The Hawking of Insecticide Treated Nets

The Hawking of Insecticide Treated Nets.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

No sight could be more bizarre than this. Young men hawking Parmanet branded mosquito insecticide treated nets in the traffic. My greatest regret was not having a camera on hand to capture this most worrying sight. What is this nation turning into?

The young man holding two blue coloured insecticides packs in each hand and about five more balanced on his head approached the window of the commuter bus. He peered into the bus with that “traffic jam sellers” look, rapidly scanning the bus for buyers. I sat by the window and I had my eyes at him. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He must have thought I was interested in his product so he held on a little longer, pushing his goods closer to my face in an obvious effort at advertisement.

“They don dey sell this one too?” was all I could say. The hawker hissed and moved off to the next car.

He wasn’t alone. There were so many others all hawking mosquito insecticide treated nets like they would do cold pure water and Gala. These nets are provided free to hospitals and health centers with the help of international donor agencies to be distributed free of charge to pregnant women and children as part of the much talked about “Roll back malaria scheme”.

Now, I don’t know how much of malaria we have succeeded to roll back in Nigeria or what figures the Ministry of health brandishes to show off as the success of the Roll Back Malaria scheme but I am convinced (and certainly we need no better proof) that that scheme is achieving nothing whatsoever with the nets intended to drive it now being hawked on our streets and in hold ups.

I feel particularly bad about this development. The truth is that many women and children who these nets are intended for don’t get to receive them at the hospitals. The maternal and childhood mortality rates as a result of malaria attacks continue to rise. We are far from meeting the millennium development goals especially in the areas of Childhood and Maternal mortality. Yet we find pleasure in ridiculing efforts even by foreigners to help us meet them.

What laughing stock we would be (we happen to be already) in the eyes of the international community when they find that instead of distributing the nets to mothers and children and mounting a massive campaign to encourage them use it, the nets find their way into the hands of hawkers. The fact that this is happening right here in Abuja the nations capital makes it even more interesting.

In the hands of hawkers, the nets first do not get to the target users and even worse, it ceases to be free. These nets were produced/procured with donor funds to help fight malaria which remains the highest killer in Africa. Ultimately, the aim is defeated. Why do we insist of making mockery of good intentions?

It is in this same way that subsidized drugs find their way into private pharmacy’s, books and materials meant for primary schools end up in bookshops, and public funds end up in private pockets. There has and continues to be reports of pupils being asked to pay fees in primary and junior secondary schools despite Governments continuous boast of offering free Basic Education.

The question here is, how did the nets get to the hawkers? And is it not criminal for free nets to be hawked freely on our roads?

We shall assume that the authority, in this case the ministry of health is not aware. We shall assume that their workers don’t travel on the roads and have not seen the hawkers. We shall also assume that the nets simply grew wings and flew out of the hospitals or that perhaps every needy mother and child in this country has gotten a net and perhaps there is a need to dispose of the rest of the nets by hawking it. We can assume a lot of things, but one thing should be clear to us all, the lives lost every day especially in our rural areas and urban slums following exposure to mosquito bites which can be prevented by the use of these nets shall be on all those who are looking the other way when the free nets are being hawked.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

nzeifedigbo@yahoo.com

THE DILEMMA OF BEING A VET IN NIGERIA

A while ago, when I was about rounding up my national service, a Diaspora friend of mine while asking what my plans were for the future had asked, “Do people really visit vets in Nigeria?” That question did so much in deepening my anxiety at that time and really summarizes the fate of many young graduates of Veterinary Medicine in Nigeria.

Veterinary Medicine is perhaps one of the least popular academic disciplines in the country. Before I got into the University, I really didn’t know people spent such time to learn how to raise and treat animals. 95 percent of my 118 size class in year one never filled in to study Vet. Medicine but took it up as a last option following the unavailability of the desired. Many of us nursed the ambition of changing over to our desired course (which was mainly Medicine or pharmacy) in the second year. Some succeeded, many did not.

Perhaps even more worrying was the fact that the course was itself a difficult business. If you studied in any of the Universities that had a vet school, you would appreciate what the life of a Vet student is.  The schedule is unimaginable. The course content is endless. The Volumes of notes is brain cracking. The lecturers are merciless. The exams are scary. The results bring so much despair.

It’s not unusual that vet students rank among the top over stayed students. I lost so many of my classmates to the embarrassing verdicts of Professional exams. From 118 at the beginning, just 47 of us finally took the oath and were inducted into the Profession up on graduation.

Vet students don’t have holidays. We are on campus all year round. We run a schedule that is same as that of our Human Medical colleagues. We do basically the same courses and more. We study the husbandry, medicine and surgery of at least seven species plus a comparative study of Humans. We are literarily made to develop a seventh sense to use in decoding our patients problems since they don’t talk. We pay as much as the Human Medical students for our studies. Our official course duration is six years just like them.  We use the prefix of “Dr” too.

But that’s as much as the similarities go. Right there on campus we begin to feel the stigmatization. You hear such derogatory terms as “Animal Doctor” and soon you are proud to be addressed as such. You try so much to put the negatives out of your mind and concentrate on the positives. Gradually you get to appreciate the fact that unlike your human Medicine colleagues you have no guaranteed life after graduation. You find proof of this in the number of your senior colleagues who return for their masters with the hope of joining the more lucrative academia. Chance meets with these senior colleagues tells tales that suggests that “all is not well”.

Upon graduation you head for the national youth service.  Friends, family and society now know you as a Doctor. With that name comes so much expectation.  While serving all you are thinking of is a job after the service. Hardly any job advert requests the services of Veterinary Doctors.  Who really employs Vets? You find yourself caught between joining your fellow corpers in applying for the available jobs mostly the banks or sticking with your profession. You feel strongly about the six years you spent to obtain the DVM and you don’t want to vie away.

Even when you decide to apply, you come to discover that employers in Nigeria hardly remember that people study Vet in this country. Drop down buttons for “qualification” never has space for vets. You will find B.sc, B.A, B.Engr, B.Agric, B.Ed, even B.Pharm and MBBS, but never DVM. This makes you begin to question yourself again about who you really are. Worst still, your fellow corpers don’t consider you as being on the same boat with them. They think the “Dr” in front of your name makes you immune to bothering about a job. They don’t seem to understand why you should be hustling for a job like them.

Once I turned up at the venue of a bank interview. I felt like an alien. When I got tired of answering the “Doc, wetin you dey find for here?” question, to which I responded that I only sauntered in to see a friend, I left the place. Honestly I had hoped to gate crash as I didn’t receive an invitation though I had applied.  I didn’t wait to see if gate crashers would be welcomed. I left sharp sharp.

Not to mention here that you are worlds apart from your Human Doctor corper friends. Having had the privilege of a one year Housemanship post graduation where they get very juicy pay, they throw car keys around when you are discussing with them.  While you jump okada’s and Buses, they Cruise around. You don’t stop wondering if it is not the same doctor that you are that they are too.

After service, Human Doctors get jobs more readily. At the very least a Private clinic takes them. These private clinics pay them appreciably well. But for the Vet it’s a whole different issue.  Who really employs vets? Private vets clinics are so few, most of them hardly satisfying their owners own financial needs. Adding hands to be paid is thus unwelcomed. Those that employ pay peanuts. Peanut is the word. I don’t know how else to describe working from 8.00am to 6.00pm daily (Saturdays inclusive) and receiving less than N30,000.00. Matter of fact there are very few (if any) vet clinics in Nigeria that pay their employed vets anything above N30,000.00. How do you reconcile that with the tough years of training and the high expectations of family and society given the “Dr” prefix?

The only lucrative options for young vets seem to be the academia and the civil service. Jobs from both of these sources however  are as scarce as water in a desert. In any case how many vets can be taken by them? There are only eight vet schools in Nigeria. How many vet lecturers retire in a year and how many new lecturers are taken? The civil service doesn’t take staff every other day. The result is that there is a backlog of vets who are unemployed, under employed or simply not doing something fulfilling.

Recently the Nigeria Police in its recruitment advertised spaces for Vets. I couldn’t see myself in a Police Uniform at whatever prize so I didn’t bother. In any case I hadn’t the N1000.00 for the scratch card. But classmates that did came back from the verification exercise with tales of meeting with other colleagues who graduated way before us. It simply meant that for all these years, they have not found anything good enough.  How sad for such a nobel profession.

Of course I know some people will bring up the issue of private practice. The existing private clinics like earlier mentioned are on a daily battle for survival. In any case establishing a private practice as a vet is a damn big step of faith. Unlike the Human medic who has a guaranteed clientele, the vet is thrown into a battle with the existing private outfits for the very few clients. Would you advise your son to go into that world of uncertainty?

Perhaps the other option left is livestock farming. People don’t often seem to remember that it takes so much money to start a farm and that there is great risk involved in running one. How many livestock farms are owned by vets? Do you need to be a vet to own a farm? Given, as a vet you have the training to be able to establish and run one effectively but then, it is not anywhere as easy as it sounds. I know many who have tried. Some even had the balls of taking loans. A good number didn’t come out of it with pleasant tales.

So the post graduation experience is not a pleasant one at all for the young vet. It’s not been pleasant for me nor for a host of my colleagues especially those of us who didn’t vie off or who tied and weren’t very successful. Unemployment is already a huge problem in the country but for the Vet it’s even more. Worse still you spent so much time in the university trying to graduate that you know little or nothing else outside Vet Medicine. Save for some of us who did other things (at the risk of flunking our professional exams) a host of my class mates know how to do nothing else. Some never heard of Hi5 or facebook until recently. Other began computer appreciation classes after graduation.

Studying vet feels like driving into a Close. You feel trapped in there. You feel tied to the six years wahalla and the name. Yet you are getting nothing out of it. Employers outside the profession are not eager to hire you. Either they feel they can’t pay you or they just feel you know absolutely nothing outside needles and syringes or dogs and meat.  Our people do not keep pets and simply kill any sick animal. They thus hardly have any need for a vet. No matter how optimistic you are in life, you begin to actually wonder why in the world you spent all those years studying this course.

I am done complaining. This is my signing out piece. The FCT minister had on my passing out from service announced an automatic employment for me and ten others who won the Honours award. I thought I had escaped the dilemma. Four months on and its now obvious the word “automatic” doesn’t have the same meaning in the dictionary of the FCT administration as is found in the English dictionary. Not the money, not the job has showed up. I am done waiting for them. At a proper time I will launch my attack against them. For now I am looking for other options. I am looking up.

Pitifully a whole lot of my colleagues are yet to come up to this level of thought.  They daily grapple with the challenge of answering a big name and being very small in the pocket. It’s not their fault. It’s the fault of the system. A system that judges you basically by what degree u hold. Veterinary Medicine no doubt is a great course, but sincerely in Nigeria it’s a hard knock life for Vets.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

Special Church Advert

Let me start by acknowledging the source of this picture. I first saw it on Sahara reporters, but it was from facebook where it is currently being circulated that I pulled it out. Guess this is what my mass communications roommate back in the university would describe as a candid shot. The photographer whether this picture was taken professionally or as leisure deserves credit and I so do give.
This picture tells a million tales. It summaries what religion has come to become in Nigeria. It is an indication that we have clearly plumbed the abyss of permissiveness. It’s a picture that shouldn’t just make us laugh but should make us hide our face in shame. It is a picture that shows that we now preoccupy ourselves in mocking God.

Writing on my blog and on this forum a while ago in a piece titled “Nigeria Men of God As Con-Artists (see www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/articles/sylva-nze-ifedigbo/77.html , nzesylva.wordpress.com/2008/06/24/nigerian-men-of-god-as-con-artists/- ) I had attempted to draw attention to the obvious negative trends in modern day Christianity especially as is now prevalent in our country. Then, I had sounded it as clear as I could that Christianity was now a business venture with prayers at a cash and carry basis. Not a few holier than thou fellows filled my e-mail with scathing attacks on what blasphemy I had indulged in by daring to speak ill of men of God.

In that piece, I pointed to the rich, super star celebrity men of God who wore shinny suits whose price tags read like telephone numbers in choice boutiques in London, spoke with a cultivated accent (preferably American), rode in classy tinted glass four wheel rides, bought private jets, established universities, and had all sort of marital scandals.

This group who went by names such as General Overseer, chief shepherd, founding Bishop and the likes sustained themselves and their high standard of living on the generosity of their congregation after cajoling them with sermons that tells them to part with more and more of their hard earned income in the form of tithes, seed sowing, donations and thanksgivings which was expected to win them more blessings from God. The God of riches.

Just like in every business line, there are the high players and the under dogs. The picture shows us a different group of men of God, the ones at the lower sections of the ladder. The ones who have to actually fix prices for their work. The ones who operate from batchers and shanties in the slum-like part of town, fighting their own poverty by taking advantage of their gullible poor congregation.

Here we see an advert board which is in itself a study in advertisement as a tool in business. The letterings and graphics are nothing to write home about. The spellings leave you wondering how the man of god gets to read the English bible. The message on the board produces a peppering sensation in your lower abdomen. You wind up asking yourself; have we gotten to this level?

It Is interesting to note that in “Holy Japhet Munistry (ministry)” there is a clear difference between “special prayers” and “ordinary prayers”. It also cost more to carry out “anointing” than “baptism”. Deliverance sessions are a very expensive exercise. Perhaps the man of god needs to prepare adequately for it and that might require buying some extra materials hence the extra cost. Generally shaa, Donations are happily received any time, any day. Every day is as stated “for Gods work”.

Need I say more?, the picture says it all. I only hope governor Fashola is taking note. These men of God, whether of the super star class or the likes of holy Japhet Munistry, should be paying tax on the revenue they generate.

Sylva Nze ifedigbo

I Need A Ghanaian Visa, Fast

I need a Ghanaian Visa urgently. Time is running out on me. Can anybody help? I must be in Ghana next month. I am eager to commit treason. Treason as defined by the PDP Deputy national Chairman Dr. Mohammed H. Bello. I want to join Nigerian opposition leaders to the Gold Coast to commit treason. Treason committed with the active connivance of the leader of the free world must feel good to commit. I need a Ghanaian visa fast.

Yes, I want to join forces with a “failed” presidential candidate, two former Speakers, a former Senate President and “a sprinkling of political hangers-on” plus the United States embassy in Nigeria to cause instability in Nigeria. No, not just instability, I want to generate a tsunami. A tsunami with a strength that is yet to be recorded in geography.

The tsunami shall leave no refugees in its wake. It shall blow across the land. To Wadata Plaza. To Aso Rock. To kebbi state. To the palatial mansion of one big mouthed Veterinary doctor. It shall blow roof tops away and bring down walls. It shall open the can of worms and then scatter the piles of papers used to seal dirty deals.

When the tsunami is done, we shall know why the Railway has remained comatose despite all the bla blaa black sheep Government has been singing about it. And wait, did I mention the Presidential panel on Customs shall also be on the Tsunamis flight path? When the tsunami is done, the chairman of the panel, the same talk talk vet doctor will remember where he kept the terms of reference for his assignment.

Did you not read that Siemens recently landed a new contract from the Federal Government? Siemens !, The same Siemens you know. I still have a copy of the daily with a shouting cover page headline indicating that Siemens had been black listed by the Federal Government a while ago. After a macabre dance of sulugede, Siemens is unblacklisted and is landing juicy contacts. Our talk talk Vet, the jack of all trade is also not far from the circumstances that led to the initial blacklisting. I hope my tsunami unfolds the mystery that Farida has failed to reveal.

Give me a Ghanaian visa let me go. I am so eager to destabilize this country. Surely Barack Obama should have the formular. Or perhaps Attah Mills will also play a role. Aha, Jerry Rowlings will not be far away. Who else has a better, tested and trusted way of destabilizing a country but Rowlings? I want to seat down to a glowing tutorial on country destabilization 101. I want to learn from the best.

Abeg I need this visa. Even one day outside this country will help my life expectancy. I need to breathe a different air. Air devoid of election rigging. I want to see light for twenty four hours. My laptop can remain full charged all day. Oh, Oh, Ghana, here I come. I heard I wouldn’t have to push and fight to enter a bus. I need a Ghanaian visa.

This is my dream trip. An experience of a life time. Nothing could be better? Anything that would destabilize this country is welcomed especially when the definition of the word ‘destabilize’ is as conceived by the reincarnation of Abacha’s Wada Nas. I sign up. Mohammed H. Bello thank you so much for exposing the plans of these failed members of the opposition. They wanted to have the booty alone. Now we all know. I am also going to Ghana. I just need a visa.

A REASON TO LAUGH

There are those things you remember doing some years back or events that occurred way back that makes you want to laugh your guts out. These are those things you remember now and you wonder; did I really do this?, did this happen?, How were things then? Etc
For example I remember the television we had when I was way younger. To be fair, the tv was big. I mean big. How did people get to carry those kinds of tv then sef?. Of all its size, it was black and white and wait for this, it had a wooden shelter. The shelter was like a wardrobe or should I say a cabinet with two hinged doors. At 4.oopm when the NTA began transmission (usually with a rendition of the national anthem) the tv door is unlocked. Much later (I can’t say when ‘cos I promptly went to bed after the Network news then) it was locked again. Among the special effects of the tv was its channel searching apparatus. It was a knob just by the screen. To get a channel, you turn the knob like you will while switching on a fan. Gee, it seems so laughable now with buttons and remote controls.
Remember all those childhood plays we used to play. We had this play in which me mimicked a family. The guys acted the role of father. The girls naturally act mothers. There is usually the cooking part, usually with sand and leaves. When it’s done. Its served and consumed via the neck. You just touch some of the food to your neck and then throw the rest away.
There was the war play. Any guy that did not do the “war start” needs to revisit his childhood. There are two teams. Just like in the war movies. You hide, seek out the opponent and make sure you shoot first. Check out the kinds of gun now…Sticks, clubs, broken pipes, paw-paw leaf stalk, name it. Perhaps the more interesting part of the play was the argument on who shot who first and who has refused to die.
Do you remember your favourite tv programes then? Tales by moonlight, Speakout, Sesame street, Super Ted, vultrone. Tom & Jerry are new skool. Jeez, I would do anything for a spider man comic book then.
Remember when we use to go to so much trouble to get the lyrics of a song. You get the cassette and armed with a radio, you play, write down, rewind, play again and write down. When you meet up in school, you needed to hold your own in the company of your guys. I think the last lyric I took pains to ‘download’ was Sisquo’s Unleash the dragon. Did I really get the lyrics right? Lol.
Think of what pains you went through to get a girls attention. Think of how you went to great pains just to get her wave or smile at you. Think of the first time you “chyked” a girl, how long it took you to muster the courage, how well you tried to memorize your lines, how you called her out to that tree shed to deliver your well rehearsed manifesto. Remember her drawing maps with her leg as you rattled away. Then what was the response?, “I will think about it”. Hahaha.
Remember what it was like before the coming of GSM. Then, maybe only one person had a NITEL land line in your street. Rare and far in between calls from distant relatives are received from that line. I remember neighbours coming over and sitting for hours waiting for a call in our small parlour. Yes, I was one of those who grew up with the privilege of having a land line at home.
The other alternative was the public phone booths. Those places were the center of frustration and comedy. Especially on campus. You arrive a phone booth on a hot afternoon and meet a queue. ten or eleven people are before you. Five are there is flesh and blood, while three are in spirit. They have either strolled off are the space had been secured for them by someone else pending their arrival. You wait patiently. The network is usually a mess. Connecting one line could be no mean task. It gets to the turn of one of those activity-chewing gum chewing-chicks and instead of making her call and giving way, she stands there, the phone handset held to her ear by her shoulder, flipping through a phone diary. Each call is to a darling or a sweetheart or to “baby”. She spends ages before she is done. All she had been doing was begging for money from one mugu to another. While her drama lasted, the kind of hisses and grunts you will be hearing from others waiting to take their turn is better imagined.
One that got me really laughing recently was my first birthday picture. Hey I advice after reading this piece that you go back and take another look at your first birthday picture. See all the effort put in to make you stake the picture. You might even be crying. See the table; minerals to either side and the cake in the middle. i wasn’t crying in mine though, but I was not interested in neither the cake no whoever the photographer in front was. I was looking away. I later showed my mum the pix and after a long laugh which got tears to her eyes she recalled with joy how the photographer had taken several shots before he could come up with that shot which was arguably the best.

Life is good jooh, especially when we look back and fond memories remind of where we have been. It presents you a reason to laugh. Whether your laugh comes as a result of the stupidity of the event or the humour content, either way you laugh and each time we laugh, somethinh happens to our physiology. I leave that part to psychologists to explain.

Sylva Nze ifedigbo.

Mixed Marriages and the Southeast

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

When a Catholic man weds a non catholic female it doesn’t steer up much controversy save for the baptism (or re-baptism) of the lady involved and administration of the sacrament of the Eucharist. The lady becomes whole and whole Catholic just like her husband. They become one. But when a Catholic lady intends to marry a non catholic man a serious controversy steers up.

Here is the issue. There has always been this age long law of the Catholic Church as regards to mixed marriages. From a very strict position, the Vatican in 1966 as part of some minor reforms relaxed some of the law. The Holy See in the document softened some restrictions and eliminated the penalty of excommunication for Catholics who are married before a non-Catholic clergyman. This provision is automatic and retroactive. For the non-Catholic partner, the impact of the promise that children born of the marriage be baptized and raised in the Catholic faith was softened. The nuptial Mass may be celebrated, the nuptial blessing imparted, and a clergyman of another faith may assist at the marriage of a Catholic and a non-Catholic. (see 1966 Religion Archive Article of Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009).

One place where apparently the 1966 relaxation of the mixed marriage law has not taken effect is South-East Nigeria. Here, a lady marrying a non Catholic man is viewed almost as an anathema or a sacrilege. The trauma undergone by the persons involved is better imagined. The biggest victims in most cases are the parents of the bride who have to withstand the greatest challenge to their faith. It is often a case of choosing between the wishes/happiness of their Children or respect for the Church. This trauma is transferred to the children in forms only those who have experienced it can explain.

Spelling it out, in most parts of south east Nigeria today, the parents of a lady wishing to marry a non catholic stand the risk of excommunication. I am very certain of the situation in many towns in the region. In fact to the minds of the Catholic villagers there, such a thing should not even be mentioned to the hearing of the ear.

Where the normal practice of the lady dragging her would be husband to the Catholic church for the wedding is done, the lady and her husband have to promise (I prefer to say swear) that the lady will maintain her faith after the wedding and that children born of the marriage would be baptized and raised in the Catholic faith.

For the purposes of proceeding with the marriage usually, the couples make this promise, but do they keep it afterwards? Since there is usually no mechanism to enforce the promise the couples made before the marriage, why insist on the law in the first place? Is the Catholic Church not just holding onto something that has been overtaken by events; a law that is both retrogressive and archaic?

Out side the need to keep people within the faith which informs the insistence that both wife and children remain Catholics, isn’t the Church simply causing more troubles for such mixed marriages? How does it look that on a Sunday morning the wife dresses up and heads in a particular direction and the husband dresses up and heads in a different direction. What does this portend for the unity and oneness of a family which is critical to the success of marriages? Aren’t the two supposed to become one after wedding?

The offspring’s of these marriages are even in a greater dilemma. They are by the law supposed to be baptized in the Catholic Church and to follow their mother to that church. The father we know is still the head of the family. How many fathers with the ego that goes with being one in Africa would see his children going against his own faith? Does a situation where father and mother are in a battle to secure the allegiance of their children to their own faith mean well for any marriage?

The questions here in summary are, why make couple make promises they wouldn’t ultimately keep? Why indirectly encourage instability and lack of unity in marriages? And thirdly, why threaten parents who had no hand whatsoever in determining the person their daughter met and fell in love with, with excommunication if she doesn’t wed in the Catholic Church?

I know a host of persons who have been held hostage by the insistence of some Parish Priests with Vatican I ideologies and conservative village Catholic communities who would not bulge or relax the law. We have a situation of parents some of who are high up in the catholic lay leadership and who are expected to know better insisting on their daughter’s compliance on the one hand and a daughter caught up in love and the desire for marriage on the other hand. The end result of most of the situations I have known of had not been very pleasant ones.

It is important to enquire if the practice in Southeast Nigeria does not negate the 1966 document of the Vatican to that effect. There is also enough reason to wonder why the situation appears worse in the southeast. Does it have to do with the traditions of the people, the age long battle for supremacy between the Catholics and the Anglicans, or does it have to do with the world view of the Bishops in this region?

This issue is a very disturbing one for my generation. In the absence of verifiable statistics, I can safely state that Catholics dominate the Christendom in Nigeria. Among these are many young ladies who need to get married. With increased association made possible by education, business and travel they meet with and have greater chances of falling in love with men of other Christian faiths. Should this law (or the obsession of some clergy men to enforce this law) be a hindrance to their pursing love and happiness?

nzeifedigbo@yahoo.com

www.nzesylva.wordpress.com

Now, i will retire

Now, I will retire.

“Once this goes right, I will retire”, the man tells himself as he paces the room. The business had been more lucrative than he had earlier imagined. It was a way of getting back from the society what the society had siphoned from his people for so many years. Each of his accounts in the twenty five banks had a handsome amount. The type he hitherto heard only when Governors were announcing contracts on television. Those contracts that never get executed.  Now he was taking his share. He was getting even with the society. But he thought it was a good time to retire. “I am not a criminal”, he thinks. “I am not like them, those rogues that run around town making plenty noise with their sirens. I am a freedom fighter” He reminds himself. “ I will retire after this deal”

He drops the shiny pistol on the table and picks up the phone. He needed the phone to ring. He dials a number and listens. There was no response at the other end. “wetin they happen now?” he musses and drops the phone again. His eye runs to his wrist. The twelve hours ultimatum would be expiring in two hours. He was eager to get this done. “Was thirty million still too much for them to pay?” he wonders. The negotiation process had been exhausting. He had been on the phone for close to an hour. At the end, he had to slice off twenty million. That was how generous he could get. The commodity was worth much more, but he needed to get this done with. Thirty million was a round enough figure.

There were two other calls he expected. Two other commodities had over stayed in the warehouse. The value of one had gone from twenty million to ten million and even now at two million, the owners didn’t seem in a hurry to come and claim him. This was the problem with dealing in locals. We didn’t have value for our own. He had told his boys the very day they brought in the commodity that he wasn’t worth much. Two weeks now and no deal yet. He was just consuming food for nothing. “May be I should further reduce his amount” the man thinks. “I can take one million. One million is a good price for a councilor”.

The other over stayed commodity in the warehouse was worth twenty million. She had been there for three days. How he hated keeping female commodities. He was a hard man, but not so hard in the face of the tears of a lady. She had been crying and throwing tantrums all day, asking to be released. She is a daughter of one of the traditional rulers. A princess. The intelligence information that she was visiting from England where she was a college student had been very accurate. She had strayed out to a club in Port Harcourt one night and never got back home. When the calls were made, her father, the Royal Highness had promised to deliver on schedule. Twenty million should be a chicken change for him. “Why was he now stalling?”

The man begins to pace the room again. His pistol is in hand. One thing he had learnt in this line of business was patience. Patience was a virtue. Be patient and a bit firm. It always worked. His very first mega deal, his breakthrough in the business had thought him that. Those seven white skins from Shell. It had made the news headlines. All the dailies reported it on the cover. Even CNN mentioned it.  He remembers how he had sat and watched with pride, a bottle of Squadron in hand. He had invested much in that deal. The seven whites had to receive a five star worth treatment in captivity. For a whole week, they made no demand. He was patient. Give time for the anxiety to build. The Government first threatened. Shell ran from pillar to post, evacuating all other offshore white skin staff to Port Harcourt. The home Governments of the seven soon began to mount pressure on Aso Rock. Aso Rock’s tone turned from threats to pleas. Then he rang out their demand. A hundred million for each head.

The state governor led the negotiation. He was a good negotiator. He had negotiated his way to the government house with the barrel of guns. The man had boys that had been stealing oil and selling for him from time immemorial. He was not different from the hostage takers. He had the whole state hostages. He knew that much. So when the bargaining began, he played ball. Forty Million was paid for each head. The Governor pocketed five million on each head, for his services as negotiator. The commander of the Army Task Force got a million on each head. The hostages were released and every body was happy. The governor and the army boasted on how they had secured the release of the hostages. No one mentioned the amount s that was involved. They said they didn’t negotiate.

Another big deal had been the capture of a top politicians aged mother. The man had been running his mouth in Abuja about the situation in the Niger Delta. He said the freedom fighters were mere criminals. When his Mother disappeared, he came crying. Obviously he loved his mother very much.  The ransom was paid in full, right from the Central Bank. A week later, he evacuated both his parents and everyone related to him to the safety of the Federal Capital.

Once, a young man; a university student – a spoilt son of one money bag had contacted them requesting to be kidnapped. His father had been starving him of pocket money for a while now. He had flunked all his exams in the university and his father wanted to show some anger. His monthly two million naira pocket money was withheld. He willingly submitted himself to be kidnapped. That way, he could force out some money from him stingy father. Ten million was demanded. The father bargained. Five million was agreed. The boy got his two million and went away happy.

And how he had been enjoying his proceeds. A Rover-Rover Sportage Jeep just joined his fleet. That fleet had a Hummer 2 and a Nissan Armada. Two new gun boats had only just arrived too. The oil bunkering division of his business had to remain one step ahead of the Army task force. Those liverless agents of tyranny. How he hated them. He enjoyed killing them. Once his boys sank a naval gun boat and killed three ratings on board. They had celebrated it with bottles of Rum. “I am a freedom fighter” he moans under his breath. His index finger caresses the pistol trigger.

Even a freedom fighter had the right to a retirement. His palatial villa in Yanegoa was ready for occupation. The oil bunkering would continue however. Those massive pipes that crisscrossed the creeks would guarantee his pension. After years of hearing from corrupt leaders that the solutions to their problems was in the pipeline, they had decided to break the pipeline and see for themselves what was in there and why it was taking such time to come out. What they saw was black gold. Indeed, the leaders were right after all. The solution to their problems was right there in the pipeline.

He thought briefly of what he would be doing in retirement. He would join a golf club. Yes, that’s what those retired Generals do. There wasn’t much difference between a retired General and a retired Freedom fighter. The similarities were more. They both had the right figures in their bank accounts. “I could even join a political party” he thought aloud. “May be I can contest for a seat in the legislature”. He knew at least three senators who were retired freedom fighters. “No. I will join the opposition. That’s what respectable freedom fighters do”. Being in the opposition as an ex-freedom fighter had it’s advantages. Each time you sneezed, the Government caught cold. There was no better security for your pension. And of course, the boys in the creek will still see you as one of their own.

The phone on the table rings. The man is jolted out of his thoughts. He moves over fast.  The caller number seems to excite him. He smiles. He lets it ring over and over. It was part of the strategy. He finally picks and sounds so impatient and uninterested. The call is short. The discussion is straight to the point. The call ends. A smile is on his face. Thirty million had been delivered. “Now, I will retire” he grins.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

Nigeria’s Corruption Diary for one week (Mon 4th May – Fri 8th May 2009)

It’s been an interesting week in Nigeria. Interesting not because we accomplished any outstanding feat,  but because of the many sad incidents of that same thing that have left us a pariah state and which Prof Dora thinks she can burnish with a wave of the hand; Corruption.

In just one week, we had news reports of brazen acts of high profile corruption involving such huge amounts that could sink the entire economy of some of our less endowed African states.

In this week, the PDP did what they do best. Employing their ‘do or die’ approach and with the express assistance of the cash n carry conscience of Ayoka Adebayo, they masterfully stole back Ekiti State even against the hue and cry of the people. Of course the Police and the Army were on ground to see that the people were fully repressed and for all their cared, we all can go to blazes, Oni has been returned elected.

But the women who walked naked in Ekiti in protest against the PDP don’t seem to have walked in vain. Disagreements over the sharing of an alleged 250 million naira bribe money by the INEC officials in Ido-Osi has since emerged. Ido-Osi we will recall was the theater of PDP’s rigging project. It was only there that some 19,000 people voted and of course close to 16,000 did so for the PDP. It was results from that LGA that made Ayoka Adebayo resign in the first instance and of course, it was the laughable figures from there that gave Oni victory.

The Police say it is quizzing the said INEC officials and that serious confessional statements have been made. If this issue is not treated Nigerian style, perhaps we might not wait for lengthy judicial processes to prove what we all know happened in Ido-Osi. The gods are not dead after all.

Still in this week, A top cop and EFCC’s Director of Operations was sent packing.  In an act that was enough to make us a laughing stock in the world, this man was found to have contracted out his studies and exams as a Law student at the University of Abuja.  This man is the head of Operations of Nigeria’s anti graft agency. Why then do we worry over the operations of the EFCC when one of its head is a common criminal buying his way to a Law degree?

Examination malpractice carries a punishment of 21 years in jail. I remember my school principal reading out those laws to us before the commencement of WAEC exams. Surely, the disgraced cop will not get 21 years. His case might never be mentioned again, but he has provided for us a big reason to question what happens at the University of Abuja.

It is not a hidden fact that as soon as our politicians rig their way to power and arrive Abuja, they immediately register for one program or the other at the University to shore up their credentials. Soon, you hear they have graduated, beaming with smiles in an academic gown. Most of them do the very same thing the former EFCC director of Operation was caught for. They bribe everybody from the dean to the cleaners. They only come to claim their degree after the duration of the program.

This time we had a cop, a law enforcement officer and one who carries the extra responsibility of ridding our society of financial crimes being caught in the act. In places like China, he would have been hanging by the neck, but in Nigeria, were such things are deemed normal; the man was just sacked from EFCC.

Still within this week, the EFCC seemingly waking up from deep sleep (perhaps following the sack of their Director of Operations who might have been the clog in the wheel) uncovered a massive scam of about 5.3Billion Naira. Billion I must repeat here for emphasis not Million. A senator and other official of the Ministry of power have been picked up for questioning while three House of Representative members involved are still plying hide and seek with the EFCC agents.

The money, 5.3 billion which was meant for Rural Electrification vanished. The senator, his cohorts in the House and the officials of the ministry preferred to electrify their pockets with the money. Coming on the heels of the seeming inability of the House to tell us what really happened to the 16billion dollars Independent Power Project, this tells us that darkness will remain one thing Prof. Dora will never re-brand in our National image.

Earlier in the week, the Minister of Works, Hassan Lawal on inspection of Federal Roads construction around the country had made a startling revelation, one that was enough to bring out the people of Anambra and indeed the entire southeast in violent protest. He revealed to the utter amazement of Governor Peter Obi and the journalists in his crew that contrary to the held belief, no contract was awarded for the construction of the second Niger Bridge.

Former President Obasanjo a professional maverick, had in the last days of his administration, when the campaigns were already high announced that the Federal Government had approved the construction of the long sought after bridge. It was said to be counterpart funded between the Federal Government and the Anambra state Government.

But the minister stated emphatically and would have sworn by the holy books had he been pressed further that no such thing existed in Governments records. It never happened, he stated. He didn’t deny Obasanjo saying so, but he was saying invariably that Obasanjo simply lied. Considering that he was a member of Obasanjo’s cabinet and a close one at that (one of the few who never lost their portfolios) he is in a position to know better. 

Invariably speaking therefore, Obasanjo said that as a campaign trick to cow the south east into voting PDP again. Imagine a President, the father of the nation, lying to the nation with a straight face on an issue as important as the second Niger Bridge which held so much to the economy of the nation. This president walks around free and plays statesman monitoring elections all over Africa.

As if to bring the week to a thrilling climax, a House Committee disclosed that 1.3 billion was paid by the Nigeria customs for the supply of two light surveillance aircrafts in 2007and in May 2009, the aircrafts have not yet arrived. Did the money grow wings or is it that the contractor vanished? In any case, what do we say about a Customs leadership that paid for an aircraft, it wasn’t supplied and they are so ok with it? The Comptroller General argues that only part payment was made, an audit report brandished by the Honourables stated otherwise, so who then is lying?

All these incidences of corruption happened or were revealed in just one week and we hardly took notice. In the US the diversion of some funds by officials of AIG was a huge scandal, one that took Television headlines for weeks and there were probes and all that. Here however, scandals of larger magnitudes hardly steer up any discourse because they’ve become normal occurrences and because nothing happens after its revelation.

Which way Nigeria? I beg to ask.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo.

www.nzesylva.wordpress.com

The Re-branding of Conscience; Ayoka Adebayo as a case study.

“My conscience as a Christian will not allow me to further participate in this process” It was with these words that Mrs. Ayoka Adebayo resigned her appointment as the Ekiti State Resident Electoral Commissioner on April 28 2009. A series of events followed which has left every one in doubt of just what value Mrs. Adebayo’s conscience is worth.  It all came to a climax yesterday when she shamelessly and without recourse to her hitherto advertised Christian Conscience announced and returned Segun Oni of the PDP as winner of the protracted gubernatorial re-run election.

It first became obvious that so much dirty water was flowing under the bridge when the 74 year old electoral umpire after purportedly resigning her appointment and being declared wanted by the police arrived Abuja and had a closed door meeting with the wuruwuru master himself Prof Maurice Iwu the INEC chairman. She emerged from that meeting singing a new song. “I am still a member of the INEC family” she shouted and perhaps to confuse us all the more, she added “God bless Nigeria”.

Before that meeting, she had claimed that she had resigned as a result of the overwhelming pressure put on her to announce results that her conscience wouldn’t let her. Further investigations by journalists including a phone interview on Ray power fm with one of her aides revealed that trouble had started after results of the re-run election in Ido-Osi LGA were brought in. Mrs. Adebayo had rejected the result based on the fact that its collation was done in a Police station (not a designated collation center) without her permission and the said result was not signed for by the party agents. Both anomalies were against the provisions of the electoral act.

No one needed any special intelligence to decipher where the pressure was coming from. The PDP had allocated unimaginable figures to themselves in that LGA, enough to wipe out The AC’s 11,000 lead and needed her to announce that result and secure them victory.

After the Abuja meeting with Iwu, Mrs. Adebayo returned to Ado-Ekiti to finish her job. Elections held Tuesday 5^th May in the Oye and afterwards the final result was announced.

In an unbelievable U-turn, Mrs. Adebayo announced the tainted results from Ido-Osi, the same results her conscience had held her from announcing. The same results she had rejected before resigning. Her conscience suddenly took flight or perhaps it got rebranded after her meeting with Iwu. She in dealing a final blow to the hopes of the people for credible elections did the bidding of the PDP by announcing Oni as winner.

Why is the results from Ido-Osi an issue? Aside the fact that they did not meet the primary requirements of the electoral act (as initially stated by Adebayo her self), the figures as announced yesterday was itself suspect. PDP pooled almost 16000 votes with the AC recording just some 3000. The PDP will of course be fast in reminding us that Ido-osi is the base of their candidate, but has it occurred to any one that in all the 10 LGA where elections held it was only in Ido-Osi that over 19,000 people voted. In fact in most of the other LGA less than 5000 votes were recorded. Why such high figures from Ido-osi? Needless to add here that it was the Ido-Osi figures that gave Segun Oni the close to 4000 votes with which he emerged winner over Fayemi.

The fraud here is so obvious. Once again The PDP gets away with massive electoral fraud and this time they did it with the active connivance of the re-branded conscience of Mrs. Ayoka Adebayo, a 74 year old granny.  Mrs. Adebayo must know that she just lost an opportunity to do one good in her entire 74 years on earth and she so squandered it.

Now the women who went half naked in her support might as well go stark naked in protest against her. The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) that threatened to go to court if anything happened to Mrs. Adebayo in the height of her being declared wanted perhaps would now chew their words. Obviously Adebayo’s definition of Christian Conscience did not agree with CAN’s. Some people even called her “an icon of democracy”, alas we know, she is nothing close to that.

The AC has announced its readiness to go to court again and challenge the elections. That is the civilized thing to do. But it hurts to know that while the courts take all their time to do their thing, an imposter will be sitting and administering a state. I feel hurt for the people of Ekiti, the women and Youths who came out to boldly express their desire for change. I feel hurt for the lives that were lost in the process. I feel hurt for the Electoral observers who the PDP unleashed terror on. I feel hurt for the soul of this nation. It was high time we stamped a foot strong and said enough is enough.

As Oni prepares to be sworn in for a fresh four year term, I wonder what his conscience (if indeed he has one) tells him. “This people voted me to lead them” or “I am a thief, I stole my way to power”. The things we see in this country makes one wonder if ‘Truth’ was still a virtue.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

www.nzesylva.wordpress.com

 

 

I am getting bald

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo

I am getting bald! Chei!!!. The reality first struck me as I shaved my rough jaw at the barber’s two days ago. The barber’s aproko mirror had made the revelation. Oh, how I hate mirrors. I don’t own one. My visitors after grumbling their displeasure about it always made do with the shiny surface of a CD plate or my laptop cam coder. Fine people don’t need mirrors, I always argue. We already knew how good we looked.

On this day, the poke-nosing mirror in the barbers shop decided to carry out an assignment no one asked it to. Oh, how I hate that mirror! It did some good job though. It first showed me my soft dark lips made more inviting by the strip of mustache just above it. The barber had just shaped the mustache out and hey I was feeling like Prince Hakeem…Coming to America, remember?

Then, there was my not too pointed and not too flat nose, which sat there like the creation of a master sculptor. Nobody has my kind of nose in this world. Oh! My special nose. I have doubled checked on my parents and I am convinced neither of them gave me that. With my nose, Obama might just have garnered the primary requirements for being described as ‘Handsome.’ You just didn’t read that. Oh, my special nose!!

Did I ever mention to you that I had sexy eyes? Well, now you know. The barber’s mirror confirmed it. I am not just bragging. Eyes that tell a million tales. Oh, how many dames have I scored with those eyes. The spectacle in the eyes is their ability to modify in diameter depending on the occasion. Those eyes started having medicated eye lenses over them since primary four. Now, I hide them from public view with big dark glasses. The celebrity kind. Wouldn’t want to cause a stir in public you know, with chics starring and walking into gutters. Believe me, it has happened before. But even with them glasses on, I still cause the stir. Ever seen Sean Combs, I mean the American record producer and rap artist, also known as Puffy, Puff Daddy, and P. Diddy? He looks kind of like me when I am on those glasses.

And this; my eyebrows. Wonder brows. Amazing sight. The eight wonder of the modern world. Never carved by any razor blade, yet so perfectly curved. Bushy patch of jet black hair, that runs in semi circular fashion over both eyes and rendezvous at my nose ridge. Are you shocked? Yeah, indeed my eyebrows meet. Even the barber was impressed or was it appalled? What ever, just know that you will not find too many of my kind even on Google earth. Special me.

Then the yeye barber’s mirror spoilt every thing. The next thing it revealed was a long stretch of hairless skin. This can’t all be my forehead I wondered. Jeez!!! What is happening?. The place looked like a deserted patch of land ravaged by desertification. What I was seeing was the Kalahari not my head. Not the remaining part of my fine boy face. This mirror must be playing a trick.

Where did all the hair go to? Oh God, I am dead. As I looked at it, I could swear the hair had retreated by at least close to an inch especially at the edges. So I was going to end up looking like Daddy after all? Ewu Chi m oo! Gregor Mendel’s law in action…for my head? Na wah oh! This was what my classmates in vet school would have called a case of “frontal alopecia.” And just imagine, I was planning to keep an afro like Wole Soyinka when I am forty and see it turn grey as I approach seventy. Pipe dream!!

But wait a second. Bald is good. Yeah. Bald is cool. Bald is beautiful. Bald is sexy. Most successful men I know are bald. I think it confers some kind of manliness. Cool, manly me. Isn’t that something to cheer about? Check this out: cool, manly, fine boy Sylva. Complete picture. Perfect picture. Are the ladies listening?

What am I saying? Life is not a perfect walk. Nothing is perfect. Perfect is nothing. Things happen along the line. Things we wish were just dreams. Things we wish we could change. Things we can’t change. But in most cases we fail to see the beauty in those things. We pitch ourselves against ourselves. We struggle to make it perfect. We end up hating ourselves. We fail.

I imagine me at forty. Not with the Soyinka brand afro. On my extremely cool low cut. A fitting designer suit hanging down perfectly. I would look into a mirror and remember this first day the barber’s mirror showed me a glimpse of the future me. I would smile. Fine bald daddy Sylva. No regrets. Thank Goodness I am bald. And oh, did I mention I am going shopping for a room mirror? I need to keep track of this hair retreat process.

Sylva Nze Ifedigbo