NIGERIANS AND THE TRUTH!

As an active member of Facebook I have benefited from belonging to the online social media. From reconnecting with old friends to finding new friends, i have done it all. I became a fan an follower of CNN's Errol Barnett for a good number of reasons but his good looks are at the top of the list. While Errol reminds you that people can make the most of their youth, I fawn over the dude when he lights up my screen. the result is loss of hearing for most of his report.

Anyway, my dear Errol knows how to keep his fans active till the point of religiosity. I am more than grateful for this as i have made great friends who converge on that page to air their opinions. As much as I am ashamed to admit this, good looking Errol has held me captive to the detriment of my dear blog. I rather slug it out with an unlucky somebody who had the temerity, audacity, animal boldness, effrontery...,(catches breath), Phew!!! sorry about the grammar..., to make unsavoury statements about my dear country Nigeria. Yet for the life of me, most of my angst is wasted as I have not met a Nigerian on that site who didn't tell the truth as they saw it. A truth I totally agreed with until a recent comment was posted on the high school gay scandal where a lesbian was not allowed to bring her partner to a prom night dressed in tuxedo. Asking for their opinions, Errol also asked his fans if such a thing could happen in their countries. 

As expected, everyone had something to say. One gay lamented the discrimination against them but the majority of people I will like to assume are heterosexuals said as much as they did not like homosexuality or understand it, they could not judge the people identified as such. A fellow Nigerian took a bold stand, quoting the Bible and standing on the moral strength of Nigerians as a people to avoid or stem the growing popularity of homosexuality. And at that point I realized certain Nigerians didn't know how to tell the truth. And I was angry not because someone was insulting my Nigeria but because someone had just lied out rightly on a public forum about what was obtainable in the country. That in my opinion was also constituted rubbishing the image of the country as everyone across the globe knew of the evils abound in my darling country thanks to the information, television and internet age. The evil that lives with the good, the evil we cannot dress with a veil and we had someone telling the world that just because we regarded homosexuality as illegal, we were had a high moral standing. So it is okay to spill blood of INNOCENT CHILDREN AND WOMEN as seen in the different sectarian, religious and tribal clashes around the country?  Or the killing of innocent people by so called Boko Haram? It is okay to fleece unsuspecting foreigners of their hard earned money or condone ritualists in our midst and take a stance against homosexuality? That for me was the highest level of hypocrisy. 

Blind patriotism is inimical to national development and methinks this person was probably not looking objectively at what was on the table before spewing words that made little sense. Worse, she said the words ".. as a lawyer, you should know that..." and yours truly cannot understand why a forum for opinion giving should become a platform of subtle insults. I hold her argument in derision and can only pity her mind set. In her "intelligent" view, the people are largely moral and innocent, our politicians do all their hanky panky with the assistance of martians. And to make it worse, this person is a lawyer. Whither thou goest Nigeria?

-Appreciating Ayim for initiating this piece

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Modern Day Bullies

They say bottling up a feeling is a really bad thing.I couldn’t agree more. I have observed... no I actually have more than observed, i have stalked or to put more civily, watched in awe more closely a a really disturbing recurring situation like a play script acted out amongst ourselves everyday of our lives.

I can’t display enough my profound hate for this particular thing.It tears out my skin and makes my heart bleed, Not only for victimized but for the perpetrators as well.

Who do we even think we are?

Who gives us(this generation of pouters,fashion crazed  teens,skinny jeans wearing males)the audacity to judge another being, irrespective of how low a person has brought himself. We have created a certain standard to which he who does not reach is considered a lesser human being a not just in. 

Our filthy little minds,Oh no..it is indeed not enough,we have then decided to take it a step further to even publicly destroy the person, not attempting to vile our hearts. I know of a friend who will brag of getting the latest Peruvian hair, the latest LV Collections, how she and her said fiancé shops online to get the latest stuff.

Who set these invincible rules? 

Who is the game master?

Who is the trend setter? Who do we even trail?

If these questions have never crossed your mind,well it’s about time they did!

I totally agree that the beautiful ones are not yet born, because if what we portray is beauty,then the world is in dire need of  another saviour!

The innocence of our infancy is a vague memory. If only we'd bring down our shoulders, if only we stop for just a minutes to think, we'd see that instead of growing to adults, we are growing into babies, however possible that is. 

If only we’d bring down our shoulders, if only we stop for just more than a minute to think,we’d see that instead  of growing to be adults, we are growing into babies, however possible that is. 

Growing to be babies that are attracted only by shiny things and pick people only by what they hold in their hands; that speak without regard to who is being spoken to and care only about what makes them happy,possibly taking forcefully what belongs to another to get as much self comfort as we reach. 

A new breed of bullies,I must say,commanding of ourselves laws no one has set.

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Straight Talk: Each Day At A Time.

One of our readers sent in this to our mail, we felt we should share. We hope you learn one or two from the story.

Enjoy!

“What’s wrong?” asked my customer as I covered one eye, then the other, and stared at her in disbelief.

“Your head is missing,” I said anxiously. I slumped on the stool behind the counter of my fashion boutique and placed my palm over my left eye. Sure enough, there was a large black area at the top of my vision in my right eye.

A phone call to an ophthalmologist’s office started the ball rolling and a dye test to look at the retina was performed that afternoon. That night I couldn’t sleep with worry, petrified that I might go blind. The eye specialist confirmed that there was damage to the retina and he wasn’t sure exactly what the cause was – a virus, perhaps? He stressed that it could happen again and cautioned me to keep my immune system strong. I was given a dose of antibiotics and told to rest.

That was in 1986. I was 36 years old, married with three children and working full time. While it didn’t take long for me to grow accustomed to my vision impairment, the shock of partially losing my sight made me rethink my life, and I left my marriageMother-In-Law! Couple Kept Grudges And He Died!. Read more ... » of 19 years. Moving to northern New South Wales in 1990 gave me the chance to experience living in a small community. Perhaps it was the pressure of a new job, a new relationship, and raising a family that took their toll, but by 1993 the vision in my right eye had become more cloudy and blurry. The specialist asked me if I’d ever been to the Wheat Belt in America, as the scars in my retina were similar to a disease from that area. I hadn’t, and so we remained in the dark about what was causing my loss of vision. But I did notice that I was often tired and found it an effort to keep my head upright. I wanted to sleep all the time.

Time passed. In 1995 my new husband and I bought a small yacht and were preparing it to become our permanent home when I realised the vision in my left eye had changed.

I’d been cat sitting and the owner’s relatives were ophthalmologists who had recently been to a conference on the disease toxoplasmosis. They thought I could have it. A trip to a Brisbane eye specialist revealed that toxoplasmosis was almost a certainty and, moreover, that I had lost half the visual field in my left eye.

What did it all mean? I was asked if I’d had contact with cats, which, of course, I had – I always had a cat draped around my neck as a kid.

Cats, as it turns out, are one of the carriers of the Toxoplasma gondii parasite, which they spread through their faeces. When the parasite becomes active it causes inflammation in muscles or tissue. In my case, the parasite settled in the retina, where it was damaging cells and slowly eroding my vision. I digested this information and discovered there was little I could do while the toxoplasmosis was latent but keep healthy and strong.

I knew I wasn’t 100% fit as we cruised up the Queensland coast in 1995. I felt really low on energy, but I put this down to the emotional upheaval of leaving my teenage children and learning new life skills.

At the southern end of the Whitsundays lies the idyllic hideaway of Goldsmith Island. As we traversed the golden sandy bay, I bent down to pick up shells. Each time I thought I was about to clasp one it would disappear. With a sense of dread, I placed my palm over my right eye. I had no vision in my left eye. Panicking, I tried again and again to look at the yacht bobbing on anchor, but could only see black blobs through my left eye.

That day, we contacted my eye specialist in Brisbane by sea phone and made an appointment for me to see a specialist in Mackay a week later. The unstable weather delayed us, but finally we arrived at Airlie Beach, where it seemed the entire yachting community knew about my plight. As we walked down the street I kept bumping into letter boxes and phone booths, apologising profusely as I tripped and stumbled. Deep down, I knew that this was a really serious situation. Instead of colour, I was seeing everything in black-and-white; glare caused unbearable sharp pains in my eyes.

When the specialist informed me that I’d lost the central sight in my left eye and that it was unlikely to return, I burst into tears and returned to Airlie Beach traumatised. A friend had to crew for me on our journey back to Brisbane. I could still handle the head sail but had to relinquish cutting the vegetables, as my husband and our friend were convinced I would spear one of my fingers or take out their eyes.

A few months later, my husband and I built a house on an island in Moreton Bay, where I hoped to put my vision problems to rest forever. However, my disease became active again that year, and again in 2000, 2003 and 2004 – at which point my eye specialist firmly encouraged me to “sit under a palm tree and learn floral arrangement”.

I’ve taken his words seriously and have learnt not only to relax more, but also to monitor and manage my eye health. I regularly use the Amsler recording graph to monitor my areas of lost sight and to check on the good vision in each eye.

The damaged areas show up as black blobs on the graph; if these change shape, I know the disease is active and immediately visit my ophthalmic physician and surgeon. These recurring episodes can leave a sufferer feeling depleted for up to six weeks. I tend to recover by sleeping as much as possible, as the only available treatment is a prescription of triple antibiotics to minimise the damage.

These days, I occasionally suffer migraines, a result from straining my eyes when reading and writing, but I feel very lucky to still be able to read and drive. And, after all these years, I’ve realised my dream of living by the sea and writing.

I know now that it’s up to me to manage my eye disease. I’m the only one who puts pressure on myself and I’ve learnt that life is richer if I just take each day as it comes.

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Rape: Outcome of Depravity or a Mere Reflection of a Chauvinistic Culture?

Rape has been defined as "the unlawful compelling of a person through physical force or duress to have sexual intercourse." One of the most appalling crimes done by man, rape has been used as a weapon to humiliate and degrade would be victims. Victims of rape can either be male or female. However, I will be looking at rape where women are victims of male attackers. 

In Africa, rape has become more prevalent than ever. In Congo where there is endless conflict between militias, about 1,100 women are being raped daily (American journal of public health) with more than 400,000 women aged 15-49 raped during a 12 month period between 2006 - 2007 (AFP). While rape tends to be a norm during wars like the Congo situation, it is also a reality in peaceful societies. While western countries have stringent laws to checkmate this crime, African societies have had a hard time finding any tangible solution to this menace and operates absurd laws as a panacea for the issue. 

In Nigeria, the criminal code provides a life sentence for a rapist once a rape has been established that it took place, however the conditions on which such a claim is to be established puts a burden of proof on the victim and in the end frustrates justice. Many of such conditions such as the requirement of one or two witnesses for corroborative evidence, proof of penetration, proof that penetration is linked to the attacker or accused, and proof that penetration was without consent of the girl (section 357: criminal code) are just many of the roadblocks successfully erected by the Nigerian legal system with the help of a culture that appears more sympathetic to the perpetrator of the crime than the victim. I remember vividly the 2001 case of Sunday Jegede v. the state where the judgement held that the injury on the victim's vagina was not conclusive evidence as the requirement for corroborative evidence was not met, and the then Abia state University gang rape case that had a sitting governor, Vice Chancellor and commissioner of police denying the rape took place without proper investigation. 

Now the question is, is rape an outcome of depravity or a mere reflection of a chauvinistic culture? If the judges in Sunday Jegede vs the state were women, would the victim have found justice? If the Abia state governor, the Vice Chancellor of Abia state university and the commissioner of police were all women would they have swung to action and immediately brought the rapists to book? The answer is obvious. It is clear that a culture of male chauvinism affects laws relating to women and countries like Nigeria where lawmakers slap their female colleagues will never provide the necessary legal framework to provide true justice for female victims of rape and other crimes. I also watch on on the legal proceeding involving a young Indian adolescent who was also raped in far away India. Without bias to gender, the panel gave a good verdict to the perpetrators who sent the young girl to her early grave. 

However in this part of the continent, especially in Nigeria the complicity of security agencies make it difficult to get a clear picture of the exact number of rape cases as a result of under reporting because police themselves have been implicated in the rape of female detainees. The culture of male dominance which has been accepted as normal makes it possible for rape to continue. 

Aside this problems, the society which is more patriarchal in its outlook will blame the victim who will have to live with the stigma of being raped. 

Nigeria must do away with cultural practices that hold no value. As a signatory to the U.N charter on human rights, Nigeria must go back to the drawing board and enact laws that provide adequate punishment for male attackers as well as adequate compensation for their female victims. It is indeed disturbing that rape as a trend continues unabated. I recently read from a Nigerian Newspaper of a rape incidence of a 16 year old virgin in Lagos by three men and the now common gang rape of old women by youths aged between 17-25, show the danger of bad laws and a dysfunctional culture. Article 1(3) of the U.N charter on human rights calls for the respect of human rights for all without distinction on account of sex. Nigeria however is still undecided on the superiority of its male driven culture over laws that provide for gender equality.

 

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Travelling Abroad: How Favourable Is It To A Relationship?

It has become a normal saga that when people travel out of the country leaving the other partner behind, there is always an iota of doubt in the continuation of the relationship. 

Why should a relationship end because one partner went to study abroad or for business purposes. Some don’t even stay for 2months before changing. They begin to complain of busy schedules, busy bla bla bla……..and the likes. The fact is when some people get there, they feel they are in their comfort zone and they can do what they like. They feel its better to go for someone over there for a better advantage. 

Some guys begin to date white women because of their hidden agenda(getting a stay permit). Am not saying anything is wrong with dating a Whitey. Whatever the case may be, I feel distance is a test of love and it's an opportunity to know how much you will be faithful and honest to your partner. 

If you can’t be faithful due to distance, then you won’t be when you are married and busy with different assignments here and there. It all boils down to personality. 

Do you also know that 80% of people end up disappointing their partners. 10% pretend to still be in it while with someone else there. The remaining 10% try to be faithful and keep to their promise. 

So now, is it good to travel abroad while  leaving our partner behind? 

Yeah!!!for good purposes some of you would say. If this is the case, why then should there be fear in the other partner that that’s the end of the relationship or are there more reasons to it. 

Let’s discuss here please……..what do you think about this? 

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Are Nigerians victims of themselves?

 

Many atimes we’ve come across situations in this present dispensation where a Nigerian has had to take a step back, unwillingly of course( you know the average Nigerian) so a citizen of another country is brought to light. And this sad occurrence is mostly seen in the gathering of Africans. 

I have witnessed situations where a qualified Nigerian among other Africans has been cautioned or indirectly asked to be ‘on the low’ so as not to upset a crowd or specific set of people. This line of words ‘ we don’t want them to think its a Nigerian thing or to feel like its only Nigerians that are always chosen’ has become wanton amongst the Nigerians themselves! How is it that we believe it is okay to portray ourselves as smaller than we actually are so people are pleased? Is this a business strategy or just a wrong mindset? 

In short I’d like to say that there are different forms of this sort of victimization.

As I  post this here, I wonder if my beloved readers would take this up as a topic for thought or then again if I’ll need to reassure my non nigerian readers that this is just a controversial topic to prevent offense.

Comment people ( this is just a controversial topic though, lol).Lets hear your view here on Straight Talk Monday!

Email: info.posche@gmail.com