s alumni meeting a few weeks ago. Here, he met a number of his old school mates and they had become a shadow of themselves. Guys who used to be the toast and envy of all had deteriorated so badly and they all wondered why he looked so clean and radiant.

    “The only thing that keeps me going is my dear Amaka, the woman who has made me to fly in emotional colours. She is a wonderful heart to be with and every moment spent in her company makes me feel better and younger. She helps you plan your day in a unique way and when you are down, she is ever ready to proffer solutions that would make you go to bed with a heart filled with joy.”

    That, for him, is the emotional tonic required to fly around like a butterfly.

    A strong, healthy relationship can be one of the best supports in your life and business. As you look around for success stories, you find that good relationships improve all aspects of life as well as strengthening your health, your mind, and your connections with others.

    However, if the relationship isn’t working, it can also be a tremendous drain. Relationships are an investment. The more you put in, the more you can get back.

    For some, no matter what they put in the other party would just not make them fly because the relationship was not based on trust but on lust and material gains. Once you find yourself on the edge like this, it is better to device ways to repair the trust and love in a relationship on the rocks.

    At such moments, it may be better to withdraw from the hustle and bustle to nature. That was exactly what Adunni did recently and it took away the emotional confusion without stress. Here, she saw a beautiful butterfly flying and perching around. The brightly-coloured insect stole the show. It was beautiful watching the overlapping rows of tiny scales jumping around in excitement.

    However, she discovered that as beautiful and exciting as it was, the experience did not last forever.

    To understand this, you need to understand that as beautiful as the butterfly is, it has a short lifespan. The average lifespan for an adult butterfly is 20 to 40 days. Some species live no longer than three or four days; others may live up to six months.

    From egg to adult, butterflies undergo a series of physical transformations known as metamorphosis. After mating, the female butterfly lays her eggs on a caterpillar food or “host” plant. The eggs can hatch within a few days, or within months or even years, depending on whether the conditions are right or not.

    In addition, a caterpillar’s first meal is its own eggshell. It then spends most of its time eating the leaves of the plant on which it hatched. An adult butterfly uncoils its long, straw-like proboscis to sip nectar from flowers, juice from rotting fruit and water from puddles.

    Many butterflies have developed interesting ways of defending themselves from predators. One method is disguise, or “cryptic colouration”, where the butterfly has the ability to look like a leaf or blend into the bark of a tree to hide from predators.  Another method is chemical defence, where the butterfly has evolved to have toxic chemicals in its body. These species of butterfly are often brightly coloured, and predators have learned over time to associate their bright colour with the bad taste of the chemicals.

    Interestingly, it also reminds you about the lyrics of the song by Westlife titled ‘Flying without wings’.

    It talks about everybody looking for that special thing, that thing that makes them complete, the thing that brings excitement to their emotions and life in general. The song writer hints that such pleasures and excitement occur in the strangest places, places where you never knew or imagined that you could find cupids arrow.

    The big question then would be where can you find the kind of love that you truly desire?

    Well, some actually find it sharing every morning while others have to stay away from the maddening crowd to find it in their solitary lives. If you do not get it here, then you may just rediscover lost affection in the words of others or in the deepest friendship. Friends whose hearts are as beautiful as the butterfly can be a great asset. These are the kinds of hearts that you would cherish all your life.

  • What goes around comes around

    When a democratically elected legislator says he lost his leadership position in the legislature as a result of a coup against him, his choice of words deserves attention.

    Senator Mohammed Ali Ndume of the All Progressives Congress (APC) who represents Borno South Senatorial District was removed as the Senate Leader and replaced by Senator Ahmed Lawan (Yobe North) in dramatic circumstances on January 10. His removal was plotted and perfected by the APC’s Senate Caucus which communicated the development to Senate President Abubakar Bukola Saraki in a two-paragraph letter entitled “Notice of change of leadership.”

    Ndume’s reaction: “This is a parliamentary coup because many of my colleagues said they were not aware of any Caucus meeting. But so be it. God gave me that position and if that is His wish that I should leave, I have left everything to God. Had it been that I was found wanting of any allegation, I will not be surprised. All I know is that God will fight back for me.”

    Ndume added: “I did no wrong, except the issue of the confirmation of the Acting EFCC chairman, Mr. Ibrahim Magu, which brought up some issues. There was a disagreement on Magu beginning with my fight with Sen. Dino Melaye. Based on legislative procedure, I said Magu had not been rejected by the Senate. Shortly after that, there were rumours of collection of signatures to remove me. Even at that, we met at the Senate leadership level on Monday; there was no complaint against me. I was not aware that the leadership was not happy with me. There was no allegation against me at all. Certainly, it is a coup.”

    When did legislators in a democracy begin to plan and carry out coups? Certainly, it did not begin with Ndume’s ouster. Indeed, Ndume himself benefited from what may be called a coup when he was installed as Senate Leader in a move that defied the directive of his party leadership.

    A June 23, 2015 letter to Saraki by the APC National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, had named Lawan for the position of Majority Leader among the “names of principal officers approved by the party” for the 8th Senate.

    At the time Ndume emerged as Senate Leader contrary to his party’s position, he did not see it as a coup against the party. It is said that what goes around comes around.

  • Giving the country the run around

    One thing is sure: this mystery could not have been more fascinating if it came from the pages of a bestseller

    Lately, I have watched young Ese Oruru seize the country’s imagination by the simple act of disappearing and re-appearing like a magician between last year, 2015, and this year. First, the story read that she had been kidnapped; then that she had eloped; and then that she had been forced into something like a marriage in the very modern city of Kano from the bosom of her mother’s shop in Bayelsa. Imagine the distance of that journey! It is almost as long as the saga!

    One thing is sure though: this mystery could not have been more fascinating if it came from the pages of a bestseller. The Ese story only goes to prove to my unbelieving friends what I have been trying to tell them for ages: that life is many times stranger than fiction. As Hamlet has proclaimed, ‘there are more things in life than are found in your philosophy (literature) books!’ I think the man must really have been exasperated by his friend’s naive innocence. I am equally getting exasperated as this saga seems to really be giving the country the good ol’ run around. It is drawing out more questions than answers.

    I am often fascinated by the ‘whodunit’ structure of many mystery books. In my professional opinion (err, as a detective, that is), many aspects of this story fit into the structure of a mystery book like a glove. It is complete with your leading lady, a probable protagonist with her innocence, and the sinned-against rather than the sinning face (at least for now). It also has the antagonist, a certain Mr. Yunusa, who is said to be the violator and snatcher of the many properties of the protagonist – her innocence, naivety, purity, youth, freedom, rights, religion, identity, culture, parents, home, familiar birthplace, friends, etc., and all the things that went into making her who she fancied herself to be.

    From the accounts, it would appear that young Mr. Yunusa had many motives. Indeed, at the height of the elopement theory, the motive seemed to have been romance. For a tiny winy while, it actually seemed like a romantic story; and since most of us like romantic stories, we were kinda tempted to let our guard down on the age thing. That was just for a tiny winy bit, mind. I have since changed my mind, even in the face of that data.

    That is what brings in the third, fourth, fifth and any number of parties whose interests in the story are not yet clear, nearly all of whom can be said to have some elements of motive, complicity and/or failure. There is the theory, according one of the stories, that the girl had been fetched up north by the said Mr. Yunusa and kept in the palace of the Emir of Kano, but this has since been denied.

    There have been many speculations as to why the police did not enforce the girl’s freedom earlier. I think there is an aspect of the law that says that security operatives are not supposed to enter one’s house except on invitation or there is a warrant from a competent, unbiased judge that says your house can be searched in an emergency security situation. However, it is well known that the Nigerian security systems have more respect for persons of a certain class; so there is often a very elastic or varied interpretation of what constitutes ’emergency situation’. So, I cannot blame the police too much for waiting for clearance on the situation before releasing the girl. There are just too many things that are not clear about the case, even for the police.

    You can see that this is a tightly woven and complex plot that could only have been conceived by a wild imagination such as natural occurrences. Indeed, if some wild writer had come up with it for a bestseller, I tell you that s/he would have been hung, strung and quartered for trying to start a war in the country comparable to that which greeted the stealing away of Helen of Troy.

    You remember Helen of Troy, don’t you? It is said that she was the most beautiful woman of her time, and when Paris (a handsome young ‘un) forcibly took her from her husband and brought her home to Troy, that city did not mind going to war in order to keep her. Consequently, hundreds of thousands of people died trying to keep that beauty within Troy’s borders in a war that lasted about ten years. I have seen something of Ese’s beauty and I am afraid it does not quite come near Helen’s.

    However, were a writer to conceive the Ese plot in a work of fiction, s/he would have been accused of trying to pit the north against the south religiously, economically and culturally. It could very easily have been a religious war, seeing that the girl is said to have been taken from her Christian roots and put in a hijab within the few months of her departure. Culturally, Ese is still considered underage and in tutelage in her birthplace,, having much schooling ahead of her whereas in the new setting, she would be considered to have arrived at the port of her life even at that age.

    It would have been an economic war that would have pitted the rich resources that the girl might have dreamed of; you know, the Abdul-like kind of treasure trove that opens to ‘Sesame!’ against the poor resources of her shop-keeper mother. Who really knows how she ended up in Kano?! For all we know, she might have been lured by the beauty in the simplicity of saying ‘Sesame!’ to open the treasure troves to meet all her needs, who knows? Who really knows what is going on in the mind of a thirteen year-old girl?! For now, we can only hope that all the questions that will keep the country quiet will be answered soon by time. I can’t trust any of the parties in this matter to do that.

    In the meantime, I think it behoves us as parents of teenagers and other young ‘uns to learn to become mind readers fast, fast. This is because too many things are going on in their heads, and you need to be able to predict which thought will dominate and become ideological. As parents, believe me, you want to be able to hold and call the spades. You need to be one step ahead of your young one. You want to hold the element of surprise in your hands so you can control its use. This is as good as saying you should not let your ward control the element of surprise so that you don’t get this kind of run around that the country is agonising through. Good luck to us all.

  • ‘I ‘ll turn Kogi around’

    ‘I ‘ll turn Kogi around’

    Kogi State All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain George-Olumoroti Olusola, in this interview with MUSA ODOSHIMOKHE, explains why he wants to govern the Northcentral state. 

    Why are you in the race for Kogi State governor?

    I was motivated to contest for the position of the governor of Kogi State because of its visible problems. Having seen the blessings that accrue to Kogi terms of the natural resources and human capital, today we ranked about the 34th poorest state in the country. This means our resources have not been adequately harnessed and there is so much poverty in the land. That is why I am motivated to come out to help the situation. I believe we need to do things differently, put in fresh ideas that can move the state forward. There is the need to harness the natural resources for the benefit of our people.

    How formidable is your structure?

    This is a structure that I have built since 2007, under the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). I obtained form too in the same year for the position of the governor, I was screened and cleared. But the leadership of the party prevailed on us to step down for Prince Abubakar Audu which we did. As a loyal party man, I have remained with the party, helping the party in whatever capacity. In the last election, we demonstrated it by winning three senatorial seats and six out of the nine House of Representatives seats. We won 11 out of the House of Assembly seats. So, the structure is formidable. In Kogi west, where I come from, where I have always been known to belong to the progressives, I have been playing my part in ensuring that the party is a force to reckon with.

    What are your plans for the state, if elected?

    My plan for the state includes investing aggressively in agriculture. Kogi State today, about 70 per cent of its population work force is agrarian. But, this is a sector that had been largely neglected by subsequent governments since 1999. Kogi State that used to be the food basket of the nation is now the importer of food. Again, because of the impact of the ozone layer, it is really difficult for farmers to go to the farms in the morning without the necessary support. The administration under my supervision is going to provide farm implements and equipment for all farmers in all the local governments. We are going to procure fertilizers and ensure that we eliminate middlemen and allow the product to get directly to the farmers. We will ensure that the farmers have direct access to the equipment. In addition, we are going to establish a revolving soft loan for the farmers. This is going to motivate farmers, who are the largest number of our work force. The education sector is another critical area to look into. It has been neglected by successive governments. There is no single secondary school that is comparable in terms of quality or standard to the Kings College in Lagos State. We used to have good secondary schools in Kogi. So, we are going to invest largely in education. We are going to revive it by ensuring that we rehabilitate the structures that have collapsed. We will motivate the teachers, who are currently spending more time at home due to strikes. This is because the current government has refused to implement the elongated salary structure agreed upon with the governors’ forum.

    What will you do about this, if elected?

    Our primary school teachers have been at home in the last eight months for lack of implementation of good condition of service. We are going to ensure that we implement the elongated salary structure. I have plans under my administration to explore the tourism potential of Kogi State. Kogi State has so many histories behind it, being the first administrative seat in Nigeria, where Lord Lugard resided. It is the place where Nigeria was pronounced as a country. We have so many structures behind us; we have the only cemetery that housed the European armies who fought in the world wars, in Lokoja. We have other exiting tourism attractions, but this has largely been neglected. We are going create awareness about these and invest in them. We are going to invest in the cargo handling capacity in the Ajaokuta and Jetties. We thank God that the Federal Government is dredging the Niger Delta, which is going to be of help in the development of our state. The state government is going to invest, to ensure the cargo handling equipment is useful to our people. We will get the public/private partnership to harness the natural resources that the state is blessed with. The Ajaokuta Steel Complex which government has invested a lot in will get our support, but for the past 32 years the project has been abandoned. My plan is to do position paper and present it to the Federal Government for a consortium arrangement that is going to be tripartite in nature. This will include the federal, state and private investors to bring it back to life. This will create about 10,000 direct employment for Nigerians and indirect employment of about 90,000. Many industries will spring up immediately, if this is done. We are targeting 100,000 jobs directly or indirectly. This will also help the state to improve the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). Another area we want to pursue is the power generation. Kogi State has large deposit of coal in Kabba area, Koto Karifi in the western part of the state. The coals are unexplored and we know that part of President Muhammadu Buhari’s agenda is to improve power generation at reasonable cost.

    How can your party have a rancour free primary?

    I am a team player and I have always advocated to the leadership of the party, to ensure that we have a free and fair primary. The choice of the party is paramount to me. I have always worked for the party as an individual; I have also worked for the party in cooperative terms. During the general election, we worked so hard for all the successes we recorded for the President. We are committed to ensuring that the party takes over Kogi State, because of the strategic role Kogi has continued to play in the national economy. We are committed to ensure that Kogi State is taken over by our party; we are appealing and praying that the primary is going to be free and fair. That all the other aspirants are going to work with whoever emerges.

    Are you not worried that the Igalla people have been the ones dominating the state?

    It is true that since 1991 when the state was created, and lately since 1999 that this democracy started, it has always been the Igalla ruling the state. I am not a strong advocate of power shift, but I believe that the best candidate will emerge. In last election, it clearly shows that 50 percent of the votes came from Kogi West and Central. If we have the system that can guarantee free and fair election like we had in the last election, I can tell you that from Kogi West and Central, they can win. They have 12 local governments out of 21, Kogi east has nine. So, in a free and fair primary under the supervision of the national body, if the west and central work together, they can always deliver a candidate that will win the election.     

  • I have been playing around

    She isn’t so keen

    I have been in a relationship with a girl I met on a plane about two years ago. As soon as I saw her I knew that she was the kind of woman that I wanted to marry. We got closer and I liked almost everything I saw and heard about her and her immediate family. However, I realised that I am the only one making efforts to make the relationship work. On her part, there is a non -challant attitude and I wonder if things would work this way. Bala

     

    Response

    Happiness is not something that is ready-made. You just have to work towards it on a daily basis. If what you want is a healthy relationship, then you must work towards it. It is about two people who truly want to work together to create something meaningful out of life. Love is great when spoken, but greatest when shown. You need to do little things daily to show your loved ones that you care.

     

    I have been playing around

    My fiancée sent a letter to me last week telling me that she was no longer interested in the relationship. Her letter took me by surprise but I guess her reasons are genuine. She stated that she had stayed too long in the relationship and found that I wasn’t showing some level of commitment because I was dating other women. Well, I thought I was just doing what the other guys were doing and that I still had time to play around a little. However, she is the one that I love and wish that she would take me back. Do you think that she would come back if I apologise and promise to change my ways? Henry

     

    Response

    You cannot eat your cake and have it back. If she continues to hang around and you finally decide to marry another person, then you would have succeeded in ruining her life. The truth of the matter is that, there cannot be a relationship without commitment. You cannot win a heart unless there is loyalty, understanding, patience and persistence. If you are sure that you are serious, then go back to her and propose to her right away.

     

    Didn’t get my mother’s approval

    Please I need your advice. I have been in a relationship for about three years and we want to marry each other. But my mother is against it because he is not from my state. He is a Yoruba man and I love him so much. Please what can I do? I do not want to lose him. Amara

     

    Response

    Even though it is important to respect the wish of your mother, your needs also matter. You can’t ignore your feelings especially when you have found what you really want. Plead with your mother to change her mind. Sometimes, you just have to do what’s best for you, your life and not what is best for someone else. So, you have to say what you need to say and let her know how you feel about this guy. If you do not speak up now, you may live to regret losing the one you love.