The ancient city of Axum in Northern Ethiopia is an enchanting place to visit. It has  many  great sites and artefacts that point to an illustrious past. Among the top attractions are the stelae park, St. Mary of Zion Cathedral, Ethiopian Orthodox Church’s holiest site and Axum Rosetta Stone. OKORIE UGURU recently visited the place and reports.

As the door of the Bombadier plane was opened by Ethiopian Airlines’ cabin crew, the whiff of air that came in was relieving. One may not know whether the altitude of the town was higher than the ancient town of Lalibella (another town in Ethiopia) with its thin air that made breathing  difficult for visitors.

Here, obviously the air was richer. Most tourists on the plane were coming from there. For many tourists from Lalibella, their lungs reacted positively, gulping in air rich in oxygen. This is the ancient city of Axum, northern Ethiopia, just about 150 kilometres away from Eritrea. It is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The ancient Kingdom of Axum has existed for thousands of years, but was at the peak of its power between 100AD and 10 century AD. Within this period, the Aksumite kingdom, as it is sometimes called, established an empire that covered the  large part of northern Ethiopia, Eritrea  and some places in the Arabian peninsula.

During this period, the empire controlled trade between the Greco-Roman empires and India, leading to its prosperity and wealth. With the wealth, kings of the kingdom built monuments that have become a source of study and interest.

Driving through the town, the topography is not different from what obtains in the far north Ethiopia, huge rocky hills jutting out and encompassing the space. In most cases the roads have to be literally hewn from the rocky hills.

Axum, though ancient, is somehow sleepy, most of the vehicles in use are buses. There are also carts being dragged by domestic animals. There are not many of  individual luxury cars. Driving in, one could see some isolated houses pitched on top of hills. The tour guide, Mengistu, explained that these were monasteries.

Axum exudes the feeling of calmness. Here, life seems to be simple and  devoid of the frenetic. Life has been on here unbroken for more than 2000 years and there is the sense that maybe 2000 years from now.

In Axum, the past and the present are intertwined in a continuous stretch of existence. Although modernity has crept in, yet the past is pervasively present in the day-to-day life of the people.

Axum has a kind of enchantment and myth.  This was the city where King Haile Selassie had to come  down to be crown king. It is also regarded at the holiest site of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The St. Mary Cathedral complex is one place a lot of activities in Axum revolve around.

Having read so much about the town with its stelae and obelisk, it is a place any historical or adventure  tourist would look forward to visiting.

They obelisks or stelae of Axum with their vague symbols and inscriptions mirror an enchanting past. It is ancient towns like Axum that have  sustained Africa as a mythical land. The stelae are concrete facts to the sophistication of African civilization thousands of years ago. What one had so much read about and seen  in pictures are standing  and could even be touched.

The Axum stelae parks are located in the heart of town. Among the stelae, there is the great stele that is 33 metres tall and 520 tonnes. But it has broken into pieces. The belief is that  it fell while being mounted.  The others are of different and sizes.

The tour guide, Mengistu, gave the history of the stelae: “There are three kinds of stelae: the rough, smooth and richest decorations. The rough one is the simplest. They are the oldest ones. They were erected in 2nd century BC. When they started erecting stellae, the began from the simple ones. After they improve their skill to smooth ones and finally to the richest decorations.

“We have six richest decorations in this compound and the six stelae are arranged in order of size from North East to South West. They represent a chronological sequence. The fallen one, that is the tallest and the youngest one, is 33 metres high and 520 tonnes. They were made of stones from  a quarry.

“There have been questions as to whether the decorations were done right there at quarry or here. They were finished here.  We still have some unfinished stelae over there. That unfinished stelae show they were cut form the mother rock and transport roughly, using elephants and wooden rollers. Using the elephants to draw the wooden rollers, the finishing is then done here. We also wondered, granite is the hardest stone, what kind of tools did they use to cut the stones? Investigations and excavations are still on.”

The rock obelisks are tall and huge, making one wonder how they were erected. The guide explained: “They also used the elephants to pull and erect it, using a system known as the rolling and pulling system. Generally, we have more 200 stelae registered by the UNESCO. The Scot traveller, James Bruce, came here in 1769. During that time, the city had more than 300 stelae. From that ancient period, the number of stelae became less and less because the local people were using the stelae as stones for building because they did not then recognize the historical value.”

Mengistu explained that the rock stelae were a king of significance as they showed the splendour and affluence of the royalty then: “Generally, those stelae were erected above the tombs for kings and members of the royal families. Those stelae were erected like pagan statues. On top of the stelae is the shape of the crescent, half moon. The holes on the body represent sun. Both represent gods of sun and moon.

“On the body of the richest of the stelae, we have the symbols. At the bottom, we have the symbol of dog and above we have the storey. This is like a skyscraper. Members of the royal families are buried underneath.

“The door symbols are used to create access for their spirits. They go through that to heaven. Every stelae has holes at the base. Those holes are used to offer animal sacrifices  to the moon and sun gods. The oldest stelae is about 2200 years.”

The tallest and the newest of the cluster of stelae in the park was the fallen one. It fell during the erection time because at 33 metres high and 520 tonnes of granite, the base was too short. It was not deep enough.

He said: “ So, they were not successful in the process of erection and it fell. That was about 7th century AD. But the local tradition has a different version. It was successfully erected and  standing up till 9th century AD when the Aksumite civilization collapsed because internal and external conflicts.

“The internal conflict was the civil war between the Christians and  Jewish settlers. The external conflict was the rise of Islam. Because of this, the Aksumite civilization collapsed and shifted to Lallibela.”

The stelae are not the only attraction at the park. Just below the fallen great stelae is one of the royal tombs that the stelae was built upon. Walking down, close to 10 feet deep to enter the tomb was a bit spooky. The tomb is not like the rock hewn tombs that are common.

It is a purpose constructed tomb. It has different chambers. The chambers are facing one another with a kind of walkway in between.

According the guide, there may be other tombs yet to be excavated, considering the number of stelae at the park. Beside the park is the museum. This museum houses some the day-to-day utensils sued in ancient Axum.

They range from the crude to some highest level of craftsmanship. They are from the stone down to the metal age.

•St. Mary of Zion Cathedral built by Emperor Haile Selassie

St. Mary of Zion Cathedral complex

The stelae complex is separate from the famous St. Mary of Zion Cathedral. The church is the holiest site of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The church was built in 1665 AD by Emperor Falisides.

This old church was replaced by a new cathedral built by Emperor Haile Salesie in thankfulness to  Mary for helping him defeat the Italian imperialists.

In between the old and the new cathedrals is the small house said to house the Ark of the Covenant.

According to Ethiopian history, the ark was brought to Ethiopia by the Menelik, the son born to King Solomon, by the legendary Queen of Sheba believed to be from Aksum.

No one is permitted to enter the house where the ark is, except the guardian priest. On this particular day, coming out from a trip of the old church and heading for the new, we saw the guardian of the Ark just by the fence of the church.

The tour guide confirmed it was him. He was holding a discussion with another individual like a priest. But while the guardian of the Ark was inside, the individual was standing outside. They were separated by the fence. According to the guide, the visitor can never go beyond that point to think of entering inside.

The old cathedral could only be entered by men as women are forbidden from entering.

By nature of worship, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church engages so much in chants and singing. The Bible used in the cathedral is made of goat skin and about 1000 years old.

Just outside the old orthodox church is a stone slap said to be the place where Emperor Haile Selasie was crowned king of Ethiopia.

On a normal day at the church, hundreds of worshippers, men and women, flock there for worship. They come in, clutching wooden sticks that are used to support the body and for chants. There is a kind of totem at the door that worshippers pray in front of before heading for the main auditorium of the church.

The complex also houses a monastery for monks who stay there giving themselves to worship of God and work in the cathedrals.

The Rosetta Stone and Queen of Sheba Palace.

Leaving the cathedral and the stelae park, we are heading for what looks like the eastern part of the town. It is up hill. The bus laboured upwards. The first stop was at a  house that contains the what has been dubbed the Ethiopian Rosetta Stone.

The Rosetta Stone of Axum was caused to be written by King Ezana of Axum. It is like the original Rosetta stone, written in three languages: Sabean, Ge’ez and ancient Greek. In the stone, King Ezana  ruled from 330 to 356 AD.

He ruled for 26 years. In the stone, Ezana recorded his war and victories over Nubians and against the Kush kingdom.

Leaving there and further up, there is another site. It is an excavation of a an expansive house. This, according to Mengistu, our tour guide, was the palace of the Biblical Queen of Sheba based on findings from the excavation.

Leaving Axum, one was thankful for the memories and so much information about African past. Axum is a town that is opening up to become a modern city, but in doing that, they are mindful and proud of the past. To a large extent, modernity has comfortably blended with the past and are existing comfortably.

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Music was never an ambiguous gift to Majek Fashek. As a member of the struggling reggae group, Jastix, he sought to change the world with music. Then he went solo and chanced on fame in common hours. It was the prototypical story of ascension to fame of ordinary folk. It was also what Saul Bellow likened to picking up a dangerous wire fatal to ordinary folk or rattlesnakes handled by hillbillies in a state of religious exaltation, in his novel, Humboldt’s Gift. Many who grasped these super-charged wires and serpents have been found to incandesce in acclaim for a little while and then they wink out. Fashek a.k.a. the ‘Rainmaker’ had a successful run until his descent. OLATUNJI OLOLADE, Associate Editor, through series of encounters with Fashek, his wife and closest friends, recounts the tragic fate of a man who taught the world to trust in his talent in order to love him

MAJEK FASHEK has located the musical ghost town. The artiste who rose to acclaim as the melodious ‘Rainmaker’ is currently caught in a rut of interminable drought. In the furrows of his melodic rut, sad reminiscences of the idol he once was, fuse brilliantly with random notes welling up in his head and his heart to fade out – just before they meld with his decomposing genius.

As you read, the artiste who garnered for Nigeria, an enviable spot atop the global map of reggae music has totally disappeared from the world musical chart.

Save occasional encounters with him at random musical events or on the street, very few people would recollect the existence of the man whose soulful melodies and rousing burr captivated and lured converted and dilettante reggae enthusiasts alike to reappraise and appreciate the brilliance and promise of Nigerian reggae music.

When he mounted the stage at Tramps on a Thursday night in December 1990, Fashek was ambitious enough to eye the legacy of Jamaican reggae pioneer, late Bob Marley. He clearly wanted to reach an international audience, presenting himself as a Nigerian lone voice battling oppression and other societal ills with music. Back home in Nigeria, his concert tickets sold out to crowds that couldn’t get enough of the young, enigmatic performer with a gift for haunting riffs and an unusual hybrid style derived from regular reggae and pacy cross-rhythms of Nigerian Juju with a jolt of hard rock.

There was depth to his messages even as his political statements meandered between ponderous denunciations of poverty, apartheid and injustice. For one song, he insisted that evil spirits rule the world. Fashek affected the insight and oracular power of Marley’s lyrics, modelling his vocal style on the late Jamaican’s tenor, yearning and strength. Now and then, he strapped on a guitar to add power chords and a limited stock of blues licks, invoking a fluidity characteristic of Nigeria’s Juju maestro, King Sunny Ade.

When Fashek sang reggae, the world ceased to exist. At least not the world that the global music map and territorial boundaries would have you believe exists. Fashek’s music traversed lyrical and territorial boundaries. Thus his acceptance in the United States where he travelled to propagate his brand of reggae radically infused with his homegrown Pangolo rhythm.

“Since the passing of Bob Marley, reggae has been searching for its great black hope. It may have found one in Majek Fashek, even if the guy hails not from Jamaica but Nigeria. No matter. Fashek makes the most melodic reggae of now. Ziggy may be Bob Marley’s biological son, but Majek Fashek is his spiritual heir. In terms of vocal tone, Fashek is Marley’s spitting image, though he grooves on inflections of his own. His first US album, ‘Spirit of Love,’ recalls the breathtaking melodies and deep grooves of Marley and his music is gorgeously hypnotic, at times approaching the elegant beauty of prime Van Morrison. For those who like their reggae sweetened with pop-rock craft, this is one of the prettiest albums now out,” enthused Jim Farber, an American music critic, in the wake of Fashek’s music career.

Farber’s quote no doubt captures the artistry and promise of Fashek’s music in his heydays; for an artiste that displayed so much talent and epitomised hope for Nigerian music, where and how did things take a bad turn?

Random encounter with the ‘Rainmaker’

This minute, Fashek appears to have wandered from the bower of artistry and acclaim that heralded his foray into the local and international music scenes. When The Nation’s Entertainment Editor, Victor Akande, ran into him in a club few months ago, his mannerism and jagged voice depicted those of a drunken man; “not of a person ‘ravaged’ by the effect of hard drugs. His crazy manner happened on the spur-of-the-moment, and one could tell, that Majek Fashek is just a jolly good fellow who is restless and could constitute nuisance. His sober state came as quick as his restiveness and within that quick solemn moment too, one could liken his face to the innocent look of a child; by this time, his real age was betrayed, and his eye balls reflected how good-looking he was in his heydays,” he observed.

Fashek’s infrequent lucid moments however, become the news. “That is because they tend to happen when he is suspicious of anyone around him. If he got crazy in the presence of a stranger, it was obvious he merely chose to throw caution to the wind,” said Akande.

Through the encounter, he said, Fashek was watchful like a vigilant dog. They had sat very close for about three minutes, and the artiste had engaged his company with disjointed tales only a discerning mind could piece together. But when the reporter’s question moved from being interactive, he sensed probity, turned around and asked; “Who are you?” without waiting for a reply, he stood up in search of a matchbox to light a cigarette.

“I am a journalist,” and without giving thought to the reply, he walked away, leaving an almost empty bottle of Stout behind. It was obvious he was buying time, because when he resumed his drinking, all that he said could hardly be made sense of.

“Samuel was a servant of Elias… Elah…” began his incoherent tales. “So one day, when Samuel was sleeping, God called him saying, Samuel! Samuliah!! But he got afraid and ran to Elias. He said to him, Ha! Dem call me o… Dem call me o, na you call me? He was afraid, he think say na juju.” Soon he drifted away from the story, dwelling briefly on the subject of mysticism. “But juju na fear,” he continued, “It’s a mind game. The third time God called Elias, he had the boldness, and so he said ‘speak father, your son is listening.’ God talks in voices. To work with God, you can be a mental man, if you can handle it. God is a spirit, and he who must worship God, must worship God in truth and in spirit.” He hit the butt of a cigarette against his left arm severally and set its tip on fire.

“You know what? I left my house this morning… I was all alone in my house… Samuel at last, was able to listen to the voice of God. It was Samuel that anointed David abi? I know Bible. I no wan talk…,” said Fashek throwing off the reporter once again, off the line of conversation.

The musician took a deep puff at his cigarette and burst out with a song: “Pasito na him be, him be?” he tried to sing a line of one of late Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s hits. “Anikulapo, I will never deny Anikulapo. He was an African pastor. He was an Osa (deity),” he said, exhaling.

“Were you a Bible student at any point in time?” the reporter wanted to know. “I studied the Bible while growing up,” he said. “I know the Bible, but I can’t make references. But I studied the book of Moses. Then at a time, I went overboard. I began to read mystic books. And I had to stop.” He looked sober at this point.

What was the implication for him? “Mystic book is very dangerous,” he said. “You’ve got to go with the rules to avoid accident. The Bible is the best. Mystic books are very dangerous. They have rules, like the native doctors rules…There are several books, some can lead you astray, but the Bible will not,” he stressed with a tone of finality. Next, he talked about his next album and video. He said it is called ‘Olodumare music.’ “Jah music,” he tried to interpret. He said the work is a sole effort and not a collaboration with another artiste.

“At a time I was afraid to stay in Nigeria because of the system. But God is wonderful, and having stayed in Nigeria for a year and half is a miracle. I didn’t know I could do it, but God say make I come. Our people are suffering. After Fela, it’s me. Fela gave me his power. King Benedict of Italian. I am the new Benedict; Gbabee!” he said, tapping the reporter so hard it hurt. “Awon orisa… Benedict don dash me the crown. Who born their father?” he drifted again. “Fela came to meet me. He blamed me for not going to Afrika Shrine. I tell you the truth; I’m a prophet of God. Taborah de o Alleluyah.. Ajajun laja ijo wa, eho iho ayo , ekorin…,” he started a popular Yoruba language white-garment church song.

Tragic portrait of a musical rain ‘god’

Few weeks ago, Joseph Edgar, an investment banker, ran into Fashek in Fadeyi, Lagos. It happened on a very busy morning while he was on his way to work. The story he shared was quite sad. “I spotted a loony figure. Pants sagged, dirty black underwear showing a caftan perched precariously on his extra lean shoulders, shock of long unkempt dreadlocks cascading down his head and teeth yellowed by years of hard living and a face still surprisingly handsome despite the ravages of illicit living. This was Majek, my hero, the one who brought down the rain,” recounted Edgar.

“This same Majek, I just saw like that in Fadeyi, begging for ogogoro (local street blend of alcohol) because he did not have N100 to pay for it. I stopped, brought out N1,000 and was immediately struck by confusion. Should I give him this money and contribute to his death or should I refuse him and watch him throw a tantrum like a disposed toddler? He saved me the dilemma as he grabbed the money from me and rushed to the ugly, black dirty merchant of death, who gleefully poured him a glass full.

“Majek downed the drink and hugged me like I had just saved him from the hangman’s noose. I looked deep into his eyes and saw a lost soul. He was actually begging for help, the demon inside of him peered at me from his once very beautiful eyes, daring me to do my worse. Assuring me that he had no intention of leaving this host until it finished its dreadful task of killing him ever so slowly,” said Edgar.

Fashek seen through the eyes of his wife and a former backup singer

With his lush dark dreadlocks, he cut a vivid contradiction to the reggae artiste stereotype that constantly suggests that the typical reggae artiste seldom wanders under a showerhead since birth.

Today, Fashek looks totally washed out yet in photographs he never fails to appear devastatingly pretty and stylish, the perfect pinup for obsessive music idolatry. This imagery of him as well as his past acclaim are just some of the reasons it takes immense critical discipline not to hate him for what he has become. It’s best to feel pity for him and show him love, advised Monica Omorodion Swaida, a United States (US) based actress and musician. In an interview with The Nation, Swaida, who used to be a back-up singer to Fashek and late Sonny Okosun, argued that, this is the time Nigerians actually need to stop judging Fashek and rather show him unflinching love and support. Swaida decried the penchant to treat him with contempt by folk who blame him for what he has become.

“Most of my treasured memories in music came from Fashek. I have known him since almost the start of my music life. I have toured with him both home and abroad. One of my most treasured memories was in Kumasi Accra. The crowd was angry because we were late. They were ready to start causing wahala, but Fashek from nowhere shouted: “All of una be prisoners! The band started playing and the crowd forgot their anger. Oh my gosh! I was most proud! It was one of our best tours. Fashek was always confident and full of life.

“I also remember when he was doing his second album. I was in the studio with him. Me, my young self messed up on the song ‘Without You’ there was an error in the song, because I sang it one time too long. He told the engineer to leave the mistake there. He said he loved it! I was shocked and at the same time so happy! This guy had no bones to hurt anyone. Sweet big brother he was.”

In the same vein, Rita, Fashek’s wife of 34 years and mother of his four sons, pleaded with Nigerians home and abroad to stop judging her husband and treating him with contempt.

“Some people are never fair, many see and say what they don’t know and say whatever they want. People judge you when you are up and judge you when you are down. Engaging in that doesn’t concern us, the main point here is getting him the appropriate help,” said Rita in an exclusive chat with The Nation.

Rita recalled fond memories of her husband. “We worked together when I was about 13 years old. It was funny because I was about to get beat up by a group of boys and he saved me. From there we were together,” she revealed. Rita’s most treasured memory of Fashek was “watching him create and inspire the world with what he loved best, music.”

Genesis of his drunken spells…

“I am not sure when things went wrong or why. Only God can really answer that. I don’t really know and I can’t really say. Of course, there were urgent interventions by his family and friends in his favour,” claimed Rita. The mother of four betrayed little knowledge about the genesis of her husband’s descent into drunkenness and the eclipse of his music career – a truth attributable to her inability to travel around with him on his music tours. In this respect, friends, associates and fellow artistes offer more enlightening information about the descent of the lyrical ‘Rainmaker.’

Swaida, for instance, offered very revealing accounts. She said: “I honestly can’t say when it started, believe me. Fashek was on top of his game. I met him when they came to Boston to play at a club. I played with them that night. That was the first time, I had seen my big brother drink. He drank a lot and I was shocked and asked him when he started drinking. He just laughed and told me he was okay. That night he drank about three stout bottles and later drank Jack Daniels. This happened after the show of course and I was a little disturbed, because he wasn’t the Fashek I knew. I talked to him about this issue, but you need to remember that Majek is a far older brother and I had to respect him. He had lost his beloved mom, his older brother Joe Fabro, those were his closest family apart from his wife and kids. I asked him about his older step brother Olu Shapara. He said he was somewhere in New Jersey. That is another story. I had to leave them that night and went back to school. Then I was at the University of Massachusetts in Boston. I never forgot that night though,” revealed Swaida.

Revealing further, she said: “I knew something wasn’t right. The last time, I was invited to play with him again in NYC. This time, we were on the same stage with late Lucky Dube. Great night, but the same story. He was drinking. I never understood his drinking and told him so. I was very disturbed because it was way too much.  I started calling him anytime I was free, because I was worried. We used to talk a lot when he was in NYC. He would tell me things which I cannot tell you here. Some very sad stories.

“We used to talk for a long while. One day, when he was asking me about my older sister and some old stories, I was shocked and said:  ‘Hey dread! you remember these things? Wow!!!’ He stopped me and told me he wasn’t crazy or sick. He remembers everything. ‘I only have spiritual problems little sister,’ he said, although I didn’t understand what he meant, I never forgot that word. He asked me where I was going, and I told him I was going to a funeral home for a friend that died. He warned me to stay away from funerals. Funeral place is not for you my little sister. “I miss the Fashek I used to know. Till this day, I promise you that I have never seen Fashek smoke weeds or take any other drugs. All I have seen him do is alcohol. This also is a drug and not good if taken in excess. Many people have said things, I don’t know and won’t venture into speculating. I can only tell you what I know directly from Fashek or what I saw with my own two eyes. Alcohol is a serious addiction. One of my closest childhood friends also died of the disease. I personally think Fashek’s problem is alcohol. He told me personally that he has some spiritual problems like I said before. As Africans, we believe these things and I don’t find it strange. He loves God. I told my mom about what Fashek said and my mom prayed with him many times. His wife took him to many churches and many have prayed,” said Swaida.

Family didn’t abandon him

Contrary to widespread rumours that his family had deserted him, Rita disclosed that the family tried to rescue Fashek from the vicious grip of drunkenness several times in the past. For instance, Fashek allegedly checked himself out of rehab in America after his wife and friends staged an intervention and took him there to be rehabilitated.

Corroborating her, Swaida disclosed: “Here in America, as a grown person, you can’t be held without your own consent. It has actually traumatised the whole family. I called on his step brother, Mr. Olu, he hasn’t seemed to care much. He just told me bluntly that I was one of the reasons Fashek is having problems because we give him money to buy drugs. I called him a couple of times but gave up. He seemed to have his own issues. We lost touch. He kind of forgot about Rita and the kids too. A lot of people have tried also to help Fashek apart from his family. Some of them include Azuka Jebose, Charles Novia, Black Rice and others.”

In another botched attempt to rescue Fashek, Rita, his wife, travelled down to Nigeria last year to take Fashek to rehab. “The story last year was an unbelievable one. When Rita finally got to Nigeria, she managed to get Fashek to the rehab and he was there for three days. A certain woman that claims to be his manager came to get Fashek out of the rehab, claiming that Fashek signed a contract with her and therefore couldn’t stay in any rehab or whatsoever! Majek of course was happy to get away. This woman even asked Rita to show her where Fashek’s land was in Lagos so she can take it.

“She is a very interesting woman. Rita called me from Nigeria crying for me to help her. I was shocked and didn’t believe this was possible. How can a fellow human being take Fashek out of rehab? I cried to all of Fashek’s former band members and close friends that I knew. No one could do anything. I was in shock. I am still in shock. Rita was told to go get a lawyer or allow Fashek to fulfill the contract. Rita spent all the small money she had until she got almost stranded there. Believe me, she never abandoned her husband. Quote me. This happened. By the time Rita returned to the States, she had lost her shop where she sold petty things because she had stayed too long in Nigeria fighting for Fashek. She lost almost everything. We have never abandoned Fashek,” said Swaida.

A promising career cut short

Born Majekodunmi Fasheke to an Edo mother and a Yoruba father in Benin Edo State, Fashek remarkably stood out as one of the increasing number of African artists to be drawn to the music of the Caribbean, specifically reggae, rather than indigenous hybrids such as fuji, jùjú, or highlife. Having grown up in a fervently religious and musical family, he was exposed to the imported sounds of Bob Marley at an early age, alongside the innovations of local stars such as Fela Kuti thus Fashek’s major influences were Marley and Kuti.

He gained national acclaim on a television show in the early 1980s as a member of Benin-based reggae group, Jastix. His band mates included Amos McRoy Jegg, George Orwell and Osagie (Black Rice). They toured for many years with fellow reggae group The Mandators. In 1988, shortly after Jastix disbanded, Fashek began a solo career and quickly became the best-known reggae artist in Nigeria. His song “Send Down The Rain,” became a hit that won rave reviews and six US-based PMAN Music Awards.

After leaving Tabansi Records, he was signed to CBS Nigeria in the early 1990s before moving to Island Records’ Mango imprint, a label more accustomed to marketing reggae internationally. His first album for the company included a cover version of Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song.” In 1990, he was signed to Interscope Records and released the critically acclaimed album ‘Spirit Of Love,’ produced by “Little Steven” Van Zandt. Flame Tree released The Best of Majek Fashek in 1994. Fashek has recorded several albums for various labels including ‘Rainmaker’ for Tuff Gong (1997) and ‘Little Patience’ for Coral (2004).

Fashek held sway as a reggae musician in the 80s. His musical exploits took him to the United States, where his stardom was on the rise. The Prisoners of Conscience, his 14-member band, made simple vamps springy and full of detail. Bubbling keyboard lines, the chatter of gourds and the dynamic interjections of talking drums (played as rhythm instruments rather than as simulated speech) transformed the reggae beat. Where a Jamaican reggae band would have most instruments drop out for an interlude of stark dub rhythms, Fashek’s rhythm interludes leaned toward the bustle of Juju, as he and the band members dance. With his English lyrics, rock guitar, pop keyboard hooks and smiling, confident demeanor, Fashek geared to reach an international audience. And he did, until his descent.

Music and drugs

Reggae has historically been associated with Jamaican social religious opposition but has been popularised worldwide. The term reggae hints at a subculture, known for glorifying marijuana and alcoholism as a means to gaining “knowledge” or a higher plane of spiritual awareness. A connection between preferences for reggae, heavy metal, rap, electronic dance music,

and substance use has previously been established; in a study conducted by researchers at the Department of Health Promotion, National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland, Departments of General Social Sciences and Education, University of Utrecht, Netherland and Trimbos Institute, National Institute of Mental Health and Addiction, Utrecht, The Netherlands, overall, when all other factors were controlled, punk/hardcore, techno/hardhouse, and reggae music were associated with more substance use.

“Overall, it seems that genres with nonmainstream, youth-oriented pop appeal attract listeners who are also more likely to consider behaviors such as smoking and drinking “cool” while liking for music that is either mainstream or adult-oriented seems to buffer tobacco and alcohol use.

Personal characteristics such as rebelliousness, recklessness, and sensation seeking may be the basis for attraction to both nonmainstream music and smoking and drinking. These associations were further explained by a characteristic such as recklessness, rebelliousness, or sensation seeking,” concluded the researchers.

Saving Fashek

In the wake of several failed interventions staged for his sake, Rita, Fashek’s wife and Swaida have initiated yet another bid to rescue Fashek from drunkenness and rehabilitate him. Left to them, Fashek is hardly finished. “I don’t believe he is burnt out and there will always be hope for him,” said his wife.

“When he is taken care of, he will be fine. Fashek will rise again by the grace of God. Fashek is a brilliant musician that needs a little push. He will surprise most people. I believe it in my bones,” enthused Swaida.

Both women are asking Nigerians home and abroad to contribute generously to their initiative, among which is a GoFundMe page for the former reggae star. They aim to raise money to fund Fashek’s rehabilitation in an appropriate medical facility.

“We need every dime we can get to achieve this task. Nigerians should help by donating to get him the help he desperately needs. He needs to go to rehab and also get spiritual help. People should stop giving him alcoholic drinks. People should say no to him. This will help him a great deal.

Indeed, Fashek defines the vaunting, unstable strength that is the soul of music even in the face of insurmountable hardships especially the fear of the big flop, the dread of every artiste. There were several scars and some wounds that never healed. His drunken spells and pitiful state notwithstanding, memories of his artistry remain intact, inviolate, in the hearts of his ardent loyalists and fans. No other Nigerian artiste has ever pushed reggae so far, or asked so much from it. In youth, Fashek seemed to play possessed; as if driven by a force alien to his peers in other fields.

There was the fear that society might never enjoy his music, let alone, identify with his messages. However, he has been vindicated as even in the sunset of artistry, his peers, underlings and admirers pay service to the greatness of his music and his contribution to Nigerian art.

Perhaps the remembered sounds of Fashek when he could still chant spiritedly and send down the rain can drown them all out.

But how should Nigeria remember Fashek’s glorious years? Rita’s most treasured memory of Fashek was “watching him create and inspire the world with what he loved best, music.”

“We want them to see something else, so that one day, they will sing along with Majek the way they used to sing not so long ago. We used to sell out stadiums. I was there. This will happen again by the grace of God,” said Swaida.

Whatever memories trail Fashek’s descent from musical acclaim to obscurity, Nigeria won’t forget in a hurry when he made music fall like raindrops. Some history becomes myth. Some myth goes down in history. Fashek made history so quickly that the resonance of his achievements remains strong and out of chronological sequence that they form their own associations, like a painter’s motif.

Some of the colors may be psychedelic, but the shadings are the pastel of memory, the patina, a jolt of remembered melody.

The post Who will save the ‘Rainmaker’? appeared first on The Nation.

THEY came from different families, entered this world by birth at different times and also at different locations but in the course of time, and subtly too, a cruel fate began to bring them together bit by bit with its malevolent hand appearing largely undetected.

They were all promising future leaders – in education, law, politics, governance, arts, sciences and you name it, yet fate schemed it that they became undergraduate students of the state – owned Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago-Iwoye, Ogun State and in life shared the common identity of being university mates.

Thirteen of them had taken off at the Ago-Iwoye park in a passenger bus around noon and had hoped to spend the weekend as usuall with their parents and siblings in Lagos.

That was not the first time they would travel home for the weekend but as the journey progressed along the Lagos – Ore Expressway, little did any of them know that at the Sagamu – Ilssan stretch, the cruel fate that had laid ambush for them at a treacherous slope, showed in a moving truck – a weighty container tipped and fell on their bus.

Welcome to the story of the Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU) 12 – promising young boys and girls. They never made it to the Lagos destination – their lives were terminated abruptly last June 26, when the container from a moving truck fell on the roof of their bus and crushed them to death.

Among the dead were the quartet of Damilola Eunice (200 level Political Science); Aribiola Yetunde( 100 level Bio – Chemistry); Adams Suliyat Oluwatobi (100 Accounting); Ibukunola Ashade and then Tunji Dairo(NYSC hopeful, Physics graduate).

The case of Damilola Eunice was quite touching. Her friend, Miss Shodunke Deborah, who described her as jovial, lively and embodiment of black beauty, said she was full of energy and enthusiasm while embarking on the journey that ended midway on a sad.

According to Deborah, Damilola was one student who was serious with class work and rarely missed lectures if she was around in Ago – Iwoye.

Adebiyi Adeola she was full of tears about Tunji Dairo whose case appeared more touching.

Adeola said Tunji had finished during the 2013/2014 academic seession and had only come to OOU for clearance, while waiting for mobilisation for the one year National Youth Service Scheme.

According to her, Tunji spent two days in Ago – Iwoye and had ‘signed off’ completely having cleared and left for Lagos along with others in that ill-fated passenger bus not knowing that would be his last day on earth.

Already, their colleagues who were touched by the reckless manner their lives and future were cut short are asking for N120million compensation from a plastic factory they suspect to own the truck and container that killed the students.

Last week, the students forced their way into the factory, located few meters away from the scene of the accident and carried placards with the inscriptions: “We Demand Justice for the Lost Souls; ” OOU Mourns, OOU Weeps, OOU Cries,” “A Future Lawyer is Gone!,” “Fresh Graduates Gone!,” “We’ve Lost Our Scientists,” “OOUITES Are Not Chickens.” “ Stop Giving us Phobia,” “Police, FRSC, TRACE Must Be Probed.”

The Student Union Government’s President, Com. Adegbesan Adenola, told The Nation that  they are demanding immediate payment of N120million naira compensation – N10millon for each of the dead students.

Adenola warned that should the company fail to pay the said amount to each family of the victims within seven days, they would return to the factory.

Also last Monday, OOU students, clad in black T – shirts and pairs of black jeans, stormed the scene of the accident in luxury buses to pray for the repose of their colleagues’ souls. For over an hour, they sang dirges for the 12 victims as Muslims and Christians also took turns to pray for the dead.

While a youth pastor, Tobi Adesanya, from the Redeemed Christian Church of God(RCCG) prayed for the Christians,  Oresanya Adewale 300 level Business Administration (Education) student of OOU, prayed for the Muslims.

However, the head of the university’s teaching hospital’s Morbid Anatomy and Histopathology Department, Dr Deji Agboola, told The Nation that the families of the affected students had begun collecting the remains of their wards and children as at a week ago, while the last batch of corpses were taken last Tuesday.

Agboola disclosed that one of the victims of the accident is still lying in the morgue of the teaching hospital because nobody had come to claim it.

According to Agboola, an associate professor who also doubles as the Chairman of the OOU branch of the Academic Staff Union of Universities(ASUU), the identity of remaining corpse could not be established.

The post How Ogun varsity student died on his last day in school appeared first on The Nation.

•Effects of excavation
activities in the delta

Massive infrastructure development and boom in property business across the country over some decades have resulted in increased hunger for sand, an essential material in building, road and other construction works. There is hardly any road or housing project that does not require a huge volume of this item from foundation to finishing. Even some roofing materials contain sand in various forms.

To assuage the hunger, local and professional sand dredgers as well as multinational firms have devised various means of extracting this essential material from the ocean, streams, rivers and even ponds, mostly without recourse to best practices. Some go the extra mile bringing down mountains and burrowing deeper into the foot of the earth or any other place where sand can be found.

Gone are the days when sand excavation is done by locals who dive to the bottom of the ocean or stream to scoop up bucketful and offload same into canoes or riverbank. The huge appetite for sand means that the conventional method of sourcing it is no longer adequate. These days, dredgers use heavy equipment, which are able to suck sand and other materials from the riverbed in large quantity.

An investigation our correspondent conducted in Delta, Bayelsa and Rivers states, among others, revealed that sand miners are now found in every nook and cranny as sand dredging is now a multi-billion naira industry and a money spinner that spews millions of naira for operators, even at the long term risk of communities and villages.

Sand excavators are commonplace from the Central Senatorial District of Delta State, through Ox-Bow Lake and around Ecole Bridge (Bayelsa), Emohua and other parts of Rivers to Akwa Ibom states. Hundreds of sand dredgers litter rivers, streams and ponds in the area.

Our finding revealed that the business was given further fillip by the ongoing East-West Road construction project and others like it requiring immense sand-filling of the unfriendly terrain, particularly in Bayelsa and Delta states. The sheer volume of sand required for the 150-kilometre Warri-Port Harcourt axis of the East-West highway led the construction firm, Setraco Nigeria Limited, to award several contracts with irresistible incentives to local dredgers.

In spite of the contract, Setraco is also excavating from every available source along the road. Massive sand moving equipment are deployed by the Lebanese firm to areas that are inaccessible to local operators with limited resources and skill.

Unfortunately, our findings revealed that the activities of sand miners are not regulated despite the probable negative effects on the environment, economies of communities, infrastructure like roads, bridges and houses around the sites, as well as the long term future of the residents of the area. The lack of regulations has resulted in the ease with which every Dick, Tom and Harry is getting involved in the extraction of sand.

Experts express worries

Experts who spoke with our reporter said that although the activities of these operators pose grave dangers in most parts of the country, the Niger Delta region is the most susceptible to disasters and damage to its fragile environment which has been exposed over time to the effects of oil exploration and exploitation.

In Delta State, a former Commissioner for Environment, Hon. Frank Omare, banned unrestricted sand dredging in the state in 2012. The lead was followed by his Bayelsa State counterpart, Dr Sylvanus Abila, who read the riot act to dredgers in the state, following unmitigated dredging.

In Delta, Omare’s directive was part of the recommendations of an ad hoc committee of the Delta State Environment Protection Agency (DELSEPA), headed by a renowned geologist, professional dredger and former staff of the Nigerian Dredging Company, Chief Ken Iwhewhe. Sadly, compliance did not last long before it became business as usual again.

The Association of Sand Miners and Quarries in the state, Mr Adelabu Bodjor, claimed that “members of the union operated under strict ‘internal rules’ and with strict adherence to industry regulations to guard against unhealthy practices that could lead to damage to the environment.”

Iwhewhe

Iwhewhe, who spoke exclusively with our reporter on sand dredging, lamented the lack of compliance and implementation of the recommendations of the committee, which he led. He warned that continued utter dredging poses grave risks to the region. Explaining the processes of safe dredging, Iwhewhe says it is obligatory for an engineer to visit the site and obtain samples of the soil for laboratory analysis.

He said: “The engineer should be able to confirm the suitability of that burrow pit, depending on the volume of extraction. If you don’t do that, the bank could collapse, because when you dredge too deep, you have to be mindful of the angle of declination.

“The collapse of the bank can affect the vegetation. The houses and everything (around it) will be affected. When you dredge close to civil structures, you are also impairing the lifespan because what they are doing can undermine the integrity,” he said.

Speaking in the same vein, Comrade Sheriff Mulade, an environmental activist at the Niger Delta-based Centre for Peace and Environmental Justice, decried the nonchalant attitude of the ministries of environment both at the federal and state levels.

Like Iwhewhe, Mulade remarked that there is need for comprehensive test of mining site before commencement of operation, adding that environmental impact assessments (EIAs) should be imperative before permits for large scale mining are given.

He said: “You cannot carry out the magnitude of dredging that is going on in some parts of the region without proper investigation of the land structure and texture, because when you continue to dredge the sand you are opening up gaps in the underbelly of the earth, and over a period of time it can lead to serious problems, including erosion and even earthquakes.

“The menace of this business, coupled with the attendant effect of crude oil exploration and exploitation in the region, poses a time bomb that could explode and bring with it a devastating effect not just for the next generation but the present generation. This is a clear and present danger, but unfortunately, nobody is doing anything about it.”

He particularly lamented the unbridled excavations going around the East/West highway by contractors working for Setraco and also by the Lebanese company.

He said: “You can see what is happening at the ongoing construction of East/West Road. Setraco is dredging everywhere and some (burrow pits) are very close to the road. This can lead to erosion that can easily cut off the road within a short time. Dredging activities are done within and without any responsible manner,” he noted.

Chief Iwhewhe and Mulade’s concerns are in tandem with an international report on the effects of unchecked sand mining on the environment by the Ojos Negros Research Group, San Diego State University, Southwest Centre for Environmental Research and Policy. It noted that “excessive instream sand-and-gravel mining causes the degradation of rivers.”

The report circulated at http://threeissues.sdsu.edu/ further declared that “Instream mining lowers the stream bottom, which may lead to bank erosion. Depletion of sand in the streambed and along coastal areas causes the deepening of rivers and estuaries, and the enlargement of river mouths and coastal inlets. It may also lead to saline-water intrusion from the nearby sea. The effect of mining is compounded by the effect of sea level rise. Any volume of sand exported from streambeds and coastal areas is a loss to the system.”

For Mulade, the risks highlighted in the above report are much higher in the Niger Delta region because of lack of initial examination of mining sites before mining operations.

He remarked that “relevant information on the topography of the site, hydrologic and hydraulic materials obtained from the location are needed to know how much sand can be safely removed from the stream or site with very minimal effect on the environment of the area. Without that information, what we have at best is a jump in the dark and because those mining are doing it for profit, they can continue to mine until there is nothing left to extract. They cannot be allowed to regulate themselves as claimed by the union in Delta.

“Some of the effects can be serious erosion, washing away of the riverbank, and even earthquake because coupled with the oil exploitation and exploration activities, the risk is there.

“What is an earthquake really? Earthquake is caused by tremor from underneath the earth and it is also caused by a sudden shift when there is a void. As they are dredging, they are creating space, which needs to be filled by something. When it gets to the extent that the upper crust cannot hold due to the void underneath, it would have to cave in to fill that void and you will have an earthquake.”

Nevertheless, Iwhewhe played down fear of possible earthquake, describing the threat as “remote”. He said: “If you ask me if dredging can lead to earthquake, I will say yes and no. Yes, if you are in a seismic area. There are certain regions where the earth structure is not very stable, so the earth is still likely to slide on each other. So when that tendency is there, you have to be careful. When you dredge in these kinds of area, you are enhancing the possibility of plate tectonics to occur.

“Extraction of oil from the bowels of the earth, yeah, that is a very interesting study because of the earth structure. It is interesting to know that underneath this ground, there is liquid molding, hot liquid under the earth. Before then you have layers. Your oil is in a kitchen that is protected by stratigraphic traps.

“Aquifer are widespread; they don’t have that kind of trap or else oil will flow all over the world. It is the evidence of underground oil traps that leads to oil in some parts of the world. When you extract, there is the possibility that what you are extracting from a particular horizon, you are causing depletion of the composition and components therein and it could lead to collapse. And if it collapses, of course, it leads to land mass movement and that is where there is possibility.

“But it is very remote because as you are extracting, it is being replaced because nature does not allow vacuum. That is the beauty of it. The filling is naturally from the bowel of the earth. All the water, peculations and dirty waters go into the earth; they fill the voids,” he added.

Nevertheless, the renowned geologist conceded that the absence of regulatory bodies and agencies, which have led to sand dredging being done with careless abandon, could unleash serious environmental degradation and flooding.

“The indiscriminate siting of burrow pits is leading to land loss; land that could have been used for some other things are converted to burrow pits, which could become isolated lakes because they have taken away the lands and it could take millions of years for the land to come. In our lifespan it is not possible for the land to come back.

“The ecosystem is destroyed and this is not good for the environment. We can talk on and on but not until government comes up with stiff penalties, guidelines and principles to guide operations of dredging people, we will keep on degrading the environment. In (looking at) the pros and cons, the negative aspect is far more debilitating,” he added.

Taking up the analysis, Mulade called for a probe into how Setraco and others chose burrow pits where oodles of sands were extracted. He said the company should be sanctioned if it is discovered that they did not carry out EIAs.

“If you travel along the road from Warri, Yenagoa to Port Harcourt, you will see that dredging has affected ecosystem, farmlands are destroyed. There will be flood in the area and it will affect communities there. You will see buildings will be affected and their livelihoods damaged and destroyed.

“The life span of the road cannot be guaranteed. I believe within the shortest time there will be erosion on that road and it will not be a durable project. On the long run it will affect the road users and there are instances where there will be loss of lives because of the craters they are opening by the roadside.”

Mulade’s claim could not be independently ascertained and our reporter’s efforts to get the company’s reaction were futile. A request for clarification sent through the company’s website and email was yet to be answered two weeks afterwards.

However, our findings revealed that fishing around the Agbarho River in Ughelli, Delta State is now no longer as profitable as it used to be since dredgers have taken over the area. Fishermen who spoke with our reporter said the humming of the dredgers and the force of dredging probably killed the fishes or drove them out of the area.

Meanwhile, the Director General of Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency, Dr Moses Beckley, recently listed Delta, Rivers and Bayelsa among states that could experience coastal flooding in 2015. He was quoted by NAN as advocating attitudinal changes and measures to help reduce flooding hazards in the states.

But environmentalists and other experts who offered professional advice on the development, said the government must take proactive measures to address the trend of risk putting the entire region and other parts of the country where illegal bunkering are carried out at risk.

Mulade cautioned that apart from flooding and ecological degradation, intra and inter-communal crises could erupt in the future due to land shortage owing to sand dredging.

He said: “There are economic and social effects too. For instance, with farm lands gradually eroding, there could be shortage of land for farm and even building. The cost of refilling lost land would be enormous when it is time for development.

“Look at the land around Osubi Airport near Warri. The land was excavated some years ago, today the land is now a river. It is a choice land and people would eventual need to develop it. But the cost of the land would reduce because of the enormous amount of money needed to reclaim it.”

The post LOOMING DISASTER: Experts alert on possible earthquake over reckless sand excavation in Niger Delta appeared first on The Nation.

It was my last class of the day and as I stepped out of the classroom into the corridor, I ran into Debra, a fellow teacher. Trailing behind her were two students, a boy and a girl in the senior school with their school bags strapped on their backs.

“Ah, Sonia, I was about looking for you in the staff room. Please, lend me your cane. I need to teach these two a lesson,” she said, turning to scowl at the students who looked down as if ashamed of themselves.

“What have they done this time?” I queried.

Drawing closer, she explained she had caught them at the back of the class she was teaching, watching porn movies on a mobile phone.

“My students were doing a test I had given them. I stood by the window to relax a little and take some fresh air, when I looked down and saw them outside, by the wall. They were supposed to be in class but were instead watching dirty films. At your age! Is this what your parents sent you to school to do?” she said angrily to them.

“Please, Ma. We are sorry! This won’t happen again,” the girl pleaded earnestly, her hands raised in supplication.

“Shut up! I will report both of you to the Principal after flogging you. And you know what that means; your parents will hear about this and you will both go on suspension!” Debra stated angrily. At that point, both of them knelt down, pleading with Debra and even appealing to me to save them.

“Please, Ma, do whatever you want with me. But don’t let my Daddy hear or he will kill me,” the girl begged.

At that point, I took Debra’s hand and drawing her aside said:

“I think it’s better you handle this instead of involving the Principal. The exams are approaching and it might affect them if they are suspended from school.”

She grudgingly agreed and turning to the two errant students, she ordered:

“Follow me!”

I stood watching as they all marched down the long corridor until they disappeared round a corner…

I shook my head and walked towards the staff room, thinking about all the stuff and ‘drama’ one saw every day as a teacher. I had been working at the school for about three years and while I enjoyed the job, it could be stressful at times. But it was better than staying home idle after graduation. I had written so many applications and attended endless interviews all to no avail; I had not been able to secure a job nearly four years after leaving school.

Infact, I was at the point of getting really frustrated with my job hunt when one of my uncles, who knew the proprietor of the school, arranged the teaching job for me. To supplement my salary, which was not that fantastic, I conduct home lessons for some selected students.

On getting home, I took a quick bath, ate and rested a bit before going to the home of one of my students…

***

Her name was Joy and she was an eleven-year-old JSS 11 student. Joy was sitting at the dining table working on her lesson, when I arrived.

“Joy, you have not finished the homework since yesterday?” I queried, standing by her at the table.

She looked up at me sheepishly then said:

“No, Aunty Sonia. I’m really sorry. It’s just my friend Ena came over and she wanted to watch the new film my Daddy brought and…” she said.

“You know that’s not good enough Joy. Always do your home work first before watching movies or playing games,” I told her.

“Ok Aunty. Please, Aunty Sonia, can you help me with this calculation?” she asked, pointing to her note.

Except for her playful ways, teaching Joy was no problem as she was quite intelligent. I had been teaching her for six months and we were getting on well. If it were not for the unforeseen problem that had come up, I would have continued as her teacher for a long time. But from the look of things, I might have to give up as her teacher.

It was all because of my friend, Thelma, who incidentally is Joy’s older sister. Thelma and I knew ourselves way back at the university. We had done a lot things together which I will state later in my story. Presently, however, Thelma is at war with me because of her father, a widower. Her mother had died over ten years earlier when Joy was still a baby. He had not remarried and had focused on taking care of Thelma and her siblings.

Her father, whom I usually called Uncle Luke had to my surprise, fallen in love with me. All the while I was coming to their home to teach Joy, I had regarded him like my own Dad or older uncle. He was about sixty years old, nearly twice my age and I looked on him as a father figure. But unknown to me, Uncle Luke had developed feelings for me. And just a month ago, he had taken it a step further and proposed marriage!

When my friend heard about the proposal, she had hit the roof. She had been really angry and we had had a big quarrel over the matter. She had accused me of seducing her father and using charms on him to make him fall in love and even propose. She said if I did not leave her Dad alone, she will reveal so many secrets about me, especially about my escapades while at the university…

To be continued

Send comments/suggestions to 08023201831(sms only), psaduwa@yahoo.com or psaduwa007@gmail.com

Names have been changed to protect the identity of the narrator, Sonia and other individuals in the story.

The post Game of hope (1) appeared first on The Nation.

After he had been declared missing for seven days, the body of former Vice-Chancellor (VC) Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA), Ondo State, Prof. Albert Ilemobade, was discovered in a generator store in his Ijapo, Akure residence. His guard and former driver, suspected to have carried out his assassination, have since been arrested. DAMISI OJO writes on the intrigues provoked by the death of the ex-VC.

THE murder of former Vice Chancellor of Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA), Prof. Albert Ilemobade, will go down as one of the most callous in the history of Ondo State, particularly Akure, the capital. There had been no previous reports of a man of the age and status of the former university don being strangled to death.

Concerned family members and symphatisers had embarked on marathon prayers for God to touch the minds of his abductors when the news first filtered out penultimate Monday that the retired academic had been abducted by some unknown persons. Eager to see her husband return home, Ilemobade’s aged widow, Mrs. Olakitan Ilemobade (73) had promised to find any amount demanded as ransome by his captors. Unknown to her, the late academic’s body was decaying inside the abandoned store within their white-coated building in Ijapo Estate, Akure.

Before the late professor’s body was detected, Olakitan said she was inside the house sleeping when those she thought were kidnappers entered the house and took her husband away. According to her, she woke up only to discover that her husband was nowhere to be found while the car he parked inside the compound had also disappeared. The gate man was also nowhere to be found.

She said: “When I got to the gate of the house, I discovered that it had been locked and our vehicle had been taken away. That is all I can remember or say about the ugly incident.”

She said the car reported to have been abandoned along Ijare Road in Ifedore Local Government Area of the state was not the late VC’s car, adding that the suspects took him away in a Toyota RAV 4 SUV, which had not been found at the time.

About seven days later, the corpse of the 79-year-old professor of Veterinary Medicine was discovered inside his store, causing relations and sympathisers to weep and mourn. Friends, associates and kinsmen of the late professor have continued to throng his residence on Ijapo Estate, Akure.

Many of them were heard raining curses on the killers of their benefactor, who they said was too nice to be killed in such horrible circumstances. Ilemobade’s residence turned into a Mecca of sort as people from Akure and other parts of the state tried to catch a glimpse of the scene of the gruesome murder. They wore mournful looks as they discussed the incident in hushed tones.

The family and church members have also made an appeal to the police and other security agencies in the country not to allow the killing of the late professor to be swept under the carpet. They described the death of the septuagenarian academic as too painful, hence the appeal for quick investigation into his killing and subsequent dispensation of justice on those found guilty in the murder case.

The Ondo State Commissioner of Police, Mr Isaac Eke, assured the family during a chat with newsmen at the State Police Command, that Ilemobade’s killers would face the full wrath of the law. Eke also noted that the suspected killers of the late Ilemobade had confirmed to the police their involvement in the death of the late university don, adding that the law would take its full course in the case.

Describing the suspected killers of the late professor as evil minded people, the police boss said they should not be allowed to live among human beings, hence the determination of the state Police command to ensure that justice is done promptly in the matter.

Eke, who described the incident as traumatic and sad, described it as another dimension to criminal acts in the country, assuring that the police would ensure that the two suspects arrested in connection with the murder case, who were domestic employees of the deceased, were made to face the music

He warned other criminals in the state, saying there would be no hiding place for them in the state.

Adesola, a professor and eldest son of the deceased who is based in South Africa, said the family was yet to come to terms with the death of the patriarch of the Ilemobade family. According to him, “We do not know why he could have been killed in such circumstance, as he was very generous to those that worked with him, especially the driver and his security guard who have both confessed to killing him.”

Adesola recalled that the last conversation he had with his late father occurred during the last Fathers’ Day, which he said the deceased celebrated in style.

He said: “Papa’s (Ilemobade’s) last public function was the Father’s Day where, according to him, he played active roles in all the church activities and had personal discussions with all his children after he returned from church.

“He specifically told me and my other siblings who came around to celebrate Fathers’ Day with him that he was happy. When we asked him why, he said he could not explain the cause of his joy but just felt happy and highly excited. He said he was too happy and could not hide his joy. He expressed his joy to everyone that came around him both in the church and at home that Sunday.”

The only daughter of the deceased, Mrs Tolulade Ozigbo, also described her late father as a disciplinarian, stressing that the family has lost a gem and that the vacuum left by the deceased would be very difficult to fill by any member of the family.

She recalled growing up under the tutelage of her late father, saying: “My father was a disciplinarian who would ensure that we all woke up by 6 am for family devotion, whether we liked it or not. He was too much to be missed. Nobody can say any bad thing about him, not even those who worked with him in all the places he worked, including FUTA.”

The youngest child of the deceased, Adeseni Ilemobade, who expressed regrets on the death of his father, said the deceased’s former driver and one of the suspects arrested for his killing had during the last Easter misbehaved.

He recalled that “when daddy travelled to Ondo, our home town, for the last Easter celebration, the driver suddenly disappeared while service was going on. After the service, Daddy could not find the driver and the car in the church premises. He reported the case to the police and after some days, the driver was arrested and the car was found. But daddy, after a while, accepted the plea of the driver. Now,the driver has done his worst by eliminating him.”

He described the alleged action of the driver as vengeance, stressing that “the driver later came back on revenge mission. But we thank God our father lived a life well spent in the service of God and humanity. He was a man everybody would like to come across and these make us happy as his children who are also growing in his counsel.”

Notwithstanding the circumstances surrounding the death of Ilemobade, the family said a befitting burial would be given to the late professor, stressing that “no matter the way he left, we are still going to celebrate him as a hero that he was.”

Adesola, eldest son of the deceased, said: “Regardless of the circumstances that surrounded his exit (death), our late father will be given a befitting burial. The family is already meeting and planning on the date of the burial,” he said, adding that “our late father will be celebrated by the family whenever we agree to bury him.”

Also, the Vicar-in-Charge of Vinning College of Theology, Akure where the deceased attended before his death, Dr Ayodeji Fagbemi, said: “We have lost a very great scholar and it is just too wicked for a man of his caliber to have been killed this way. It is a terrible thing and I believe that those behind this killing will not go unpunished.”

He called on the government and the police to ensure that the killers of Ilemobade face the music, saying the case should not be swept under the carpet, just as he called on the judiciary to give accelerated hearing to the case for the world to have confidence in the judiciary.

Ilemobade’s suspected killers were arrested in Ogun State and, after interrogation by security agents, it was discovered that the two suspects confessed to the killing of Ilemobade, hiding his corpse in a store that housed the generator before running away with his vehicle, which they planned to sell. This led to their transfer to the Ondo State Police Command.

One of the suspects, Bamitale, a 36-year-old man who claimed to be an indigene of Ekiti State, had during interrogation said he stopped working as a driver with Prof Ilemobade about four months ago when he attempted to steal a car belonging to his boss, adding that Daniel, who was also a domestic staff of the late university don, contacted him a few weeks ago and told him that he had consulted his herbalist on how to steal the car without running into trouble.

Narrating how they killed Prof. Ilemobade, he said: “After he had told me about his herbalist on the phone, Daniel asked me to come to the House at Ijapo Estate on Sunday by 9p.m. When I got to the place, he told me that he had met his herbalist who told him that if we wanted to take the car, we must ensure that we killed Prof and that he must take away some sand from that house so that there won’t be any problem after we might have killed him. “

His words: “When I asked him how we were going to kill Prof who was already sleeping outside, Daniel said he would lure him to the security room by telling him that there was a power surge, and from there, we would strangle him to death. We would then be able to enter into his room and take whatever we wanted.

“He went into the sitting room of Prof and called him that there was a power surge, and Baba passed through the kitchen to the security room. It was there that we grabbed his neck until he stopped breathing. We took him to a store beside his car park and dumped his body there, We put a picture on his chest so that if the body was later found, they would think that it was those who killed him that dropped the picture.

“When we entered his room, we saw the car key and N7,000 with his laptop and two phones. Daniel locked the gate from outside and we went away with the Rav 4 Toyota car. When we were about leaving his residence at Ijapo Estate, in Akure, we met some police officers who passed by us thinking that Prof had sent us out.

“We slept at Alagbaka area of Akure because Daniel’s brother, who lived at Arakale in Akure, refused to pick his phone. The following morning, Daniel asked us to take the car to Calabar, but I told him that the N7,000 with us was not enough to buy fuel to take us to Calabar. We agreed to take the Car to Lagos, but the people I know in Lagos did not agree that I should bring the car to them.

“We left the place for Ijebu-Ode. It was then that FRSC officers arrested us, saying that we did`n’t have the car documents. They took the car to a nearby police station where we were directed to pay N3,000 at First Bank.

“There was no money on us again, and when it was the second day, we took the laptop and the two phones to Epe so as to get buyers in order to secure the release of the car.

“When Daniel saw one of his kinsmen, the guy agreed to buy the phones and he gave us N3,000 so that we could secure the release of the seized car. I went to First bank to pay the money and we took the teller to the FRSC. We were given a letter which we took to the police station and they released the car to us.”

Meanwhile the remains of the late Ilemobade were still in the morgue at press time and may be buried as soon as the family concludes arrangements for the burial rites. It was learnt that the church and the family had met on how to give the late Ondo born academic a befitting burial.

Efforts to speak with Mrs Ilemobade were futile as her children and symphatisers insisted that the septuagenarian widow had been advised against making comments on the incident probably because of age factor or mood of the moment.

Shortly after her husband’s corpse was found in the store room, she had pleaded with the police to bring the suspects to her in order to give her opportunity of asking five questions from them on why they killed his long time companion and bread winner.

However, it could not be ascertained whether the Commissioner of Police acceded to Mrs Ilemobade’s request before the two suspects were remanded in prison awaiting trial.

The post Our father was unusually happy few days to his death—Ex-FUTA VC Ilemobade’s children appeared first on The Nation.

–Ex-NBA President Priscila Kuye

It’s bad  that women are exposing too much these  days in the name of fashion’

Her name is adored within and outside the Nigerian legal community. That is because, Dame Priscilla Kuye has in the last three decades plus, worked hard and contributed to the development of the legal profession, and today is a Life Member of the Nigerian Body of  Benchers. From a privileged background, young Priscilla keyed into her parents’ dream of having educated daughters in the family as against the poor attitude towards educating the girl child which was the order of the day then. She went on to the University of London, where she got her law degree; she later returned to Nigeria and years later rose to become the first female president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), the first Regional Vice-President of International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) for Africa among others. Dame Priscilla Kuye is today a happy grandmother, but still dutifully sits at her desk in the chambers to attend to law matters and even goes to court. She gracefully combines the beauty of years gone by, with the classic modernity to create a charm lifestyle for herself. She spoke to Paul Ukpabio in Lagos.

Looking at the enormous success that you have made out of your life, how far would you say that your background has helped to shape the person that you are today?

I was lucky to have had parents who were teachers. They were educated at the Yaba Higher College of that time. It was the university of those days. So, I was lucky to be educated despite the fact that I happen to be a girl. In those days, there was stiff discrimination against the girl child acquiring education. My parents insisted that I had to be educated. They also insisted that my sister too must be educated. I am happy that today, my sister is an architect, while I am a lawyer. I had a happy childhood with firm religious upbringing because my mother used to take us to church. We were Catholics. They instilled the fear of God into us and we learnt to pray regularly.

Did you grow up in Lagos?

No, I grew up in Ibadan. That was some decades ago. Though my father was a teacher at a Grammar School, he was the Assistant Registrar for Co-operatives. And when he retired, he later became an Oba (a traditional ruler) in Ogun state. He used to be called Oba Alade Merin then, that was because he could rule in any of the four areas in Ijebu.

How about your mom?

Unfortunately she died, but then I had returned from England when she died, I was already married and living at Glover road in Lagos.

Why did you have to go to England for studies, were there no universities here?

That was what my parents wanted for me. They chose the United Kingdom for my further studies. So I left for the University of London where I got my LLB. Afterwards, I came back.

You schooled in England, at that time did it cross your mind to marry a ‘white man’?

No, it didn’t cross my mind (laughs). I had to marry a Nigerian. I suppose that if I had fallen in love with a ‘white man’ may be it would have been possible. But then, I didn’t. However, I fell in love with a Nigerian. So I married a Nigerian. Nonetheless, inter-cultural marriage is good. But it didn’t happen to me. I was more interested in coming back to Nigeria after my studies.

Did you meet your husband abroad?

We met here and also later met abroad. But we did not go abroad together. We went differently. He attended the London School of Economics.

The idea for both of you to get married to each other, was it conceived here in nigeria, or in the UK?

(Laughs) The idea was conceived in London and not here. We were just friends in Nigeria, but got closer when we met again in London.

Was it that you met in school over there?

No. it wasn’t at a school, we met at a social gathering. We got married in london and then returned to Nigeria.

As a young girl, what was it like to practise law in Nigeria?

It was okay. Law practice is very interesting but you must be ready to work hard, especially if you want to stay in private practice. When I qualified in August 1966 in London, I went to the Law school and in 1967 I worked with a senior colleague for three years. He was a brilliant lawyer, especially in commercial law. I gathered a lot of experience from there and in 1970, I started work at my law firm.

What motivated you to set up your chambers?

At that time, there were few female lawyers in private practice. as a matter of fact, only few female lawyers. That was because, it wasn’t easy for women to combine managing their homes and combining that with their law practice. I had to organise my time and prioritise on those things that I had to do. I enjoyed what I was doing.

Did you have your children before you opened the chambers or after?

I had them in London before coming back. That was a fortunate thing to happen because it helped. They were already growing when I started the chambers. And so they attended Corona school and St. Saviours Schools. They had their primary and secondary schools here in Nigeria.

How did you cope with the home front and running a young chambers?

I used to take the children with me to the chambers sometimes. They followed me anywhere I went whenever the need arose. I had to bring my children up well with the fear of God. We had to teach our children the truth and teach them by example. When bringing children up, we must teach through examples because children are clever. They watch what we do and not what we say most of the time. It is not what we tell them, they do what they see us do. I am happy that our children have copied us. They fear God, they have taken their religion serious and that makes me happy because this is what I wanted them to be. They fear God and in their own ways, they are very good at their business. They are successful people and I am proud of them.

Did you at anytime work for government?

I never did. I have been contented being self-employed. I felt that if I was working for government and at the same time rearing children, it may conflict. But if I am self-employed, I would have more time for the children because I would be able to organise my time. I am one who believes that it is important to be a good wife and a good mother. It also helps to raise children who would not be mis-fits or drug addicts. I believe that the lax we are experiencing in the society now is a problem from the home. It is important that we give our children quality time and teach them good values, we have to teach them to be patriotic, to fear God and to do unto others what they will like others to do to them.

Through your years of practice, which would you say was your toughest case?

I believe that as a lawyer, one cannot win all cases. I won some and I lost some. I cannot even remember my toughest case, it’s been a long time since: 1967. But I remember one now, Late Tai Solarin took Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie to court, and the Late GOK Ajayi was the lawyer on the other side. The matter was about education. And Cardinal Okogie was an Arch Bishop Okogie at that time. The Late GOK Ajayi had more experience than me, but I won the case. It was a tough case. GOK Ajayi said he was going to appeal the case, but he never did. As a young lawyer then, I was very happy that I won that case and it did also help to get more high profile cases (laughs).

Is it just litigation that you do?

No, I do a lot of commercial work too that is, drafting of documents, registering of patents and trademarks, all the other things that I learnt at the chambers where I worked on return to Nigeria.

Which has brought more success to you, litigation or other commercial work?

I will say that it is the commercial work because people know me that I am good at what I do, that I know my onions. I go to court too because once you are retained by a bank, you have to go to court at some point for them. Here you can be a solicitor as well as a barrister.

What were the challenges of working with male lawyers when you returned to Nigeria because according to you, female lawyers were not many.

The male lawyers used to say then that ‘women are good for rearing of children and being in the house!’ I used to ask them then, how can we get a university education and then sit down at home and not use our knowledge? Let me tell you, a female lawyer has to work twice as hard as a male lawyer before they can recognise her. But once the men know that you are a good lawyer, they give you your respect. The male lawyers respect the female lawyers who know their onions. It is hard work. One just has to decide to do anything one is doing well whether you are male or female. Being a woman is totally irrelevant in professionalism. At least that is the experience that I have had.

Have you been on advocacy for women?

There is no way that a female lawyer will not get involved in women advocacy. I am a Life Member of the Council of Women Societies, so there is no way that I wouldn’t have been involved in giving talks, holding seminars to educate and motivate women. In my earlier days, so many people used to invite me to give talks and raise the status of women.

Has that improved women generally?

Yes, it has. I think women should take part in such seminars and workshops because they will learn a lot at such places. Again, I belong to an organisation that is against female genital mutilation. We try to make sure that such mutilations of the female genitals should stop. There is no reason for such mutilations. We educate women on this and even go as far as educating and creating awareness among traditional rulers that this custom must stop. It should be abrogated. There is no reason why a woman should have her clitoris mutilated. It affects them when they want to have children. Some of them bleed which is not good for their health. There was a book that the Late Vice Chancellor of Lagos State University Professor Jadesola Akande and I put together to educate women. She was my classmate.

Lets talk socials. in those days, professionals and graduates returning from the UK, we hear, used to have their special socials and elite clubs. Does it still happen like that these days?

In those days, there was more security. Then we could go to night clubs on weekends and come back late. But these days, one has to be careful. In those days, we didn’t have armed robbers and kidnappers. I remember going out to Late Bobby Benson Club and we won a prize.  We also used to go to Metropolitan Club, but these days, night life is dangerous. One has to be careful because one doesn’t know where the armed robbers and kidnappers are coming from. The night life these days is not for me. But I honour wedding ceremonies and other such social outings. I also attend professional dinner events. But in those days we had fun because everywhere was secured.

How about leisure?

Oh, I love to relax. I used to play golf at a time, but not anymore. I had reasons to stop. These days I just walk. I had to give it up. I walk for 10 or 20 minutes and then do exercises in my house. I watch films, read detectives books, I read Agatha Christies detective books. I visit friends during the day, not at night (laughs); it’s not really wise going out at nights. I do that because I relax when in company of my friends.

Apart from law, what are you passionate about these days?

I am passionate about church work. I believe we must give thanks to God, do things about God. God created us, we must find time to contribute, to give back through the development of the church, of the society. we must give back because we have received. And when you give to God, you are giving to the society. It is important.

When last did you have a holiday?

I don’t miss it at all. I do that every year. I use my brain a lot, so I do not miss my annual holiday. Every year, I take a full month off work. Lawyers have one month vacation in August, so I use it well. I think it is important to do so because all work and no play make Jack a dull boy.

Is it only London that you go to for holiday?

No, I go to other places. The holiday that I enjoyed most was when I went to the USA and also Dubai. Both are lovely places to visit. I have been to many states in the United States of America. I do my vacation in Nigeria too.

What kind of music appealed to you when you were younger and what kind of music appeals to you now?

(Laughs) You are really taking me back in time, good old memories. We used to dance to Sunny Ade music then, Ebenezer Obey’s music too. But I also love classical music. I still do. I listen to them at home. They are relaxing. I listen to Christian music too. I use them to meditate.

You play Golf but do you agree that it is for the elite?

It is not true, anybody can go to the golf course and hire clubs, you do not have to buy. You can go to Ikoyi Club, see if you enjoy the game. If you do, then you can then buy your clubs. I know buying them could be expensive but you can hire.

But to enter into Ikoyi Club, one has to be a member and that costs huge money

Yes, I am aware of subscription fees and dues, but I still feel golf is not for the elite only. I am a Life Member of Ikoyi Club, I am a member of the golf section. Golf is a wonderful exercise. When you are on the golf course and you want to play 18 holes, you immediately know that you want to walk three miles or more, so you could choose to play nine holes. Then you have to concentrate on the golf ball. You have to make sure that you are on the fare way. By the time you finish playing, you are sure to have breathed in fresh air into your lungs. While playing, you will forget about work, business or legal practice. You are totally relaxed. And of course you are likely to be there with your friend. As you play and walk, you are chatting with your friends depending on who you are playing with. I find it very relaxing and it is healthy.

So you can play nine holes or even 18 and you can also play alone if that is what you want to do. Though it is better enjoyed in good company of two or four persons. A good game, good exercise.

As professional men hang out after work in the evenings, how do women hang out?

(Laughs) You know, we have International Federation of Women Lawyers, I do not think women hang out together at night like the men do. I do not think women can do that because women are very busy, they are sometimes house wives, and as a career woman before you finish attending to your husband, attend to your children, there will be no time for such. But again, these days, women have clubs for those who have time.

There is a club called Cosmopolitan Club for women, though I am not a member yet, however, some of my friends are. also, I think there is The Ladies Dining Club, Zonta International Club and so on. Women go there to discuss about women affairs and how they can raise the status of women. There is too much discrimination against women in Nigeria. Women have to be economically, politically and educationally empowered. You know that there are men in this age who still believe that girls should not be educated. I think that is a wrong conception because every individual needs to use their brain, it doesn’t matter the sex. Education is very important for raising the status of women. Education is knowledge, it is power.  Mind you, we also arrange dinners for ourselves too.

What was your fashion sense in those days and then now?

We had a lot of fashion in those days. We had ‘bonfo!’ (Laughs) The clothes  reached down to the knees, at least it didn’t expose the body as what is being worn these days. We didn’t have ‘spaghetti’ at that time in Nigeria, but they had in England, the evening wear, the Europeans liked it. We had Buba and Iro; the Buba was short sleeve though, not long sleeve as it is being worn now. Some of the old fashion that our mothers and grandmothers had is coming back. I believe that a girl, a woman must dress with modesty. These days, women are exposing too much and I do not like it. A mother must watch what her daughters are wearing. They must be properly covered up.

Nowadays, women are exposing too much. And it is the mother’s duty. The girl dresses before leaving the house; that is the best time to correct her to wear something decent before going out. I am happy that there are churches today that when a lady comes in looking too exposed, they tell her to go and change into something decent. When you come to church exposing everything, your back and front, you will distract the men and they will not be able to concentrate on their prayers! And they are supposed to concentrate on their prayers, that is why they are in church.

You are a grandmother now. What is life like as a grand mother?

Yes, I am a grandmother many times over. Life now is very interesting, you thank God for the grand children and you enjoy them. Children liven up your life at this age. You exchange visits and you listen to what they have to say. Children are funny, they watch what you do and do the same.

Your advice to young lawyers

They should work hard, set their goals and always ask themselves what they want to achieve with law practice. They should also work hard, pray hard so that God can bless them. If you are going to court, prepare your case well in the chambers. Young lawyers should not come out of school and then start practising. They should spend some time first with a senior in his chambers to learn. From there, they can then establish their own chambers. They should also pay attention to details.

You have handled many cases in time past, what if a husband tells his young lawyer wife not to work or a case where a young lawyer is posted out of the state where her husband is resident, what do you advise the couple to do?

I know it happens because I have seen graduates whose husbands said they shouldn’t work, not necessarily lawyers alone. If the husband says don’t work, then between the two of them, I think that they have to dialogue. The wife has to make the husband to see the reason why she should work. Even if it is part time. That is I do not see the reason why a woman should sit at home and not do some kind of productive work that will generate some kind of income after going to school to be highly educated. They should dialogue and with patience, they can resolve it.

As regards the issue of posting for a young wife, it is difficult because I believe that husband and wife should be together for a stable marriage, especially if they have children. Again in our country because of the economic situation, it happens, but it is not a good thing for marriage because it may not even be a temporary transfer. I don’t like separations in marriages, especially long separation, because it will affect the stability of the marriage.

The post How defeating GOK Ajayi in a tough case helped my career appeared first on The Nation.

DEAR Reader, if your family life turns out to be successful, you’ve played a part in its success, even though God is the ultimate builder (Hebrews 3:4). If your family life is not successful, God is not to be blame, because He always keeps His side of the covenant. Before your family can be built successfully, there are certain responsibilities that you must accept and fulfill.  By the special grace of God, all through this month, I will be examining the responsibilities of the man and his wife in a marriage covenant. This week, I will start with one of the responsibilities of the man.

The Love Responsibility

God gave man the responsibility to love his wife and his family members. Wherever love is present, it can be seen, read, heard and felt. You can’t hide love. The question now is: how well do you love your wife? Wherever love is absent, there can’t be effective leadership. However, anyone who draws people to himself, is touched by their feelings and shows concern for them, would always be an effective leader.

Love and control are two sides of the same coin. If you want to be in control of your home, you need to use the weapon of love. Ask yourself, “Do I really love my wife and family?” Remember, where there is love, selfishness does not exist!

As a man, God has given you the responsibility to love your wife, just as Jesus loves the church; that is the standard. Jesus loved the church when it had no comeliness. The Bible says, while we were yet sinners, Christ laid down His life for us His Church (I John 3:16). A man that loves his wife, therefore, does not wait for his wife to be perfect before he loves her. Rather, he is unconditionally steadfast in the demonstration of his love for her and for his entire family.  Whenever your wife is going wrong, call her back to order with love. In the world they say, “Love is blind,” but that is not true because God is love and God is not blind. Love has the clearest eyesight; it sees danger afar off and warns it’s loved ones.

Love thinketh no evil… (1 Corinthians 13:5). If your wife could see the thoughts that you’re thinking towards her, would you be ashamed? Therefore, always resist any evil thought concerning your wife or other family members, in the mighty name of Jesus.

Also ensure that you express your love verbally. If you can’t tell your wife you love her, who else do you want to tell? I hear it from my husband continually and it creates in me both the ability to submit and a reassurance to make our family a delight always.

A man who loves his wife speaks good and godly words to her and the children. When he calls his wife a virtuous woman, she longs to live up to that title. As he refers to his children as being gifted and intelligent, they work hard not to disappoint his expectations. He disciplines them when necessary, with a heart full of love and compassion. He interacts (plays) with them, communicates with them, asks them relevant questions, allows them to ask him questions and answers them. He is a good listener and always there for his family when they need him.

Husband, if you really love your wife, you will treat her just as you treat yourself. Wherever love is, there will be nothing like beating or boxing. If you love your wife, you will correct in love not with brutality. It’s sad to discover that some men literally involve themselves in real boxing matches in the corner of their room in a bid to correct their wives. If you keep beating your wife, you are not walking in the terms of the covenant and it is punishable by God. How can you say, “I love you” to your wife in a moment and then the next, slap her? Remember, action always speaks louder than words. The Bible says: No man ever yet hateth himself, but rather cherishes it and nourishes it even as Christ does to the Church (Ephesians 5:25).

If you see a man beating himself on the street, won’t you say that he’s going insane? In the same way, it is spiritual insanity for a man to look at his wife in the face and then slap or beat her. That is an abuse of the privilege of being the head and leader of your family. Don’t be a taskmaster or a lion causing everybody to hide behind the chairs and under the tables as soon as they hear your voice from afar. You don’t have to scare members of your family just to prove that you have them under control (1 John 4:18).

A pinch of salt looks so little but when it is absent in any soup, it is very obvious. Similarly, no matter how great every other thing looks in a family, when love is missing, it will be glaring to the whole world.

These are the things that make a family sweet. There is no secret anywhere; obedience to these divine instructions will give you enviable results in your family life. If you desire the grace of God upon your life to be able to carry out your God-given responsibilities as a man, there is need for you to surrender your life to Christ. You surrender by confessing your sins and accepting Jesus as your Saviour and Lord. If you are ready for this new birth experience, please say this prayer: “Dear Lord Jesus Christ, I come to You today. I am a sinner.  Forgive me of my sins and cleanse me with Your Blood.  Deliver me from sin and Satan to serve the living God.  I accept You as my Lord and Saviour. Make me a child of God today. Thank You for accepting me into Your Kingdom.”

If you prayed this simple prayer, you are now a child of God. He loves you and will never leave you. Read your Bible daily, obey God’s Word and seek Christian fellowship (John 14:21).

Congratulations! You are now born again! All-round rest and peace are guaranteed you, in Jesus’ Name. Call or write, and share your testimonies with me through contact@faithoyedepo.org; OR 07026385437 and 08141320204.

For more insight, these books authored by me are available at the Dominion Bookstores in all Living Faith Churches and other leading Christian bookstores: Marriage Covenant, Making Marriage Work, Building A Successful Home and Success in Marriage (Co-Authored).

The post Marriage convenant responsibilities appeared first on The Nation.

Ace fuji artiste Adewale Ayuba had an early foray into music. At seven, he had made up his mind on a life-long career to be an entertainer, a struggle that later found him establishing a music band at 17. He became a force to be reckoned with when his hit album, ‘Bubble’, was released in 1991. Since then, he has not looked back. A few weeks ago, Ayuba clocked 50, and he was hosted by his fans in America. In this interview with Paul Ukpabio, the fuji artiste revisits the lifestyle that has sustained him in an industry that is full of uncertainty.

You were not in the country for some weeks. Why did you travel?

Yes, I was invited by some of my fans abroad to celebrate my 50th birthday. I was in some sates in America where my fans celebrated me. It was a time for me to thank God. There were different parties for me in New York and Chicago. Now I am back home to business in Nigeria. There was a party on May 22 in Houston, Texas. There was another one on May 24 in New York.v We also had another one on May 30 in Minneapolis. I am grateful for the reception I received over there.

How long were you out of the country?

I spent about three weeks abroad. Though I performed, the trip was specifically for my birthday celebration.

What can you say about your fans based abroad?

The people who had the parties for me abroad were mainly my Nigerian fans. I have a lot of fans who are not Nigerians.  I have Jamaicans and Americans as fans, but it’s Nigerians that invited me.

So, 50 years has gone; what is your hope for the future?

I intend to continue to promote fuji  to the world. That is actually my prayer. I want a situation where fuji music is discussed by Americans in America.

I also pray that God allows me to achieve a situation whereby  people from foreign lands can come to Nigeria to look out for me and hear my music. It is better for that to happen than for me to be going there to play or do shows. 99% of Nigerians already know what is fuji. It is our music. People like the late Baba Agba Ayinde Barrister tried for fuji music, Kollington Ayinla too has tried. But it is better when foreigners come looking for us in Nigeria.

Why do you have hope that America will swallow fuji music like that?

America is ready for fuji music. The average American likes anything that is not American. Just as we over here appreciate hip hop music, they too love fuji music. Most individuals like what is foreign. Take for instance, makossa. It is not Nigerian, but Nigerians like the music and dance to it too.

As a matter of fact, at a time, it was all over the Nigerian airwaves. Also, you know today that Americans are celebrating Fela Anikulapo-Kuti because they appreciate the type of music that he played while he was alive. Whatever you cannot do, of course, you will likely appreciate it.

Do you have any regrets at 50?

I am happy that I am a Nigerian. More importantly, I am happy that God gave me the music talent. But the only regret I have is that I started music at a tender age of seven, which means that I have done music all my life, but as I am talking to you now, I do not have an album out there which I can say is generating income for me. I have done many albums, successful ones too, but not one to show that this is the one that has been generating income for me. But every now and then, I see my music selling in town, but no money is coming to me. And this is happening to many musicians here. It is sad that our country allows musicians to be so robbed by pirates.

How many albums have you made so far in your music career? And which ones did well?

I have done 25 albums so far, and all my albums are good. I thank God for that. The first and second albums are good. ‘Bubble’ actually brought me into the limelight.  ‘Mr Johnson’ and ‘Ijo Fuji’ are there. ‘Fuji Music in America’ is there too.

At seven, that was quite early to go into music. How did you do it?

Music was God-sent to me. I realised that at that age and even earlier, anytime that my parents sent me on an errand, I went along the road singing. I was also usually attracted to the places where ceremonies were taking place in my neighbourhood in Ikene-Remo in Ogun State where I grew up. Once there, I would start singing without being contracted. I was singing for free.

What kind of music were you singing? it must have been deep indigenous music…

It was fuji music that I was singing. I chose fuji music because it was the music that I could start with little or no money. That is because all the instruments for fuji music are local. One didn’t need to have the knowledge of guitar, unlike juju music, for instance, where the knowledge of guitar and keyboard is needed. Fuji needs just your voice and locally made instruments.

At what time did public acceptance come from you?

Acceptance started in 1980. I was in Ikene, but my first album was in 1985. I was going around with no equipment, singing with three of my friends who held local items as instruments.

One day, a man named Sunday Olojuanu saw me at a party. He was a welder. He went to my parents, told them that he was going to form a band with me. But my parents declined. They told him that they wanted me to go to school. He promised them that the band would only play shows on weekends. They eventually allowed him and we came up with a band name the Sunny Ayuba Band. We were together for three years.

Were you making much money then?

I was collecting whatever he gave me. But when I became 17, I then formed my band. I called my friends together. I started coming to Lagos to perform at Canary Hotel in Surulere, after which I returned to Ikene- Remo. I was coming for a weekly jump every Thursday evening. In 1985, I moved to Lagos Island where I got accommodation with a friend with my band boys. Then after my first album where I sang about Dele Giwa, people started knowing me.

What was the motivating factor for you?

For me it wasn’t about money. It was about making musical albums and being well known like the fuji mentors such as Alhaji Ayinla Barrister. At that time, any contract that was put before me, I would have accepted because it wasn’t about money. It was about being popular with what I was doing.

How did you get a breakthrough in Lagos?

From Canary Hotel where I was playing at the night club, I moved to Ariya Night Club which was owned by King Sunny Ade. I was playing there and my popularity was building. Not long, I got a breakthrough album, ‘Bubble’, in 1991.

How did you manage your fame then?

My parents were particular about me. They wanted me to go to school, and I was well cautioned from home about women.They told me that I could only marry one wife because in my family, we are not allowed to marry more than one wife. That made me to sit up and I saw the female fans as my sisters.

At what point did you get married and what attracted you to her?

I got married over twenty years ago. I was in Queens Borough Community College in New York when I met her. The moment I saw her, I told the person that was sitting next to me that she was my wife. I didn’t even know whether she was Jamaican, American or Nigerian. But she turned out to be a Nigerian, an Ibo lady.

How did her parents react to her choice of a musician?

It was initially tough because her parents already had their impression of who a musician was. They believed that musicians were womanisers who lived on alcohol and so on.

How did you feel about the reaction from her parents?

Well, I would perhaps have reacted in like manner. That is because 22 years ago, the lifestyle of musicians then was completely different from what we have now. You know, then Fela Anikulapo was reigning, and he was an image of a musician of that time.

So how were you able to convince them?

She was the one that eventually convinced me that I was the only one that she wanted to marry. At that time, I could not defend myself because there was nothing that I had to say.

So many years after, what can you say about your marriage?

I thank God. Marriage is like being in the university. We keep learning. Now, we have beautiful children and living happily. There is no way I could marry another woman because it is an abomination in my family. And I am the last child of my parents. So despite being a musician, I could not marry a second wife. Moreover, I do not even think that I need a second wife. After all, I wouldn’t want my wife to marry two men.

What do you like most about her?

I cannot say that there is a particular thing that I like about her. Till date, I have not been able to identify what I love about her. I just know that I am in love with her and that love keeps flowing.

Is your wife into music too?

She is not. Yes, she loves my music, but does not go to shows with me. The truth is that she is a housewife; she takes care of the home for us.

Has your style changed?

I love wearing white. It shows that one is clean. I like a tidy look and I wear other colours too, but at least 70% of my clothes are white.

You keep looking younger than your age; what is the secret?

It is rest of mind. For instance, we just talked about my wife. Marriage to the right person is very important. It helps a man to be organised, but when you are married to many women or to many girlfriends, your health and the health of your business will be affected, and that, of course, will lead to stress which would allow someone to grow old quick. I thank God that my home is settled.

Apart from music, what other thing appeals to you?

I love soccer ; I love football. Whenever I return from the office, I sit down in front of the television and watch football. I do not hang out like that because I am always at parties and shows. I am always like running home afterwards, so that I can get there and relax.

What if a female fan walks up to you and tells you that she loves you, what do you do at that point?

Well, when they say that, it invariably means that she loves my music. It is not really an expression directed at affections. It is the music that brought the fan and I together, so when she relates with me on that platform, it is the music that she loves not me as a person.

At the same time, if she actually means to relate to me affectionately on a higher level, then it will be up to me to accept or not. It takes two to tangle. If she does not see me, then no affair will take place. If I do not take her to a hotel, for instance, I will not get to make love to her. So, I must make sure that I am not available for such affair.

As a musician, has a fan ever embarrassed you?

Yes, I met a lady one day while I was playing. She stood in front of me romantically and accused me that I was always frowning. She said I should relax and be cheerful and free with her. She was looking for something that she couldn’t get.

We hear that you identify with COSON, do you think that the body is a solution to musicians?

I am a Director with COSON. They are doing well. I must say. They are collecting money and sharing among artistes, but I still believe that they can do better. Collecting money is part of it, but the major one is to let the music pay. That is, let us be able to receive money for all the albums that we have done. Let us make piracy a thing of the past.

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WHO could have thought that palazzo pant that was rocked in the 60s and 70s could make a major comeback? A pretty big comeback.  Palazzo pants are extremely wide-leg, loose, flowing pants. They are very comfortable and can be worn by anyone irrespective of your size and shape. With the right styling, they can work as casual, summer, professional, vacation outfit.

Rock your palazzo pants with a funky bold tees, crop top or sweater, classic stripped shirt, tank top, lace shirt, button down shirt and denim jacket. High heeled sandals, platforms or flat sandals are best worn with it depending on the length and width of the pant. You really don’t want your pants sweeping in. Add a touch of accessory like statement necklace, floppy hat, sunglasses, belt, bag, clutch purse, scarf and bangle. Remember don’t overdo it, simplicity is the key.

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Jos, the Plateau State capital, recorded its 4th multiple bomb attacks last Sunday night. YUSUFU AMINU IDEGU x-rays the unique nature of the last set of attacks.

The attacks on a restaurant and a mosque in Jos, Plateau State capital, which left more than 50 people dead and 48 others injured on Sunday, was one attack too many. The Plateau State capital is fast building a reputation as the city of multiple bombings after the first experience on December 24, 2010. On that eve of Christmas, multiple explosions occurred simultaneously at Angwa Rukuba and Kabong communities in Jos North Local Government Area of the state. The ones carried out on a mosque and a restaurant would be the fourth multiple bombing in Jos city. These are besides suicide bomb attacks on worshippers in churches or on markets and viewing centres, among others.

Not a few residents of the city doubted the story when the news of Sunday’s explosions broke. Since it occurred at about 10 pm, it was unthinkable to start rushing to the scene. Only security agencies and officials of National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) could do so. The twin explosions were unique in the sense that the explosion aimed at worshippers in a mosque on Dilimi Street was accompanied with gunshots. The state police command described the shooting as rapid and sporadic.

The attack was also unique in the sense that the casualties were mostly children and teenagers. That much was evident in the faces of the victims on admission at various hospitals in Jos. In the Izala mosque at Dilimi, there were as many children on the night of the attacks as there were adults, listening to the Tapsir (sermon) delivered by a famous Islamic scholar, Sheikh Sani Yahaya Jingre, the leader of JIBWIS Islamic sect.

Many of the children and teenagers were shattered by the explosion, while many of others were shot dead and others escaped with gunshot wounds. Eleven-year-old Ibrahim Umar, who escaped with gunshot wounds and was being treated at the Plateau State Specialist Hospital, said: “I was feeling sleepy while the sermon was going on, so I went home to sleep. But my mother said I should go back and remain there till the end of the preaching because my mates were still there. I went back and after a short time, the gunmen came.”

Another 13-year-old boy, Mustapha Isah, said: “I was so tired after breaking my fast, so I slept off during the preaching inside the mosque only to be woken up by the sound of gunshots. I was confused and I didn’t know where to run to. As I was just coming out of the mosque, a bullet caught my shoulder and I fell down only to find myself on the hospital bed the next day.”

An adult victim, Abubakar Abubakar (35), was also lucky to discover himself at the Plateau Specialist Hospital the next day. He said he did not know how he got to the hospital. His tummy was ripped open with bullet and doctors had to stitch it. “I went to the mosque with my two children for the sermon, but I don’t know where they are now,” he said.

•11-year-old Ibrahim Umar

The various hospitals in the city have had to contend with more victims than they can accommodate. At Plateau Specialist Hospital in Jos, many of the injured victims had to be put on bare floor because there was no more bed space. Facilities at the casualty section were also over-stretched. Many of the wounded victims required surgery for the removal of bullets from their bodies, but there were not enough medical experts to do that.

Medical doctors had to be mobilised from wherever was possible. The Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) in the state had to send appeals through the media and also made phone calls to its members to come to the hospital and help to save lives.

The day after the attacks, many people stormed the hospital searching for their loved ones and praying for those undergoing surgery to get the bullets out of their bodies. Distraught mothers were all over the hospital, creating a scene that looked like a market setting.

At the mortuary section of the hospital, it was wailing and mourning as trucks and ambulances were brought in to evacuate bodies for burial. Some other family members were busy going around the various hospitals to locate their own. People ran into one another in confusion as they moved from one hospital to the other. The event simply turned the entire city upside down.

A lucky survivor, Jibrilu Shuaibu, said: “The children were mostly affected because at the time the attackers came, it was already past 9 pm. Naturally, the children were already dosing off. So, when the attackers started with gunshots and people were running, the children became confused. They had just woken up from sleep and did not understand what was going on around them. Some of them were even running in the direction of the attackers. That, I think, was why they formed the bulk of the casualties.”

It was difficult to say which of the attacks was more pathetic; the one at the mosque targeted at worshippers or the one at the restaurants, targeted at people who were having their dinner. The one at the restaurant was like the story of the last supper. The people were having their dinner without any premonition of the calamity that was about to befall them. Some of them had already been served and had begun to enjoy their chosen meals. Others were on the queue with plates in their hands, waiting to be served. The female attendants were busy attending to customers who needed extra food or extra meat, as well as those requiring drinking water.

Unknown to them, a suicide bomber was in the midst of the more than 30 people, watching everybody. Then all of a sudden, the bomber shouted “Alahu akbar!” and detonated the bomb. Of course, only one person inside the hall survived. Both the attendants and the customers were blown out of life.

A lucky man, who had only left the restaurant two minutes before the explosion occurred, said: “There were up to 20 people who had already been served and were eating in the restaurant. I was among the people waiting to be served, and there were about 10 of us. I left in annoyance to find an alternative place to eat. As soon as I stepped out, I heard a very loud sound and the impact of it threw me on the ground because I was only about 20 metres away. When I recovered from the shock, I realised that only one of the people I left in the restaurant had survived.

“I could not believe it when I saw the same people I had seen eating a few minutes ago lying dead in pools of blood. I thought I was watching a horror movie.”

The Muslim worshippers at the mosque were in the holy month of Ramadan and were listening to Ramadan sermon, not knowing that some people were planning to terminate their lives that same night. As they were planning to conclude the day’s sermon, the attackers came in a dramatic fashion and all hell was let loose. Most of them never lived to complete the 30-day fasting.

An eye witness, Yahaya Musa, said: “We were listening to a sermon being delivered by Sheikh Sani Yahaya Jingre himself. His sermon usually attracts hundreds of followers, including the young and the old. This time around, there were no fewer than 300 worshippers in the mosque listening to his sermon.

“The sermon was almost over and the Sheikh was about to say the closing prayers when all of a sudden, we heard sporadic gunshots. We rushed out of the mosque only to discover that we were under attack. The next thing was to think of how to escape. Initially, we all lay down. But after a while, when the gunmen were coming too close, we decided to get up and run as fast as we could. I am even surprised that I escaped. Many of my friends could not.”

A member of First Aid Group, Zekeri Mahmud, said: “What happened was that the gunmen came in a Hilux van. We had mounted serious security to check whoever was coming for the sermon but the gunmen came in a Hilux van and stopped at the roadside. Three of them alighted from the car and opened fire on the security guards.

“Then they headed straight to the mosque. While they were shooting at the worshippers, some security guards decided to confront them. One of us grabbed one of the gunmen by the waist but another gunman shot him dead immediately. The worshippers decided to rush towards them, not knowing that the gunmen were also carrying explosives. They threw the bomb into the crowd and disappeared within in the twinkling of an eye.”

Meanwhile, National Assembly members from Plateau State have condemned the attacks on the Muslim community in Jos, describing the twin explosions as wicked. The member representing Barkin Ladi/Riyom Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, Hon. Istifanus Gyang, on Monday strongly condemned the attack by terrorists on Da-lo memorial college Foron in Barkin Ladi Local Government Area, Plateau State, in which two students were brutally killed.

The representative, who equally condemned the twin bomb attacks in the Jos metropolis on Sunday night, said: “No words are strong enough to condemn the cruelty and brutality of these incessant attacks on our people.”

He expressed sadness over the attacks which came barely two weeks after he moved a motion on the floor of the House calling on the Federal Government to intensify security arrangements in his constituency due to the constant attacks.

He noted that the terror attacks in Jos, which targeted worshipers in a mosque, revealed that the terrorists have no respect for creed. Gyang, who described the attack as inhuman and must be condemned by every Nigerian, especially by the political leadership of the country, hoped for speedy eradication of terrorism and extremism in the country.

He observed that all efforts at peace building were being impeded by the terror attacks. He again appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari to strengthen the security arrangements, especially at schools, places of worship and vulnerable communities and soft targets.

I.D Gyang prayed for those who lost their lives, expressed sympathies with the bereaved families in Jos and Da-lo memorial school communities.

Senator Jonah Jang, representing Plateau North Senatorial Zone and Hon Edward Pwajok representing Jos South/Jos East in the House of Representatives, have also joined sympathisers to condemn the attacks.

Governor Lalong, who personally inspected the attacked mosque in Dilimi and visited those receiving treatment in the hospitals, expressed deep sympathy with the Muslim community and promised that he would ensure that the security agencies fished out those behind the attacks.

A Jos based non-governmental organisation, known as APURIMAC ONLUS, has also condemned the attacks on Jos. The director of the NGO in Jos, Godwin Okoko, who reacted to the attack in a statement, said: “The attacks were coming at the peak period of the Ramadan season and targeted at the Muslim faithful is purely a wicked act by enemies of the state and enemies of progress.”

A coalition of Christian Youths on the Plateau (CYP) has also expressed their sympathy and condemned the attacks. The group, who also condemned the attacks on two churches shortly after the twin blast, said but for God’s intervention, the situation would have turned into another religious crisis.

The chairman of the group, Evangelist Joshua John Ringsum, who stated this in a press conference in Jos yesterday, said: “Majority of casualties in the twin bomb attacks are youths of the state, which makes the situation a major loss to the entire state.

Evangelist Ringsum said: “These victims are without doubt leaders of tomorrow who are great assets to the state and the country at large.”

While commiserating with the immediate family members and relations of the victims of the bomb blasts, the group also condemned the reprisal attacks in Barkin-Ladi, Riyom, Wase and Langtang South local government areas of the state as a result of the bomb blasts.

It appealed to the youths not to take the law in to their hands, saying the group was making efforts towards addressing issues of violence among the youth as well as unemployment, HIV/AIDS and the vigorous crusade against illicit alcoholic drinks.”

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DEAR Reader, God’s Word concerning your family life is reaching out to you again, so your family life can be a thing of joy, pleasure and high esteem, as it was instituted to be from the very beginning (Genesis 2:22).

However, to enjoy fulfilment in the marriage covenant, co-operation between the husband and the wife is a major requirement. Wherever the man does not co-operate with the woman or the woman does not co-operate with the man, fulfilment remains a dream that can never be realized. This week, we will go ahead to see another responsibility of the man in a marriage covenant.

A French Proverb says, “A father is a banker provided by nature.” You are responsible for the needs of your home. Meeting the needs of the home is the responsibility of the man, primarily; the woman is only your help meet. Never shift your responsibility; it is anti-covenant.

Some men do rejoice at the fact that they are the head of the home, forgetting the responsibilities attached to that office. It is not enough to rejoice at the great authority that God has vested on man, but to live up to the responsibilities attached to it. Therefore, men, put your hands to work so as to perform your God-assigned responsibility.

As a father and husband, you have the responsibility of providing for the home. It must be accepted joyfully, and executed excitedly. Be concerned about your wife and children’s welfare. Some men leave home, not concerned whether their family members have eaten or not. This is a violation of covenant obligations and it’s very risky. No man has any right to wear new clothes, when his family members are going about in rags. You should set aside some amount of money from whatever you earn, to cater for the personal needs of your wife and children.

Some men shy away from their responsibilities and don’t give their wives home-keeping allowance, under the guise that their wives are working. This is not right and it is not of God. The Scripture says: But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel (1 Timothy 5:8).

When a man stops looking after his household, his life becomes worse than that of an unbeliever. No matter how much tithe and offering he gives, God says he has denied the faith and will suffer the same fate as an unbeliever.

Therefore, a man without a job is not ready for family life at all. The first requirement, which is having a gainful job, has not been fulfilled. Adam didn’t just have a job; he was pursuing his God-given assignment and purpose. He was gainful employment.

A man, who is too slothful to find a gainful employment should not eat; rather, he should go out and put his hands to work in order to cater for his wife and children. It is not a part of God’s programme for a wife to take on the responsibility, as the breadwinner of the home. Such a situation is abnormal; the hand of the devil is involved. This normally results in the wife hiding money from the husband, because she is afraid he would squander it and at the same time refuse to take care of her because he is unemployed.

It is unfortunate that some cultures encourage idleness, by permitting family members, relations and even friends to live off others without having a job or source of income. They do this in the pretext that there are no available jobs or I just want to put up with my uncle till a good job comes up. Where there seems not to be any available work or job, create one. But by all means refuse idleness. God’s Word says: Whatsoever thy hand FINDETH to do, do it with all thy might… (Ecclesiastes 9:10). Look at the word FINDETH. It is your responsibility to locate something that can yield profit, not your uncle or your father, but your own responsibility.

Anyone who chooses to be idle need not bother about food, whether male or female. God’s Word says: For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: If a man will not WORK, he shall not EAT (2 Thessalonians 3:10 NIV). ‘Rule’ here means ‘command’. Therefore, to work is a commandment. There is just ‘no food for the idle man.’ God’s Word does not permit it. Right from the time God blessed Adam with a wife, he has been the head of the family. This, also, placed upon him the responsibility of providing for his household. That means, by God’s arrangement, the husband is to provide for the family. He is to work and ensure that there is food for members of his family, most especially his immediate family (wife and children). Therefore, the man must work with his hands; he can’t afford to be lazy, idle or beg.

Are you born again? I give you the opportunity today to surrender your life to Him. This is by confessing your sins and accepting Jesus as your Saviour and Lord. If you are ready for this new birth experience, please say this prayer: “Dear Lord Jesus Christ, I come to You today. I am a sinner.  Forgive me of my sins and cleanse me with Your Blood.  Deliver me from sin and Satan to serve the living God.  I accept You as my Lord and Saviour. Make me a child of God today. Thank You for accepting me into Your Kingdom.”

If you prayed this simple prayer, you are now a child of God. He loves you and will never leave you. Read your Bible daily, obey God’s Word and seek Christian fellowship (John 14:21).

Congratulations! You are now born again! All-round rest and peace are guaranteed you, in Jesus’ Name. Call or write, and share your testimonies with me through contact@faithoyedepo.org; OR 07026385437 and 08141320204.

For more insight, these books authored by me are available at the Dominion Bookstores in all Living Faith Churches and other leading Christian bookstores: Marriage Covenant, Making Marriage Work, Building A Successful Home and Success in Marriage (Co-Authored).

The post Marriage convenant responsibilities (2) appeared first on The Nation.

DEAR Harriet, I read your page for the first time at a friend’s place. I must commend you for putting out important information on how to deal with life issues. Your article,’My hubby betrayed my trust,’ was an eye opener for me. Please, can you throw light on general family problems because a lot of families today are facing many challenges. Thanks

Mr. Ezekiel Jacob,

Ogba, Lagos.

Thanks for your compliment and contribution. We really appreciate them.  Family problems as a matter of fact come in all shapes and sizes. Some are shortlived and easily managed, while others are more chronic and difficult to handle. Some are just temporary phases that go in no time, if only families learn to be patient and tolerant. As the saying goes, there is no perfect family. That is why each family develops its own ways of coping with the various stresses like illness, injury, changing jobs, unemployment, financial difficulties and so on. Unsuccessful coping can be recognized by a number of characteristics as follows: poor communication, poor problem-solving methods, poor division of duties, lack of emotional support, differences, overdependence on others and chronic crises.

Poor communication : It is one common problem that exists within the family. Could be that family members either avoid talking with one another due to past encounter or have not learned to listen well to what others are trying to say through their words, expressions or actions. As a matter of fact, a situation where conflicts  are not resolved poses  a problem to the family. This usually occurs when family members avoid discussing problems or even avoid admitting that there is a problem in the first place.  Impression like this extends conflicts and causes some discomfort and unhappiness. Some families still have not learnt  the skill of negotiating or, for some other reason, cannot let go of bad  feelings with little or no regard on how this action can affect the members of the family, bearing in mind that children on their own pattern their attitude after their parents’ bahaviour.

In addition, inability to settle issues within  the family can also pose as a huge problem. For example, in a situation where family members are finding it difficult  on  deciding what problems really exist, who is responsible, the option for working out the problem and how the family can agree upon an option and act on it. There may not be an agreement on what the priorities are within the family in the process.

Another aspect that poses a problem in a family is the area of poor division of responsibilities. Families often decide how family responsibilities will be shared among family members. When situation like this occurs, the life of the family becomes completely confused and many things are not accomplished. At the other extreme, some families are not flexible at all and family members do not help one another out or fairly reassign responsibilities as family circumstances change.

Insufficient emotional support is not left out as a problem facing the family. Families are the most important source of emotional support for children. During the middle years, children, for instance, believe that their emotional support should come from their family. A  situation where it is not available, they then start seeking for it outside the family which, as a result, put them in danger. It should be noted that children do not perform or develop well without their family support.

Lack of individual differences: Families function best when the individuality of each family member is acknowledged and appreciated. Personal traits and characteristics are to be highly valued. Each family member needs to tolerate and respect individual traits, and lack of this can lead to serious challenge in the family. When family members withhold love from one another because of family differences, children, as members of the family, are most likely to have difficult time developing a healthy self-image, and they will have low self-esteem and limited poor social skills.

Overdependence on others: Children need to succeed in order to feel capable of successfully managing life’s stress and challenges. If they are taught or encouraged to depend on others (within the family or outside it) to solve their problems will be a difficult issue. It also limits their ability to challenge themselves. Low self -esteem is one common factor that is attached to overdependence on others. As a matter of fact, this is one common problem the family suffers

Chronic crises: Families which have some of the above characteristics are likely to have trouble coping with life’s inevitable crises. In these families relatively simple problems are not resolved, but take on the appearance and feel of major dilemmas. Thus by their lack of successful coping skills, these families create additional difficulties for themselves and go from crisis to crisis with little relief and little pleasure from life or from one another. Although we all strive for perfection, there is no perfect family. Each family has its own strengths and weaknesses, assets and liabilities, challenges and problems. If your family seems overwhelmed with problems or if there is breakdown in relationships within your family, it is probably time for professional aid.

As parents as well, your task is to meet the multiple demands of the family with energy and creativity. By doing so, you will enable your children to grow and develop in a positive and healthy way in order to experience self-fulfilment.

Harriet ogbobine is a counselor and a motivational speaker. Send your questions and suggestions to her on bineharriet@gmail.com or txt message only 08023058805. You can also follow her on twitter: @bineharrietj

The post Dealing with family challenges appeared first on The Nation.

A black dress is an evening or cocktail dress, cut simply and often quite short. The “little black dress” is considered essential to a complete wardrobe by many women and fashion observers who believe it is a “rule of fashion” that every woman should own. Elegant black dress can be dressed up or down, depending on the occasion. For example, a black dress worn with a jacket and pumps for daytime, business wear, or with more ornate jewellery and accessories for evening. It can be worn with ballat flats, gladiators shoes and court shoe pump.

The post BLACK DRESS appeared first on The Nation.

Notable activist and top legal practitioner, Mr Femi Falana (SAN), indeed has a true wife in Funmi Falana. She just fits into that maxim, ‘behind any successful man, there is a woman.’ Simple in looks but tough within, she fought her way through a polygamous home to the ivory tower, where she became a lecturer after studying Physics and then Law. In this interview with Paul Ukpabio, Mrs Falana reveals how true love and romance could inspire the success of a marriage through the trying period of a family, in the struggle for people’s emancipation through the practice of law.

 ‘While others go to parties to unwind, I party with Christ in church’

Looking back, can you recall a reflection of your early days in your present life?

I was brought up in a polygamous setting where it was believed that everyone had to aspire to the top. We grew up knowing that we had to compete between ourselves to be the best in the family. That indeed helped me later in life to aspire and be the best in whatever I do. It has been part of my life since then.

Your father had two wives?

(Laughs) It was a polygamous family with many children. And my early life was in several places not just in one place. But I am from Ondo state, Akure precisely. I attended St Louis Girls Grammar School, I studied Physics at the university; thereafter I read Law and went on to the Masters level and taught briefly at the University of Lagos before i came finally to active private law practice.

Why did you decide to go into private practice?

At that time, my husband had been in private practice. He was becoming more involved in the defence of human rights and was always in and out of prisons and the chambers was neglected and suffering. So I also discovered that it would be a better idea to leave the civil service and the university, to take up the management of the chambers because he was always in and out of the prison and the military regime was around then and he was being picked up incessantly. I needed to usually be at the chambers to take care of the place and ensure that the place was still running as a business office. I had to also combine that with taking care of the children.

What motivated you into studying law, since you were already in the science line?

I actually studied sciences and also worked in UNESCO for some time before I got married to a lawyer. Fortunately for me too, I am from a home where there also existed legal practitioners. Though I did not really think before then that I would one day go into the legal profession since I was in the sciences.

But at a point in life, I suddenly realised that I needed the instrument of the law for the defence of the masses and also to press for my rights when I discovered the way the society was treating the masses and also the way that my husband was being picked up here and there. So I decided that I must also join in the struggle for the emancipation of the Nigerian people. I felt I needed such an instrument of law to fight for the right of the Nigerian people as well as for my own right as well as that of my family.

You mean you were already a full-grown adult when you went back to school to study law?

Oh yes, I was. I was married with children (laughs).

How did you cope?

Usually, when you are a science student, you can always cope in every field because you are already used to long reading time. I love reading. What would have been a problem and which was actually a problem was that while I was in school, I also had to contend with looking for, and searching for where my husband was, as the military government was always picking him up. It was a problem that was added to my being in school, taking care of the children, taking care of the home and then taking care of the office. But I thank God who saw me through.

How do you describe that period?

(Sighs) It was a difficult period. I managed to handle the situation at that time because, I also knew that it was a struggle for the emancipation of the Nigerian people. It was a struggle that was worth fighting for. Despite the fact that it was not easy, I sailed through.

How about class work, attendance and your academics?

Luckily and interestingly, I was one of those who came out of the school with good result. At the Law School, I had second class upper division in a particular year that there was no First Class. Only about five of us had that second class upper in that set.

You would actually expect that I couldn’t have had enough time for studies. Even at that time, my friends abandoned me because i didn’t have time for them and they were always complaining that I was not the only one with excuses that my husband had been picked up. So I had little time to concentrate on my academics. But God was on my side.

So you joined your husband in private practice, how has it been so far?

It has been wonderful. Like I keep telling people that when a business is ‘our business’, it is fun because, there is a higher level of commitment. When I was not working in the chambers, there was no one to see to the active management of the chambers. But since I came in, there has been a big difference.

Like I also tell people, your husband is the best business partner that you can ever have. That is because, both of you can carry the management of the office into your private lives, into the home, into the bedroom, into the dining place, into everywhere. you keep discussing, always having time to rub minds on issues about the office. So it is better when it is ‘our business’ than when it is ‘their business’.

Do you just handle the administration of the chambers alone or you go to court as well?

Oh, I am a lawyer, so I do go to the court as well. It is Falana and Falana Chambers, the chamber is ours. However, before I became a lawyer, it was Femi Falana Chambers, but about 20 years ago when I became a lawyer, we changed it to Falana and Falana Chambers. To God be the Glory, today, we have vibrant offices in Abuja, Ekiti and the one here in Lagos.

Still, how do you cope?

We have lawyers working with us and I move around the offices to ensure things are working well. I do cope especially with this era of internet and good communication network. When the need arises, we can send messages online, pass instructions, correct whatever is needed to be corrected online, ensure files and court process information that need to be attended to, are well attended to.

Since you are always on the move, how do you cope with the children?

My children are adults now; they are grown up and married. I don’t have that particular problem again. Our last born has even finished studying for her Master’s degree.

Is any of your children in the legal profession too?

Yes, two of our children are lawyers. But right now, they are not working in the chambers. It is usually better to go and learn and build up elsewhere before coming into the chambers. That is because if they come straight here into their parent’s chambers, they will be seeing themselves as owners, but when they go out and get the rudiments of training, pick up their skill and discipline, then they can come and join.

But you joined the law firm from the top

Yes, but at that time, I was already an adult. I knew what I wanted, I was a mother, the owner and I knew what I wanted to do. But they were just starting out in life after school. They need to go grasp the rudiments of practice and then come and join us.

Thank God, your husband is not going to prisons these days

Oh, he has paid his dues, though he is still very involved in the struggle of emancipation of the Nigerian citizen. I know you understand that, though there are democratic structures in the country now, we still need to do a lot about human rights. And in terms of managing the democracy that we now have in our hands, he is still running around, putting the politicians and the government on their toes. Most times, he is usually in Abuja, where we also have an office. We share the management activities. Sometimes if I have to go for cases in Abuja, he stays in Lagos. And same goes to the chamber we run in Ekiti state.

Do you do more of litigation?

Yes, we do more of litigation. I go to court. We actually do more of litigation, though we also do corporate practice. But we are more known for litigation.

Are you personally into activism?

I have an NGO that defends the rights of women and children. I have a television programme too on the same issues to sensitise the public on the rights of children and women. The NGO is called ‘Women Empowerment and Legal Aid.’ We also have a rehabilitation centre where we take people to. On a daily basis, we attend to about eight or nine women coming to give reports of one domestic violence or another.

We are also in partnership with the Lagos State Ministry of Women Affairs; we have been able to do some work for them to simplify the laws of domestic violence. We put the laws in a simple way for the ordinary citizen to understand. They also send people here for legal advice. Lagos State has a home for rehabilitating victims of domestic violence and because we partner with them, when we have victims, we send them to the home. They keep them for about three months, enough time to rehabilitate them before they return home.

Do you think domestic violence is on the decrease?

It is unfortunate because it is on the increase. When you talk of domestic violence, it is not a respecter of class. Recently, we had the story of a former governor that ended up beating his wife while abroad and he was arrested. Also, the story of an ambassador that beat up his wife some time ago, and he had to be recalled back home: Then again, a traditional ruler who did the same thing in Western Nigeria. So it is not limited to a particular class or race. It happens in civilised countries and they wage war against it.

It is something that will continue for many years. So we are in here to fight against violence in the society, not just violence but rape too which has continued to increase in the society. There are children who are being molested, raped. These are issues that are connected with the developing society. It is a phase. We need to wage war against these ills in the society.

It is increasing. Before now, people were not reporting rape because of stigmatisation but with a lot of publicity, it is now different. That I believe will continue to curb this terrible ill in the society. It will also deter those who may want to do such. We have also been teaching women to teach their girls how to comport themselves in the presence of the opposite sex and to note a dangerous man. It is usually read in the behaviour and disposition of the man.

How about the immodesty of the ladies on the issue of rape?

I disagree when people say ladies dress immodestly. Men too dress immodestly, are they raped? I see men sag their trousers, men who open their chest, leave their buttons open, why don’t they get raped? I think it has to do with chauvinism and discrimination against women and they think that women are instruments and articles to be molested. It has nothing to do with the way of dressing. However, albeit, we also encourage women to dress decently and comport themselves as responsible ladies in the society.

How about socials, do lawyers do socials?

Lawyers do socials. It depends on the individuals. For me, I may not do a lot of socials but I do take time to rest when I am on vacation. My socials are usually in the church. But there are lawyers who go to parties too, but I am not much of a party person. I party with Christ in the church. I do a lot of dancing, singing and praying in church. You need to see me dance in church.

When are you happiest?

I am happy when I am in church, when I am communicating with my God.

Let’s talk about your style and your fashion

I am not a fashion person like that because I am a lawyer, I am most often in black and white. But when I am not in court, I prefer to wear bright colours. Since our uniform is black and white, I usually want to get away from the normal black and white thing, so I wear yellow and such bright colours.

It’s obvious you like fashion accessories since you are presently adorned with them. So what fashion accessories do you not do without?

(Thought for a brief moment) There is nothing that I cannot do without.  I put on accessories when I think that I should. But sometimes, I do not even remember to put them on and at such times, I still move on with my life.

How do you describe yourself?

The eye sees not itself but by reflection. I am not the person to see myself, it’s people to tell me what they think of me. So I see myself from what people tell me that I am. If I say this is what I am, it could be a subjective judgment of me.

What does success mean to you?

Success to me means having a relationship with God and affecting positively the lives of people around you. So I think that one should think he or she has succeeded if the person has been able to touch lives. It is also when many people can raise up their hands and say that they have benefited from the legacy and life that you impacted to them. And that is what I aspire to do every day. I am actually at my happiest when I have been able to touch somebody’s life, when I put a smile, joy and laughter in the life of such person. It gladdens my heart when I do that because at that point I feel fulfilled. I feel God has given me the opportunity to do such and I feel really happy about doing it.

It couldn’t have been easy to cross from one profession to another and still excel in the new profession or what do you think?

It is the Lord’s doing; again, the study of law after physics is not so difficult because Lord Denning, a great legal luminary, was also a science student before he moved into law.

Your most memorable holiday?

I do take holidays regularly. One is always different from the other. I spend them as God wants me to spend them. We have had quite a number of holidays, usually memorable.

Coming from a multiple marriage background, do you think polygamy should still be tenable in a modern society?

(Suddenly alarmed) It is a terrible thing! Would you as a man want to go for it? It is a situation that one should not wish one’s enemy. No matter how successful a polygamous home is, it can never be a happy home. It cannot, because God did not ordain polygamy. Otherwise, when God created Adam, He would have created two women for him. When God was ordaining marriage, He ordained a man and a woman. That is why only Eve was created. Else God would have said, ‘Let us make women for him.’ But He didn’t say so.

It’s not every day that one meets a woman who works under the same roof and within the same organisation with her husband, how has your marriage been over the years?

(Relaxes and laughs heartily) I thank God for my marriage. My husband has been my friend, my lover, my partner, my brother, my best friend and a colleague. That is why it has also been easy to work with him. I cannot stop telling people that your husband is the best person to work with to ensure proper marriage because God said the wife should be a ‘helper and a partner’. A help-mate is your better half. It is when you are married to your friend, your brother, your partner, your confidante that you can say you have a marriage. It is also then that you can work together as partners and enjoy it. There is no stranger then because everything both of you do, is ‘our thing’ it is the best thing that can happen.

Working with one’s husband as a partner in the same business is the best thing that can happen to the marriage because it helps in managing the finances of the couple because the money is ‘our money.’ You know women are more meticulous and are better managers when it comes to money management. When you as a man keep your business away from your wife or you put a line between your business and your wife’s business, separating things, marriage becomes difficult. But when you put a sense of belonging between both, it becomes ‘our thing,’ ‘our business’, a signal of total commitment between the two of you.

Was it love at first sight?

The marriage has been over 30 years. I can only say that it was something designed by God. And that is why we are still together till today.

What do you like about your husband?

(She laughed, re-adjusted herself; obviously this was her best mood throughout the interview) I love a lot of things about my husband, most especially because he is a compassionate person. He usually wants to touch people’s lives and see them being happy people. He is most often at his best when people around him are happy.

Between teaching law and private practice, what’s the difference?

Teaching law is telling the students about what the law is on paper, while the other one is the practical aspect. There are so many things you teach the students that go beyond what you see in practice. When we teach them, we let them know that you go beyond practice. But of course it is what we teach that we speak in the court room. But you need to perform in the practical aspects.

Which do you enjoy most?

Naturally I love teaching but I enjoy the practice more than teaching.

The post We take our business into the bedroom; it works better–Falana’s wife Funmi appeared first on The Nation.

Travails of children going to school on rivers used by smugglers, oil thieves

• It is an easy way of conscripting innocent students – Security expert

Children are highly vulnerable and, by all estimations, need protection against situations that portend danger to their lives. This is particularly sacrosanct for children living in riverine communities that are daily exposed to dangers by the growing activities of hoodlums on the waterways.

The Nation’s investigations revealed that the children, who by the design of nature have to go to school on the various rivers, have been going through psychological and emotional trauma, helplessly watching the menacing activities of smugglers, oil thieves and other criminals on the rivers.

Visits to one of such rivers at Ishashi\Itekun , a community between Lagos and Ogun States, revealed the magnitude of the dangers that the children encounter going and coming to school on the river used by smugglers to perpetrate their heinous acts.

The movement of the smugglers infuses fears and cripples the innocent students and other travellers on the river.

Biola, a student in the community, said: “I was perplexed the first time I saw them. In fact, I could not concentrate on my studies all through that day because of  the anxiety that gripped me. I couldn’t go to school thereafter for some time because it took a very long time before I overcame the tension.”

“It is always horrible running into them. You dare not use your phone when they are coming because they would think you wanted to take their picture. I am not sure they have physically assaulted any student before but I it doesn’t have to get to that level before something is done about it. Their presence and activities are not good for our development as children,” another student said.

The waterways that separate the mainland and the island in Lagos are other notorious  areas where students’ lives are frequently endangered by the activities of illegal oil bunkerers.  Six students were recklessly killed and eight others seriously injured by one of such hoodlums last week at Irewe, Ojo, a suburb of Ojo Local Government Area of Lagos State.

Lamenting the risk involved in plying the waterways that serve as entry and exit points for oil thieves,  Joe, a student in the community, said: “It is a common phenomenon to see illegal oil bunkerers on the water. They are always very reckless when returning from where they have gone to do their illegal business.  This is quite dangerous for the innocent people, especially we the younger ones. This is what we witness from time to time  but the general public would not have been aware of our predicament if the incident that claimed the lives of those children had not happened.”

Another student who gave his name as  Adu  said he had always had fears about the activities of the hoodlums on the river, adding that his phobia has been heightened by the ugly incident that claimed the lives of six students in the area last week.

“The frightening movement of the hoodlums on the river instills fears. They always look wild and daring. We are always praying that God should not bring them our way.  Their speed on the water is always a problem to other people because they always cause the wave to affect the smooth sail of other boats and canoes.  Psychologically, this has a telling effect on us as we are always crippled by fears anytime we are on the river. Nobody who has witnessed their movement on the water would wish to experience it again.

“Apart from the dangers they constitute on the river, they are bad influences on us. Some of us could be tempted to buy into their activities and begin to see illegal oil bunkering as a right way of making money.”

Sunny, a member of the community, told The Nation that illegal oil bunkering thrives in the area because they have no filling stations from where they could buy petrol for their daily use, adding: “ We don’t have a single petrol station in the whole of this island and people, with the present state of power supply in the country, would always have need for petrol to charge their phones and at least watch television. This simply accounts for why some people latch into the yearning opportunity to engage in illegal oil bunkering. Unfortunately for us, they sell it at exorbitant prices to us.

“If there were petrol stations here that could sell the product at the fixed price, oil thieves would have nobody to sell their products to and that would make them to look for something else to do. Their activities are not beneficial to us. Instead, they constitute grave dangers to our lives and those of our children. It is only some very few people that aid and abet their activities that benefit from them.”

Insufficient schools

Findings revealed that most of the children in these communities wouldn’t have been exposed to such dangers if they had enough schools in the area. Because of the dearth of schools, they are left with no alternative than  to travel long distances to go to school to meet their educational needs. Itekun, for example, has just a dilapidated primary school said to have been built since 1940. Consequently, the teeming population of students troop out every morning to distant communities and different parts of Lagos State on water to go to school.

Irewe, a, community which has 37 villages stretching from Badagry area of the state to Apapa and Lagos Island under it, has just a secondary school available for all the students to attend. This, it was gathered, exposes the children to the risk of travelling on the water everyday to go to school.

A visit to the community showed that the students often spend a good part of their time travelling on the river to get to their schools. For instance, travelling in a canoe from Waterside, a loading point for the boats and canoes along Iyana Iba, in Ojo Local Government, takes about an hour to get to Irewe, while it takes between 20 to 30 minutes using flying boats. Some of the students residing along the lagoon trek a distance of about 30 minutes from their various villages to get to the bank of the river from where they usually board canoes or boats to their schools.

One of the student who identified himself as Kayode, said: “I come all the way from Whispering Palm to come to school here because there is no secondary school in my area. It is not in any way easy for most of us because a lot of challenges come with travelling on water, especially during the rainy season. It is worse on our waterways because hoodlums equally use it.  If there were enough secondary schools across the communities, most of us would not be taking the risk of travelling far distances to go to school everyday.”

Another student, who simply gave his name as Abayomi, also expressed concern about the plight of the students, saying: “We only have a secondary school when people on land have a variety of schools to choose from.  This does not enhance our learning because the teachers can afford to be complacent knowing full well that we have no alternative. If we had more schools, one can move to another school if one is not getting what he wants here.”

Odunayo, a pupil in Itekun, explained that she prefers taking the risk of crossing the river to schooling in the community. She described the community’s school as a goat house, adding: “The school I attend in Lagos is very beautiful. It can never be compared with this one.  I don’t think that one can acquire the right knowledge attending the school.”

Also speaking, Chief Simon Olabisi Aina, the Agbaakin of Itekunland, regretted that the community has not had more than a primary school 300 years after its existence.

Lamenting the absence of standard schools in the community, Chief Aina said: “We really feel very bad that the community does not have more than a primary school built in 1940 by the Anglican Communion. Most of the people here don’t want their children to attend the school because it is a rural school. Many people from Lagos that came here to build houses would never allow their children to go to school here. A good number of the people in the community prefer to send their children to Lagos than allow them to school here.

“Travelling on the river is a big risk, especially when it is raining. When rain falls, people would not be able to go out or come in. Imagine what the situation would look like if these innocent children  are caught midway on the river by a downpour. It is so bad that most of the children don’t even go to school and many parents also do not go to work during the rainy season  to avoid the danger of boat capsize. No matter how much you know how to swim, one would still be scared. A Yoruba adage says that a good swimmer ends up dying in water. We do have canoes capsizing and it has claimed my lives in the past. It has stopped a little bit since we have engine boats plying the river now.”

He continued: “The secondary school they gave us in 1980 is about 10 kilometers away from here. The school naturally closed down because many of our people could not go there. The community is trying to do something about it but the fact is that it is too far for our children. The nearest secondary school that our children can attend is at Igbesa, which is about six kilometers away from here. Commercial motorcycle operators charge between N300 and N400 to take a passenger there because of the bad state of the road.  If we have good primary and secondary schools, our children would not be risking their lives travelling on the water every day.

“Recently, some officials of the Ogun State government came to remove the leaking roofs and replaced them with new ones but that was the last time we saw them. The school lacks furniture and other basic amenities. The students were sitting on the floor until I gave out the benches in my house to them. Not many parents, especially those who have the wherewithal, would want their wards in such a school. We want the government of Lagos and Ogun States to close ranks and build a bridge over the river so that the lives of our people can be saved from the dangers they pass through every day.”

Absence of life jackets for students

Aside from the dangers of moving on the same water with hoodlums, checks revealed that the lives of the students are further endangered by the inability of the transporters to provide life jackets for them. The elderly residents and visitors are always provided with life jackets. “The transporters don’t have life jackets for us but they have for elderly people. They are always sure of their expertise and also confident that no calamity would happen. We equally were not bothering about it because most of us know how to swim,” one of the students said.

If the parents had been banking on the ability of the wards to swim all along, the incident of last week has made them to realise the importance of life jackets.

Angered by the loss of her 18-year-old daughter, Mrs. Akindele, one of the bereaved parents, said that no child in the community would take the risk of going to school on the water without life jackets.  She pleaded that life jackets should be provided for the children to avert dangers in the future.

“It is important that our children are provided with life jackets to save them from imminent dangers on the river. Left to me, no child would take the risk of travelling on the river to go to school without wearing life jackets. They should sit back at home if life jackets are not provided for them, after all what is the outcome for those of us that even went to the so called school?” she asked rhetorically.

She added: “The government should also deem it fit to build new secondary schools for us to save our children the risk and stress of travelling long distances to get to school. The population of children in this community has soared beyond what a secondary school can accommodate.  Our village is far bigger than Irewe where the school is located. It is imperative that we have one secondary school constructed for our children to reduce the challenges they face every day.”

The monarch of the community,  His Royal Majesty, Oba Adekanbi Durosinmi Agunbioyinbo II, Osolu of Irewe, also called on the government to “provide life jackets for the children of different age grades coming from far places on water to school here. There are jackets for the adults but there are none for the children.”

He, however, differed with the call for the construction of new secondary schools in the area. Instead, he said the government should turn the existing one into a boarding school. “Aside from life jackets, we want the government to make our secondary a boarding school so that these children would not have to risk their lives travelling on the water to get to the school.

“Presently, we have a four-bedroom flat hostel for the teachers but that is still not enough because a lot of them still come on water everyday to the school. The government should help look into this and also give us  more teachers because there are not enough teachers to teach the students.”

Wilson Esangbedo, a security expert, expressed serious concern about the despicable experience of the students, stating: “They are capable of being caught in a cross fire in a situation where the hoodlums and security operatives exchange gun shots.  If the hoodlums in question are oil thieves, there could be oil spill in the course of trying to escape from security agents. If for any reason the oil catches fire, the students may be consumed. The females are also prone to all manners of abuses by the hoodlums who most often operate without conscience.

Also speaking, Honourable Prince Dipo Okeyomi,  the Executive Director of Marial Security in Texas, United States of America, blamed the escalation of the menace on the failure of security agents to nib the problem in the bud, saying: “The security agents know these hoodlums but they have always refused to do the needful. They cannot say that they don’t know the hoodlums. They know them very well. This is why you see some of the hoodlums wearing uniforms of different security agents in the course of their operations. Some of the hoodlums in trying to appear to be doing legal businesses have built hotels and petrol stations. They give free lodging and feeding to their security-agent friends. “Those that have invested in petrol stations are quick to give free petrol and diesel to them in a bid to continue to enjoy their unholy support.  The implications are many and dangerous for the society. The first implication is that some of the students could be killed as it happened last week in Irewe. “The second implication is that some of the students could be influenced to take to such criminal acts because they have seen that they are cheap ways of becoming wealthy. When you have children watching criminals having a field day in their activities almost on a daily basis, you will certainly have some of them that would gladly want to toe that line or be part of them.”

Explaining the psychological effect of criminals’ activities on  students on the waterways, Lateefat Odunuga, a psychologist, said: “When children are exposed to these experiences, some of them could be  adventurous to explore the end of the experience, while some are afraid to attempt it. Some children are fast learners who learn through some modelling. This could result in them engaging in behaviours that might not be morally acceptable.

“The survivors of boat wrecks are always in a far worse condition, psychologically as well as physically. They’ve usually swallowed lots of chemical toxins, salt water, other waste substances and are suffering from respiratory diseases as well as mental trauma, having been in the water and having seen their companions die.”

She added: “Users and operators of vessels on waterways should  take extra precautions during the current rainy season when ocean levels and tidal waves increase. They should also be able to call the attention of credible government forces when they are confronted by hoodlums. This would help to reduce the rate of hazards children are exposed to. More life jackets should also be provided.”

Speaking on the efforts of the Nigerian Customs Service towards combating the activities of hoodlums on waterways, the Public Relations Officer, Western Marine Command, Ngozi Okwara,  said: “We are working assiduously to rid the waterways of smugglers. Our men  have just been recently trained and well equipped with AK 47 to deal with the smugglers.

“The training proved very useful last month when some smugglers attacked our men with dangerous weapons. Our men overpowered them using the knowledge and equipment they acquired during the training.”

She dismissed fears that innocent citizens could be injured when the officers go after hoodlums, adding: “Smugglers  don’t operate anyhow. They have hours of the day that they operate and I  can assure that we are on top of our job and would never operate in a way that would be detrimental to the public that we are serving.”

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The Association of Tourist Boat Operators and Water Transporters of Nigeria (ATBOWATAN) has inaugurated a 10- man committee of experienced professionals and technocrats to drive the investiture activities and programmes of the Emir of Borgu as life patron of private sector regulator of water transportation in Nigeria.

Recently, the Emir of Borgu, Mai Borgu, Senator (Dr.) Haliru Dantoro, Kitoro III, had accepted the appointment as life patron of the association in a letter personally signed and dated April 26.

The committee members are Alhaji Nurudeen Muhammed; Tafideen Kaima (Chairman); Chika Balogun, DG, NIHOTOURS; Dr. Mubo Eniola, immediate former Permanent Secretary, Kogi State, Ministry of Tourism; Mallam Kabiru  Mallan , President Association of Tourism Practitioners of Nigeria (ATPN) ; Mr. Muazu Sambo of National Inland Water Ways Authority (NIWA); Mr. Sola Ilupeju; Mr. John Best, ATPN (Jos Branch); Mr. Richard and Mr. Frank Meke.

President, ATBOWATAN, Mr. Ganiyu Tarzan Balogun, while inaugurating the committee, stated that the investiture of the highly cerebral Emir of Borgu, a former Senator and FCT Minister as life Patron is not only a call to honour the revered royal father  whose domain transcends the Kanji /Jebba water bodies, but  also to showcase the tourism potential of River Niger discovered by Mungo Park.

‘    “This committee must help reinvent the benefits of Nigeria’s ocean economy and the employment windows therein, and also to put together a world-class event that would unveil the critical interventions of Mai Borgu in aqua-culture, agriculture, solid minerals, ecological and water tourism”  Mr. Balogun said.

He charged the committee to be free to come up with activities and programmes that would make the Emir’s investiture a world-class event that would not be forgotten in the industry of water transportation business in Nigeria.

Already, the committee has announced the third week in July as a tentative date for the emir’s investiture.

The post ATBOWATAN life patron: Committee set up on Emir of Borgu’s investiture appeared first on The Nation.

There seems to be fresh trepidation in the country about Ebola, the lethal virus disease, as its West African neighbours, Liberia and Sierra Leone, have in the past few days recorded fresh outbreaks. Two new cases of the disease were recorded recently in Freetown, the capital city of Sierra Leone, negating the assumption that the capital city had already defeated the deadly virus.

This was immediately followed by a fresh outbreak in Liberia penultimate Sunday, when a 17-year-old boy tested positive and died. The devastating development occurred seven weeks after the West African country was declared free of the virus.

The fresh outbreaks, according medical experts, portend grave danger for the country as “all the necessary measures that are needed to nib any outbreak in the bud are totally not on ground”.

Recall that barely a year ago, Nigeria, as a result of its failure to adopt  proactive measures to check the spread of the sickness from its neighbours, carelessly allowed the  late Patrick Sawyer , a Liberian already eaten up by the disease to callously import it into the country. The havoc wreaked by this dastardly act caused huge human and economic losses to the country.

One of his victims, Dr. AmeyoAdadevoh, was infected when she tried to restrict Mr. Sawyer to his bed after he tried to remove the drip administered on him. She and few others later died of the disease, while several others survived. A total of seven people were reportedly killed before the disease was finally contained. Experts put the financial loss recorded by the nation during the outbreak at over N3billion.

In the wake of the crisis last year, government at all levels and corporate bodies began massive education and awareness campaigns to alert the masses to the ways of contracting the disease and how they could avoid it.

To avoid the risk of falling victim of the deadly disease, individuals and corporate bodies upped their levels of hygiene as many organisations mounted wash hand basins and sanitisers at their entrances to stem down the transmission of the disease. Religious houses were not left out as a number of them refrained from the rites of shaking hands during their services.

Shortly after the disease was contained and the country declared free of the virus by the World Health Organisation (WHO), the campaigns thinned out, the awareness died naturally and all the hygienic measures that were religiously adhered to by the people in the heat of the problem, discarded.  The country soon forgot its ordeal in the hands of the sickness and subsequently lowered its guards, apparently assuming that dangers were already over.

Unfortunately, the outbreaks in the neighboring countries have shown that it is not yet uhuru for the country. However, the Federal Government, realising the potential danger, during the week urged Nigerians to remain vigilant and adhere to hygienic and other preventive measures to guard against the deadly disease.

In a statement issued by the Director of Press and Public Relations in the ministry, Mrs. Ayo Adesugba Awute said: “Nigerians should not panic but must be aware and vigilant. Members of the public are advised to observe basic hygiene and report any suspected case to the nearest health facility. It must be noted that the main symptoms of the Ebola Virus Disease are fever, severe headache, abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea. Patients in some cases, also have neurological symptoms of becoming confused and restless.”

He added: “In order to address the challenges of the developments in neighbouring Liberia, the Federal Ministry of Health is reactivating its response mechanism and increasing the level of its alert.”

He directed all state ministries of health and health facilities nationwide to raise their alert level and report any suspected case to the Federal Ministry of Health.

According to the health ministry: “The resurgence of the Ebola virus in Liberia confirms that the disease is still circulating in that country and transmission from person-to-person is possible.
The new cases have raised anxiety across the globe, placing Liberia once again on the radar of global health authorities.
There were also fears that a resurgence of Ebola in Nigeria may spell doom, given the challenging economic environment in the country.”

Ogun State government has also stepped up surveillance across the 20 local government areas of the state to guard against the importation of the disease.

The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, Dr. Daisi Odeniyi, said presently there is no Ebola case in Nigeria, but to guard against any form of importation of the disease through international contacts, the state government has taken proactive measures to prevent the return of the disease.

“I would like to use this opportunity to call on members of the public not to panic. They should not relent on hand washing, general cleanliness of their environment and quickly report any suspected cases to the Ministry of Health at Oke-Mosan or the nearest health center closer to them,” Odeniyi said.

But is the country in any way anticipating any danger and doing anything to avert it? Findings showed that answer is not in the affirmative.

•Health workers attending to an Ebola patient then

The Nation’s investigation revealed that the screening of immigrants at Seme, the nation’s border with Benin Republic and other neighbouring countries, has long been abandoned, thus making it easy for anyone infected with the disease to come into the country and put it through another tortuous battle with the disease.

Some of the residents who spoke with our correspondent expressed concern over the development, fearing that their lives are constantly put at risk by the abandonment of the screening of immigrants by the relevant authorities.

“We certainly are apprehensive of the fresh outbreaks of the disease in neighbouring countries. If anybody should be afraid of the development, it should be those of us at the border because our neighbours have unhindered access to our community. As a result of this, if any of them is infected with the disease or any other lethal sickness, he could easily transmit it to us.

“To make matters worse, we don’t have hospitals that any sick person could be rushed to for urgent medical attention that a disease like Ebola would require.  We would appreciate if the government could help us address this challenge by building a hospital for us and making sure that everybody coming into the country is duly screened,” said Seun, a resident.

A visit to the Ebola Isolation Centre at Mainland Hospital, Yaba, Lagos, before the Federal Government’s alert, shows that the wooden fittings to the building are fast falling off. The premises which were locked at the time of the visit looked unkempt and deserted. Only the hospital workers attending to people with communicable diseases were seeing moving around the premises.

One of them, who did not want her name in print because she is a civil servant, said: “I don’t know anything about the Ebola centre but you should know that the doctors and the nurses would not just sit down doing nothing when the disease is no longer in the country. Before the outbreak of the disease, they were attached to one hospital or the other and now that they are done with that assignment, they must have returned to their areas of primary assignment.”

Checks also revealed that virtually all the banks that placed sanitisers, washhand basins and water at their entrances have discontinued the practice. They have equally done away with the use of non- contact thermometer for screening customers. The situation was the same in all the schools, both private and public, visited by The Nation.

A school principal, who simply identified herself as Mrs. Adewumi, said they did away with the practice of hand washing and use of sanitisers because Ebola is no more in the country, adding: “There is no need for all that anymore because the disease has been flushed out of the country and by God’s grace, we would not experience it again. I have heard that it has been recorded in some neighbouring countries but I pray that it doesn’t get here again. Bye bye to Ebola for ever.”

It was also discovered that the sales and consumption of bush meat through which the disease could be contracted has resumed. A seller of the meat considered as a delicacy in this part of the world, told The Nation that some of her customers have ‘conquered their fears’ and started patronising her again. “The business is picking up because Ebola has gone and we don’t pray for its return because it deprived us of our means of livelihood and almost turned us to beggars. It is not bush meat that is causing Ebola or was it the consumption of bush meat that caused the case that were recorded in Liberia and Sierra Leone recently?”

Dr Rotimi Adesanya, a public health physician, dismissed all the reasons given by the people for abandoning the hygienic measures that were adopted when the disease broke out last year, stressing that they are universal practices that people should carry out on a daily basis.

“For us as medical practitioners, hand washing is a standard anywhere. Health workers should protect themselves when touching patients. We call these universal precautions. Where people don’t have money to buy sanitisers, they can make use of soap. We really need to update ourselves, especially now that there is a fresh outbreak in our neighbouring country. We are supposed to be having jingles and messages in the broadcast and print media to this effect. There is danger around the corner with the way we are handling issues presently.”

He added: “The truth is that all the measures that we put in place during and shortly after the outbreak last year have been stopped. The schools are no longer screening the students for fever, they are no longer using all the wash hand basins and all the taps they made for that purpose.

“They no longer encourage the students to wash their hands anymore. Even the banks, except for one or two, don’t use their non-contact thermometer. They have forgotten about it. Being Africans, we are used to fire brigade approach which is a very bad approach to things, especially things that have to do with life and death.”

He decried the approach of the country to handling epidemics occurring within and around the country, saying: “What is happening here is the fire brigade approach that we are noted for. In developed countries, they are always fully prepared for things like these. Instead of toeing that path in this part of the world, we always believe that God will help us.

“The second challenge that puts us in danger right now is that we just had a change in our government and there are lots of distractions for the new government. Right now, the minister of health has not been nominated, the same with commissioners for health in many states across the country. It is when these public officers are appointed that they would be able to use the budgets meant for all these we are talking about.

“We need serious sensitisation to reawaken the people to the reality and dangers of this disease. It is crucial that the people should be made to realise that Ebola is near us because the more they hear this, the more they would take precautions. The education about the ways of contracting it should be drummed into the ears of the people.”

What we got wrong the first time

Even though the country succeeded in containing the disease last year, Dr Adesanya noted that there were some things that the country got wrong. “We had a refresher course recently where we were reminded about Ebola. Even though we succeeded in taming the challenge when it came up, we were told at the training that there were so many things we didn’t do right. For instance, we were told that there was supposed to be an isolation centre at the airport such that if anybody is screened and found to be positive, they would be isolated right there.

“Sawyer travelled all the way to Obalende for treatment. Thank God that the public hospitals were on strike, if not, the casualty figure would have been worse. The other thing we didn’t get right was the way we attended to malaria patients during the Ebola period. We are in a malaria endemic region. At the first point of call in the hospital, there is supposed to be a form for the patient to fill. This will show whether the patient had contact with Ebola patient or coming from an Ebola-infected area or if the person is bleeding from his ear or nose.

“These are basic pieces of information we needed that time about any patient instead of the unwholesome attitude of running away from people that had different types of malaria. The third thing was the funding. The government needs to set aside special funds for epidemics and made easily accessible during emergencies.

If there should be an outbreak today, because we are not prepared, we may not be able to overcome it. The other time we did, there were some other factors that helped us. If it happens now, it will take us a lot of time and resources to contain it.”

Dr Lawal Bakare, the Executive Director of Ebola Alert, doubted if the country would have medical personnel to serve as volunteers if the country records fresh outbreaks. Consequently, he said the country may not be as lucky as it was last year.

“We were lucky when we had the first outbreak. It wasn’t just that we knew what to do. We were only lucky that several things were where they were then. We might not be that lucky next time because our preparedness as a country is very low. All that we call preparedness are laid down principles and not rocket signs. As we speak, we don’t have the manpower on the ground to respond to such challenge. We called volunteers during the outbreak and had them return to where they came from without any recognition.

“The UK, for instance, gave Ebola medal to all the people that volunteered to help but in Nigeria, many volunteers are still being owed. It is going to be hard to call this group of people back again, they are also humans. Aside from that, the other thing is to sensitise the citizens. For there to be fresh outbreak in any country, there must a breach.”

He also identified the porosity of the border as a serious threat to checking the fresh outbreak of the disease in the country, saying: “As far as I am concerned, one of our greatest challenges is the failure to address the problem about the porosity of our borders. Ebola is a contact disease and the only way it can come into the country is the way it came in the first time. For us to have the problem again would mean that we are not checking the people that are coming into the country through the borders and the airport.”

He tasked the new government on the need to place priority on the screening of immigrants at the border, stressing: “They must make our border checking optimal because most nationals from neighbouring countries want to come to the country for business. We need to be testing people, especially those coming from those flash points. If we start doing this, we would at least have a bit of optimal performance in terms of screening and monitoring. The last that I heard was that the people screening at the borders were not being paid properly.”

He also frowned at the neglect of precautionary measures, saying: “It is unfortunate that responses from the citizens and corporate organisations have dropped because we all are emergency-led beings. We need to keep our universal precautions very high. Our people have dropped hand washing because they associated it with Ebola, but we need to continue making the people realise that the things we were doing during the Ebola outbreak are the lifestyles we are supposed to sustain in order to live healthy lives. Many corporate organisations had sanitisers at their entrances when we had Ebola in the country. But that is no more.

“Right now, MERS has come into Africa through Egypt. Now, Muslims will be going for Hajj and there would be Umrahh at the end of Ramadan. People from Nigeria would go for all these and come back home. This MERS is in many countries of the world. So it is important that people begin to live hygienically and when you have symptoms, you need to go to the hospital or the appropriate body.”

Part of the challenges the country might face if there is a fresh outbreak, according to him, is funding. “The challenge we are having now is that funding has dwindled seriously. It is important that the government should be funding some of the campaigns that we were running during the outbreak. Now, the call centres we were running then are down because they are not being funded anymore.

“The kind of toll free communication access we granted to people across the country is also no more there. We are pushing for that to return. Do we have the funds set aside for any outbreak? If we don’t, then it means that if anything happens, we are going to be looking up to the United States of America to fund our response because it is obvious now that the government is broke.

“If we should have an outbreak of Ebola the way they had in Liberia and Sierra Leone, or the way we had polio, the story would not be the same. Again, you should remember that Ebola always has a terrible impact on the economy. We need to be very smart this time so that it doesn’t aggravate our weak economy if, God forbids, it finds its way into the country again.”

Mr. Yusuf Salman Babatunde, the Public Relations Officer of the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS), however, denied that the service has jettisoned the screening of immigrants at the border, noting that the exercise has only been relaxed following the declaration that the country has been rid of the virus.

He said: “We have been doing everything we did when the country recorded Ebola outbreak last year. We still screen people but it is not the way we were doing it when we had the sickness last year. We have relaxed the screening partly because the Federal Government and the World Health Organisation have declared the country free of the sickness.

“Aside from that, some people always frustrate and harass our officers in the course of trying to screen them. We have had occasions where some people called ministers and other top public office holders to complain that our officers were molesting them at the border just because they asked them to present themselves for screening. To paint our officers black before the person they are reporting to, some of them would claim that our people were trying to extort money from them. This hampers our efforts to some extent.”

He also identified the state of the border as one of their challenges, saying: “The porosity of the border is another challenge we have here. Many of illegal immigrants always explore this opportunity to pass through illegal routes. The comptroller is not handling this with kid gloves as officers have been adequately deployed in all those illegal routes to address the challenge.

“Every illegal immigrant caught along these routes is immediately repatriated. We also work with the Port Health Services and if in the course of doing our job, we come across an immigrant suspected to be suffering from Ebola or any other sickness, we would invite them to examine the person. We are always on top of situations at the border as the comptroller has been giving us the necessary support.”

The post Again, Ebola alert appeared first on The Nation.

AT long last, you bought that expensive dress that you have been eyeing , saving for and dreaming of. So now you have an important function to attend and then it hits you, it looked wonderful in the shop, on the mannequin, how do you make it look gorgeous on you? Sit back on enjoy the steps.

Choose the right shoes, shoes are most important accessory for the it-woman. The woman of style knows that shoes can make or mar an outfit, the right shoes can move the same dress from the office, to church, to the beach, simply by changing your shoes.

Only wear what fits

1.This means knowing your body type and sticking with what works for you.

2.If you are pencil slim, wear a flared dress, to create an illusion of volume.

3. If you are pear shaped, wear a form fitting or bandage silhouette, especially if your stomach is not big, if not, wear a body shaper or girdle to create the illusion of a flat tummy.

4.If you are apple shaped

5.A rule of the thumb of fashion in shoes is wearing covered shoes with short dresses, and sandals or slippers for maxi dresses. Simply put, the longer the dress, the skimpier the shoes and vice versa.

6. If your dress is monochrome, that is one colour, wear silk or patterned shoes.

7. For a neutral colour dress, wear red, black, brown or grey shoes

8. If your dress is black, white , or silver, go for earth toned shoes in gentle browns and blues

9. For a bright green, blue, or yellow, wear white, black or biege shoes.

Choose jewelry that suit your dress

11.This means that the collar/neckline of your dress determines the jewelry, especially the earrings and necklace.

12. Also,  when wearing lace dresses, wear a pearl necklace, nothing else. Anything else would be too much, reducing the beauty of your dress.

13. A vintage dress (or old school style as we call it) wear pearls or vintage earrings. Do not wear big earrings.

14. For a dress in a modern style, you can heap on bracelets, especially geometric ones, ditch the necklace.

Wear the right make-up

15. For a vintage dress, wear false lashes or plenty of mascara.

16. For a dress in a modern style, use make-up effectsto make your eyes look arger, and “pop”. Wear nude lipstick.

17. For a simple, chic dress,  a smoky eye and pink lips in a soft shade.

Wear the right hairstyle

20. For a vintage dress,  pile up your hair, or leave it down looking natural. If you are wearing earrings, rock an updo.

21. For a dress in a modern style, pile up your in an impressive style, wear a hat, or wear your hair straight.

22. For a simple, chic style, make a curly style or a wavy one.

Choose the right bag.

The post Accessorizing your best dress appeared first on The Nation.

Inagbe Grand Resort and Leisure in Inagbe Island, Lagos, in an effort to make its resort affordable and available for Nigerians and international tourists, has launched its Explore Cards.

At a press conference at the resort, its Managing Director,  Mr.  Adeyeye Ogunwusi, said “the resort is out to revolutionize leisure and relaxation in the country”.

He said part of his strategy was to use locally sourced building materials in building the resort. He said “the visitors have the opportunity to have a taste of truly African experience”.

He said: “We have a 1200 multi-purpose hall, a floating lounge that could take about 700 guests. Our corporate clients can, after their schedule for the day, go to their rooms and come for party at the lounge. It is a perfect resort for our corporate clients. But over and above, we want to reach out to typical Nigerians, non-Nigerians and even Nigerians in the Diaspora. We want to sell the tourism sector of the country to the outside world.

“The Explore product is something we are launching to make the average Nigerian knows that the resort is not for the elite. It is a typical destination getaway for your holiday, honeymoon, marriage renewal, marriage vows and generally a place to have a good time. It is ideal when you have day’s event and it is very close to the city. Even the boat experience of coming to this island is very refreshing. A lot of Nigerians are warming up for it now.

“We also have mostly foreigners coming here. Nigeria is a country like Gambia, Seychelles and even France which depend on tourism. We want the resort experience to be reachable to typical Nigerians. We are coming up with a scheme that has actually been tested and open to the public. It is going to be on point based. It simple means you will sign up to have Explore Cards, if you want to come and experience the entire resort. You can assess it at  25,000 points and each point is given at two naira. It can be converted for our foreign visitors with the dollar equivalent.

“You can come here with as low as 25,000 points and you will experience everything that can be experienced at the resort because the Explore Card comes with some level of discount. It is going to be a loyalty package.

“At the time we launched it last year, we had so much demand that we were unable to meet up and we worked to try and get everything right. Now we are ready to provide Nigerians and non-Nigerians to come and experience the Inagbe Leisure experience. You can see how refreshing it is when you wake up in the morning. You breathe in the clean air devoid of pollution. It is a typical getaway.

“Tourism is culture we want to encourage for Nigeria because we can’t continue to depend on oil for everything. Like I said earlier on, some economies depend on tourism, so we want to focus on it.

“Holiday season is coming again, July to August. Everybody knows what the foreign exchange is saying. It has really gone up. So, to encourage local tourism, so that a typical Nigerian would say I want to come and rest. I want to get away. When the children are not in school. You want to travel out of the country. This is an environment that we would want Nigerians to come and feel. We have a lot of different packages for children and teenagers, they can come with their parents. It is more of a family oriented environment.

“Explore Card is our loyalty programme that you can use. From time to time, you will be upscaling it. You will then acquire points which you would spend here. You will get points for you accommodation, luxury chalets, romantic dinner at the floating lounge, business meetings, children’s fun, boat cruise, jungle experience and so on.

“Our objective as a company is to set up this all over the country to offer the experience. Our strategy over the next five years is to replicate this resort all over the country.”

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