The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Myth

  • Benue killings: Grief and tears in myth

    SIR: Like Queen Niobe and the legendary Electra in Greek mythologies, the pains and grief of watching his subjects helplessly being massacred so hardened Benue State governor, Samuel Ortom’s resolve to damn whatever consequences even at the expense of being governor or loosing political party patronage. He cried out loudly to expose the injustice being visited on the innocent citizens through the war of genocide by a group that appeared to have the backing of some conspiratorial patrons. And instead of maintaining studied silence of helplessness or bias, some power brokers and attention seekers chose to add to the existing grief by making hate speeches to add salt to injury.

    For instance, to suggest that the killings in Benue State are as a result of communal clash or because of the enactment of anti – open grazing law appears to be gross insincerity and a hate speech.  For one to suggest that the killings are justified because of blockade of grazing routes smacks of complete ignorance, and it also amounts to hate speech.

    Meanwhile the killings continued unabated and so also are the stream of grief and tears in the land.  The massive deployment of police force and the relocation of the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Ibrahim Idris to Benue State which the president graciously ordered became a hide and seek exercise and did nothing much to assuage the tension.  Many people wondered and even cried out for deployment of the core military to crush the invaders as had been done elsewhere with ‘Operation Python Dance’ and others but the commander- in – chief who himself is a war veteran had the ace.

    He had great confidence in the ability and capacity of the police to perform.  Thus when the president wrote a letter to the Senate enumerating the steps he had taken to quell the crisis, ordering the relocation of IGP and the visit of the Minister of Interior to Benue State were listed as part of his efforts to tackle the menace.

    Despite all that, the killings continued and even spread further.  Citizens became completely disenchanted and called for more serious actions from the federal government. Those who criticized the poor handling of the situation by the federal government were branded as making hate speeches.  Those who commended or justified the killings and condemned Benue State government for enacting the anti-open grazing law were branded patriots and pampered with a studied golden silence. When the body language of officialdom suggested bias or tacit support for the agent provocateur, some poodles misread the horizon and played along.  So instead of making statements that should help to douse the tension, they justified the killings through hate speeches including verbal insults by describing the embattled governor as ‘a drowning man’, feeling that such was the officially recognized position.

    Thus despite the massive massacres going on, a chief executive of a state would describe it as a political game to beg for money. Ordinarily such would have been described as the worst of all hate speeches but it was greeted with loud silence as a mark of acquiescence.  So the orgy of killings continued with its attendant grief and tears among the hapless natives.

    However, during a recent visit to Nassarawa State, the president came down heavily on the perpetrators of the senseless killings and threatened to have them arrested.  He followed by directing the deployment a special military squad known as operation ‘Ayem A Kpatuma’ or ‘Cat Race’ to all the troubled areas in Benue and other states within the North Central Zone. With these presidential initiatives, it is hoped that the bloodbath in the Benue valley will subside and life return to normalcy again, and the citizens saved the reality and trauma of the mythological grief and tears.

     

    • Professor Jerry Agada,

    Makurdi.

  • The ember months’ myth

    The ember months’ myth

    Earlier this month, five persons died and many others were seriously injured in an early morning multiple road mishap at the famous Kara Bridge, just by the Lagos end of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. Viewing the gory scene of the tragic event through various media platforms was quite distressing. Three of the victims reportedly died instantly while the other two died in the hospital.  Reports had it that about 55 people were involved in the accident, 40 men and 15 women.

    An account of the incident revealed that a tanker laden with 33,000 litres of Automotive Gas Oil (diesel) rammed into a stationary truck carrying brewery products. The resultant oil spill on the road resulted in the multiple crashes involving some trucks and cars. Conservatively put, not fewer than 16 vehicles, comprising eight trucks and eight vehicles were involved in the multiple crashes allegedly caused by the spilled diesel on the road.

    As if the lives that wasted through the gruesome incident weren’t enough for that day, reports had it that two other people died in another accident which involved a collision between a truck and a train in the Fagba axis of Lagos State, on same day. So, it was a rather busy day for men and officials of the Lagos State Emergency Agency, LASEMA, who had to move immediately from that incident on the Kara Bridge straight to Fagba for rescue operation.

    Characteristically, many have tried to establish a connection between these bloody incidents and the usual ‘ember’ months’ tragic jargon.  The so-called ‘ember’ months, which refer to the last four months of the year from September to December, are naturally regarded as tragedy-prone period. This belief is so entrenched in the consciousness of the people that various religious groups and other relevant institutions regularly organize special prayer sessions and seminars with a view to minimizing ember months’ havoc.

    The reality, however, is that the so called ‘ember’ months are not really spiritually jinxed as many might want to swear they are. Tragedy occurs in ‘ember’ months just as it does in every other month of the year. Ascribing needless spiritual and mythical undertones to tragic happenings during the ‘ember’ months could just be the usual Nigerian way of trivializing issues. Rather than clothing the ‘ember’ months in a garb of gratuitous mystery, the pragmatic way of explaining dreadful events during these months is more human than mythological.

    The truth is that there is usually an increase in the tempo of public, private and corporate activities during this period.  Religious bodies are equally not left out of the frenzy of the season as they organize various events during the period. The ‘ember’ months are always the busiest on our roads for obvious reasons and the tumultuous air of festivity do not really help matters. It is a period when people are in so much haste to make all the money they have not made since the beginning of the year. Hence, commercial drivers, who usually embark on five trips per day, capitalize on the aura of festivity to go for 10 trips. This, naturally, comes with its fatal consequences. It is only logical that when there is a mass exodus of people from one place to the other, there is bound to be a measure of uncertainty and disorder.

    The bottom line, therefore, is that tragic occurrences are bound to happen during the ‘ember’ season because of the intensity of human activities. In a bid to be part of the various end-of-year activities slated for the period, a lot of people throw caution into the wind by disregarding critical safety issues. Vehicles are driven irresponsibly. Alcoholic drinks are consumed with reckless abandon while social outings are organized as if tomorrow will not come. The atmosphere, during the season, is often filled with unusual allure and jollity. It is in the midst of this hilarity that avoidable human blunders that result into diverse kinds of misfortunes usually occur.

    Hence, it is imperative for everyone to, first and foremost, have a changed perception of the ‘ember’ months. Hence, conscious efforts must be made to disrobe the months of every garb of unfounded mysticism. It is only when we are convinced that the dangers associated with the months are human rather than mythical that we could really make considerable progress in averting disasters during the months.

    Therefore, enforcement of existing laws and attitudinal change is central to making any progress. Sadly, law enforcement agents are also involved in the mad ‘ember’ months’ rat- race. In a bid to make some ‘extra’ buck to furnish special festive ‘necessities’ , they usually engage in treacherous compromise that encourages lawbreakers to go un-punished. The result, of course, is the continuation of avoidable circle of pandemonium and sorrow.

    Consequently, as we march towards the end of the year, we must modify our views on the ‘ember’ months. We must not get involved in any pointless extra-ordinary end of the year ‘rush’ that could endanger our lives, and indeed, those of others. Those who have to organize social events to correspond with this period should do so bearing all safety precautions in mind. Commercial drivers and other road users must respect the sanctity of the human life by observing required road safety measures.

    Perhaps, more importantly, relevant government agencies must step up enlightenment campaigns as well as enforcement strategies to guarantee that ‘ember’ months’ crashes and other related tragedies are reduced to the barest minimum. In this respect, the Federal Road Safety Corps, FRSC, and the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority, LASTMA, should be commended for their various ‘ember’ month’s safety strategies, in Lagos and adjoining states.

    However, there is a need for them to intensify efforts in this direction while more appropriate government agencies should also come on board the ‘ember’ months’ re-orientation and re-awareness project. Presently, the Lagos State Ministry of Information and Strategy is embarking on an ‘ember’ months’ responsiveness campaign across the state. The objective is to change the attitude of the people towards these months and offer key safety tips.

    As it has been previously affirmed, it is critical to re- affirm that tragic happenings during ‘ember’ months are promoted by reckless human actions. It is only in living modestly and responsibly that we can avoid the dangers and hiccups that are generally associated with ember months. If only we could rid ourselves of our usual ‘ember months’ excesses, we would discover that nothing is actually wrong with the months.

     

    • Ogunbiyi is of the Ministry of Information and Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja.

  • Budget: Myth, reality and the in-between

    Exactly a week after the formal laying of the 2018 Budget before the National Assembly, there has been just enough dissection of the elements to make for treatise on Political Economy 101. It’s like a typical Nigeria football match setting: everyone is a participant, observer and coach – rolled together. From the budget size to sectoral allocations; crude oil benchmark oil price to the revenue profile; capital estimates and recurrent expenditures, debts and cost of service; trust every citizen Joe to have an ‘expert’ opinion. I recall my local vulcanizer telling me the other day that the government policy – particularly the non-faithful implementation of the budget is killing his business!

    Never mind that the economy had been long in trauma before the new-fangled buzzword called‘recession’ crawled into the national lexicon; you’ll be tempted to imagine that the cancer which has reduced the economy to a mere shadow of uitself actually begin and end with the annual ritual called budget and budgeting! Again, never mind the manufacturers long used to drawing fixed, imaginary lines year –in, year –out in the sand as if such a world exist,; it seems an inextricable part of their corporate culture to blame the budget of the government for failures in corporate decisions even when abundant evidence would seem to point to gross derelictions in inventory management. The public sector employee waves it as an alibi when the creditors show up at the door; the same for politicians when the constituents come calling for their share of the commonwealth. It is all part of the myth, being spun around an exercise, a good part of the fixation under which the budget has become a be-it -all.

    Now, don’t get me wrong. The budget is important – very. Aside letting citizens into the mind on what constitutes government priorities, it sets out the limits of what is achievable within certain parameters in any given year. It lays out the revenue profile; ditto the expenditure.  Through the budget for instance, we are able to know how many kilometres of roads are doable in a given year, the number of dams, if any, to be constructed as well as other physical projects and the costs of delivering them. Through it, we get to evaluate the efficacy of government’s previous spend with careful attention to what economists call the multiplier to enable government chart a realistic future.

    Put it to the vast understanding of the place of that instrument of public finance in their development matrix that serious governments and corporations are able to effectively deploy it to catalyse their economies, deliver on key targets and sometimes, and steer their economies in certain direction.

    Unfortunately, things are different in Nigeria. Take the 2017 budget for instance. That was the budget on which the Buhari administration’s Economic Growth and Recovery Strategy – was supposedly anchored.  Presumably, the fancy label could not have been an accident: Five successive negative growths in the preceding year had plunged the economy into recession. Inflation, exchange rate and other macro-economic variables were running riot. Manufacturers, the few that were still in business that is, could not get forex to buy; most states, no thanks to the gloom in the oil sector, could not meet up with their wage obligations. With pretty little economic activities going on, the economy was effectively on ‘hung’ mode. All of these, at a time of unprecedented infrastructure gap. The situation was one of dire emergency, hence the conventional wisdom which suggested a spend-your-way-out-of-recession strategy.

    At least, that was the expectation when the Budget was presented to the National Assembly by President Muhammadu Buhari on December 14, 2016. By Nigeria’s modest standards, the outlay was supposedly large even if, for Africa’s largest economy, it came to a tiny fraction of comparatively ‘smaller’ economies like South Africa and Egypt. It contained all the essential good stuff; roads, railways modernization, power, education, health – with allocations which although barely enough to make a dent, offered at least some hope.

    We know what happened. If we expected that the very instrument which the administration advertised as offering the best chance to take the economy out of the doldrums would receive swift passage, nothing of the sort happened. For the expectant citizenry, it would take six months from presentation to get the budget signed into law.

    Meanwhile, the economy somehow, crawled on. Thanks to the rebound in oil prices, we somehow managed to exit the recession the second quarter. More importantly, we managed in spite of the budget! Proof? How about the release of a paltry N450 billion out of the N2.2 trillion capital spend for the year – six weeks to the end of what is supposedly the terminus of the current budget cycle!

    Let’s look at the other myth that has endured – the myth that a twenty-something billion dollars spend would carry a $1.09 trillion Gross Domestic Product (GDP) load? While the myth endures, the reality of course is that the economy is simply too big for the government to wrap its hands around. And if I may add – it is far too robust for government’s tokenistic policies to make any real difference difference!  A more reasonable imperative is to find a strategy that ensures that the government creatively gets out of the pretensions that it has the answers when in fact it is the major source of the problem.

    In other words, for those looking to the budget for the miracle, the matter seems as simple as saying that the thought of a miracle is nothing but an illusion – It won’t happen. For while it is increasingly obvious that a poorly conceived and abysmally implemented budget will never make a dent on the $3 trillion outlay required to make a difference on the infrastructure situation over the course of the next 30 years, it seems to me the best time ever, to remove the illusions about the current state of our national budget as being anything other than a hollow event.

    Let me emphasise this as I close. The budget remains important. The fact of the matter however is that we are not there yet. Not in substance. Not in process. Not in implementation. And certainly not in terms of the fulfilment of the most basic expectation to the ordinary citizen for the delivery of the public good. While that is the case, the myth endures somewhat that we will get there somehow. That is why the number of white elephants continues to grow, the rite of roll-over of ill-conceived projects and the misplaced expectations that attend the process at every budget cycle.

    Didn’t they say – as it was in the very beginning…

  • Still on myth of Aare Ona Kakanfo title

    SIR: Since the announcement of Otunba Gani Adams, the national coordinator of the Odua People’s Congress as the Aare Ona Kakanfo designate, newspapers and other social media have been awash with different opinions on the institution of the Aare Ona Kakanfo, the generalissimo of the old Oyo empire, especially the myth surrounding the early or violent death that has been the lots of many of the occupants of the office, both in the days of yore or in contemporary times.

    As a matter of fact, historians are not left out of the debate on the reality or mythical nature of the curse of the Aare Ona Kakanfo. Majority are of the opinion that the violent or early death of Aare Ona Kakanfo is a myth and cannot be substantiated. This is the position of the eminent historian, Professor Banji Akintoye, an expert on Yoruba history.

    However, research into Oyo history shows that the curse of Aare Ona Kakanfo is real. Of the 14 Aare Ona Kakanfo thus far, not much was recorded about the first three occupants of the office. However, the fourth, Langbin, from Jabata, was beaten to death in Oyo Ile during Alaafin Abiodun’s reign in 1870s. Oyaabi, who followed him and led the revolt against Basorun Gaa and eliminated him could not have been saved from the curse because his town of Ajase has remained a shadow of itself since. The history of Afonja, the fifth Are is well known. Toyeje who succeeded Afonja died peacefully but, Oyo Empire was subordinated to Ilorin in his time as Aare. More so, Edun of Gbogun, a town under Ikoyi, was sacked by Ilorin forces under Emir Abdulsalam and Edun himself slain around 1826/1827. The story of Kurunmi is equally well known and need not be repeated here. Aburunmaku of Ogbomoso, who many thought died peacefully nearly ended the reign of Soun dynasty in Ogbomoso in 1868 due to a civil unrest instigated by him. In the same vein the exploit of Aare Latoosa of Ibadan aside his deviant posture, which led to the prolongation of the Kiriji war and eventual stalemate, were well documented by I.B Akinyele, in Iwe Itan Ibadan. The old man emphasized that the office was not a good one and prayed that no one from Ibadan should occupy the office again. In the contemporary period, although the office has become an honorary one and no military function is attached to it, and the office has equally lost most of its spiritual and diabolical efficacy or power that made it a death sentence; yet, as can be noticed in the history of the two last occupants of the office, late S. L. Akintola and late M. K. O. Abiola, the curse is for real.

    Chief Adams, although, not of Oyo Yoruba stock and the first outside Oyo Yoruba to occupy the office, (Abiola from Abeokuta has Oyo Yoruba blood), is qualified going by his patriotic zeal for the Yoruba cause and the corporate existence of the nation at large. Alaafin Adeyemi III has made a good choice in Gani Adams despite his nativity. Adams is nonetheless advised to steer clear of trouble, either socio-economic or politically induced. Once he is installed, he becomes an owner of a glass house, who must not throw a stone. He is wished a good luck in his new endeavour.

     

    • Adewuyi Adegbite,

    ayekooto05@gmail.com

     

  • World Cup not a myth

    Nigeria’s quest for a credible outing at the Russia 2018 World Cup is now in the front burner. Suddenly, those who didn’t give the Super Eagles any chance of qualifying from the much touted ‘’Group of Death’’ – Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria and Zambia, all four countries former Africa Cup of Nations winners –  have invaded the media with all manner of analyses, which seem to be dictating to manager Gernot Rohr about the composition of the squad to the Mundial.

    Credit hasn’t been given to the players. Nor have the coaches got kudos for throwing negative predictions into the lagoon by remaining unbeaten in the group. The World Cup is eight months away, enough time to scout for younger players to compete with those whose positions appear to be our weak areas. Rohr built the squad to this point. He should be allowed to do his job. You don’t give a man a job with one hand and then turn around to dictate to him. Who carries the can when things go awry?

    This will be Nigeria’s sixth appearance at the Mundial, with nothing to show for it beyond what we achieved at our debut outing in USA 1994. We did so well that we were rated the fifth best soccer playing nation. If we had listened to Clemens Westerhof’s pleas to relocate the Eagles from their posh hotel where they were being distracted before the game which we lost 2-1 to Argentina, Nigeria would have been the first African country to play in the semi-finals of the World Cup. This isn’t a patriotic claim. After all, Nigeria whacked Bulgaria 3-0 in one of the group matches, yet the Bulgarians left US in 1994 as the third best team of the tournament.

    The discussions have hit a frenzy pitch, such that these analysts have started naming those to play and those who should be dropped, with the ripple effect being a likely bad blood among the players when they resume in camp on November 5 in Morocco. Nigeria has a meaningless final round game against Algeria on November 10. It is our best chance to begin our preparations for the Mundial. It is heartwarming to note that Rohr wants to field our best, knowing that friendly games cannot be decided now. Most countries that have qualified are waiting for the Russia 2018 World Cup draws slated for December 1. It is only when the draws are made that countries can plot their strategies, using teams in the groups to pick their pre-World Cup opponents.

    Russia will be full of upsets. My hunches tell me that Nigeria will be one of the fairytale countries, given what we are seeing in terms of our preparations. With a game left in the group,  Amaju Pinnick and his men have secured an international friendly game against Argentina in Russia on November 14. We are waiting for FIFA’s approval. But the biggest aspect of the game is that both countries have agreed terms and know the venue. FIFA picks the match officials, which is its prerogative.

    Argentina is a Grade A football nation. The Argentines have some of the biggest soccer stars in the world, such as Lionel Messi, Higuan, Aguero, Di Maria et al. Any game involving Nigeria and Argentina has some landmarks, which the players cherish. Very few countries are bigger than the Argentina, which makes the November 14 game, the biggest fillip for our preparations for the Mundial.

    The first advantage is that it offers both countries to have the privilege to play on one of the designated stadia for the Mundial. It gives the players an opportunity to play under the same climatic conditions as they would find when the World Cup holds next year. I’m glad the two countries are fielding their best players. I also hope that the re sults will help either team on FIFA’s ranking.

    The Argentines offer skeptics the best chance to access our goalkeepers, especially Ikechukwu Ezenwan. I hope Rohr will have the courage to test Ezenwa and another goalkeeper, irrespective of the result. There cannot be a stronger attacking onslaught than what the Argentines (Messi, Aguero, Higuan and Di Maria) have. In fact, the trio of Messi, Higuan and Aguero rank among the highest goal scorers in Spain, Italy and England. So, it is a battle of the fittest for our goalkeeper(s) and defenders. What a way to start preparations. Thumbs up NFF.

    Don’t wake me up from this dream that England wants a friendly game  against the Eagles as part of their preparatory plans. I’m not surprised because most of our big boys play in England. And we represent the best of Africa’s physical approach to the game, although we have the talents to play the attractive brand. Our ability to combine both styles of play is what would have informed England’s quest for a friendly. I hope it holds because if on December 1 we are grouped together, then no dice for this mouthwatering tie.

    FIFA World Cup draws are such that there must be one European team, one South American team, and two from any three continents in each group. So, you can see why the English (European block) want the Eagles. You can appreciate why the Argentines (South American block) have agreed for a game on November 14. Argentines have not forgotten what the Cameroonians did to them at the Italia’90 World Cup. Cameroon beat Argentina 1-0, courtesy of Francois Omam-Biyik’s goal. The Argentines had the revered Diego Amando Maradona playing in a country where he was a demi-god.

    The Black Stars have qualified for three FIFA World Cup tournaments; (2006, 2010, and 2014). In 2006, Ghana was the only African side to advance to the second round of the FIFA World Cup in Germany and was the sixth nation in a row from Africa to progress beyond the group stages of the World Cup. The Black Stars had the youngest team in the FIFA World Cup 2006 with an average age of 23 years and 352 days.

    In the 2010 World Cup, Ghana progressed beyond the group stages in South-Africa, and reached the quarter-finals where they were eliminated by Uruguay. Isn’t it true that Ghana, Cameroon and Nigeria are in the league of big football nations in Africa? It is our turn to make the biggest impact at the Mundial by qualifying for the semi-finals. It isn’t beyond us.

    Senegal didn’t need a pilgrimage of World Cup appearances to do well at the 2002 Japan/Korea World Cup. Senegal made its debut at the Mundial in 2002 and qualified for the quarter-finals, with average players – in terms of international exposure. Senegal’s coach then wasn’t one of the best European coaches but his tactics and the players’ resolve to make a name did the magic that shook the world in Japan and Korea.

    Come on Eagles, it is your turn to stun the world in Russia.

     

    FIFA Player of the Year Awards: if it held in Nigeria

     

    Monday’s FIFA Player of the Year Awards held in London was a great spectacle. The audience was defined. The players took the centre stage. They came with their spouses. The dress code was unmistaken. It lit up the red carpet. The media coverage was awesome. The questions bothered on the players. No question was controversial. The players responded well because their questions were friendly.

    As I watched the event run through its 90 minutes course, one foolish thought, yes foolish, ran through my mind. I wanted to know how the red carpet and the main ceremony would have looked like if the event had been held in Nigeria.

    This thought flashed through my mind the moment Cristiano Ronaldo, his expectant girlfriend Rodriquez and his son, Junior alighted from the car. No ceremonies. They were guided in by the ushers. No rowdiness. Ronaldo was the star actor but there wasn’t any trouble when he hit the red card.

    If Ronaldo was a Nigerian player, he would have arrived the place two hours after the event must have started. He would have blamed it all on the traffic and the organisers – for not creating a special route for him. If Ronaldo was a Nigerian, his arrival would have been chaotic. Urchins and roughnecks would have led the way. Security operatives would have had a hectic time pushing them back. There would have been a stampede, which would have grabbed the headlines.

    Guests would have been tear gassed. Bags, phones, jewellery would have been missing. There were no top government officials in flowing dresses in the hall. They were there but their entrance was quiet because the event wasn’t theirs. At the gates in London on Monday, the security operatives were civil.

    If it was in Nigeria, we would have lost count of gunshots. We would have seen the dignitaries coming in with the gun-totting security operatives who would have crowded the red carpet with the top government’s aides, not forgetting his wife and kids.

    The London event lasted 90 minutes. No long speeches. No long recognition of guests. No theatrics. Things went as scripted. No needless praises to sponsors, the Queen of England et al. No formal announcement about the late arrival of the guest of honour or any big shot in the society.  No apologies from a dignitary who couldn’t attend as he had to attend to urgent matters of state.

    Presentation of awards was by the icons of the game, not the heads of government, National Assembly members, ministers, governors, Obas, Obis, Igwes, Otunbas, Alhajis, Mallams, Imams, Etuboms, etc. No sweet talks. No gallivanting by FIFA members or their staff. The FIFA president only came on stage with the winners’ diadem.

    Sponsors of FIFA didn’t have to present any awards. Nor was there any need to ask the Queen, the Sports Minister, the Prime Minister or parliamentarians to do any presentation. Some of these people were in the hall, but they knew the ethics of such occasions. They didn’t need to throw their weight around to be recognised like our leaders do here. Lessons learned, I hope.

  • The myth of Fela Kuti

    Perhaps Nigeria will never again know a figure so singularly iconic as the marijuana chain-smoking, government-yabbing, harem-maintaining, revolutionary musical virtuoso Fela Anikulapo Kuti – he who made a portable accessory of Death. In addition to his infamous twenty-seven wives, he managed to marry aesthetics and politics in a typically uncanny fashion.

    In his eponymous essay on semiotic theory, if I might simplify it at the risk of misrepresentation, the French critic Roland Barthes defined ‘myth today’ as different from the ancient stories of gods and monsters, but still relevant to modern culture as the narrative structures on which society is underpinned.  Per Barthes, everything signifies something greater or hidden. Popular culture is annexed by the status quo (the ruling ideology) and reproduced to mean something quite different from the original; depoliticised and decontextualised.

    What then does Fela Kuti signify? To conjecture, I take it for granted that Fela means something slightly different to everyone who has ever been stirred by his raspy crooning and barking amongst the horns and drums of his acolytic band. And indeed, he was akin to a prophet seized by some divine force, prancing bare-chested around the stage; otherwise contemplative with that sage-like, perennially occupied stare in his bloodshot eyes from inhaling the hemp or grieving over the African condition. To me, Fela the prophet, the gadfly, the swashbuckling iconoclast; to others, perhaps an errant musician ignorant of his place, an obstruction, a hypocritical decadent. And to the modern Nigerian music industry, it would seem, a fashionable bourgeois symbol of (faux) consciousness – not unlike the posters that commonly decorate dormitory walls.

    One has to discover Fela. The first time I heard him – I daresay everyone who has heard him and had a meaningful experience of it will have repeated similar sentiments – I was street-walking and the resonant strains of ‘Water No Get Enemy’ caught hold of me through the rolled-down windows of a danfo bus. I’ll admit that I am being slightly untruthful. Of course, I had overheard his music before that. His songs always struck me as odd. They seemed overlong and overly reliant on the instruments. This was the first time I had really heard him, and I was arrested. Hitherto, I had only ever glimpsed the nuanced undertones of Nigerian Pidgin’s common-sense quality. It was a political and linguistic epiphany. I was introduced to a radical who possessed an unwavering sense of justice, and had a penchant for incisive satire. It was as if every action and speech-act was part of a sophisticated maintenance of image; every utterance a subversive political statement.

    A few months later, I came across Wizkid’s sampling of ‘Lady’ in his song, ‘Jaiye Jaiye’ (which incidentally featured Fela’s son, Femi, who has remained politically engaged). ‘Lady’ has the distinction of being one of Fela’s most misogynistic songs, mocking the ways of a ‘civilised’ woman i.e. a ‘lady’, as opposed to the better, more submissive African woman. Fela was a champion of women’s rights in his own way, and both songs are light-hearted and even catchy, but sexism remains inexcusable. Furthermore, it speaks of a fundamental misunderstanding of Fela’s message and ideological stance to choose that song from his oeuvre and then promote it as a reincarnation of his style (and frankly, ‘Lady’ has little to do with the subject matter of Wizkid’s song). It is a dilution, a watering-down. Fela was much more than the spectacle and the Afro-beat. The politics must not be obscured.

    This misrepresentation, if at a stretch, seems to sum up the general attitude: freeloaders are all in for the pomp and circumstance, but not the strife of revolutionary politics. I am generalising terribly, and possibly being didactic.  Nevertheless, examine a few other popular reworkings of Fela’s music (and his image) and the issue at hand will be evident. This manner of appropriation has happened with a host of populist icons from Bob Marley to Che Guevara (who is the poster boy for this sort of thing) to Thomas Sankara. Indeed, for the sake of directness, this article might be better titled ‘The Appropriation of Fela Kuti’.

    In 2013, after the release of that song, Wizkid tweeted that he was the ‘Young Fela’ in an ostensible (and ostentatious) bid to draw comparisons between himself and Kuti. The tweet resurfaced recently as Nigerians, no strangers to lip service, now wondered where the young Fela was amid the ongoing economic recession. In the background to this, Tuface Idibia, another popular musician, had planned a rally to call the government to action and later bathetically bailed out after acquiescing to a cautionary instruction by the police. Thus, there was no popular figure to spearhead the protests.

    The run of events was surreal, to minimise the description. Tuface appeared on television in suit and designer sunglasses flanked by wife, Annie, and spoke of how the onus was on him to lend his voice to the masses. There were the various galvanising messages and infographics. Then on Sunday, February 5, 2017, a day before the scheduled protests, Tuface opted out in a strange video posted to Instagram in which he appeared to be crying (sans sunglasses), fuelling speculation of coercion. He cited security worries, following ‘advice’ from the police. In his words: ‘it was not worth the life of any Nigerian’. The general response was sardonic and weary. I do not wish to impugn Tuface -the initiative is commendable, and the demonstrations held after all– but one could never imagine Fela, mauled and incarcerated so many times under military rule for dissidence, ‘falling the [collective] hands’ of Nigerians in such sublime manner.

    To compare oneself with myth, it seems, is folly. Granted, artists have no obligation to be political. But it is surely not untoward to hold them to the standards that they profess themselves to exemplify. If, as Marx suggests, ‘history repeats itself: first as tragedy, then as farce’, then the appropriation of Fela’s mythical mantle is the sad, inferior joke. Perhaps this should be considered a requiem.

  • Nigerians and ‘ember’ months’ myth

    Recently, sorrow, tears and blood reigned supreme at the Lagos-Ibadan expressway as three lives were lost in a road carnage that led to the destruction of some articulated vehicles and a few cars. The sad incident would complicate the agonizing Lagos-Ibadan expressway traffic jam as movement along the road was at a standstill. Folks who live along the axis had to make alternative sleeping arrangement as going back home was definitely out of the equation. No thanks to the excruciating traffic jam occasioned by the horrifying road accident.

    As usual, many have attempted to explain the dreadful Lagos-Ibadan expressway disaster and similar others across the country in the characteristic ‘ember’ months’ tragic jargon.  In our country, the so called ‘ember’ months, which refer to the last four months of the year from September to December, are naturally regarded as tragedy prone period. This belief is so entrenched in the consciousness of the people that various religious groups and other relevant institutions regularly organize special prayer sessions and seminars with a view to minimizing ember months’ havoc.

    The reality, however, is that the so called ‘embers’ months are not really spiritually jinxed as many might want to swear they are. Tragedy occurs in ‘ember’ months just as it does in every other month of the year. Ascribing needless spiritual and mythical undertones to tragic happenings during the ‘ember’ months could just be the usual Nigerian way of trivializing issues. Rather than clothing the ‘ember’ months in a garb of gratuitous mystery, the pragmatic way of explaining dreadful events during these months is more human than mythological.

    The truth is that there is usually an increase in the tempo of public, private and corporate activities during this period.  Religious bodies are equally not left out of the frenzy of the season as they organize various events during the period. The ‘ember’ months are always the busiest on our roads for obvious reasons and the tumultuous air of festivity do not really help matter. It is a period when people are in so much haste to make all the money they have not made since the beginning of the year. Hence, commercial drivers, who usually embark on five trips per day, capitalize on the aura of festivity to go for 10 trips. This, naturally, comes with its fatal consequences. It is only logical that when there is a mass exodus of people from one place to the other, there is bound to be a measure of uncertainty and disorder.

    The bottom line, therefore, is that tragic occurrences are bound to happen during the ‘ember’ season because of the intensity of human activities. In a bid to be part of the various end-of-year activities slated for the period, a lot of people throw caution into the wind by disregarding critical safety issues. Vehicles are driven irresponsibly. Alcoholic drinks are consumed with reckless abandon while social outings are organized as if tomorrow will not come. The atmosphere, during the season, is often filled with unusual allure and jollity. It is in the midst of this hilarity that avoidable human blunders that result into diverse kinds of misfortunes usually occur.

    Hence, it is imperative for everyone to, first and foremost, have a changed perception of the ‘ember’ months. Hence, conscious efforts must be made to disrobe the months of every garb of unfounded mysticism. It is only when we are convinced that the dangers associated with the months are human rather than mythical that we could really make considerable progress in averting disasters during the months.

    Therefore, enforcement of existing laws and attitudinal change is central to making any progress. Sadly, law enforcement agents are also involved in the mad ‘ember’ months’ rat- race. In a bid to make some ‘extra’ buck to furnish special festive ‘necessities’ , they usually engage in treacherous compromise that encourages law breakers to go unpunished. The result, of course, is the continuation of avoidable circle of pandemonium and sorrow.

    Consequently, as we march towards the end of the year, we must modify our views on the ‘ember’ months. We must not get involved in any pointless extra-ordinary end of the year ‘rush’ that could endanger our lives and indeed those of others. Those who have to organize social events to correspond with this period should do so bearing all safety precautions in mind. Commercial drivers and other road users must respect the sanctity of the human life by observing required road safety measures.

    Perhaps, more importantly, relevant government agencies must step up enlightenment campaigns as well as enforcement strategies to guarantee that ‘ember’ months’ crashes and other related tragedies are reduced to the barest minimum. In this respect, the Federal Road Safety Corps, FRSC, and the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority, LASTMA, should be commended for their various ‘ember’ month’s safety strategies, in Lagos and adjoining states. However, there is a need for them to intensify efforts in this direction while more appropriate government agencies should also come on board the ‘ember’ months’ re-orientation and re-awareness project. Presently, the Lagos State Ministry of Information and Strategy is embarking on an ‘ember’ months’ responsiveness campaign across the state. The objective is to change the attitude of the people towards these months and offer key safety tips.

    As it has been previously affirmed, it is critical to re- affirm that tragic happenings during ‘ember’ months are promoted by reckless human actions. It is only in living modestly and responsibly that we could avoid the dangers and hiccups that are generally associated with ember months. If only we could rid ourselves of our usual ‘ember months’ excesses, we would discover that nothing is actually wrong with the months.

    Ogunbiyi is of the Features Unit, Ministry of Information and Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja.

  • Hernia: A myth, disease or health issue?

    Hernia: A myth, disease or health issue?

    Hernia has for long been a dreaded health issue prevalent mostly among men from their late adolescence to old age. It is common among people engaged in physically-laborious occupation. This health issue is common among people engaged in  building industries, mechanical and structural engineering jobs where lifting of heavy items is involved, traditional medicine practitioners who also produce their products physically, weight lifting athletes, traditional farmers and reckless style of living – multiple sex partners –  and activities.

    Hernia is one of the most controversial health issues within our traditional medicine groups. We have for a long time been fed with wrong perception due to lack of the internet in those days.

    Some of us in the field are still cherishing this notion and this article will for once open their eyes to facts about hernia as a health issue to be left to conventional medicine. It is an opener and testimony of my person who had been actively involved in witnessing and also treating it for over a period of 15 years before finally surrendering to conventional medicine.

    I attach a picture of one of my clients who suffered Hernia for 12 years believing that traditional medicine can treat it. He survived surgical operation and lived to tell his story, without having any bitterness or loss of faith in traditional medicine. Thanks for helping to bring this awareness to our traditional medicine practitioners as well as the general public who may seek help in traditional medicine because of the high cost of surgery or fear  or misleading medical advice from my people.

    In Western countries, where majority depend on conventional (orthodox) medical therapy, and with exposure to all the information resources of the internet, Hernia has seized to be a myth , but a health issue or body accident, that conventional medicine can repair. Few years back, before the benefits of technology, the Internet was relatively within the reach of many Nigerians or West Africans since it was a luxury before the year 2000, only available to the rich literate few, hernia, to most people, was another type of disease that required medicine either traditional or synthetic drugs to treat or cure.

    This opinion is factual as I am writing from the point of view of a Naturopathic as well as traditional medicine practitioner, a renounced herbalist, who had encountered many clients and sufferers who had approached me for advice on how to deal with their hernia problems. To most of us traditional medicine practitioners in the last 20 years, hernia was being considered a health issue that traditional medicine therapy can cure and that belief is still prevalent among many of our practitioners today.This is because of the erroneous belief in the efficacy of traditional medicine as panacea for all health issues and our fervent antipathy for surgical operation as the scorn of conventional medicine since to us they are ‘licensed butchers’. We never believed that traditional medicine also had its own limitations. Even though I was already a graduate from United Kingdom before I joined traditional medicine group and later moved to becoming their national secretary general, I was led into believing that we could handle any health issue with the ‘magic’ of traditional and herbal medicine; unfortunately most of the practitioners at that time were still under the cloud and hence the importance of this eye opener article on the hernia, a myth or a health issue explained it is beyond herbal treatment.

    What then is hernia? We have come across many of our predecessors who firmly believed that any traditional medicine can be used to cure any genital-related health diseases such as testicular cancer and other neoplasms swelling of a testicle, caused by hydrocele testis. Inflammation of the epididymis, called epididymitis, can also take care of hernia. And in all honesty, I was inclined to share their strong belief and hence submitted to trying for the next 15  years to prove them right. But hernia is not related to any sexually  transmitted diseases which can be  cured with traditional medicine. If only we have all come to this awareness many years back, many lives would have been saved. I still recalled the case of a close associate who was diagnosed with hernia in 1999, when he noticed a swelling around the region below his navel, the groin. He was advised to come for surgical operation to repair it, but he was discouraged by our predecessors who guaranteed his cure with herbal medicine. He believed and including me too. For the next 10 years he was drinking so many traditional medicines; some so toxic as they are made with burnt lime peels mixed with caustic soda in alcohol with the belief that it would burn away the tear. My friend was also given another medicine soaked in cow bile, of course very bitter but it never solved it but rather it made his matter worse as the second side of his loin got torn and he ended up with double hernia with the scrotum enlarging by the year to accommodate the intestine that escaped into the region of the scrotum thereby pushing the testicles downwards. Hence he had to be lying on his back to reduce the pain and the annoying noise emanating from the region of the stomach which we call “Ikunsinu” or loud rumbling stomach as the movement of the intestine (Peristalsis) were becoming so audible to his embarrassment sometimes in public.

     

    What then is hernia?

    A  hernia occurs when the contents of a body cavity bulge out of the area where they are normally contained. These contents, usually portions of intestine or abdominal fatty tissue, are enclosed in the thin membrane that naturally lines the inside of the cavity. Although the term hernia can be used for bulges in other areas, it most often is used to describe hernias of the lower torso (abdominal wall hernias).

    Hernias by themselves may be asymptomatic, that is when there is no symptom indicated, but nearly all have a potential risk of having their blood supply cut off (becoming strangulated). If the hernia sac contents have their blood supply cut off at the hernia opening in the abdominal wall, it becomes a medical and surgical emergency.

     

    Different types of abdominal wall hernias include the following:

    Inguinal (groin) hernia: Making up most of all abdominal wall hernias and occurring up to 25 times more often in men than women, these hernias are divided into two different types, direct and indirect. Both occur in the groin area above where the skin crease at the top of the thigh joins the torso (the inguinal crease), but they have slightly different origins. Both of these types of hernias can similarly appear as a bulge in the inguinal area. Distinguishing between the direct and indirect hernia, however, is important as a clinical diagnosis.

    Indirect inguinal hernia: An indirect hernia follows the pathway that the testicles made during prebirth development. It descends from the abdomen into the scrotum. This pathway normally closes before birth but may remain a possible place for a hernia. Sometimes the hernia sac may protrude into the scrotum. An indirect inguinal hernia may occur at any age. This type of hernia is what we call ‘ipake’ and I will like to say I have seen this cured in babies and young children with herbal concoctions.

    Direct inguinal hernia: The direct inguinal hernia occurs slightly to the inside of the site of the indirect hernia, in a place where the abdominal wall is naturally slightly thinner. It rarely protrudes into the scrotum. Unlike the indirect hernia, which can occur at any age, the direct hernia tends to occur in the middle-aged and elderly because their abdominal walls weaken as they age. This type is very common among the cases we erroneously believed that traditional medicine can treat; hence resulting in preventable deaths of many sufferers due to ignorance and misconceived idea passed on from generation to generation.

    Traditional or herbal medicines cannot cure direct inguinal hernia because it is not a disease; it is a tear within the membranes of the body which can be repaired not with herbs but surgical operation. It is beyond the application of herbal medicine; hence one of our limitations.

    Femoral hernia: The femoral canal is the path through which the femoral artery, vein, and nerve leave the abdominal cavity to enter the thigh. Although normally a tight space, sometimes becomes large enough to allow abdominal contents (usually intestine) into the canal. A femoral hernia causes a bulge just below the inguinal crease in roughly the mid-thigh area. Usually occurring in women, femoral hernias are particularly at risk of becoming irreducible (not able to be pushed back into place) and strangulated.

     

    Umbilical hernia: These common hernias, not very common, are often noted at birth as a protrusion at the bellybutton (the umbilicus). This is caused when an opening in the abdominal wall, which normally closes before birth, doesn’t close completely. If small (less than half an inch) this type of hernia usually closes gradually by age two. Larger hernias and those that do not close by themselves usually require surgery at age two to four.  Even if the area is closed at birth, umbilical hernias can appear later in life because this spot may remain a weaker place in the abdominal wall. Umbilical hernias can appear later in life or in women who are having or have had children. This is another type of what we commonly refer to as “Ipake” and we have seen them treated with herbal concoctions so I believed, but I stand to be corrected.

     

    Obturator hernia: This extremely rare abdominal hernia develops mostly in women. This hernia protrudes from the pelvic cavity through an opening in the pelvic bone (obturator foramen). This will not show any bulge but can act like bowel obstruction and cause nausea and vomiting.

    Hernia causes

    Although abdominal hernias can be present at birth, others develop later in life. Some involve pathways formed during fetal development, existing openings in the abdominal cavity, or areas of abdominal wall weakness. Any condition that increases the pressure of the abdominal cavity may contribute to the formation or worsening of a hernia. Examples include:

    1. Obesity – The people suffering from inguinal hernia are often getting constipation with heavy foods such as yam, cassava flour (eba) as the heavy food contents descend straight into the scrotum region causing so much pain from further tear of the thin membrane. It could lead to the strangulation of the intestine.
    2. Heavy lifting: People suffering from hernia are more at risk of worsening the damaged thin membrane separating the abdomen from the groin due to excess pressure released from lifting anything above 50 Ibs.

    Coughing : Lump increases in size when standing or when abdominal pressure is increased (such as coughing)

    Straining during a bowel movement or urination

     

    Chronic lung disease

    Fluid in the abdominal cavity – This rumbling noise is from where we named this type of hernia as ‘Ikunsinu” meaning noisy stomach, very audible to next person sitting beside anyone with direct inguinal hernia.

    A family history of hernias can make you more likely to develop a hernia.

     

    Hernia Symptoms

    The signs and symptoms of a hernia can range from noticing a painless lump to the painful, tender, swollen protrusion of tissue that you are unable to push back into the abdomen—an incarcerated strangulated hernia. When you push it back, it comes out again and it is by lying on your back before you can get relief from pain as the intestine moves back again into the stomach.

    The common symptom associated with Reducible hernia is: New lump in the groin or other abdominal wall area as in the picture above. The lump may ache but is not tender when touched. Sometimes pain precedes the discovery of the lump. Lump increases in size when standing or when abdominal pressure is increased (such as coughing) May be reduced (pushed back into the abdomen) unless very large.

    In addition to this, people suffering from advanced hernia have complained of erectile dysfunction; lack of erection when about to penetrate, though they may feel the erection during fore-play as extra pressure is put on the wall of the groin which at this stage is already torn.

    We hope all practitioners of traditional and herbal as well as Alternative medicine will not rely on the assumptions and claims handed over to us by our renowned predecessors but keep an open mind and readiness to investigate and conduct their own research now that the internet is readily accessible to everyone willing to learn and gain more knowledge.

  • Myth of northern domination

    SIR: Ever since President Muhammadu Buhari was inaugurated as president, some indecorous critics have taken it upon themselves to be fighting imaginary wars, making a mountain out of a molehill. There’s hardly a day that would pass by that friends won’t at every turn ask me: “where’s our change”?

    On every appointment, a very close friend of mine would send the names of the appointees on my facebook wall to notify and remind me that no South-east person has been appointed by the president.

    To many of my southern friends, the appointments so far is an indication that President Buhari is pursuing a northen agenda so that a particular region would continue to dominate Nigeria.

    I don’t want to comment on the few appointments made so far, considering the fact that the president has over a thousand appointments to make in no distant time but interesting facts abound about this northern domination which I have seen but don’t know if others have seen it or pretended not to notice.

    I noticed there is a BBC Hausa station but no BBC Yoruba or Igbo. Was this caused by Buhari to continue northern domination? What about Africa Magic Hausa? It’s even on GOTV but Africa Magic Igbo is not on GOTV, just DSTV and on a higher bouquet plan. So Africa Magic Igbo is not given equal opportunities with Africa Magic Hausa. Who’s to be blamed? Buhari!

    Boko Haram has been attacking only the north and they have not come to the south. Another evidence of the north wanting to have everything under Buhari. Lets blame Buhari.

    Again, Shekau has been silent but when he speaks in his videos, what language does he speak? Hausa without Igbo or Yoruba translations. Hausa domination of other languages, is that not so?

    What of the recent arrest and detention of some former northern governors by EFCC and the 12 hours siege at the Abuja residence of the immediate past National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) last week Thursday, by men of the Department of State Security Service (DSS). Was those acts part of the northern domination of Nigeria?

    Now that relevant authorities are going after politicians of northern extraction, who were fingered in corruption cases, some malicious partisan whistle blowers really seem to be comfortable with it but when same authorities will begin their manhunt of corrupt politicians from their regions, they will still cry out that President Buhari is on a vindictive mission.

    It is only those who are yet to recover from agony of defeat and some ethnic bigots that would insist President Buhari is pursuing a northern agenda through his appointments. The President in his inaugural speech assured Nigerians he would be president of Nigeria and not president of a particular region and so far his few appointments has been purely on merit and competence. This is a clear depature from what was obtained in the past and even the blind could see that President Buhari is keeping to his inaugural promise of belonging to nobody but everybody.

    The truth is, common sense is not really common here in our polity. Or how can one explain the resort to checking where Buhari’s appointees are from not their abilities? With the monstrous problems facing us, we are really carrying elephants on our heads and scratching the grounds for crickets with our feets. May God save us from us!

    • Joe Onwukeme,

    *Enugu.

  • Adekunle… The man, the myth, the reality

    Adekunle… The man, the myth, the reality

    His compatriots had many things to say about him when he was alive. Some put such thoughts in writing.  Those who did not put their views in writing also found other ways to express them. Gen. Benjamin Adekunle came out in these thoughts as a man misunderstood and neglected, writes Olayinka Oyegbile, Deputy Editor (Sunday)

    Gen. Benjamin Maja Adekunle, who died on September 14, was different thing to different people. Since his death, the social and traditional media have been awash with tributes and condemnations of what he stood for.

    These were not unexpected. He was a controversial man and was like the carcass of a dead elephant amidst a crowd of the blind. The blind who held its trunk called it the leg of a big mammal while the one that held the leg called it another thing. Each of the perceptions of the fallen elephant to each was informed by at what end he stood. So was Gen. Adekunle, both in life and in death.

    Some have labelled him a “murderer”. To others, he was a “saviour”. One would not have expected anything less of such a man. He lived and died in a blaze of controversy.  He was a man who was mostly misunderstood and his place in history still remains neglected and ignored.

    The late war hero was a typical Ogbomoso man. He was more known outside his hometown. This was because he lived almost all his life outside his ancestral home. He was born in Kaduna and his mother hailed from Bachama, Adamawa State. He joined the army in search of life fulfillment. Did he find that fulfillment? It is actually difficult to say because he left the war front where his command, the 3 Marine Commando, was a very crucial sector in the prosecution of the Civil War! He was recalled to the Army headquarters in a controversial circumstance, which perhaps left him devastated because he was not allowed to savour the victory of his command. This glory was left for the then Col. Olusegun Obasanjo, who later became not only a General but a two-term President. Gen Adekunle’s misfortune (or something akin to that) could be said to be Gen. Obasanjo’s fortune.

    Perhaps because of the manner in which he left the war front he was never the same again until last week when he died. He became a recluse; he withdrew from all public and social activities and never allowed himself to be drawn into any political comments on the country.

    In Ogbomoso, where he hailed from he was the Asipa of the town, a traditional title that well-suited his life. Asipa is the War Leader. As a man, who played a prominent role in the country’s civil war, this was not unexpected. However, not many people in the town, especially among the young ones ever knew him. He was installed as Asipa by the monarch of the town, Oba Olayode, who was later rebelled against by the citizens and murdered. His murder devastated the late General and he never perhaps forgave the people for this act, leading to his long absence from the town of his birth.

    The late General was perhaps too great a man to be linked with one town. He was a Nigerian first and foremost. During the Second Republic, when most of the people of his part of the country belonged to the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), he rather tried to organise students for the defunct Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP) led by the late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. This, according to Mr. Dapo Atanda, who was then a student leader at the University of Lagos, showed the kind of world view he held. Atanda, who is now a lawyer based in Ogbomoso, said: “He called me then and said I should mobilise students to form a student wing of the NPP. We tried to do this but he was such a busy man and anytime we go to him, it is either we never saw him or he was too busy.” That haws how the idea flopped.

    On the kind of a man he was, Atanda said: “He was clearly a misunderstood man, he was different things to different people. But one thing that can never be taken away from him is that he loved Nigeria, he fought to keep it one.”

    Another prominent Ogbomoso man, Gen. Oladayo Popoola, a former Governor of Oyo and Ogun states, said the role Gen. Adekunle played in uniting the country cannot be diminished. According to him, “Gen. Adekunle was a hero of the civil war. His contributions made the war to end in time. It was because his Command opened the axis towards the coast that the war ended at the time it did. He coordinated the Armed Forces very well.”

    Asked how to situate his assessment of the late war hero’s role and people’s criticism of his style during the war, Gen. Popoola retorted: “Nobody is perfect. There is no way some people will not be against a war General. He did his best for his country.” When such criticism was directed at him during the late Gen Adekunle lifetime, he has simply said he had a war to win!

    The late war hero was as such a man that aroused different emotions from diverse people. Not two peoples would perhaps agree with each other on his life. That was his life. To some, according to Bernard Odogwu, who was Director of Biafra’s Directorate of Military Intelligence in his book  No Place to Hide -Crises and Conflict Inside Biafra,  the late General at his appointment was “dismissed just as “the officer who spent all his time as Dr. Akanu Ibiam’s Ade-de-Camp and had lost touch with the military.” He concluded: “And yet when the time came, Adekunle had so terrorised them to the extent that only very few had the courage to oppose him in combat.”

    Celebrated British author Frederick Forsyth, in his book, The Making of an African Legend: The Biafran Story, called him “Colonel ‘Shoot anything that moves.’ He was really the Black Scorpion, thorn in the flesh of rebels.

    A saviour and liberator

    Whereas many Igbo view him as a ruthless and wicked soldier, to some others in the Southsouth, he was a saviour and a liberator of their people from the pains of war.

    One of those who would forever be grateful to the late General was the late Ken Sawo-Wiwa, who in his war memoir, On a Darkling Plain, almost devoted a chapter to the heroic exploits of Gen. Adekunle. It bears quoting him copiously. The late environmentalist said: “It seems appropriate here to say a few words about the brilliant officer (Adekunle) who scored such tremendous success in the civil war. Born in 1938 (actually 1936) to a Yoruba father and a Bachama mother (a minority ethnic group), he trained at Sandhurst and came to prominence when he was entrusted with the command of the troops sent to Bonny. The rebel entry into the Mid-West meant that he was diverted for a time from Bonny and the Southeast of the country to the South-west.

    “I met him for the first time in November 1967, after my appointment as Administrator, when I was introduced to him by Chief Harold Biriye, to whose sister he was married. Slight of frame, of medium height and by no means handsome, his exploits at Bonny and the Mid-West had already made him famous. I must confess that I had expected a different type of officer.

    “At that first meeting, he was gentle, solicitous and cheerful, although he appeared fairly worn out, having just returned from a meeting. It is possible that being introduced by a famous and older brother-in-law, to whom he was just “Benjy”, made a lot of difference. But in my interaction with him over the next year or two, I found him approachable, generous and open, with a great sense of humour. It is true that when he had to deal with his subordinates in the force, he was firm and seemed to terrorise them. But, I thought and still think that I detected there a posturing, a mask which he wore because he so perfectly understand the mentality of the Nigerian. For it must be remembered that he was not the Commander of a highly trained disciplined corps. The bulk of his men were illiterate, inexperienced and raw. Most of them had never heard the sound of gunfire. Some believed that charms could save them from bullets. Again apart from the very top echelon, he could not attest to the quality of training of his officers. In short, it was an unusual corps, in an unusual war. In such a situation, the African mentality fears the masquerade. The man in the masquerade is vulnerable, but the masquerade is beyond reach, a myth. Adekunle tried to be that myth. And it worked.”

    During the civil war, so many myths were woven around his personality. Most of this had to do with his ancestry. It was believed and widely circulated that his Bachama mother had “soaked him” in her people’s juju and coupled with his Yoruba origin, he had been “soaked” and well “cooked”. All these perhaps made him more mystical and were a folk hero and war leader who reportedly died several times from rebel bullets. In fact, there was a common one that when he was shot and killed, the rebels cut him into pieces and poured the flesh one in River Niger and the other in River Benue. According to the myth, when his mother heard, she made “consultations” and his charred flesh were swept down the two rivers and when they met at the confluence of the River in Lokoja, they merged again and he walked back to the war front to the admiration of his troops. So much for a man of controversy and the myth narrated here by Saro-Wiwa.

    The late Saro-Wiwa continued: “He drove himself and his men hard. He built a creditable organisation from nothing and the pressures on him as Commander were many, not least the way the men at the rear were often blissfully unaware of the tremendous pressure of the battle front…

    “As I have pointed out, he was not lacking in compassion. He took great care of Ibo lives and property, ensuring that “refugees” were well treated and cared for, he decreed harsh punishments for looters. I may be wrong, but I would certainly vote him one of the most Nigerian top military bras that I have met.

    “If his career suffered a setback towards the end of the war, it was possibly because he did not know how to handle his great success, his stardom. But this is not unusual. Publicity, which he courted, is normally a double-edged sword. It can be easily turned against those for whom it roots. What Adekunle needed, above all else, was a public relations man.”

    However, under his watch and command, the fall of Owerri by the federal troops led to the change of guards and Col. Adekunle, along with Cols Haruna and Shuwa of first and second divisions, were all replaced. According to Saro-Wiwa: “The loss of his Command was very painful to Colonel Adekunle. The send-off party given him by his officers was a very emotional affair- on the part of the “Black Scorpion”. He wept openly. He had built the Division from the scratch, had won significant military successes, had become a national hero and had obtained international attention. The reality that he was about to give up all, or most of that, did not sit down well with him. He had had power which he enjoyed exercising and would definitely flow therefrom. That was not to be. There is an Ogoni proverb which says “He who roasts the yam does not eat it.” Colonel Adekunle had roasted the yam, I should say he ate some of it, the honour of eating all of it fell on Colonel Obasanjo.”

    What an apt observation. The then Col. Obasanjo who replaced the then Col. Adekunle as commander of the division who now had the honour of receiving the instruments of surrender from the rebel forces was later to write a war memoir, My Command, which was published in a hail of controversy. In that book he had this to say about his predecessor, “Col Adekunle, at this juncture, saw the war not only in terms of crushing a rebellion, but also as a means of building himself up for any political position or responsibility which he might seek. I knew people of Western State origin who had felt politically victimised and who saw Col Adekunle a saviour and told him so, and he believed them.”

    Today, it is clear who saw in the war and got from it “a means of building himself up for any political position or responsibility.”

    Great men are always controversial even in death. This is the lot of Gen.l Benjamin Maja Adekunle, a real war hero.