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Tag: Lions

  • Lions unveils first autism community club

    Lions unveils first autism community club

    Lions Clubs International has inaugurated Lagos Autism Community Lions Club, the first in Nigeria.

    The event, which doubled as Charter Presentation and Fundraising, took place at Lagos Airport Hotel, Ikeja.

    Petrolina Amos was installed charter president. Amos said her leadership would focus on building a supportive environment for autistic children and their families.

    “I will create a community where children with autism are loved, valued, and empowered,” she said. “I want them to know their worth, unlock potential, and thrive despite the challenges.”

    She paid tribute to her family for their sacrifices and thanked the Montreal Autism Community Lions Club in Canada for standing by the vision of establishing a similar platform in Nigeria.

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    Chair of the Charter Presentation and Fundraising Committee, Emeka Obi, said: “Today is a milestone not just for Lagos or Nigeria, but for Africa. This club signals an era of inclusion, awareness, and support for individuals living with autism.” He urged members and guests to sustain the club’s programmes.

    Governor of District 404B4, Adebowale Afolayan, congratulated Amos and urged her to serve with compassion.

    “The club is born from vision and resilience. Your installation is a call to champion the cause of the autistic community and amplify the strength of the neurodiverse,” he said, promsing support.

    Experts estimate that at least 600,000 children live with autism spectrum disorder in Nigeria, though the figure could be higher due to under-reporting and poor diagnosis.

  • Lions holds luncheon for new members

    Lions holds luncheon for new members

    • By Naimat Dauda

    Lagos Pacific Lions Club has organised a fundraising luncheon and induction for new members.

    Its President, Anita Rasaq, said her role is a call to greater responsibility and dedication to service.

    She said: “To who much is given, much more is expected. For me, this position represents an opportunity to do more for the community. One of the club’s key initiatives for the year includes establishing a vocational centre in a primary school, aligning with the Federal Government’s introduction of skill acquisition in school curriculums. This project will serve as a major focus for this Lions Service Year, and it will create value for our community.”

    She hailed the club’s progress, saying “we are not where we were last year, and I am proud of how we have grown. However, there is still so much to achieve.”

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    Governor for District 404B2, Nigeria, Tolulope Senbanjo, noted that the organisation, founded in 1917, spent 107 years serving humanity in eight focus areas –  vision, diabetes, environmental protection, pediatric cancer, hunger relief, humanitarian efforts, youth development, and disaster response.

    “When there is disaster, Lions are the first to respond, because our responsibility is to serve humanity.” he said.

    Senbanjo urged members to prioritise community needs and respond with compassion. “My advice to them is to consider people’s needs and ensure they respond with compassion and kindness. They should identify needs in society along the service areas Lions are known for and see how they can meet those needs,” he said.

    Secretary of Lagos Pacific Lions Club, Ismail Ogunbamire, noted the execution of 15 to 18 projects under the leadership, all aimed at addressing people’s challenges.

    “These projects are not just numbers; they represent our passion, dedication, and commitment to making a difference in lives,” he noted.

  • In the lion’s den

    In the lion’s den

    To Isapatoromoyan, the ancient Yoruba town, through the ancestral homesteads of Eko-Einde, Eekosin and Iwere-Ile for the annual pounded yam festival with the rogue Okon in tow. This annual festival is a Yoruba rite of passage and the equivalent of the American Thanksgiving which began centuries earlier when some intrepid descendants of Oduduwa settled in the northernmost fringes of the new empire among hostile tribes who viewed them with dread and trepidation as bearers of a new type of civilization.

      In gratitude to their mighty deity who had helped them to survive another season among implacable warlike marauders who were bent on exterminating them to the single person, they often gathered at this historic site among huge rocks and Olympian crevices with their best yams and the plentiful venison abounding in the sprawling plains to jollify and to make merry as well as to give vent to the more playful and gregarious side of their nature. Very soon, it became routinized and regularized as an annual festival of hope and renewal.

        It was an epic feast of a feeding frenzy beginning at sunrise and ending when even the cooperative moon began to complain of tiredness and exhaustion. It is all too reminiscent of the magnificent pounded yam festival in Things Fall Apart where it took three days for feeders on all sides to behold each other.  Replete with rare venison of extinct herbivores, wild mushrooms which tasted like upmarket sand grouse and some aromatic vegetables now out of historic circulation, it was a moveable feast indeed.

      But it was also a celebration of spectacular heroism, incredible self-sacrifice and the ancestral spirit of all those who gave up their life so that others can survive. It was the hazy beginning of armed empire and fiery battlements. Yet it resolves the post-Oduduwa paradox and the Oranmiyan Question: How a people who had conquered and grown their old empire through the force of persuasion and superior civilization could now resort to fierce conquest and slaying on an industrial scale.

       The empire rose like a comet, subduing and subjugating far and wide beyond the realm of possibility and human endurance, incorporating in its mighty and minatory embrace strange territories and even stranger people leading to an incredible miscegenation of tribes and human tributaries. Yet like all empires, it also eventually fell like an expired meteor as the auld enemies joined forces with superior cavalry and the bearers of a new civilization who felt that the old one was a threat and nuisance to its own version of history.

      Empires rise and fall. And the rest is history. History was the farthest thing on the mind this morning as a historic fog laid its icy fangs on the entire country. The motoring condition had become simply atrocious. You could hardly see beyond your nose. Even some international flights had to be diverted to neighboring and more inclement climes. With Okon in tow, history and harmattan were the least of the problems, human nuisance was.

      Before snooper lay an ancient map of the magic route. You journey from Lagos to Ibadan and then to Moniya, Iseyin, Okaka, Otu and then veer off through an old mystery route known only to old empire hands and noblemen which eventually led them back to the ancestral shrine at Ile-Ife. You then come back through Iseyin, the scenic and spectacularly picturesque Ado Awaye, Eruwa, Igbo Ora, the “Randa” intersection near Abeokuta and then back to Lagos through Ewekoro, Orile Wasinmi—Segun Odegbami’s ancestral hideout—- and Sango Otta.

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       The journey had hardly started when Okon began making subversive commentaries in his rasping breathless monotone. Irreverent and caustic, Okon does not take hostages.

       “Oga, I just say make I tell you say dem  dey sell diesel for 245 naira for today. Petrol revenue dey rise and naira still dey fall. Na dis year we go know who get dis yeye kontri. If dem like make dem send dem soldier everywhere. When soldier don finis for barak, he mean say katakata don come be dat.” The mad boy yelled.

     “Okon leave me alone and leave the government alone.  At least they have started paying the very poor and aged people the money they promised”, yours sincerely snapped.

     “ Oga, no be yeye nonsense be dat one? Dem for build food shelter, employ Okon as Chairman for Belly Infrastructure make I dey feed dem old people. Na food dem people need. Na dis dem one –chance boys dem find  food for”, the crazy boy sniggered.

      “ By the way, Okon what do you think about the prophecies this year from the men of God?” snooper asked trying to steer the mad boy away from the path of subversion and sedition.

     “ Ha oga  dat one he be like say oversee come oversee overseer”, the mad boy crowed and burst into deranged hiccups.    

      By now we were approaching the bridge after the Shagamu intersection. All hell suddenly let loose as some hoodlums  jumped out on the road from nowhere, forcing the car to a screeching a halt just before a crater.

       “ Come out!! We are kidnappers!” one of the thugs screamed.

        “ We no be kid, so make you just go nap dem kids”, Okon bravely shouted at them.

        “ Shut up, you fool!” one of them screeched and hit Okon with the barrel of his gun. Snooper jumped up and hit the edge of the bed. Snooper has been dreaming. Yours sincerely has been hallucinating.

    First published in January, 2017.

  • LUTH, LIONS partner for N200m Olusola Dada Dialysis Centre   

    The Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH) and Lions Club International are collaborating to ensure the N200m Isaac Olusola Dada Dialysis Centre becomes a reality.

    In a well attended foundation laying ceremony of the multimillion naira medical complex at LUTH Idi Araba, Chief Medical Director (CMD) of LUTH, Prof. Chris Bode, said the hospital board is backing fully the Lions Club International in honour of the departed member of the club and past District Governor, District 4041A, Lion Isaac Olusola Dada.

    The CMD who also represented the Minster of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, thanked the family of the late Dada, the Lions Club and everyone that contributed to making the ceremony possible.

    “We are gathered today to honour the goodness of one man, whose clarion call is reaching us from the paradise where he is now. His loss was a big tragedy to us, his family and the community as a country.”

    When the centre is built, he noted that it would benefit over 20 million persons.  ”There are over 20 million people in Lagos State alone and that means we need more dialysis centres where people, who are critically ill with kidney diseases, can go and readily get care. With the great plan that we have seen on ground for this centre, this has come as a great benefit to, not just LUTH, but to the whole of Lagos and Nigeria.”

    Commenting on the project, the US-based Chairman of Lions Club International Foundation, Dr. Naresh Aggarwal, expressed his pleasure over the commencement of the building of the health facility in honour of Dada.

    Wife of Dada, Lion Chief Omolola Dada, described her late husband as one who “was always driven by the desire to make the world better than he met it.

     

     

     

  • Why Nigerians cannot perform the ‘Mexican wave’

    I once saw an intriguing short video sometime ago: a small pride of hungry lions as they are usually wont to do, spotting a herd of buffalos, laid an ambush. The chase that ensued went on for a long time. But as the pursuit got to a crescendo after a long distance, the buffalos, perhaps realising their overwhelming number compared to the lions’, suddenly stopped and turned onto the lions! In a dramatic turn of events the buffalos were now chasing the lions with unimaginable ferociousness.

    The FIFA World Cup recently took place in Russia. In the wild excitement that usually followed dazzling performances on the field of play – amidst fanatical support and vociferous ovations from the usual capacity crowd, we occasionally witnessed the phenomenon called Mexican wave. This is an effect where the members of the crowd stand up and/or raise their hands in turn, creating the illusion of a wave passing through the crowd.

    In a Mexican wave, participants act in unison in order to achieve an aim, emanating from any part of the spectators’ stands – all to attain this beautiful and entertaining end. It was of course, originated by the Mexicans many years ago.

    Thus the salient point about a Mexican wave is the fact that it is spontaneous; there is no practice or rehearsal involved; it is carried out by total strangers cooperating to achieve an aim. And lastly, it can be triggered by anybody. Now, this is absolutely impossible in any Nigerian sporting arena as at yet.

    One of the biggest problems of Nigeria is that there is a general absence of an innate team spirit, and a sense of cohesiveness in the psyche of the average citizenry. Nigerians cannot perform the Mexican wave because the average citizen is too self-centred and self seeking.

    It is for this reason that as few as five people at a roadside bus stop cannot cooperate to boycott a ‘danfo’ (commercial bus) whose operator for some selfish whims decides to rip them off. It is for the same reason Nigerian co-tenants or neighbours cannot collaborate to fix a simple utility, or unite to resist a shylock landlord. They would rather spend much money individually to fix some personal problems in their apartments than contribute very little to fix a bigger problem that will be for the common good.

    The infamous wartime German Nazi dictator, Adolf Hitler, once blatantly remarked, “How fortunate for governments that the people they lead do not think.” Oh, was he damn right about us! Our equally self-seeking leaders make a good meal of this truism in our clime.

    Even animals (the fleeing buffalos) in their race for life stopped to think. Nigerians have been unable to confront their oppressors simply because we have refused to think (as one). The self conceited leaders see the docility of the people and take cool advantage of it and thus continue to use the people as willing pawns.

    Eroded family values, and the lack of a national ethos is a reason it is extremely difficult for the Nigerian to dream up or even fathom a Mexican wave. I am not talking about a rehearsed calisthenics display, but an on-the-spot demonstration of unity of purpose at any given point in time for a certain good cause. For some beleaguered number of decades, perhaps since after the civil war, Nigerians have journeyed through this ignoble path, learning and relishing the ways of the vultures and hyenas. This is Nigeria, a country where it is extremely difficult to be good.

    Our inability to think as one is the reason “our votes don’t count” simply because we say and believe so. The people refuse to go all out to cast their votes in the democratic process, yet they expect votes to count? And so, it becomes very easy for the politicians to manipulate the system to their advantage. In our collective folly, Nigerians would rather pray and expect miracles to happen – having not laboured for results; the virtuous and the diligent are maligned while gangsters and political goons get celebrated.

    The people would rather unite in a dance of shame at the village square: youths don uniforms, roll out drums to welcome unrepentant ex-convicts, and hail visceral villains, all because we ‘do not think’. Thus we’re unable to forge a Mexican wave, be it in health or in sickness.

    Still for the same reason, a single hoodlum at the bus stop can easily overpower a complete busload of passengers; the passengers all keep mute, ‘minding their own businesses’ as the brigand extorts the commuter bus operator and his conductor. Is it not for the same reason we cannot stand up to the local government (Chairman) – to patch up potholes on our neighbourhood streets and roads until they become death traps?

    Indeed, the renowned Algerian author and philosopher – Frantz Fanon, was right on point when he said, “A government or a party gets the people it deserves, and sooner or later a people gets the government it deserves.” Nigerians by now ought to realise that ‘nothing changes until you change’; given our overly ‘adaptive’ nature, we tend to be deserving of the kind of leaders we get.

    • By Morgan Nwanguma

     Lagos.

  • UN warns lions, tigers, leopards going into extinction

    UN warns lions, tigers, leopards going into extinction

    The United Nation (UN) has called for the protection of big cats species such as lions, tigers and leopards, warning that they are fast going into extinction.

    The UN spoke against the backdrop of the 2018 World Wildlife Day, celebrated every March 3, with the theme: “Big cats: predators under threat’’.

    According to the UN, the big cats are under increasing threat, mostly caused by human activities.

    UN Secretary-General António Guterres said: “This year, the spotlight falls on the world’s big cats. These charismatic creatures are universally revered for their grace and power, yet they are increasingly in danger of extinction.”

    Guterres said just more than a century ago, some 100,000 wild tigers roamed Asia while fewer than 4,000 remained today.

    According to him, all the big cats are collectively under threat from habitat loss, climate change, poaching, illicit trafficking, and human-wildlife conflict.

    “We are the cause of their decline, so we can also be their salvation. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) include specific targets to end the poaching and illegal trafficking of protected species of wild fauna and flora.

    “Ultimately, the solution to saving big cats and other threatened and endangered species is conservation policy based on sound science and the rule of law,” he noted.

    Guterres pointed out that by protecting big cats we also protect the landscapes they inhabit and the life they harbour, adding “it is a gateway to protecting entire ecosystems that are crucial to our planet’s health.

    “Wildlife conservation is a shared responsibility,” he said, calling on people around the world to “help raise awareness and to take personal action to help ensure the survival of the world’s big cats and all its precious and fragile biological diversity.”

    In his message, Yury Fedotov, Executive Director, UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), said that while “the cheetah is the world’s fastest land animal, like other big cat species, it cannot outrun the threat of extinction.”

    According to Fedetov, across the world, lions, tigers, leopards and jaguars, as well as many other big cat species, are under pressure due to poaching, lost habitats and disappearing prey.

    “UNODC is working to help countries criminalise wildlife poaching and trafficking as a means of protecting animals, including big cat species, and halting their tragic disappearance into history.

    “Our collective roar of defiance must be aimed at the poachers, traffickers and all those who would destroy our natural heritage. We must not let them succeed,” he urged.

    The Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed also lamented that “biodiversity is disappearing at a thousand times the natural rate’’, saying that the varied causes could be linked to the 17 SDGs of the 2030 Agenda.

    “Protecting ecosystems and ensuring access to ecosystem services by poor and vulnerable groups are therefore essential to eradicating extreme poverty and hunger,” she said.

    Mohammed said conservation, restoration and sustainable use of biological diversity was “an effective anti-poverty strategy,” and emphasised the need to better maintain the natural resources on which billions of people depend, especially the world’s rural poor.

    “They say cats have nine lives. Our big cats are on at least number eight,” she said, observing, however, that in many cases, poverty, hunger and biodiversity loss are intrinsically connected.

  • Herdsmen poison 6 lions, 74 vultures to save cows

    Herdsmen poison 6 lions, 74 vultures to save cows

    AS Nigeria tries to work out a way to solve the herdsmen-farmers conflict, Tanzania faces a different dimension of the problem: herdsmen versus the wildlife in the parks.

    Tanzania last week found six lions and 74 vultures dead near a national park, south of the country, after they were poisoned to death.

    Permanent Secretary for Natural Resources and Tourism Gaudence Milanzi said the way the animals were killed suggested they had been poisoned by local herdsmen amid an escalating human-wildlife conflict in the country.

    “I can confirm that six lions were poisoned in the wildlife management area just outside of the Ruaha National Park. We are investigating this incident,” Milanzi said, according to China’s news agency, Xinhua.

    “An investigation launched by the government has been able to arrest one suspect, with samples of the poisoned lions and vultures taken to the Chief Government Chemist Laboratory to identify the type of poison used,” he said.

    Tanzania’s $2billion tourism sector, which depends heavily on wildlife safari, is the biggest foreign exchange earner, but there are growing clashes between wildlife populations, farmers and livestock keepers.

    Conservationists described the latest mass poisoning of lions and endangered vultures near the Ruaha National Park as a “devastating scene,” with the scavengers killed after eating a poisoned cattle carcass.

    “Six lions… had been killed, apparently from poison, as they were all found close to a scavenged cattle carcass,” the Ruaha Carnivore Project (RCP), part of Oxford University’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU), said in a statement.

    “This event had additional tragic consequences, with dozens of critically endangered vultures found dead or badly affected,” the statement said. “They eventually found 74 dead vultures as well as the six lions.”

    Four other sick vultures were taken to the Ruaha National Park for treatment. One died shortly after arrival, but the others are doing well, it said.

    “It appears as if someone poisoned a carcass after lions attacked cattle.

    Alarmingly, poisoning is a common response to conflict,” said the Ruaha Carnivore Project, which is monitoring lion populations in Tanzania.

    In 2014, a herdsman near the Ikona Wildlife Management Area in Serengeti district in Mara region poisoned to death seven lions after they attacked his cows.

  • Lions eat poacher, leave his head

    Lions eat poacher, leave his head

    A suspected poacher has been eaten by lions near the Kruger National Park in South Africa.

    South Africa’s Eye Witness News said police officers found a rifle and ammunition next to the body at the private nature reserve on Friday.

    The animals left little behind, but some body parts and the man’s head.

    Authorities had thought the body belonged to the driver of a tractor, who had gone missing, but he has since been found alive.

    “It seems the victim was poaching in the game park when he was attacked and killed by lions,” Limpopo police spokesman Moatshe Ngoepe said.

    “They ate his body, nearly all of it, and just left his head and some remains.

    “We are now waiting for a person from the family but we are also utilising our investigative resources to see if we can successfully identify the deceased,” the police’s Moatshe Ngoepe said.

    The Home Affairs Department has also been roped in to assist in identifying the man.

    Lion poaching has been on the rise in Limpopo province in recent years.

    The big cats’ body parts are sometimes used in traditional medicine, both within Africa and beyond.

    Wildlife charity the Born Free Foundation says lion bones and other body parts are increasingly sought-after in South East Asia, where they are sometimes used as a substitute for tiger bones.

    In January 2017, three male lions were found poisoned in Limpopo with their paws and heads cut off.

  • Preview: Nigeria vs Cameroon

    Preview: Nigeria vs Cameroon

    Nigeria’s Super Eagles are set to face the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon in the  second  leg of the  2018 World qualifiers later today (Monday 4 of September) in Yaounde, the Cameroonian capital.

    The match is scheduled to commence at 6pm

    The first leg played last Friday in Uyo ended with Eagles scoring four goals to nil.

    Both teams have met 21 times in the past, with Cameroon winning four times, while Nigeria boasts a massive 11 wins and six games ended in a draw.

    The Super Eagles are in good form under Gernot Rohr having won all three played so far in the qualifying round.

    Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria and Zambia are in in the same group for the World cup qualifiers to hold in Russia. 

    Players to watch:
    * Victor Moses (Nigeria) if he gets into his rhythm, he will be unstoppable, and should create most of Nigeria’s scoring chances. He won the man of the match in the first leg

    * Christian Mougang Bassogog (Cameroon) named Best Player at AFCON 2017; he is a winger who could trouble Nigeria’s fullbacks.

     

  • Lions marks 100 years with tree planting in school

    Lions marks 100 years with tree planting in school

    Dairy Farms Secondary School, Agege, Lagos has become one of the beneficiaries of Lions Club’s 100th anniversary with its tree planting campaign in the school.
    Lions International District 404B 2 Governor, Deacon Taiwo Adewunmi, said the aim of the club’s campaign was to leave a legacy for generations unborn, adding that it was part of its centennial celebration.
    ‘’We are here as part of the centennial campaign to protect our environment and to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Lions’ service to humanity globally. This is one project aimed at protecting our environment,’’ he said.
    President, Ikeja Dynamic Lions Club, Deji Olukokun, whose club sponsored the trees as part of its yearly project, said: ‘’We are a humanitarian organisation. We went into tree planting because not too much attention is paid to tree planting anymore. Instead the trees are being cut down in the name of civilisation. There is, therefore, need to pay attention to this vital part of our society. Let us save the environment.’’
    The school’s Principal Michael Sofolahan, who with his deputy, the school’s Head Prefect John Sotola and others, planted some trees during the event, said the trees when fully grown would, among others, beautify the school premises.
    Sofolahan added: ‘’We want our children to know the importance of tree planting. And to let them know that the trees will supply us oxygen, shade and make the area cool when it is hot.’’
    Sotola thanked Loins for the gesture, promising that the pupils would ensure that the trees were taken care of.