In my last intervention,
I tried to sooth our micro-moods, to divert our attention from the multiplicity
of excruciating existential challenges, which have become the new normal
under this next-level government. I do not know to what extent I
succeeded but I just want to update that piece before going back to outstanding
serious businesses. For a start, I forgot to tell you that by being a Carinal,
Peter Ebele Okpaleke ( We are struggling to speak the Kings English here but
the Oyibos bold-facedly
called him Oku-pal'eke) is now a DELEGATE for life! This is
because he becomes a permanent member of the college of cardinals, a member of the conclave, whose
responsibility it is to elect the Pope. Of course, this is not the type of delegate
I wanted to become; through which I had hoped to hammer in 2022. Nigerian delegates are pampered, paid obscene
amounts, are often cheated by the wholesale dealers, operate under fluid rules because of which
the process is almost always contentious and manipulated, with courts always on
standby; and their ‘delegate-ship’ lasts for a few hours, once
every 4 years. For Peter Cardinal Opkaleke however, it is for life, the rules
are cast in stone and he has to pay to be a delegate; the price being determination,
commitment, obedience and studiously
maintaining a delicate balance between being in the world but not being of the world (Jn
17:14-15). Once more, I am ‘tuale-ing’
for the latest universal delegate in
town!
The latest magician in
town, Malam Adamu-Adamu, the hitherto pro-ASUU fellow, announced that the ASUU
strike would end last week(5-9 September,’22). I had already parked my things
and rejigged my mind, body
and soul for the ‘madness’ that would follow! 9 years ago,
specifically on 5/12/13, the APC exonerated ASUU for the prolonged strike and
blamed the government for failing to ‘confront
the key issues in university education and administration,’ and advised Jonathan/PDP to ‘show
leadership by working with the lecturers to find lasting solutions to the
challenges confronting university education in terms of funding,
infrastructure, standards welfare and
administration’ This same APC has been engaged in Maradonic negotiation with ASUU since 2017 (5 years and
still counting), signed several MOU MOA and
MOL( Memorandum of Lies), set up two committees, which
reached two agreements in 2021 and 2021, and treated those agreements with
ignominy and obfuscate issues by
serving the public a menu of lies, misinformation, disinformation and
uncouth under-the-belt
propaganda! And the great BAT, who was the chief APCian in 2013 and now its best man for 2023 is
today seeing ASUU as unreasonable for continuing with the strike. As all this is going on, the Chairman of
Committee of VCs of Nigerian Universities, Prof
Sam Edoumiekumo has accused the
government of supporting the Bokoharamist agenda( away with Western Education!), by not
showing commitment towards tertiary education and demands of ASUU.
Anyway, from ending last week as per Adamu-Adamu, the
matter has landed in the court with the FGN demanding accelerated hearing. The FG forgot that he who is forced to agree
has not actually agreed! However that
was before Usman Opayemi, a 200 level student of History and International
Studies at UNILORIN established the ASUU-Strike
POS enterprise. Another unknown
joker had also declared that any baby
born during this or other ASUU strikes should be named ASUquo! However,
while Opayemi has started a business and other students are taking
online classes, learning some skills, or seeking temporary employment, an UFS (Unknown Female Student) has gone online to
showcase her backside, which has
become more gigantic, rounded and
enticing than it was before the akshon!
What a dividend of ASUU strike! Her main
concern is the structure( structure again) of her backside!! Anyway, different
strokes for different folks.
Meanwhile, a government
that is so broke that it can only afford extra N60000 monthly ( or is it annually?) for professors has just increased
the out of station allowances in
multiples of 100% for public servants. For Ministers and PerSecs,
it increased from N35000 to N80000, and from N20000 to N70,000, respectively.
For traveling for a day, a PermSec receives more than what the FG is willing to
odffer Professors in a month! And this includes tours from Ikeja to Ibafo and
from Abuja to Nasarawa. I will keep you informed of the quantum leaps in local
tours and travels from the last quarter of 2022. Jigawa state has also
disbursed N193bn to lactating and pregnant mothers within 7 months (about N28bn
monthly); a very impressive record in governmental humanitarianism! We have
also been informed that if not for this compassionate government that
retained the subsidy regime, fuel should
by now be going for circa N440/ litre and that most of the stollen crude is
stored in churches and mosques. Crude oil is
not what you can put in the pockets; it is shipped in very large ships
and one wonders how the ships can berth in
church compounds and what quantity of such crude a mosque can contain?
This is as the Ministry of petroleum (headed by our Saintly president) and the
Nigerian Navy ( under the command of the same president) have openly disagreed
on the quantity of oil stollen, with the Navy stating that the 200000-400000
quoted by the former its agencies is IMPOSSIBLE!
We have also learnt that
about $3.3bn (real Dollars) worth of crude was stollen in the 14 months, ending
March 2022; 95% of oil from Bonny axis is stollen and that refinery utilization in Nigeria is
the worst in OPEC at 1% with Libya, Angola, and
Congo at 25%, 50%, and 85% respectively. No be juju be that?
Meanwhile, some mischievous but serious minded fellows have revealed that the
earnings of Messi and Ronaldo from running around the pitch once in a
while are higher than the budgets of Osun and Nasarawa states, both
with a population of 7.2m as at 2016. Why single out these two states for such
an embarrassing comparison and why
should we be quoting 2016 figures in 2022?
Meanwhile, my take-off question for my students whenever we resume
should be: planning without statics is the same as planning with expired
statistics: discuss with examples. By the way, Babagana Munguno, the National Security
adviser has revealed to this unshockable nation that 54000( yes, fifty-four
thousand) ghost names were discovered from the cursed IPPIS payment platform! And yet rather than giving ASUU a medal of
honour and giving the unit the Central Bank of Liberia treatment, we are being
harangued and demonized. CBL-treatment?
Dazed by monumental two-for-a-penny corruption, President
Sirleaf sacked all the staff of Liberian Central Bank and started afresh
One Mrs Joy Sunday of
Akwa Ibom State has, out of desperation, conspired with some rascals to kidnap
her husband because he denied her sex! Shoo; with all these men dangling
unmentionable things everywhere?
However, Mrs Zainab Yusuf( I hope she is YUSUFul) has
asked the Magajin Gari Sharia Court in Kaduna to dissolve her marriage because
the husband, Ali Garba, was a sex addict, wanting to do at all times, at
all places and at all circumstances including during mensuration and
Ramadan fast! When you look at these two women and their challenges, you see
that this world no balance. And in a related development, Esther
Kalema, a prostitute in Lusaka has sued one of her married clients, George
Mulenga for getting her pregnant and demanding K500 monthly maintenance
allowance. The man agreed ‘doing’ with her but argued that it was
pure business and that getting pregnant was not a part of her job description!
The case is still on but what will
happen if he pays her the maintenance fee: will
she be on an exclusive retainership arrangement with him or will she still be servicing other
clients? Don’t ask me what madam, the certified owner of George,
has done or will do on this matter. In another intriguing case, Yusuf Muhammed
is demanding N1.6m from his wife, Murjanto Nasiru in exchange for divorce,
claiming that he paid N50000 dowry and that since 2018 when they got married,
his brothers stopped the N35000 monthly palliative they were extending to him. The man is good
with elementary mathematics but I had
thought that alimonies are paid by
husbands. In any case, it is only Ali that should pay ALImoni not Yusuf! This
case is still on but if in doubt, go and verify!
And then, a 40 year old
educated superman has created records for marrying 15 wives and manufacturing
108 children so far. As we speak, 15 of the wives are simultaneously pregnant! I don’t know how he does it or how he manages
such a complex structure and system! As you already know, wonders will never
end and there are more and new wonders everyday. On 5/5/22, a group of
security-conscious bandits, while ‘on patrol’ arrested a scavenger with some
stolen items from a village, paraded him and handed him over to the community
leader for ‘onward transmission’ to the security personnel. The SRB (socially
responsible bandits) told the petty criminal: You are lucky we
are handing you over to the authorities; we could have executed you for
engaging in criminal activities! Bandits admonishing a petty-thief! This
country sef!
Family budget session in progress … SRB admonishing a petty thief!
As 2023 elections draw
nearer, a lot of signs and wonders are afloat. The ADC suspended its
presidential candidate Dumebi Kachukwu for anti-party activities while the
state chairmen of the party hold that it is the sit-tight chairman who should
get the boot. And than some members of
the Central Working Committee were also suspended: If you Dabo me, I
Tarka you; simplicita! In
Adamawa, the APC chairman, Ibrahim Bilal, has been sacked for gross misconduct,
including running the party like a personal fiefdom, by 25 out of 36 executives of the party while
the Roforofo in PDP is getting quite intriguing with Nwike promising to crush
his opponents. But long before then, two ‘native pastors’ (herbalists) were
arrested by EFCC for making a N24m worth
of failed juju for a House of Reps
aspirant from Oye Ekiti. The herbalists argued that they spent the money on
juju-making raw materials and
accessories, including keeping warm at night( the work is mostly done
nocturnally); that their juju was 100% genuine since they had agreement-prayers
with the gods but that the matter was scattered by the party which
zoned the ticket away from Oye
Ekiti. Why didn’t the juju thwart the
zoning arrangement? How competent is
EFCC, which does not have a juju-operations department,
investigate juju affairs? How can the court adjudicate on a juju matter? Was
there a money-back guarantee? How can a candidate in a democracy
seek juju-instead of votes-to win a ticket and why was he so desperate as to
seek juju assistance with a whopping sum of N24m? How much would he legally
earn within his tenor in the HOR and why was he not ashamed of admitting that
he consulted babalawos? Anyway, let’s leave matter for matayas hand.
And the then, the
Conference of United Political Parties has allegedly discovered the mother of all political signs and
wonders: names from Ghana, Australia and Brazil were discovered in the voters
Register in Omuma, the village of the chief Hopist. Names with male faces were registered as
female, some are aged 100+ while a
secret court action had been commenced to force INEC to abandon the revolutionary BVAS. When you see names
like Griffith Edem( Female), Guthire Silas( female) Harell Drake, Head Callin,
Gates Avye and Hines Briar in a village at Imo State, including some born in 1902, then you should know that interesting times are ahead!
People react differently
to spousal betrayals. Some men go violent and some women even go deadly by dismantling
mens’ manhood. Well, a man has just done it differently. He waited for the lady
to travel and then donated all her personal belongings to charity, and parked out of their apartment to an
unknown location. Meanwhile Niger State is beating its chest that ONLY
4000 of its teachers came in through the backdoor (unqualified). With as many
as 4000 unqualified teachers, irrespective of the %, how do we prepare our
youths for the future? How can the teachers give what they do not have? However Sanni Bello, the compassionate Governor, promised to give then another opportunity,
rather than sacking anybody. But how did 4000 unqualified teachers find
themselves into the system and what has he done to sanitise such a rotten
system?
This one is DIFFICULT to believe: that a man raped
a friends wife, when she was in the matrimonial bed with her husband, on
22/8/22, in Surulere Lagos! The woman felt somebody doing her,
thought it was the husband and while she was gyrating to the tune of the
music, her hand touched the husband beside her and that was when she raised alarm. The
rapist claimed he lost his way to his house due do drunkenness! And the
only place he could land was into the honeypot of the woman? Why didn’t he wander into the ocean or the
many dirty ponds around Lagos? The husband would have been in that kind of
slumber in which Adam was when God
extracted one of his ribs to create Eve. The woman sef, na waa:
was there no difference in style, human smell, size of --- between the husband
and the stranger? How could she not know that a stranger was chopping
her? The rapist is surely daring, and
would have applied a powerful and
multidimensional remote control! Anyway, the man was arrested and this is more job for
the overstretched police!
Our people say that when you stay at home for too long, you will be asked to explain
what happened to the missing chicken or what caused a neighbourhood quarrel. I
have been home since February and as I was writing the first draft of this
article on 7/9/22, a cacophony of
threatening noises in the neighbourhood, rising in crescendo, disturbed and
distracted the son of man. I had to go
find out whatsgwan and that was how I got involved in a marital squabble
that had gone out of hand. This would
not have happened if I were managing BUS 90; it was just because I was
home. Anyway, that was a part of
the community service. And that is the reality of today’s social-media
marriage: Today, if I don’t marry her, I will die; Tomorrow,if she doesn’t leave this
house, I will kill her! Luckily, I have not be invited to give witness
at the police post or at the court and I pray it doesn’t come to that. And for
thise who think we are not working, teaching is just one-third of our
over-saturated responsibilities, the other two-thirds being community service(
like peace-building between husband and wife) and research( like what you are
reading!
In 2002, the dome of the national stadium Abuja, the contract of which was awarded under
anticipatory approval, collapsed before
it was commissioned, killing three people. That was during the imperial
presidency of OBJ, the author and finisher of babacracy. Well,
just the other day, a bridge collapsed while being commissioned, ‘somewhere’. I
say somewhere because some people reported that it was in South Africa, while
others reported that it was in the Democratic Republic of Congo while one source, trying to play safe said it happened
in one African country. Anyway, the bridge collapsed and readers are called upon to vote for their
preferred location! However, I advise that you watch the video of the incident to see how all those who came on a rescue mission were only interested in lifting the beautiful
lady at the scene while the man was left to his fate!
In my last
intervention, I x-rayed the fashion statement made by Alh. Shetimma, Tinubu’s
MM running mate at the last NBA conference( where the lawyers, because they
were in Lagos, the HQ of areaboyism, behaved like first-class area-boys!) Anyway, Chike, a
Nigerian singer, has made another fashion statement by wearing a skirt when he
performed at a BBNAIJA eviction show, a show has lost most of its mojo due to OBImania. You evict
somebody, you celebrate. Even the evictee, rather than being shamed for failing
an exam, goes on to become a celebrity !
This generation sef! Anyway, Chike is not the first to be skirted. I remember
that D1 Adeneye once wore a skirt during one Nigerian independence celebration.
That was when people still remembered and celebrated October1. Furthermore,
during the recent mad weather in Europe, many male Brits were skirted to escape
from the scalding weather,
It is not in my character to do this kind of intervention
without paying homage to our pastors, whether native or modern. A deliverance
consultant, Pastor Michael Rabiu ( married with 3 children from 2
wives)who was arrested for chopping a 12 year old girl has
revealed that he did so in the process of deliverance. This is to exorcise the spirit
of death caused by tanran (the snake spirit), which has
been plaguing the family( the mother had lost 2 daughters). He also accused the
devil of being a culprit in this act of sexual molestation. As for the distraught mother, I do not blame
her; our people say that people do not patronize white-garment churches for the
fun of it; it is usually due to their
afflictions.
But his case is better than that of Kinto Dennis, the GO
of Empowerment City Church, Uganda, who was arrested for
flogging his congregants lateness and other acts of
spiritual indiscipline. He took his
time, ordered them to lie down one after the other and gave it to them on their buttocks with full force. And they
sheepishly obeyed! Maybe people are empowered by
flogging. He now needs to be disciplined by the law as an 18-count charge has
been slammed against him for ‘assault, common assault, causing bodily harm,
promoting sectarianism and human trafficking +++’. These police people
sef! Rather than charge the pastor
simply for flogging his congregants, they generated 18 charges so that if he
escaped one, he will not escape the other.
Amid his arraignment, some of his congregants were on social
media defending him by stating that he was only "flogging his
children".
As for the
number of charges, it is normal with African policemen. Sometimes in 1985, I
was driving from Enugu to Igboukwu
through Okigwe axis in my good old 504(
AN 3705ED). A policeman accosted me, and accused me of having an irregular plate number! Irregular
plate number? I asked him what was an irregular plate-number, why my
own was irregular and to show me a regular one from other cars so that I would
rectify the error. Anyway, I relaxed and
we had a friendly discussion, where I
worked, school, why I took that route and other
inconsequential issues. When I
wanted to leave, he wanted me to settle
him and when I refused( I no de give sisi!), he ceased the
plate-number as an exhibit and summoned me to Okigwe Central Police station. I
enjoyed the development because I joined the league of big-men who drove-and
still drive- without plate-numbers. When I got to Okigwe the following Monday I
was shocked at number and variety of charges they slammed against me, including
violently resisting arrest, dangerous driving, obstructing the flow of traffic,
and disrespecting an officer of the
law! If it were today, he would have
charged me of IPOBism! I asked the officer whether he was sure
that the charges were for me! Anyway,
that was that.
Tough times demand
desperate measures and that was why Oludare Alaba a graduate of
Agricultural Extension and Rural
Development from Ladoke Akintola University
stormed the school the other day, returned his certificate and demanded
a refund of all the fees he paid for the
degree programme . He returned the certificate because it was of no use to him
and demanded for a refund of the fees to help him to take care of himself.
Frustration walking on all fours. Who and what do we blame? The school, the
student, the family, the Government (federal and state) or even ASUU? There was
a worse case sometimes ago when a young man, in a moment of rage, set ALL his
certificates, (including NYSC discharge Certificate) on fire. Another native
pastor has also advertised his shrine, in perfect working condition, for sale!
he claimed to have given his life to Christ but I suspect that business has
been very bad of late! I am one of his agents and he is so desperate that he
has offered 15% commission. The pre-qualification process has started and those
interested should forward their BVN, NIN
and PVC details! This can be done anonymously so that the public will not know
those bidding for the shrine, which may include some pastors!
-
“Find a great mentor, someone who has already been through the many challenges of being an entrepreneur..” -Jodi Levine
Entrepreneurship in Practice: Cases, Challenges and Lessons By IK, MUO PHD is now available on Amazon, since 14/5/21. Click here to view Available for order +2348033026625 | Delivery : Worldwide
Interesting Read. Jisike Ichie Muo
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