With Joseph Edgar
I know oga and a vast majority of members of the House of Representatives, who invited him on the matter of insecurity especially on the back of the farmers’ massacre, will never have heard of Neverland. So make I explain am. Neverland was Michael Jackson’s ranch. It was an amusement park with exotic animals like Llamas and the like. He built it around a fantasy theme park where he used to go and hide from reality. He never wanted to grow old. He craved eternal youth. It was a bubble na so he die o.
Neverland was where he went when he ran away from reality. Poor album sales, dwindling public acclaim, financial problems, and all sorts of practical world challenges. So when it was all too much, he would run there and hide from the reality of his situation. Hoping that by the time he came out, the whole wahala would miraculously blow away. He started dressing and looking like his favourite cartoon character all in a failed bid to hide from adult turbulence.
But sadly, the problems did not go away. Even in the luxury of Neverland, sleep eluded him, reality came to him with various police raids, and sadly, he passed on and the world mourned an icon. Hope say this invite and reported acceptance no be another trip to Neverland. The alignments are eerily similar. God save us.
ALI NDUME’S CROCODILE TEARS
Sorry, I want talk about Ndume again. But this time no be about am since the judge apparently did not read my last column and went ahead to release him on good behaviour. Na wa. Anyways, the man come out after eating beans and being denied activities in the other room for the few hours he spent in prison to say he regrets fighting Jonathan and that he now has seen the freedom Jonathan was talking about. Let me say something first, when Jonathan was talking about freedom, no be for this kind your matter. So you stand surety for a character like that, when I am sure there are millions in your constituency in the gallows and with better cases, you no stand o.
The man run away and the system moved against you, you come dey shout freedom. This is not the kind of freedom Jonathan was talking about. Nobody but yourself trample on your own freedom. Abi did anybody beg you to go and stand surety for such a known person? Mbok, that is not my issue. My issue is the confused state of our people. When suffer head don plenty, you begin to lose your physiological balance. You begin to start thinking like a fool. That is what is wrong with us as a people. People crying for Jonathan to come back? This same Jonathan that we all jumped into the street to say good riddance? We don see fire, Naira don worse pass Ugandan money. We are shouting Jonathan. This is what my former lecturer used to call buffoonery. No be only Jonathan, na Abacha. This country, person overthrow person for coup in the 1980s, we jubilate, the person wey dem overthrow, win election later, the person wey overthrow am follow jubilate. Wait o, we try to bring person back in a casket as fugitive for stealing us dry, years later the fugitive win elections. You see how suffer head used to turn people insane? Jonathan ko, Patience ni. We are 200 million people. If we cannot stop this recycling of incompetence, let’s kuku go and beg Britain to come and re-colonize us at least we go dey watch premiership free. Abeg.
GARBA SHEHU – DROOLING ON CASTOR OIL?
Kai, na this kind thing dey make me miss my papa. As far as my dear old dad was concerned, any slight illness na castor oil. Castor oil was bitter, they would boil it and you would drink and you begin to stool. You see why this #EndSARS generation never suffer reach. They did not take castor oil. In those days in my bid to escape it, I would be talking all sorts, begging and crying but it never worked, my papa would tighten my nostrils and force the thing down my throat. The effect was instantaneous and I would be purging like mad. Be like say the way this baba and him brother, the pot-bellied mustachioed, dark one, be like say na castor oil-induced dribble. How do you even attempt to justify this heinous crime on the back of what he has been reported to have said? This kind thing can weaken ‘someborri’.
At the Duke Summit when one is even trying to say, no na let’s cut these people some slack, they will come out with this kind of statement that begin to make you wonder just what exactly is going on in that Aso Rock place o. Dr. Rueben Abati must come back and better expound on that his witchcraft theory in that place. It’s looking like he knows more than he is letting on. Kai.
YAHAYA BELLO –‘BETTER RESPECT YOURSELF’
In Shomolu, we had everybody. On our street in Okuyiga, we had the Yoruba house, the Igbo house and the Calabar house. The Calabar house was us, while the Yoruba house was Papa Rasaki. The Igbo house was them Uchenna and there resided Ikpo. Ikpo was a big, gentle giant and could beat everybody but he rarely fought. So when you annoyed him or tried to be stupid especially on the field of monkey-post football, he would say, “Enyin, better respect yourself.” One blow could land you at the nearby Igbobi Orthopedic Hospital. So when I started hearing this dribble of this my younger brother – they say na youth, Ikpo came to mind and the only thing I could say was, ‘better respect yourself there.’ Na wa.
LAIDE AGBOOLA AND OBINNA ONUNKWO – THE REIGN OF PURPLE
One of my favourite colours is purple and these purple guys are simply doing well o. Laide and Obinna are the brains behind the iconic Maryland mall and are in the throes of building some very massive structures on the island, creating wealth, jobs and simply contributing to the economy on the back of their purple company.
Not sure if I can still call them youths especially Laide who is going bald. In fact, e be like say na both of them are bald abeg but they have simply, like thousands like them, refused to sit on the kerb and be doing armchair critics like millions around them. They have through continued sweat and blood decided to build an empire, I tell you.
I can vouch for their rude determination, personally. We were once on a capital raise – this is what in investment banking happens when you want to get funding for either a project or capitalize your company- I was working with Laide since I think he is the face of the partnership. Na him go wake me up at 5 am to discuss the days waka and for night na him go close my day with a rehash. These boys are the next generation Elumelu and Dangote. You just mark my words. Be watching them o.
HON. ONOFIOK LUKE – MAN OF THE MOMENT
This young man represents my constituency in the House of Representatives. We are from Akwa Ibom but the constituency used to confuse me. I know say my village dey 30 minutes away from Uyo and near Etinan. Anyways, na him, abeg. So one day after making his acquaintance, I broadcast his picture on my WhatsApp. You know I have 10,000 people following me on that platform. Come and see the feedback: “He was our Students’ Union president!” “He is such a nice person!” “He withstood the APC onslaught in Akwa Ibom!” “He will be the next governor.”
Me I did not know that a politician of that stature still had the maddening goodwill that most of them have squandered. Well, kudos to him even as I continue to wish him well in all his endeavours. Well done, Akpaneka.
