What you don’t know about me

My earliest memories were of landscapes, or put in a better perspective, hillscapes: beautiful scenery of hills and valleys; the freshest green foliage infused with flowers of diverse make amongst the tallest palm trees imaginable, all swaying gently or violently, as the elements will have it, in a land that could rival any ever seen by man.

Both my maternal home and my father’s hometown are situated in the hills of Anike. While my ancestral home sits atop a windswept plateau, my maternal home was situated in a valley—my use of the word ‘was’ is acceptable here because as a result of the tragic influence of modernity, the people of my maternal homeland have moved en masse to a barren hill a few miles from the land that was their ancestors abode. Their new abode’s only importance is the fact that an asphalt road dissects its white soiled length.

The North burns: can we talk about us?

Once again, like uncountable times in the past, the north is in the throes of ethno-religious crisis. As usual, the security agencies are caught napping and aside from accusations of complicity in the crisis, seem to be all thumbs, with little or no idea of how to handle the situation – besides their age-old ‘shoot on sight’ solution that is.

In a previous article, written some years ago, I dwelled on the nature of the north and after examining the numerous crises I witnessed and luckily escaped while living in the north, concluded that ethno-religious crisis and the north of Nigeria are Siamese twins that may forever remain conjoined, unless the drastic is done.

I warned then that the north would blow up again way before the Boko Haram clash and the first Jos affair. My forecast was not based on any form of prescience, but as a result of a brief study of ethno-religious clashes in the north.

In the north of Nigeria, from Jos and beyond, the truth about Ethno-religious crisis is not if it would occur, but when it will occur, again.

Of Heroes, Villains, and dollar baits (1)

Superman (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I grew up with comic books. I discovered comics in primary two or three. I can’t quite recall, but I think Voltron, Super Ted and other TV cartoon shows played a large part. Anyway, I discovered comics and life was never the same again. While my friends outgrew the habit I kept at it and still find it difficult to turn down the chance to read a comic book today.

Anyone who have ever held a comic book , especially the variety that made DC and Marvel household names, the sort that gifted us Superman, Batman, Spiderman and all the others whatever-mans, would be conversant with one thing: comic books are about the battle of evil and good. There are good guys, bad guys and some who appear to saddle the line between both worlds. In the world of comic books, called universe, the good guys are called Super Heroes and the bad guys are called Super Villains. The Heroes usually do not associate with the Villains and even when they do, it’s usually for the greater good.

Holding a Nation to Ransom

As has become customary, the murderous Islamist group, Boko Haram, attacked three churches in Kaduna state on Sunday, leaving death and destruction in its wake. Also, in what is becoming a saddening routine, youth affiliated to the Christian faith carried out reprisal attacks on nearby mosques and many innocent Muslims got caught up in the ensuing violence.

Death And A Mourning Nation

Before that Dana plane crashed into a tenement building in Iju-Ishaga suburb of Lagos, Nigerians died in the hundreds every day. They died on the road, victims of bad roads or the highwayman’s bullet. They died in their homes, bodies riddled with bullets fired by armed robbers. They died in churches and mosques, victims of those who say evil deeds can be used to achieve godliness. They died across Nigeria, untimely and unpleasant deaths, victims of a government’s insistence on continuing paying lip service to progressive social development.

While some of these untimely taken belong to the class people have come to believe are elites, the larger percent are masses, the new age commoners, without renown beyond their immediate environment, these ones are not mourned by the nation. No media adverts extol their qualities, no social media buzz is generated around their pictures, no websites are created to tell about their lives and the deep pain their passing wrought on those they left behind. Nothing is heard of them other than the wailing of relatives and friends, and that too is soon muted as the world winds on. While the government habitually gives last warnings to those who kill the masses and promise to fix the roads that mangle their flesh and suck their blood, the dead are buried, sometimes in mass graves, their deaths in vain still, unknown in life, silent in death.

However, these are the nameless dead, the ones without keys to the fabled rainbow’s end. Their fate is not for those who could zip around in airplanes. For these ones, the passing is loud, with a nationwide call to tears.

It is common street knowledge that planes are not for the poor, even those who eat three solid meals with meat to spare have nothing to do with it. For many of us, it is a privilege to travel from Lagos to Abuja on a plane. Why not, the cost of a one-way ticket is more than the national minimum wage. So it is a testament to the privilege and position of the victims of the Dana Air crash, at least those on the plane proper, that the buzz generated by their fate remains at giddying heights, or how else would fellow elites and wannabes mourn the passing of their peers?

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