The Nation Newspaper

Tag: ordinary

  • Being ordinary

    The western countries that we all run to now were built by ordinary people such as clerks who fought for the rules and regulations or put their backs to it and brought out the inventions they needed

    There is a question I keep asking myself, dear reader. Which came first: life or literature? When you honestly try to imagine some of life’s occurrences on stage, they sound so implausible that you are likely to have people going, ‘Ah, ah! How can that happen?’ Yet, you and I accept it as fact when people say that literature mirrors life. So, what can they mean when they say that some things sound stranger than fiction? Can you resolve that little corner of confusion for me because I’m thinking things are not as straightforward as they seem?

    I think I know fiction when I see one. Once upon a time (usually that’s how fiction starts), going to the moon for holidays was thought to be fiction. Now, there is a company that is dedicated to taking its first set of holidaying tourists to that silent place as early as in ten years’ time at a ‘sky rocketing’ price of course. I also think that the Superman, Batman, Spiderman, Green Lantern Man stories and their ilk are all products of fiction. Yet, I am told that these cape-wearing heroes are not just there for their pretty faces. They are replications of what exist in you and me. Yes, we can be heroes in our small worlds, see through walls, kick bald headed villains, survive every kind of kryptonite thrown at us, and even fly like kites in those ridiculous tights. Ask the athletes if you don’t believe me. So yes, in fiction, you and I live ordinary lives; but in actual fact, we are superheroes from small towns living in big cities.

    It’s the news however that present us the worst kind of fiction. For instance, I read in the news that a set of parents actually sold their young child for the sum of N400, 000. A lot of things went through my mind as I read that news report. Were they so ravaged by hunger that they had to dispose of their easily moveable commodity – their child? Or, were they so ignorant that they did not truly know the value of N400, 000 as a sum that soon vanishes compared to the eternal values of a child? Or did they hate the child so much? Worse, has the economic situation descended into samarianism? Fact is stranger than fiction I tell you because in a piece of literature (The Mayor of Caster bridge to be exact) the same act only drew a few guffaws.

    On the contrary, here is the federal government buying back some of the Chibok girls and I say ‘Hooray!’ to them. However, as 82 of these girls gained their freedom during the week, I heard faint whispers of complaint from some people who felt that we probably gave too much in exchange. The reason was that some boko haram terrorists had to be freed for the girls. Well, all I can say to the naysayers is that they obviously do not have any child among the lot stolen by boko haram. Believe me, if they had, they would not have cared if they had to give half of Nigeria for their own child to come home.

    By ‘being ordinary’, I mean that one should not only have an appropriate perspective to life, but that one should gain an ability to do things as they should be done. Work should be done as appropriate. Some would say that salaries should also be paid as appropriate. True, but that’s a topic for another day. Anyway, in the process of doing one’s work as one should, I assure you, extraordinary things happen. Lives are touched, lives are saved, lives are built, the cosmos also moves in strange ways to benefit one down the line of time. Take the story I heard the other day.

    I heard that a man working as a paramedical met a young man whom he had helped to deliver as a premature baby twenty-seven years earlier. What joy he had to see that the baby had grown up to be a man in his twenties. The paramedical man was doing his ordinary work for so many years. And an extraordinary thing happened. That man was not more interested in how much he could stow away from the funds given to him to run his ambulance. He was interested in whom he could save.

    Nigerians are no good in that kind of ordinariness. Yet, most of us want to be noticed, thinking that it is cheap business. We forget that even Superman had to practice the art of flying through the air, as did Michael Bolt. You know him, don’t you? He’s the one who runs faster than superman. I think though it is because he is willing to put himself out to his ordinary business of running and in the process became an extraordinary runner.

    Rather, most Nigerians think that achievement is a matter of pilfering a few millions, billions or trillions to purchase a life of unmerited comfort. I don’t think anyone has quite told them that it takes a lifetime of hard work at ordinary tasks to achieve a lifetime award of extraordinariness.

    Take for instance the news that a former president’s wife has taken the country to court asking that the money seized from her be released to her even though she has not finished answering the questions the EFCC put to her. More importantly, she has not even answered any of my own questions such as what trade did she engage in to accumulate that sum of money? Can I also join in that trade? But, she is not alone, because there are others who, not believing in being ordinary, have helped themselves to the country’s funds and are now screaming blue murder in the court. Worse, the courts are listening to them. T’phia!

    Luckily for us, ordinary people doing ordinary things abound. I heard the story of a woman who could not pay for a toy her little son really wanted in a supermarket. A rich gentleman stepped up and paid for it to the boy and his mother’s delight. Years passed and the man was taken to the hospital ill, having lost his fortune. A young doctor decided to take the responsibility of his treatment on himself. Yes, the young doctor was the little boy who wanted that toy, and the old man was the rich gentleman who paid for it. Extraordinary, no?

    In the race to lay our hands on the nation’s money, most of us have forgotten what it means to just be ordinary and do what we are paid to do. In ordinary lives, we can do extraordinary things if we have a mind to. Ordinary people do the work assigned to them and live decently on their emoluments, even though the Nigeria Labour Congress have asked for higher wages for its workers, which I support conditionally but that’s a topic for another day.

    As Nigerians, we must learn again to be ordinary citizens. It is only by persistently doing the ordinary that we achieve heroic acts, make scientific breakthroughs, build the law and bring up the downtrodden. In touching other lives, extraordinary things happen. The western countries that we all run to now were built by ordinary clerks who fought for the rules and regulations or put their backs to it and brought out the inventions they needed.

    Too many Nigerians believe in taking short cuts, thinking they are making ends meet. This is why in Nigeria, parents sell children, children sell parents, people are locked in struggles for positions instead of working together, and fiction is queuing up behind life to reinvent the stage. We must use our ordinary lives to build the nation again.

  • Reporters need to go beyond the ordinary – Lanre Idowu

    Reporters need to go beyond the ordinary – Lanre Idowu

    Following a successful 24th edition of the DAME awards for the media recently, Lanre Idowu, CEO, Diamond publications and trustee of the awards, x-rays the events of the night, challenges of running the awards over the years and more. He spoke with Gboyega Alaka.

    Dame literally shot down about two categories of awards this year; what were these categories and were the entries so bad?

    I believe you are talking about the Investigative Reporter of the Year Award category, and the Political Reporting category. When we talk about investigative reporting, it is supposed to be like the most challenging in the print category. Incidentally, the number of entries for the investigative reporting category was actually second only to Informed Commentaries. The committee that looked into that category, shortlisted five entries; then another committee, which is like a peer review committee looked through those five and picked three. And when it came for general discussions, we found out that there were still some gaps, and those gaps were serious enough that we did not feel in all honesty that we should give out any award in that category. The same goes with Political Reporting. We felt that they didn’t break new grounds. They weren’t telling us anything new or special. Reporters were telling us very much what everybody already knew and it was more about putting it in elevated language. And then there were just too much of editorialising. They were just telling us their own views. Yes we need some analysing in reporting, but at the same time, it was all common-place information.

    Could it be that the reporters got lazy or that they were biased and simply pitched their camp with their favourite?

    I think it’s a combination of all these. The reporters failed to interrogate the status quo, so to speak. Essentially, when you talk about investigation, there are two critical areas: the hows and the whys. The more answers you get to your ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions, the more you’re able to enrich your work and make it more insightful. But of course this is not the first time we’re shooting down certain award categories; and the idea is that we are not compelled to give an award for the sake of giving an award. We want to be sure that anyone that we say is a winner in that category is truly deserving of that title.

    But the Wole Soyinka Award for Investigative Journalism took place a few days after the DAME and produced winners, would that be because they were trapped?

    I cannot speak for them. Besides, I don’t know the entries that they received. I have sat on the panel before and I know that they’re very thorough. Maybe if I see the winning work, then I might be able to understand why it won.

    Investigative reporting might seem like the most difficult to handle for journalists; why is this so and what tips would you offer aspiring winners?

    Without doubt it is the most challenging. We do something annually, which we call ‘Widening the Pools of Excellence Workshop’; we’ve done it for two years and interestingly, two of the major supporters of the workshop are The Nation and The Punch. What we do there is to actually take people on what we see as deficiencies in the previous year’s exercise. We’re going to do that by the grace of God in the New Year. We look out for the active players and we organise a retraining workshop, where first of all, we remind them of the fundamentals of reporting and then break them into groups and take them into further nitty-gritty that we saw were lacking in the previous entries. You will also recall that I said that the Insurance Reporting prize was not given for many years, because we just could not find a winner. But the winner this year has won it about four years back; even in those years that we didn’t award it, she was always sending in entries. But she attended that retraining workshop and I’m sure part of what she learnt at that training helped her to get back to winning ways. The whole idea is to help our craft get better, to help journalists put up their best and ensure that those roles they need to be playing are not overlooked.

    Could the dearth of quality investigative reporting also be because a lot of people are simply trying to save their neck and not fish too deep into dangerous waters?

    There is no story that is worth dying for. But having said that, some of these shortcomings are not so much about danger, but more about not pushing enough or maybe not understanding what they should be looking for. In some of these stories, you find out that the writer starts well, but after sometime, they’re relapsing. Some don’t know the right thing to look out for; and that needs nurturing in-house, as well as reading wide. What is the story about? What is the approach to the story? Maybe we shouldn’t blame the reporters alone; we must also talk to their news managers. I believe media houses still have their editorial meetings, where you discuss story ideas before going after them. We’ve had some conferences, where we encouraged people to share story ideas, but we’ve found out that people are not so welcoming of this because they believe their colleagues would steal their ideas.  But overtime, we have been able to let them realise that when you share ideas, you learn more. The other person you’re sharing with may have some angles that you may not be aware of but which may be vital to the success of the story. Somebody can question your premise and by the time you listen to different shades of opinion and are able to harness them, you find out that they help you to unleash the investigative exercise. There is nothing wrong with collaborating, but in our own case, we give the award to the media house once the writers are more than two.

    What do you make of the ongoing tussle between the social media and the traditional media?

    What is the threat? The threat is that once upon a time, to break news, you have to wait on the NTA network news at 9 o’clock, but that is not the case anymore because things are happening and getting posted online immediately. Good enough, every mainstream media now has a web presence; so for me the web is there to break news and the print is there to give you more substance and understanding of the news. So I see more opportunities; for engagements, for specialisation and depth in reporting. I don’t believe the print media will disappear, but for some publications, especially those who are development-oriented, for which the print may not be the most ideal outlet. For instance, Media Review, which we publish at Diamond Publications; of course it’s not going to circulate like your usual traditional print newspapers, so what we are doing is to turn it into an online publication and occasionally do the print version. So the newspapers will just have to do more work. Nobody wants to pick up a newspaper at N150, to read exactly what they have read online.

    The DAME Awards night was by all means a beautiful night; how have you managed to sustain it for 24 years?

    We started with just eight categories only in the print media. But over the years, we have been building on it. Don’t forget the name: Diamond AWARDS for Media Excellence; so it’s not just one award. Our style is to look for partners in terms of sponsors to support the different categories, to encourage the reporters to continue to improve in the different categories. So we categorise the beats and look for sponsors to support the categories. The best thing we would have loved is for somebody or an organisation to endow it in perpetuity, for say X million of naira; but that’s not always easy.  So, some people agree to sponsor for a term and observe. But again there is also the question of who are the people or players, who are strong enough to sponsor the award or awards in perpetuity? We run the risk of turning it into a strictly elite thing or a money-bag affair. In DAME, we always look for a linkage between the sponsor and the prize. For example, we have the Editorial Writing category, which my mentor, the late Tunji Oseni endowed for a while before he died; hence it is called the Tunji Oseni Prize for Editorial Writing. He endowed it with some money – not exactly in perpetuity; but we also published a book on him after his demise, and used the seed money – after paying the royalty, to continue the award, because we wanted to continue the prize in his honour. We also have some, like Business Reporting, which Aliko Dangote has endowed for a term. And then we also need judges; we have a collection of academics and veteran journalists who serve as judges. The whole idea is to have a community of believers, who believe in the nobility of the idea; because again, it is essential to keep the nobility of the idea alive, so that the quality of the award is not compromised in any way. And of course we have friends who now and then donate to support the exercise.  But we’ve not been lucky to get one sponsor for the whole event.

    Some people enter great stories in the wrong categories; do you ever take the liberty to put them in the right categories while sorting?

    Yes, we’ve done it once or twice, but it’s part of the responsibility of the writer to read the instruction very carefully and enter stories in the right category. Once a reporter entered a story in the Health category, but the extent of work done was so huge that the judges decided it should go for the investigative reporting category.

    You were quite a young man, when you kick-started this awards; what prompted you into the whole exercise?

    I was in my late 30s alright, but I had worked at The Daily Times, at The Guardian and at The Democrat – I was a pioneer at the last two; Thisweek Magazine too; and I’d even worked at the USSIS (United States Information Service). But all the while, I had some ideas in mind. I wanted to do a directory of the media; I wanted to do review for the media, because I have always seen the media as a profession, not something you just stumble in and stumble out. At that time too, the debate about how the media should be regulated and co were also going on. So the idea of Media Review was born, the idea DAME was also born. My colleague and friend Taiwo Obe worked with me briefly on the projects before he moved on; but he still shared that passion for the media.

    What other thing is Diamond publications into?

    Diamond publications is a publishing company. It publishes books, magazines, biographies…. We organise in-house training as well, and do general consultancy for organisations.

     Journalists are looking forward to the days when winners will begin to smile home with as much as 1million Naira in cash prizes.?

    I wish there were prizes when were younger. We started with N5,000; but it’s not about the cash. I think the idea that you have won is more than the money. But…maybe One million, five million, ten million, I don’t know. Let’s wait and see.

  • Open letter to ordinary Nigerians

    SIR: Several letters have already been written and addressed to those at the corridors of power, their cronies and establishments. I have lost count of the number of well-written, thought-provoking and soul-piercing articles I personally authored and addressed to those in power; high-profile personalities and government establishments. As usual, such articles were basically targeted at ensuring that our leaders don’t veer off the lane of commonsense, resist the temptation to promote personal interests and constantly remind them of the sacredness of the tasks in their hands.

    Whether such letters have produced desired outcomes is a different thing altogether.

    Fellow countrymen and women, I’m very sad and worried. I’m alarmed by the way we allow our appointed or elected representatives to choke us with practices considered very harmful and detrimental to our lives and that of our dear nation. No nation grows in an environment where laws are breached with impunity. No nation attains greatness in an environment where a negligible percentage of its population bury themselves in affluence, while a large chunk of its population still live from hand to mouth. This is a country where social and economic rights of its citizens are serially abused by those in authority.

    We, the citizenry allow so many ills to go unchecked. Through our unified silence, we have indirectly endorsed some ill practices. In extreme cases, we even offer support to these leaders to further impoverish, insult and shortchange us with impunity. Like sheep without shepherds, our leaders have led us astray into dangerous lands. We have groped in the dark for too long. Our leaders have since realized that we are too fearful, too naïve and not daring enough to question their profligate disposition, ostentatious lifestyles, greed, avarice and primitive accumulation of our commonwealth.

    We have become so used to the mess that our country has become. Nothing seems to bother us anymore. Many have lost interest in the project called Nigeria. This is very sad. Ideally, as citizens, we should all be benefiting from the nation’s wealth. As citizens, irrespective of tribe, creed and political persuasion, we have equal stake in the sharing and allocation of Nigeria’s vast resources. Unfortunately, the sad reality is that our leaders have cornered the resources to serve their interests and those of their cronies. This gross injustice is so obvious to be left unchallenged.

    Challenging them doesn’t imply taking up arms or inciting others to attack our leaders. It’s about reminding them of the need to redistribute the resources among Nigerians. It is about telling them of the consequences of their actions.

    Strangely, we, those often called ordinary Nigerians tend to defend and hold brief for leaders accused of graft. Instead of naming and shaming those cornering our collective patrimony through contract splitting, kickbacks, contract inflation, misappropriation, we often rise to defend their action for very stupid reasons. It is sickening to see ordinary Nigerians rise in defence of leaders found to have abused public office simply because such a leader shares blood or certain affinities with them. I recall with pain how some young men in Imo State took to the street to defend Aviation Minister, Princess Stella Oduah who was alleged to have directed heads of parastatals under her supervision to get her two bullet-proof cars with funds not captured in the budget.

    This is not how to build a country. We have stayed too long on the wrong path. No matter how far we have gone on the wrong lane, we can still retrace our steps back to the drawing board to start again. Let us begin the year 2014 on a promising note. Fellow ordinary Nigerians, I wish that we could all take our pride of place in how this nation is governed. We were once blind, but we can now see. Do have a hitch-free festive season and a prosperous new year in advance.

    • Abdullahi Yunusa

    Imane, Kogi State.

  • My man does not care to buy me ordinary body cream

    Aunty Deola, I am a girl 21. My man does not care to buy me ordinary body cream and when I make requests the reply is, “Do you love me because of my money?”

    My dear, how old is this your man? Maybe this person we’re talking about here is still a young man taking money for boxers from his parents and you want him to buy you body cream. I may not be right. But if I am, you should know that when a boy or young man is yet to find a good job and all he has is love, then you have to take him the way he is. He won’t break a bank to please you. You must have seen his financial incapability before you went into a relationship with him. Or may be like most women (young or old), you just assumed that since he’s a man and he was brave enough to talk to you, then he should have enough money to take care of your needs. Things don’t always happen that way. When a man says he loves you and he shows it, that is the first thing on his mind. He wants to show affection. It is after that, that others things follow.

    One thing I know is that even very stingy men want to look responsible to their women and so, when they have enough to spare, they spend it. Men however do not like women who make unnecessary demands. In fact, from my understanding of men, they want to give you without you asking, except for the occasional demands for important assistance. But by the time a girl gets to the point where she must get money for body cream and hair-do and she doesn’t have a job to unable her do these things on her own from time to time, men may get discouraged and may even feel used.

    As a young woman, you must learn to be independent and to love for the sake of love first before expecting to use the man at will. Men love women who are reluctant to ask; they are ever so willing to make those kinds of women happy.

    This is my opinion, but if you think otherwise, you may have a serious talk with him about your expectations – financial and otherwise – in the relationship. Take care!

  • I’m not an ordinary person —Ara

    I’m not an ordinary person —Ara

     Aralola Olamuyiwa, known as Ara queen of talking drum, has had her share of betrayal in life; a world she thought would end as fairy tale. In this interview with DUPE AYINLA-OLASUKANMI, she reveals her plans for her new project through her NGO which has to do with women, children, and others. Enjoy

    TELL us about the concert you had recently in Osun.

    It went very well. I will describe it as a huge success too.

    What about your tour abroad?

    We are still working on that, and it will take place next year. It is to promote the movie Osun Funke, as well as Ara in Concert. We will be going to places like Copa, and some states in the US.

    Can you explain the reason behind this tour of yours?

    It is within my territory as an entertainer. Most artistes that have been able to do it, have the financial capability and the grace to thrill their audience. For me, Ara has been on stage for the past 25 years, and I don’t have a single CD in the market. So it is only those who have the privilege to come to my concert that have the opportunity to see me perform. And I feel that celebrating my silver jubilee with a movie and collection of video is worth the time.

    Having been in the industry for 25 years without an album, is this deliberate?

    It was not planned that way really, because I have recorded several songs in the studio, hoping to release them. But a lot of factors came in and it had to be put on hold. The most of it, is that Ara is always on the road for one thing or the other. Like my concert, appearances, or my NGO project or family issues. But mainly it is because of my busy schedule. And because of this I somehow find myself sort of different in the box. Because when I am on stage I let loose, but when I am in the cage, I mean studio, I find it difficult to let loose. But I have been able to get over that, and now I have work that I will be releasing, and one is the one I did with Tuface, Olomi remix.

    What does your NGO project?

    The Ara NGO is a project that has to do with what I am passionate about. I am very much passionate about issues that have to do with women and children. Even before I became a mother, I had this concern to reach out to children which I did through different orphanages before I had my child. So after I had my child, I realised that there is more to just buying gifts for children, that there is more, like taking care of them, which has to do with the time they are in the womb and the time they are born. A mother is more or less like a god to them, so taking care of them has to do with education, basic amenities, creating a positive environment for them. The one I am working on right now is on maternal mortality And the reason I am very passionate about this issue is because I have seen, heard and read about how a lot of mothers die for reason next to nothing, and their babies too. Recently, my youngest brother’s wife lost a five-month-old baby. I was the one who drove her to the hospital and she delivered the baby normally and I had the belief that if there had been enough equipments, the baby would have survived. I was the one who buried the baby and everything was already formed. And I asked myself how he died, and I just realised that it was lack of equipments that are inexpensive. And I have heard of nine months pregnancies too. So I went online and Google to find out how much incubator costs and I was shocked, that most of our maternity hospitals do not have incubators, and then risk the lives of mother and child. So I am doing something that will involve Lagos State and other states too, and see how we can work together to provide these equipments needed to save mother and child. As far as I am concerned, I will do my best and leave the rest. I have a voice and a name and one of the purposes I have that is for a purpose to make people happy. There are some deaths that you know you cannot avert, but there are some that you could avoid. My son at one year had malaria, and slumped and they could not resuscitate him at the hospital we took him to, I had to use mouth to mouth. They have oxygen machine, but the doctor on duty did not even know how to use it. He was gone for about 45 minutes; it was God that brought him back. What we are after is to save as many mothers and babies that we can. Another thing I am working on is thyroid glands, a lot of women have this, but I have seen men who have it too. I know about this, because I had it and I know the test, and treatment is expensive. And I know what it does to the body too. This is my second or third project, but right now we are trying to get incubators and monitoring machines for distributions. That is the Ara Passion Project.

    When did you realise that you had passion for acting and writing?

    I have always been in the entertainment, but not in movies. Well in secondary school I did a lot of stage plays and did win a lot of prizes for my school then. I had acted in one movie, where I played a nurse. I did act on stage this year at the Black Image event. I wrote the story and was scripted by Tunde Babalola, and hopefully we will be working with uncle Tunde Kelani. Ara is a total entertainer that involves singing, dancing, and acting. We have Ramsey Noauh on board already; he will be playing the lead act in the movie Osun Funke. We are not on set, because the script is still in process. But for the book, we are done with chapter one and we have eight chaptersin all. The book has everything about me.

    Why did you decide to write an autobiography?

    You see as stars, there is more to us than you see. We are just like every regular human being, but with special talents. We are more or less the chosen ones and our life should be role models to people. Our life is not always perfect, but people see a perfect us on TV. We cry, we curse, we bless, we fight, we yab, we fart, we shit, we make babies, we make love, some of us cook, we make friends, we make enemies, we do everything. But we have the extra responsibility of making your world a better place for living with our talents. So I believe that you should know that part of us that is like you and learn from it. In that regard, I respect two people a lot. Oprah Winphrey went from rape to miscarriage, and still came out successful, and Nelson Mandela, from prison to all sort of things. So I want to share the story of my positivity, my first kiss, my first boyfriend, and all those things.

    You used to be a tom boy while in school. Do you still smoke and drink?

    No, I have stopped smoking way back. But I still drink occasionally. But I am still a tom boy in a way. An example is the one I mentioned earlier that the dead baby of my brother’s wife was placed in my hands, I removed the baby from the pack, wore a glove and looked at all the parts and I prayed for him and buried him. And my mother was like iwo, omo yi sha. A woman naturally will not do such things. And after doing those things, I sometimes ask myself where I get the strength. Like when I do all those things I do on stage and sit down to replay, I ask myself if I was the one that did all that. And for me I don’t see obstacles because I am a woman. If I want to get something, I go for it.

    Has it ever occurred to you that, there might be something unusual about you?

    I know a lot is unusual about me, that is the spiritual angle. I know I am not an ordinary person and that is the reason I chose my friends. I cannot even say I have friends, but I have people that I work with. And because I have a very strong spirit I can see with my third eye. So I am not fooled by certain things. But people like me; our weakness is attached to the people that we give our heart to. They are the people that can mess with us. No matter how powerful we are, our weakness is with the people we love, they are the only ones that can break us. Somebody like Samson gave his heart and secret to Delilah and he was captured. Don’t forget that a prophecy had gone ahead of him. So that explains a lot of things about me. I am a very spiritual person and my mother knows, so there are some certain things that she won’t tell about me. Like when she was pregnant with me, the things she saw and after I was born. Over-spiritual people will start terming it to mean different things, so I rather keep that part of me and use it, as long as I don’t over step my boundaries with God, my creator. I don’t runaway or deny it anymore. Even my secondary days, they knew that something was wrong with me.

    What is it like to be a single mother?

    For me I have come to a conclusion that life is how you take it. If you want it to be hard, it will be. If you want it soft, it will be. I am blessed, so I can take care of my needs, I do not need to wait for any man to do anything for me. To that, I praise God that He is putting food on my table and clothes on my back. Because I was an up and doing person, everybody was surprised that I became submissive to my ex when we got married. I won’t take any decision or step without consulting him. I don’t advise it being a single mother; I still will get married again and have more children. I am not pushing it or rushing it, I am waiting for that time. I know it will happen, because I have suitors. It is just a matter of choosing who I want and a matter of time too. I am not committed to anybody.

    How do you create time for your son, being on the road always?

    I work my schedule round my son, because I am his mother and father. So I create a balance. But single parent is not the best, because there are times that you will want just a hug, a kiss on the forehead, not forgetting that I am a very sensitive and emotional person. There are times that I just need somebody to hold my hands. I am not the type of person that will just go with any type of person, if I am not into you. Like kissing, because this has to do with my spirituality. I cannot share myself with two people. It will affect me and that is why I have to be extremely careful. But I thank God because he has been faithful.