I have no doubts that we need to educate and re-educate Africans. My blog is not a source of historical facts, but I can reflect on what has been and I have a right to write based on my observations and inspirations.
There is no doubt that we have challenges in Africa. We do.
Sometimes I wish I could go out and preach, not as a lazy religious leader ripping the people of their hard earned monies, but as a preacherman asking the people to look deep into their souls and search within for the meaning of their lives and the significance of their existence in relation to their immediate habitat and in a global context.
In matters of African policy and politics, the intellectuals have been relegated and rendered insignificant. They have been pushed to the background, relegated and made voiceless.
Why do we need to educate and re-educate Africans?
We have lost touch with our culture.
We don’t speak our languages.
We don’t write in our languages. I am Yoruba and have not written Yoruba in several decades. I don’t know how to put marks on Yoruba letters. I am guilty. I need education
We need to teach us our culture and languages.
We need to teach us the goodness of our spiritualities and educate ourselves how to remove the evil part of our spiritualities.
We need to go back to our civilization. It was modern and progressive.
We need to find out why we lost the mind games that brought slavery and colonization to our lands. We shall not make the same mistakes now or in the future.
We need to wear our natural hairs and natural looks.
We need to write our own books and read them along with others. But ours must be the priority.
We need to educate ourselves and our children on the need to work together and build together.
We need the education and the re-education that will bring us glory.
We are AFRICANS.
Our stories and our existence go far beyond the origin of the Bible and Koran.
We owe it to ourselves to find out what went wrong.
I heard a brother asked: how did we fall to the foreign forces if our gods and ancestors were so powerful? It is a stupid question. It is like asking how the lizard got into your room despite the walls and windows. If you know how the lizard got into your room, you know the answer to your foolishness or carelessness.
We must with haste, re-educate everyone.
My generation may not achieve so much, but these things we write will help us and those coming after us to know that AFRICAN is the NUCLEUS of the world.
We need education and re-education.
This short essay does not say it all. I just wanted to wake you up. You’ve been sleeping since you were born.
Nigerian politicians are criminals. None of them can walk down the street. That is how unsafe they have made Nigeria for themselves and the people.
The Wind, our Way.
By Adeola Aderounmu
How we got here? I could have said no idea. But l know a bit of history and it would shock me if after blogging since 2006 l have not put down most or all of what l know.
What continues to shock me is the existence and persistence of Nigeria. Let me explain. Nigerian politicians are criminals. They are living “good”. In quote because they have stolen monies to splash around in Nigeria and several places around the world whereas Nigeria as a country is a disaster. No Nigerian politician can walk down the street. So, living good would remain in quote.
Those who benefit from the anomalies in Nigeria do not agree that Nigeria is a disaster. But whether they agree or not, they are in a constellation, lumped together with some of the poorest people in the world and probably the most useless government in the world as well. They can argue however or whatever they like, Nigeria and the constitution on which Nigeria is operated is a disgrace to the African race. Any Nigerian intellectual who cannot argue against the 1999 constitution is more or less a fool and a selfish soul.
The wind is the way of Nigeria. It is heading for a painful end. The wind should not be our way in Yorubaland. This is the time for Yoruba Omo Oduduwa to work together. We have a choice to steer the course of history and to change it for good.
Those who love Nigeria the way it is and the politicians live in a country plagued by some of the worst infrastructure in the world. Nigeria is decayed. There are personal and principled reasons l have not gone to Nigeria since 2018. I don’t have electricity in my home in Nigeria. The instability of the supply can result to a heart attack. I cannot drive to my house; the roads are not just there. If you live in Festac and try to drive to Agbara, you will understand my points. Insecurity is a way of life in Nigeria. I don’t sleep well at night. I always fear herdsmen or armed robbers are around the corner. Even during the day, I always have to look over my shoulders.
Now, let’s look at the Nigerian people. How on earth can more than 180m people allow their country to go down? How on earth can the people continue to live in poverty, penury and hopelessness? How can they be so aware of the problems or pretend that they don’t exist? How on earth can more than 180 million people allow the status quo to continue? How?
There are options for Nigeria and Nigerians. When we mention revolution, some are quick to add, can you lead it? Who wants to die?
Really? Who wants to die? That is so funny and ridiculous. Nigerians are dying with very less dignity than cows, chickens and goats! They are kidnapped or slaughtered! They die in road accidents every minute of the day across the country. The police shoot them like games. The soldiers massacre them in manners only seen in war time genocide. Bandits, who are actually terrorists are having free rampages in the North especially. They kill village heads, community leaders, women, men and children. They kidnap politicians and their families. They kill at will.
And somebody is asking….who wants to die? We are all dying already! It is the degree, speed, timing and methods that vary. There are other options because a revolution may still lump up people who are so different in the end such that peace may be elusive even after doing away with the politicians and their accomplices that have brought decay all over the country.
Prior to the amalgamation of Nigeria, there are economically viable kingdoms and regions in what is modern day Nigeria. Even as late as 1966 before the 2 reckless coups by the military, the regions were still viable, progressive, independent and at pace with global development. The poverty, penury and hopelessness of Nigeria today is an indirect effect of the amalgamation of Nigeria and the 1966 coups and a direct effect of the people allowing criminals to dictate the affairs of the country.
That must stop. Resistance must be the new order.
It is time for a new order. Those of us agitating for the freedom of the nations entrapped in Nigeria need to be more aggressive. We cannot be silent and passive anymore. We cannot allow those keeping the status quo to our detriments to keep running the show. It is time for a new order of things.
The politicians and the elites holding Nigeria and Nigerians to ransom don’t care. If they do, they should know that the politics in Nigeria today does not cover the needs of the common man or woman. We can give a million reasons why we need to put an end to Nigeria.
Personally, I lend my support to the emancipation of the Easterners and I hope they put their house in order through unity of purpose and intents. If this comes by Biafra, so be it. For the Yoruba nation or the Oodua Kingdom to which l belong, it is no longer a secret that I will dedicate my time, money and positive actions to the realization of the Oodua Kingdom/Republic. I will channel my efforts primarily through the Ilana Omo Oodua group.
The United Nations is aware of our struggle for freedom. We will be moving ahead hoping to organize a referendum soon. I call on all Yoruba people all over the world to join the struggle for freedom.
We must act in unity for our strengths lie in our togetherness. This is not the time to view one group as superior to the other. This is the time to shelf all personal ambitions and glorification.
The wind is the way of Nigeria. It is heading for a painful end. The wind should not be our way in Yorubaland. This is the time for Yoruba Omo Oduduwa to work together. We have a choice to steer the course of history and to change it for good.
This series started in 2008 and this is the 13th edition. You can read my previous reflections using the page My Random Reflections at the top on this blog.
In 2008 when l wrote the first in the series. I was 36. l had no idea it was going to be an annual entry on my birthday, July 12. But it is now. A tradition.
Last year my post was about a number of predictions of what was going to happen before and after you finish reading the piece. If you are keen on Nigeria, you may browse the entry and see how easy it is to predict the fate of Nigeria and Nigerians.
There are still many things to reflect upon about Nigeria. They are mostly repetitions of what l have written about in the last 20 years. On September 9, 2002, l wrote a piece in the Nigerian Guardian Newspaper titled Why Politicians Steal. The reason Nigerian politicians stole in 2002 is still the same reason they steal in 2020.
Nigeria is running a very useless system of government. The politicians cannot be arrested by the police. They are above the law and they are immune to arrest and prosecution. Currently, two organised criminal organisations are running Nigeria. They are popularly called APC and PDP. But they are the same group of gangsters who moved in and out of the group at will depending on favours and ambitions.
By not having the authority to arrest corrupt politicians and bad people in the country, the Nigerian Police became one of the most useless institutions in the world. By not being independent and lacking the possibility of keeping the country under check & balance, the Nigerian judiciary is not far from the Nigerian police as one of the most useless arms of government in the world.
By being so resilient and incapable of initiating social changes that would change the course of their history, Nigerians are the most unserious and suffering-abiding citizens the world had seen. Nigeria is made of recipes for disasters.
I am sorry to say you may be an idiot if you claim to either belong to APC or PDP. That means that you don´t see how the politicians themselves are acting out the scripts. There are only a few of them who have not crossed carpets from one to the other. There is no matured Nigerian politician alive that has not belonged to at least 2 political parties in his/her lifetime. So if a citizen says, I am APC or PDP, that citizen is most likely a moron.
In essence, my point is that there are almost no political parties in Nigeria. The 2 major ones are criminal organisations. If you belong to a criminal organisation while trying to play your part in the destruction of what is left of Nigeria, you are insane and part of the problems that need to be eliminated for freedom to come.
It is not only the politicians that are ruining or destroying Nigeria. Nigeria is at a point where majority of the population are destroying the system or what is left of it so that they could survive. With massive unemployment, spread of insecurity and rise of terrorism, the destruction of Nigeria will climax someday. No one knows when or what the consequences will lead to. Nigeria is not sustainable.
You can tell that l am tired of the question: what is the solution to Nigeria´s problems? It is now clear that in order to find the answer to this question, one has to admit that there is no country called Nigeria in the first place. Nigeria is a fraudulent arrangement put together for the pleasure of the queen of England. Niger-Area metamorphosed to Nigeria as a British business empire in 1914.
The opportunity cost was the sovereignty of the nations that were clustered in the unholy marriage. For a while it worked. It did, especially when the fraudsters/colonial thugs from England who put it together perfected the process of indirect rule. What happened since october 1st 1960 unveiled the demons in the skin of the Africans occupying the geopolitical zone called Nigeria.
The gap between Europé and Nigeria for example is unwarranted considering the intellectual pool that Nigeria supplies to Europé and America annually. But how can the rest of the world be like paradise and Nigeria a total enclave of incivility? Where do you begin to do the analyses? Before you even begin to defend the insanity in Nigeria, take a trip to the oil producing area and come back with the EIA of the oil spillage. Oh, you don´t know what EIA is. Start from there.
I have written so much in the last 2 decades that l really don´t know how to summarise the points l am trying to make. But l will try. What could have become of Nigeria if for example politicians are not criminals or criminals are not politicians?
What would have become of Nigeria if there was love and no civil war from 1967 – 1970? What would have become of Nigeria if we abandoned the foreign incursions of Islam and Christianity like the Indians and the Chinese did?
What would have happened to Nigeria if the institutions of governance did their jobs and took care of criminals who found their ways to politics?
What would have become of Nigeria if education, health, medicine, sport and all basic infrastructure were maintained, sustained and kept running for the good of all? What would have become of Nigeria if no politician or military gangster stole N1 from the treasury?
The answers are clear. Nigeria would have become a paradise, a world power and the best place to live in the world. It would have been beautiful. We would have constant electricity, high standard of living, the best education in the world and our doctors would be the savers at home and globally.
Sadly, Nigeria is today one hell of a shamble. Nigeria is in the hands of idiots and complete nonentities called APC and PDP politicians. Nigerian intellectuals as l wrote in a previous article are ruled by mumus like Buhari. We had one drunkard before called Jonathan. There is one idiot called Babangida. One crazy fool called Abacha stole so much it appeared he kept sending us money from the grave. There is Obasanjo who kept writing letters but who also failed to return Nigeria to true federalism. Together with the ministers that served with them and the crook governors all over the place, they are sending Nigerians to their graves in thousands, daily-COVID or No Covid.
And all those still ganging up to keep Nigeria´s status quo, for example, Tinubu and Atiku, are all parts of the APC, PDP criminal establishments. Head or tail, Nigeria and Nigerians are doomed under the prevailing circumstances.
I just need to add that it does not matter where you live in Nigeria and how well you are doing or not, Nigeria on a whole is a useless country, representted by morons in government. For as long as more than 100m people are living from hand to mouth, unsure of the next meal and under constant lack of electricity, l am sorry, you are all living in poverty and in a giant man-made hell. Seun Kuti put it right: Nigeria is an open concentration camp.
Nigeria could have worked. But it didn´t. It must be dismantled and that is not the antidote to the poverty and hopelessness in the region. But it is the first radical step that will usher competitions in the regions as they start a century long journey to catch up with the least fortunate countries in Europé.
How hard can it be to dismantle an entity that is now working? How hard is it for a people with common interests, culture, language and future to organise and make a decision to end poverty, to build a life that their children and children´s children would be willing to embrace. How hard is the pursuit of happiness in the various regions/nations within the fraud called Nigeria?
Is Buhari the kind of person that should be ruling you? Is he sensible? Does he have the intellectual capacity of a 15-year-old? Can he solve a primary 5 mathematics task? Can he express himself clearly enough to be understood in any language of his choice? Does he, even as a farmer, know the meaning of animal husbandry? Does he represent you? Can he represent you? Can you employ Buhari to be your storekeeper? Yet, he is your president. That is a tragedy!
Intellectuals, Led By Mumus
By Adeola Aderounmu
One of the saddest things to think about in life as a Nigerian (whatever that means) is the fact that ordinary mumus took over power first through violence (two times in 1966) and a number of times since 1999 through questionable democratic approaches.
Adeola Aderounmu
In so many ways, we have discussed these issues back and forth. For so many years, we have changed the headlines just to repeat the same things. We are getting nowhere what we desired through all these essays, write-ups, criticisms and even ideas for how to dismantle the colonial enclave coined Nigeria.
Hence, we will continue to repeat the obvious, and for me personally, for the sake of the unborn generations, if they wish to be free someday. Their fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, you and I have chosen the path of slavery. We are serving the mumus in power.
If not, there is no way in the world foolish people clumped into APC and PDP would be holding us to ransom since 1999. After all the price we paid for independence in 1960 and after all the cost of our (pseudo) freedom from the gangsters who reigned supreme from 1966 to 1999. We, once again, fell into another trap of re-accepting the gangsters through fake ballots, coercion and the use of terror.
Even if there is a Buhari in Aso rock, is that the kind of person that should be ruling you? Is he sensible? Does he have the intellectual capacity of a 15-year-old? Can he solve a primary 5 mathematics task? Can he express himself clearly enough to be understood in any language of his choice? Does he, even as a farmer, know the meaning of animal husbandry? Does he represent you? Can he represent you? Can you employ Buhari to be your storekeeper?
But for some reasons that l cannot understand, he is your president. Now, he is nowhere near a sane cognitive level, but together with an array of sick minds as his, they are running your lives and destroying your essence and future. Still we sit down here together, or we go online and discuss irrelevant things.
The most relevant discussion for any person living in the geographical space called Nigeria in 2020 should be: how did this happen to me/us and how can we correct this before we die? But this is not the case because the mumus really perfected the acts of keeping the minds of the sane and intellectuals with other stuffs.
They so much destroyed the essence of humanity in Nigeria that people are busy trying to fix for themselves what the state and country should fix for them. It is also hard not to dabble into the religious deceits in essays like this. For, all the things we seek in religion in Nigeria, the most developed countries in the world got them by doing the right things. They did not pray. They did not fast. I don’t know what else the African is looking for, to become free.
Let us be clear because we are soon going to die, and the future generations need to read that some of us actually wrote letters for their freedom. We may not be the majority voices, but we did what we could to instigate, provoke, act and sensitize. Nigeria is not going to work. It will not.
We are strange bed fellows. Our collective existence is first to the pleasure of the British. Then we were partly sold to the Americans. In the new world order, the Fulanis have sold Nigerians to the Chinese. It is only a matter of time before the Chinese would take command of your lives in that space called Nigeria. Unless the chain is broken now, it may become too late.
How can a people sit upon the most treasured area of land on planet earth and be slaves? It does not make sense then, and it will never make sense now or in the future. How can you be called inferior beings and you act true to type? They said you cannot run your own affairs and the mumus played the script to perfection on your behalf?
What do l want? I earnestly yearn for freedom. I want to belong to the kingdom of Oduduwa. I know what you would say. Is Tinubu and all these mumu yoruba politicians in APC and PDP not from Oduduwa? Yes they are. But right now, they are like slaves to the Fulanis and not acting with their cerebral hemispheres.
It is that chain of bondage that we want to break. Once we are free in our kingdom, we will race once again beyond UK and France like we did up to the 1950s. We will start the rebuilding of our region, our country and our nation-The Yoruba Nation.
I do not believe in Nigeria. Nigeria is a business empire for the foreigners who invaded our territories and almagated good and evil in 1914. That contraption must be broken and the reign of the mumus over the intellectual has to come to an end.
If we fail in our lifetime to become free, then our children and children’s children will be born slaves. Of course, we take the option of travelling abroad. That is not freedom. Over several generations, that would mean extinction of the race that once occupied the Yoruba country.
One of the reasons many people don’t care about the future is because we won’t be here. If this was the mindset of those who built the developed countries and civilization (which incidentally started from regions around Nigeria), the world would have remained one giant cave today.
So many things are taking the lives of our people in the most unnecessary manners. You name them! It is so sad. I want my generation to have something meaningful to die for-the emancipation of the Yoruba Nation. It is possible.
One week ago, precisely on the 15th of March 2020, Lagos residents woke up to probably the most devasting bomb blast in the history of the state. The blast was heard in the larger parts of Lagos.
As at the time of writing this blog, the Lagos State Government is yet to provide official comments on the terror attack but no amount of cover-ups or sinister developments would be possible to hide the devastation that befell the residents of Abule-Ado along the Lagos-Badagry axis (opposite my beloved but expired Festac Town).
The first sign that the government would be seeking a cover up was from the various reasons given by various newspaper and media outfits on the immediate cause of the bomb blast.
The terrorists (whoever they were) acted with precision planting the bombs on a gas-pipeline. Lives were destroyed property worth several millions were ravaged in the blast.
As a blogger my attention was mainly on the catholic school in the vicinity. Bethlehem Girls College was brought to total ruins. The principal Reverend Sister Henrietta Alokha died in the bomb attack. Reports stated that she rescued many students before the roof collapsed on her.
Total casualties were put at a moderate 15 lives including some students. Based on the extent of the damaged and the widespread impact of the blast, it would be worthwhile to carry more investigation and to have a thorough, independent enquiries into these claims. But who dares?
As a background to this latest blast, it may interest my readers that l have personally been taking on the governors in Western Nigeria (through their handlers on the social media anyway) on matters relating to: 1) Fire 2) Tanker Driver Accidents/explosions 3) Safety of lives generally in Yorubaland.
In Februray 2020, what appears like a listening ear from Mr. Sanwo-olu resulted in a response where the Lagos State government promised to handle further explosions or tanker accidents as sabotage. The government promised to investigate such.
The Abule-ado / Catholic Girls school bomb blast is the first major test since the government made that pronouncement. Some of us will wait for as long as it takes to see how Sanwo-Olu and his gang in the LASG respond to this: investigations, arrest, prosecution and so on.
One week after, nothing has happened. But wait we will. It probably takes time to find the perpetrators for that was not an accident! It was a planned terror attack on the sovereignty of Yorubaland.
In my dealings with the governors of south west Nigeria, they are (hopefully) aware of my suggestions on the need to be proactive in securing Yorubaland. They know what they have to do, they only need the courage to do so. The Ooni of Ife I do hope is in the frame or loop and that together they know that they are the custodians of Yorubaland.
We can’t go on like this as a people. By all means, we must secure Yorubaland and make it safe for ourselves, for our children and for our children’s children.
Nigeria faces an uncertain future. Nigeria is not working and the dream that it will work is equaled to an illusion of the mind. For those who lack a common sense of history, Yorubaland was better in the 1950s than it is today. Have you sat down to ask yourself why other countries and nations in the world improved and Nigeria including Yorubland suffered severe retrogression?
Anyway, without digressing too far, my heart goes out to the families (and in fact friends) who lost so much to the bomb blast. The blast came home and got me. It got to us because this is our home in Amuwo Odofin Local Government. That which we feared is now at our doorsteps!
May the souls of the departed find rest. May the living find the courage to carry on, against all odds.
A View From The Scandinavian 