niS sI noitacudE

Okay, Atlas Cove was somewhere nearby, yet I do not even know the names of the Naval Officers that got killed.

Today, I find it hard to rant, I can only moan. I try to write, but the numbness of my fingers as they hit the keyboard will make the man condemned to using the cyclostyle in this age of digital printing smile in cheeky triumph.

It is very unlikely that any of the so-called Boko Haram ('Boko' is Hausa for "western education" and 'Haram' is Arabic for "forbidden") sect would be reading this, afterall, they claim Western Education is demonic and to save your soul from infernal destiny, you should not bother to read nor write. Just be stupid, plain stupid.

Does Mohammed Yusuf (okay, I forgot the Ustaz prefix) of Maiduguri deserve a character from my keyboard? A ‘Western-Educated’ (he denied it....but at least he could quote the Encyclopaedia copiously) man that had lawyers, rode in SUVs, and lived the good life, reducing some disenchanted Talakawa to Almajiris!

Honestly, where were we when Boko Haram was founded in 2004? When they set up a base dubbed "Afghanistan" in the village of Kanamma in Yobe, close to the border with Niger? Now at the time I am yet to have up to a thousand visitors on my blog, these freaking dudes as at the last count had 30,200 hits in 0.17 seconds on google!

What exactly is the problem? Why would a Mosque be reduced to a façade for a grenade manufacturing company to fight back the ‘invasion of Satanic Culture’ that has been on for over two Centuries? Did God go to sleep and now so much needs one Maiduguri pseudo-cleric to help him out? Why is this Ustaz speaking the ‘demonized’ English and fighting with ‘demonized’ grenades when he is yet to reprogram his mind that has been ‘demonized’ by Western Culture?

These were my thoughts, my frustration as I trod the altar of the Talakawa Temple feeling like a Priest that ran out of incense. That was when the walls around me began to spin, whirling me into its vortex. Then all was still, except for the sound of approaching footsteps. Then I saw him, or should I say it. The creature scribbled something on paper and thrust it in my palm, walking away so fast I had no time to contort my lips into forming any articulate word.

The paper read: niS si noitacudE. This time, I was moved to the verge of reeling a barrage of unprintable words; is this some Graeco-Latinic joke or what? The walls around me sensed my frustrations and I heard ‘read it backwards’. Soon as I did, I was transported right in the midst of a mob. Now, be careful what you wish for, because I was soon to find out that this mob is none other than the grenade-in-the-mosque-making-dagger-carrying-members of the I-am-more-popular-than-you-on-google Haram Boko sect!

Instantly I was bound, the now all-too-familiar blindfold intact and after some worrisome two hour ordeal in which all I heard were gunshots, angry noises, chants and rants, I was face-to-face in a dimly lit room with a man who introduced himself as the Ustaz himself.

Honestly, I had expected a man with horns and a forked tongue, with flames literally escaping every available vent in his anatomy each time he spoke; but I was sore disappointed.

‘You are the Alfa Talakawa, right?’ At this point, I could feel Scooby-Doo and Shaggy, standing on my shoulders, whispering ‘be very afraid’ in my ears. If this man thinks he could recruit me, he picked the wrong guy. The last time I hurt a fly, it was because I joked with its name! Okay, today, I pulled the bike of the dude that bumped my car a la Bruce Banner style, but that is my closest-to-violence record (that is on record).

He did not wait for my response; he just laughed, and laughed. ‘You really think I’d want you on my team, you, a worthless kaffir! He spat. ‘I only brought you here to tell my side of the story.’ I sighed, both out of relief and indignation. Ask me any question and that will be the pattern of our interview.

Are you freaking kidding me? I almost blurted out but managed to say instead: ‘Ustaz, What is Western Education?’

Ustaz: You must be either dumb and you managed to get a ghost-writer for all that you have written or just plain cheeky, wallahi! Soon you will tell me you don’t know Colonialism!

Undaunted by the insult, I went ahead to make my point:

Mathematics has more Arabic origins than English. For instance, ‘Algebra’ comes from Arabic word (al-jabr, literally, restoration) and Algorithm was derived from the name of the great mathematician, Mohammed ibn-Musa al-Khwarizmi.

Medicine; which the Nigerian core north has been robbed of, thanks to the complex conspiracy between the Masu Sarauta Governors and Multinational Companies and Pseudotalakawa Health Commissioners/Ministers and hot-headed ignoramus Alfas, has origins that date far back to the Ancient Hammurabi codes of Babylon and that points in the direction of the Arab world!

Now, to the democracy that you so much oppose; were there not primal forms of democracy even in Africa long before ‘Westernization’? In Yorubaland, we had the Oyomesi who regulated governance and no king approached the throne without the vote of the King-Makers. India had its own forms of democracy too, but it was actually the Greek model that the rest of the world built upon with time.

Ustaz: There you go! I was beginning to think you had some intelligence, before you added ‘Greek’ to the whole discussion. The Greeks, the Romans, Britain and eventually America are the ones that imposed Shaitan on the rest of the world! You Kaffir are quick to condemn us of violence, you are so ignorant you forgot about the Crusades and the number of people killed!

You have a point, Ustaz (I addressed him as such because I was within the proximity of his dagger), but tell me, is Islam not growing in America today? Are people converting to Islam because they have a knife on their throats? Even Christianity had more strength when people submitted to persecution and were fed to lions than when it was declared a State Religion. So why do you think it better that Islam be made a State Religion?

Ustaz: Bloody kaffir! You call the Islam of America Islam? You call the one you see in Nigeria Islam? kai! The Islam that people still go to Colonial Schools and take Colonial Medicine, the Islam that is not strong enough to take over the Country!

Ustaz, errr, have you ever heard this quote: ‘Say: O unbelievers! I do not serve that which you serve, nor do you serve Him Whom I serve: Nor am I going to serve that which you serve, Nor are you going to serve Him Whom I serve: You shall have your religion and I shall have my religion.

At this point, I was rewarded with a slap. I saw all the constellations at once and I was tempted to turn the other cheek (I mean the cheek of the other man) but discretion warned against it.

Ustaz: You dare to quote the Quran! If you really want this interview published with your blasphemous lips intact, you had better stick to the realm of our discussion!

Okay, sorry Ustaz, I said gingerly. ‘I like your wristwatch’

Ustaz: Thank you, I got it as a gift from Britain

Okay, I once saw you on BBC, and you spoke good English too.

Ustaz: What exactly is your point?

Ustaz, you are the wise one here, you drive SUVs, and you live in a Western Architectural Masterpiece, am I missing something?

Ustaz: I am in a good mood today and I will answer you. For me, it is almost too late, but I am raising a new generation from the scratch, hoping to redeem my own soul in the process. By the time we are done, Sharia will be entrenched in the Society and by then, I hope you would have been converted; I would hate to be the one to kill you.

Ustaz, who is your financier? Where did you get the money from? Why were you granted bail by the Abuja High Court earlier?

The Ustaz was livid at this point, he charged towards me with a dagger, that was when I opened my eyes and discovered I was sitting on my desk in the office. Ouch! I must have blacked out again, not again!

But really, I would have loved to ask the Ustaz why he was killed in police custody and his alleged financier, Alhaji Buji Foi summarily executed barely 24 hours after…is someone trying to hide something? MAMBM! (Me And My Big Mouth)

SOMETIME IN THE NOT SO DISTANT FUTURE

Gather round, children, take your seats. Please don’t sit too close to the well, apart from the inherent dangers; you know that is the only water supply we have left.

What I am about to share with you sounds more like a myth but they are realities, realities that once existed, but are no more.

Should you survive these turbulent times, you will of course recall you were eye witnesses to the drying up of the last river in this community, the Warri River and you probably have heard of how far the River Niger is from here.

There once was a town called Lagos, it used to be the capital of a Country we once called Nigeria. That was before the mighty Ocean (aaah, I will need to explain to you all what an ocean is, let me just call it very very big river) washed it away. Someone became the leader in that State and people started throwing rubbish everywhere till they blocked the normal path for water to flow. More houses were built close to this water…..now all that is left is the oral tradition of Eko Akete.

That black patch you see over there was called Macadam; some just called it tar. It used to be laid on the road for cars to pass. Now, I see the confusion on your faces; that rusty wreck over there is what is left of the last car that moved in this region. I would describe a car as a man-made iron horse that moves when it is filled with petrol. Sorry, I lost you, petrol was made by heating that black seep you see on what used to be our farmland. We used to heat it ourselves in what we called Refineries but sometime in the 1990s, we started buying from over the ‘big river’.

We bought from white men, no, I am not talking of albinos and I need to state this clearly. Recent prophecies indicate there would be a Third Coming of the white man. You may call it the Fourth anyway. The First time being from the time they came to buy African slaves, the Second, when they came to rule the slaves on their own soil (called Colonialism and Neo-Colonialism).

Twenty Years ago, they all left. It was a massive departure. The first time, they came in big boats called Ships, but this time, they left in Airplanes. (You know those ‘big birds’ that made noise when they passed?). Those birds don’t even fly in this region anymore.

Children, I will teach you to write. We will have to use part of the limestone brought in when I walked down to Nkalagu in Enugu last year. it is getting more expensive to sharpen chicken feather and use as pen.

Aaah! We once had Big Big Schools. Your school got bigger as you got older back then. We had one called the University. Trouble began when the man in charge of those schools felt it was better to spend money on his wedding anniversary than solve the problem. This trend continued for years, till the teachers (Lecturers) started leaving the country to teach elsewhere. Soon, there were no Vacancies, yet these people preferred to wash dead bodies in the Whiteman’s land instead of shouting at deaf ears. Most of the other teachers died of hunger.

I have to start ending my story because it is getting dark. Aaah! There was a time the walls brought out light. It was called electricity. At a point in time, the supply was failing, and some rich men started buying ‘generators’ (a metal that made walls bring out light). Then, something new happened. The whiteman made smaller metals that were cheaper, and more people started buying ‘generators’ this was a good business idea to those in charge of electricity, and because they were buying from the Whiteman and selling, they made sure electricity did not work well, till it did not work at all.

That meant more ‘generators’, more petrol, more activity of the Whiteman on our land. All talks with those that ruled Nigeria failed. Then the youths of our town started fighting back. Then some terrible things happened.

November 1999, Soldiers sacked a whole community called Odi. Not even the goats were spared. That is a sad story for another day.

Almost Ten years later, June 2009, it was Gbaramatu’s turn. At this time, a lot of charlatan militants had risen, most of whom were serving the politicians (just call them rulers so you won’t get confused) and were dumped after ‘Service’.

All this time, the attack was on the Niger Delta. So the people of Lagos could not be bothered. A month after the Gbaramatu incident, they attacked Lagos too. Terrible repercussions followed and in the end, almost all the oil installations had been destroyed. Our community was also on the verge of total extinction.

Years after, the Whiteman found an alternative to petrol and they stopped buying from Nigeria. Unfortunately, Nigeria had nothing more to sell. That was when the North decided to part ways. The Southwest decided to do so too. It is funny that in a war called Civil War I, it was the East and the Niger-Delta that fought to part ways. This time, we fought to stay. If the North spent their entire Groundnut and the West all their Coccoa, and they refused to go in the past, why should we let go, now that the Oil is useless?

I wish it were that easy. It was extremely bloody. The Whiteman made huge sales from the guns both sides used to ‘finish’ each other.

That was how we arrived at today. I say this because the Whiteman once claimed there was no civilization in Africa when they came. Some of them will say it again.

I think it is in order for me to let you know that ‘Whiteman’ does not refer to them all. Talakawas exist among The White race too. My ancestor taught me that. The White Masu Sarauta are the ones that sired their own kind amongst us. The Blackman never learns. There would never have been slavery if we never enslaved our kind. Those who made money from selling huge guns would never have had a flourishing business if we did not make a sport out of killing each other.

The White Masu Sarauta was just doing business. But the Black Masu Sarauta played it too far.

All these type of people may not make meaning to you now, children. But I am telling you so I can prepare you for the Third Coming of the Whiteman.

It is getting very dark now. My dim eyes can no longer see the palm of my hands. Goodnight.

The town-crier begins to ring a bell. It sounded both funny and strange. I looked up and the sky looked so white. The funny bell rings again…it was my alarm! Ouch! I am almost late for work!

Ps: Most of the words in boldfaced italics had become obsolete at the timing of this incident

FAILED AMBITIONS OF A WANNABE SOLDIER

Okay, I am not joking, at a point in my life, I wanted to be a soldier.

Looking back, I can not exactly pin-point if it is the regimented life that appealed to me, or the fact that their kids paid less school fees (I went to a Military Sponsored Secondary (High) School)…but rest assured, it had neither to do with The License to Kill, nor actually serving my Country (back then…lol).

Ironically, as a kid, I fed poorly because I felt it was an ‘African thing’ to eat too much, snubbed a good number of the morsel-based meals that are characteristically African (before you hang my lack of Afrocentricity, just remember most of our Parents were the Colonial era kids who grew up thinking that everything British is superior), and ended up with the Gangly-Slim frame that would haunt me for life. In any case, slim is cool nowadays, and I still flaunt my ‘lack-of-pot-belly’.

Okay, I did not dare the Nigerian Military School, Zaria, nor Airforce Military School (they were too ‘gangsta’), I just settled for Command Secondary School, Jos.

It was also my way of getting back at King’s College, Lagos, where I was told that due to insufficient facilities, I would have to be a day student (I wanted to Board, man!). I was given the option of transfer, but I got the Federal Government College, Okigwe in the deal. So I was done with Federal Government Colleges, period! King’s College meant a lot to us back then, so I would have you all understand why I saw the other offer as an ‘insult’; I was only Ten Years old.

A little bit of explanation for Non-Nigerian readers (audience, I mean; after all, I am ranting). The Nigeria of the 1980s to early 90s witnessed the ‘Golden Age’ of Military Dictatorship and the only way to get ‘good education’ complete with facilities was to read yourself silly so you can pass the entrance examination to ‘Unity Schools’ which were the Federal Government Colleges (High School to Americans)/King’s and Queen’s College, Command Secondary/Day Secondary Schools (CSS, and CDSS), Nigerian Military School, Zaria, and Nigerian Navy, and Air-Force Military Schools.

As students of Command Secondary School Jos, our experiences were intensely harrowing. Once you were in the school, there was no going out without an Exeat which took forever to get, and could still be turned down the way those dudes at immigration stamp their rejection on Nigerian passports with frenzy.

I still wanted to be a Soldier, skinny or not.

The senior students stripped most of us nude at one point and asked us to roll on the ground while they poured water on us and ‘messed our hides with whips’ while we chanted ‘I am a Toad, I have a long tail, cut it for me’ , we were beaten with semi-machetes; I STILL WANTED TO BE A SOLDIER!

Then came the Christmas Eve of 1989; Civil War broke out in Liberia. Since the horrifying tales of the Nigerian Civil War, never before was war this close to us. I began to have my doubts. The final nail in the coffin, rather, the final screw on the casket, was the day the Commandant arranged a viewing of the Documentary: THE MAKING OF AN OFFICER. It sounded like fun, till I heard: ‘In the final year, the cadets will be tested with LIVE ammunition (emphasis mine) ’ and they showed cadets ducking explosions! My toe-nails began to respond to the Harmattan wind, and I ended with cold feet.

But there were those that didn’t. There were those who went through the ordeal of the Nigerian Defence Academy and made it out as Second Lieutenants. There were those who were not that educated and had to start from the rank of Private.

In any case, back to the Liberian saga. The English speaking members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) decided to intervene in the Liberian Civil War and a Monitoring Group of Soldiers were sent as troops (ECOMOG). Some have alleged it was all in a bid to save Samuel Kanyon Doe’s sorry butt, (considering the fact that as at 1989, Military Dictatorship was the norm and it was an esprit-de-corps thingie) in any case, the Troops went anyway.

Unfortunately, Samuel Doe died at the hands of Prince Johnson's Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia on 9 September 1990 and since that was not part of the plan, the drama had to continue. Stories were told of organized looting to the extent that the ECOMOG got renamed: "Every Car or Movable Object Gone". There was an incident of the total removal of the Buchanan iron ore processing machinery for onward sale while the Buchanan compound was under ECOMOG control.

The soldiers went to ‘serve the Country’; were they appreciated?

What would have made rebel troops hate Nigeria so much that innocent journalists like Kris Imodibie (The Guardian) and Tayo Awotunsin (The Champion) got killed the way they did? At the end of the day, it was Nigeria that granted asylum to Yormie Johnson before the coast came clear for him to return to his Country and become a Senator, it was Nigeria that did the amnesty-cum-exile-assylum turned betrayal-deal with Charles Taylor! What did our Soldiers die for???

The macabre show had to continue. In 1997, troops were sent to Sierra Leone, to stop the RUF rebellion, and in 1999, to Guinea-Bissau.

Liberia was yet to have its fill of the blood of Nigerian soldiers. Asides from the intense participation till Madam Johnson Sirleaf became President which took a heavy toll on Nigeria, an 850-member 14th Nigerian Battalion drawn from several military formations in the country were sent to participate in the UN mission from September 2007 to April 2008.

For whatever reasons, God knows what had been going down that we may never know based on Military Omerta, 27 soldiers decided to break the code by protesting the non-payment of their allowance; the Proles dared to speak! (Antz; anyone?)

The Masu Sarauta (aristocrats) have a weapon: the Pseudo-Talakawa (refer to TRANCE COP in my June Blog)! I find it particularly annoying that the weapon is in the hands of the Pseudo-Talakawa but the Power remains the exclusive preserve of the Masu Sarauta!

That is why an old man was running the politics of Oyo State in Nigeria and all his hired thugs obeyed his orders like Zombies when it takes only one of them to ruffle the man!

That is why a slob (excuse my manners) of an Inspector General, whose tummy would seriously impede his combat skills would steal a record 103 Million dollars Police fund and be walking free after some brief VIP detention whereas he gave orders for his men to massacre petty thieves! Bernard Madoff must be wishing he were Nigerian!

The sad part of it all is that these 27 soldiers (female inclusive) were arraigned for mutiny and sentenced to Life Imprisonment! Now you all would probably give me that cliché: “A soldier obeys the last order” etc etc and I would just ask: Why on earth is Al Mustapha under trial if all he did was obeying the late General Sanni Abacha? What about the female soldier that got detained for two months and eventually dismissed for not being a sex-slave to her commander during the Sudan ‘Peace-Keeping Mission’? And the mother of all questions: Who is the freaking freak in custody of the freaking funds?

Alas! No one is going to be bothered. The Omerta has been served on us all during the spell of mass hypnosis that is currently gripping the nation. After all, we are not related to those dudes, and we didn’t ask them to enroll in the army.

One day, it will be a crime for the Talakawa to do the dookie (use the Restroom), and someone is going to be hung for protesting….that person would be better off, because he would be delivered from the toxins that has accumulated in his system, while the rest of the Talakawa would have damaged kidneys, one after the other, after all, they had no guts in the first place.

*Sees two soldiers decorating him with an Eagle, a Star and Crossed-Swords, shudders and mutters aloud: GOD FORBID!!!*

I WOKE UP IN IRAN

The alarm was ringing and I woke up with a start…just as I was approaching that threshold of full consciousness, I heard what turned out to be the sound from impact of that world famous Pre-Palestinian times missile on my window. Incoherent sounds followed, then my eyes began to slowly take my surroundings in: the building, the jingle from the radio, the poster with some Arabic stuff on the wall, the Hijra Calendar, the Billboard I could see through the window with TEHRAN written on it... it then dawned on me: I WOKE UP IN IRAN!

Now apart from the Arabic numerals that we seem to all know, I’d have sworn I could not speak anything Arab except by some gift of tongues.

Then some youths, playing what sounded like Hiphop with heavy Asian influence barged into my room…my bad! I must have been so tired I forgot to lock my door.

Something very weird happened…very weird! I began to understand them (perhaps they were actually speaking English, I can’t tell, I am not sure of anything anymore) and they were screaming ‘JUNE 12, JUNE 12!!!’ Before I had time to comprehend fully, I was whisked into the middle of a rally and I began to wonder if I had not only traveled in space, but had also traveled in time.

To the protests post-dating the annulment of the June-12 presidential election on the 23^rd of June 1993…exactly how far did I travel? When I went to bed last night, it was June 15, 2009, was it?

Then something dramatic happened. I was blindfolded and hauled into what I felt was a truck. For the first time since the turn of events, I panicked. I have seen clips of executions by extremists…I wanted desperately to scream ‘I am not American! I am Nigerian!’ but then, I had been gagged.

The gag and the blindfold were removed as I was locked in a dark and dank cell, and I was given thirty minutes to feel the pulse of a man locked in the same cell I was in and write about it. They said his name was, Iran! Are you freaking kidding me? Since when did human beings start bearing the names of a Country/Place? Then in what turned out an expensive joke, I heard one of my captors say ‘Aminu Kano, Shehu Shagari, Kaduna Nzeogwu…’ he mentioned other names I could not pick as the sound from his boots faded away from me.

I walked closer to Iran, an old man, wizened through years of war and I saw a tattoo on his arm. I moved closer, grabbed his wrists as if my life depended on it, to feel his pulse.

What felt like Megavolts of electricity coursed through my spine and I convulsed, ‘Hossein Mousavi-MKO Abiola-Babangida-Ahmadinejad-The Quick and the Dead’ was all I heard amidst harsh wailings, bloodshed, smoldering tyres….I saw what I would call a vision of Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and …I was about to name the others when I heard a voice behind me that caused me to quake ‘THE OTHER NAMES ARE FOR YOU ONLY’ I obeyed instantly.

I saw them at a table; discussing Global Domination, how to get people to believe everything they hear and see, and then I saw Saddam Hussein! Apart from the hole in his neck, he looked just as he did in the days of his reign, I dared to look at his eyes and I saw the pain of betrayal, the same machinery that sponsored him as a despot sponsored his end…okay, I broke the rules. I forgot to tell you I was given the waiver to mention two more names. I saw …Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO)Abiola ‘WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?’ I blurted out. I saw sadness in his eyes, he wanted to speak, but his characteristic eloquence (in spite of the fact that he stuttered) was gone. I wanted to know what happened on July 9, 1998; I said ‘Chief, were you actually beaten to death as Al-Mustapha (the Chief Security Officer under the late dictator, General Sanni Abacha) alleged?’ No answer. ‘What was in the Tea served by Susan Rice? Were you poisoned?’

…..I heard nothing…All I heard was silence.

Then I saw him pointing in one direction. He pointed to two video screens. The screens were labeled: NigeriaIran respectively……Two elections were held on a June 12, one 1993, the other 2009. One was an election adjudged the ‘Freest and Fairest’ in the history of the Country, the other…well, there were two opinions, The Western media reports that the Results were severely manipulated with impunity, the Arab media and was saying something I just couldn’t figure. I tried hard…I just couldn’t. Would I be locked up forever in this cell if I failed to figure it out? Would my throat be spared or...I shuddered; this is not the right time to entertain such grisly images.

What I saw next baffled me. The Nigerian screen was split in two, showing the THEN and the NOW. The then showed students being tear-gassed as they protested; I smiled as I saw myself on the screen. I saw demonstrators burning tires. I saw Frank Kokori, Beko Ransome Kuti, Pa Rewane, and Chief Gani Fawehinmi among many other faces..I saw those that fought to their deaths, I saw those that fought till they were too frail, having expended their energies over the years…then I saw, at the forefront of the fight, those that shifted ground and crossed to the ‘Dark Side’ I saw Chief’s running mate preferring years later to serve as Secretary to someone who would have called him Uncle than persevere and hold to his mandate as Vice-President…I saw the then Chairman of the Social Democratic Party, under which MKO was the Flag-bearer become one of the most dreaded Godfathers of the party that has kept perhaps the longest and most frequent track record of electoral fraud in Nigeria, nay Africa’s history. I saw Charlattans paying lip service to Democracy….and I wept. While I couldn’t feel the pulse of Iran, on the credibility of the elections that Ahmadinejad ‘won by a landslide’, I saw protesters, I saw people who actually took to the Streets to cry foul….

At this time, I was completely overwhelmed with tears, it no longer mattered to me HOW MKO died but WHYWHAT he died for. Chief was not asking me to see him as a Saint, he only wanted me to see that at the least he LIVED and DIED for SOMETHING.

I saw Nigeria in my mind’s eye, I saw a Numb Media. I saw a file on the table. It was labeled ‘Mass Hypnosis’ I need not say it contained confidential documents. Then I saw it all, why the Press has surrendered their pages for wham-bam-slap-palm journalism, why the entertainment industry is centered totally on the mundane…I saw it all…I wanted to see more, but I just couldn’t. ‘Why bother when the others won’t see it anyway?’ I told myself.

Then I heard the Cell Door open. ‘Time Up’ and I looked around me and everything was swirling again. I closed my eyes as the footsteps approached and my ‘abductor’ took up my sheet from my hand. ‘You failed to obey simple instructions again, Plumbtifex’. I opened my eyes, I was in an examination hall, the invigilator was holding my script with a frown on his face….

My bad! I was actually meant to write a short story themed: I WOKE UP AND I RAN. Cruel Joke!

Ps: The Iranian Run-Off Elections were held on...guess? June 12....Ahmadinejad, O Ahmadinejad!!! is that a code for only Nigerians to decipher?

OUT OF KEN'S SHELL

I repeat that we all stand before history. I and my colleagues are not the only ones on trial. Shell is on trial here, and it is as well that it is represented by counsel said to be holding a watching brief. The company has, indeed, ducked this particular trial, but its day will surely come and the lessons learned here may prove useful to it, for there is no doubt in my mind that the ecological war the company has waged in the delta will be called to question sooner than later and the crimes of that war be duly punished. The crime of the company's dirty wars against the Ogoni people will also be punished. –Ken Saro-Wiwa before the Ogoni Civil Disturbances Trial in 1995

I honestly do not know if I should laugh or cry.

For the uninitiated, let me tell you a thing or two about the man called Kenule Beeson Saro-Wiwa.

I never knew who he was until the rested Basi and Company sitcom debuted in 1985. I was a kid then but I will never forget the catchphrases ‘To be a millionaire, think like a millionaire’ ‘Madam the Madam’ (which drew the ‘It’s a matter of cash’ response from the flamboyant landlady Mr B (Basi) was always owing rent arrears) ‘Brandy for Dandy’…ohhh I am getting nostalgic and nostalgia is taboo in a generation suffering from induced amnesia.

Fast forward to 1993, and I read he was arrested and detained for mobilizing the Ogoni people in Nigeria to boycott the June 12 Presidential election. At a time there was mass hysteria for millionaire turned politician, the late Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, to be elected President, I wondered why my childhood hero went against the grain.

That would begin my initiation rites to the travails of the Niger Delta and the complicity of the ‘Oil Giants’ in the power play. I would later read his account of that detention under the Ibrahim Babangida administration in A Month and a Day, a Detention Diary much later in 2004, long after I had become so enmeshed in the pains and travails of the GusuTalakawa (The Proletariat from the South-South).

I take it back to 1994, Abacha was in Power, he had just granted some reprieve to Zamani Lekwot who was sentenced to death by hanging for ‘aiding and abetting’ the Zangon-Kataf communal unrest under the Ibrahim Babangida regime. The death sentence was commutted to a short prison term, and Abacha released him 18^th March 1994.

Then Ken Saro Wiwa got arrested May 22, same year. Four prominent Ogoni had been killed and Ken was arrested with 8 others, his offence? He allegedly had incited the mob to kill those four by saying in his dialect ‘Go to Giokoo and deal with the Vultures’ and according to Justice Ibrahim Auta, calling someone a vulture in Ogoniland is equivalent to sentencing the person to death. I still wonder how Ibrahim Auta got so schooled in the ways of the Ogoni and honestly, I wish I had a means to save the electronic copy back then because I have searched fruitlessly for a copy of his ‘explanation’ which was published in the wake of Ken’s brutal hanging. I feared for Ken back then for a very unlikely reason. Zamani Lekwot had just been spared; to ‘spare’ Ken would be a ‘show of weakness’ tyrants can go on ‘pardoning’ everybody…

November 10, days after the then Provisional Ruling Council (I wonder why it is only Abacha’s name that kept popping up?) approved the execution; I was listening to the radio at 11am when my worst fears were confirmed: Ken and the others had been hung! His last words? "Lord, take my soul but (let) the struggle continue(s)!"

Fingers were pointed in Shell’s direction, I recall reading some pamphlet by Shell claiming that the allegations of environmental degradation in Ogoni were exaggerated and they were going to conduct an independent Environmental Impact Assessment to prove it (I am still waiting, 14 years after).

I eerily term Ken’s last words as The Hang(ed)man’s Curse (To take liberties from Frank Peretti) because the struggle did indeed continue, however with a grisly dimension. The spate of kidnaps, the blowing up of Oil installations, further wrecking the environment, the Odi massacre…..the Spectre of Ken’s hasty hanging just keeps looming over Nigeria like an ominous portent. Why was he treated so bad, that even in death, his body had to be desecrated with acid and dumped in a shallow prison grave, the grave diggers allegedly threatened that the burial site be a secret they would take to their own graves;wherever that will be? (thanks to DNA sampling, the Obasanjo administration approved that the remains of the Ogoni Nine be exhumed for a ‘proper’ burial)

Fourteen years of legal tussle with Shell will follow, with Ken Saro Wiwa junior burdened with the legacy of his father. After years of brick walls, a US District court in Manhattan, New York decided to give the case a hearing. That was when I heard the news that made me so undecided if I should laugh or cry. Shell was settling out of court to the tune of $ 15.5 million! For once, I was hoping Shell was finally admitting guilt even though I felt the amount was a paltry sum compared to the gains of Shell exploiting oil from this region. Then, in characteristic arrogance, they would have us believe it is just a humanitarian gesture. After years of fighting valiantly to be heard, did Ken Jnr. Lose his steam just at the time someone finally decided to grant a hearing?

Why is Shell’s ‘humanitarian gesture’ just getting in about the time the trial was to commence? The excerpts from the plaintiff stole whatever rant I had on this issue: I, Plumbtifex Rantimus, Priest of the Proles, hit a psychospiritual (add that to the dictionary) crossroad!

The larger disputes between Shell and Ogoni remain and are beyond the scope of our

settlement.

The decision to accept Shell’s offer came after lengthy and exhaustive deliberations

by ten individual plaintiffs in consultation with our attorneys, but today we, Lucky

Doobee, Monday Gbokoo, David Kiobel, Karalolo Kogbara, Blessing Kpuinen, James

N-nah, Friday Nuate, Ken Saro-Wiwa, Jr., Michael Vizor, and Owens Wiwa, have

collectively agreed that it is time to move on with our lives and we have decided to

put this sad chapter behind us. -PLAINTIFFS,WIWA V. ROYAL DUTCH/SHELL,
WIWA V. ANDERSON, AND WIWA V. SPDC

I do understand the families’ need for closure. Fourteen traumatic years is a whole lot, what I fear is the image of Ken Saro Wiwa in my mind’s eye, waving his pipe furiously, telling Shell, “This is just a prequel, your day, foretold by me almost fourteen years ago, HAS NOT COME!”

TRANCE COP

Believe me, I didn’t misspell this either.

So you let them fool you, Prole? Well that is one of the major attributes of the Talakawa. You believe everything! There used to be this bad joke that if you want to hide anything from the Blackman, write it in a book! And you probably have quoted that in a desperate bid to encourage your ‘fellow blacks’ to read…YOU HAVE BEEN HAD!!!

Wake up and smell the coffee if you are black and you’re reading this because you just proved that –ism wrong! Check out the average African Summa cum Laude graduate of Economics and you will see obvious re-programming and miseducation! You’d hear someone claiming the economy has improved quoting some ‘indices’ which has no bearing on market realities!

And so, I rephrase: If you want to dupe a Blackman, write it in a book! He believes anything he sees in the Newspaper, he even believes what he sees on TV and just apes everything he sees portrayed as ‘Western’.

So much for intro, now let’s move on. (Recall I said in the last post that you should never expect a rant to be coordinated).

Check out the line-up: Transcorp (Trance COP) was incorporated by some of Nigeria's foremost business tycoons namely: Alhaji Aliko Dangote of Dangote Group, Chief Femi Otedola of African Petroleum (AP), Dr.Ndi Okereke-Onyuike, Director General of Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), Mr. Jimoh Ibrahim, Jim Ovia, Managing Director, Zenith Bank, Tony Elumelu of UBA, Fola Adeola of Guaranty Trust Bank, Jacob Ajekigbe of First Bank and former CEO of Nigerian Breweries Ltd, Festus Odimegwu amongst others and of course, the (then) Federal government.

Then they threw an Initial Public Offering and in a voice reminiscent of Achilles when he was urging his soldiers to the certainty of their death, they all said “It is yours, Take It” (okay, Bradd Pitt (Achilles) added ‘Immortality’ before his.

Sadly, a good number of Talakawa including the ‘Paratalakawa’ rushed in. The result? Just at the time the Share Value hit 54 Kobo all the way down from N 7:50 Kobo, they close in on you all, suspending trade on the Stock Exchange to “prevent panic sales which may further compound Transcorp’s distress” As usual, the Conglomerate gets protected from the Commoner, Transcorp is shielded from the Talakawa, the Powers-that-be get shielded from the Proletariat!

The first thing that will shred your heart is to learn that the N22 billion realized from the IPO was squandered; plain and simple! The Proles pull their resources to finance someone/select-few’s Klepto-orgies and dump their bastard (for want of better euphemism) at your doorstep, and that is exactly how the game is played.

How come a lot of people fell for this hogwash? How on earth could such a ‘strong’ corporation owe some staff up to Twelve months in arrears?

True to type, the Talakawa must be entertained, therefore a Gladiator must kiss the sands of the Coliseum, and who else could that be, other than Mr. Tom Iseghohi, the Group Managing Director of TRANCE COP . Someone tell Tom that not every Tom, Dick and Harry can afford this Trance! I read the family is threatening to reveal many more dark secrets down to Aso Rock (Presidential Villa) should the ‘victimization’ of their breadwinner ‘for what he knows nothing about’ persist and I laugh (very rare these days) Okay, for the sake of argument, Tom DID NOT PARTAKE IN THE FRAUD. Please! But he knows enough for the family to know some ‘dark secrets’, he must either be too dumb for his own good or just plain negligent and stupid.

That is the dilemma of the Pseudotalakawa.

Now, let me not risk losing you. I earlier mentioned the Paratalakawa they are the middle-class between the Al-majiri (Destitute) and the actual Talakawa , the mechanic, the barber, the motorbike riders who hang on every word the actual Talakawa passes down from the lies he read from the media run by the Masu Sarauta (Aristocrats). Most of them only aspire for the ‘good life’ the Talakawa is ‘enjoying’, and that is why they, also, were hapless victims of the Trance Cop.

The Pseudotalakawa is the Middle Man between the Talakawa and the Masu Sarauta. He is the courier of every fraud, the self-styled scapegoat, the fall man and fodder for the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). He is the one likely to rot in jail on behalf of his Masu Sarauta. He is the brilliant technocrat who is the King of the Stupid, the Court Jester, the butt (not the Eminem-Sacha Baron Cohen type) of every financial joke.

Back to you and I, the audience that paid to watch the show, not knowing the joke is on us; did we buy ‘Shares’? Yes a good number of us did, simply because we liked what the papers were showing, only to learn some particular share values were ‘doctored’.

Perhaps my role as the Priest of the Proles came with the gift of prophecy; politically charged investments are extremely risky. And I was not willing to palpitate my heart with such risks, hence my resolve from Day-1 NEVER to fall into a TRANCE COP. My brilliant economist friend was so convinced Transcorp was the best thing after HIV (excuse my manners) for the mere fact that he heard the beautiful oratory of one Pseudotalakawa whose mouth is far bigger than his dreams, and He believed. Only it was not ‘counted as righteousness’. It was counted as Mr-Mugu-Dobosi-Yessir! (That’s a street terminology for The Gullible).

I had always believed a Broker’s duty is to keep you Broke, so, never let him/her do the thinking for you; it will be your loss!

By the way, I just sold off a particular stock that reeks of politics…At a loss? DO YOU REALLY THINK I AM STUPID?