UNCLE BEN: FAILURE OF A VETERAN TOWN CRIER
You just can't rule out the fact that the age long saying would remain relevant for the next foreseeable future. It's a fact, indeed, that if you are not informed, then you stand a chance of being deformed. Imagine a world without information or means of information? No doubt, information is key.

I would appreciate it a great deal if we can assume this Facebook and twitter life is non existent and we think about passing across information like the people of old without mobile phones or its equivalent. Then, that successfully done would see us appreciating the town criers in those days. In this present world they have been ably replaced by the social media and the media houses. Being a town crier back then gives you the opportunity of getting first hand information.

I was privileged few years ago to meet an aged person who related to me a story that depicts an implausible paradox. I couldn't believe that is actually a possibility. How a close relative of the village town crier could have fallen into such trap was incomprehensible. I tried in vain to make the whole episode sound rational. Luckily, the story (believe it or not) is now a weapon in an arsenal!

A ritual was to be performed for peace to reign in a war ravaged land and the town crier as expected had been hinted. The broadcaster as expected took to the streets to inform the entire village, moving from markets to farm settlements, warning people to stay indoors. By daybreak, it was evident that calamity had knocked at his door and had even secured a room for a nap. His son that stays some few kilometres away from his house had been used for the said ritual. The questions I asked myself were: Did the town crier just assume his son must have got the information and consequently thought it's unnecessary to warn him? Why would the son of a town crier be bereft of such vital information?

If you don't know him, you are either an individual that cares less about the social media or doesn't care two hoots about happenings in the Nigerian political sphere. He is a vibrant Senator on Facebook and twitter. He is fondly called 'the commonsense senator' by his admirers. Infact, as you read this, he is probably talking on twitter about the ills of the Nigerian state. He is very good at pointing out the wrongs in the system, even though he had said almost nothing about them for more than a decade - a case of political irredentism.

It is not out of place to help another individual remove the spec of dust in his eyes, but it's best done if you do that after spending at least, few seconds in front of a clean mirror and examine the entire circumference of each lens and the eyelashes. It is on record that you own silver bird TV with a cinema that accommodates both human beings that comes to relax and rats that come for bites of the expensive popcorn. That is business anyway and I reckon you are at liberty to do business just the way you like.

There were youths that you've always fought for on social media at your 60th birthday celebration and they claimed they were faced with discriminations that very day. I was glad you promptly apologised to them and further stressed that they would get a copy of your book after a registration of some sort on your website. I wasn't one of the youths that attended the birthday celebration, but, being an avid reader, I was one of the youths that requested for an electronic copy of your book and I'm still waiting to get the book in my mailbox even as I write this piece. A Yoruba adage says: 'A warrior that just came back from war and stepped on six hens to death and subsequently tells the tale of how he had beheaded six enemies. If we are in the dark as to what ensued at the war front, we have at least seen what happened at home.'

I don't want you to see this as an attack by an angry Nigerian youth. On the contrary, I want you to see this as an avenue to alert you as to the popping up of loopholes in a campaign that is expected to have penchant for perfection. Nigerians are still waiting for the explanation for printing the commonsense book in the United States, even as you encourage us to buy naija to grow the naira.

Uncle Ben (permit me to call you this), we also realised that the portion of the budget that endorses the construction of Lagos-Calabar coastal rail line had been deleted and we are so sure that happened right under your nose. Sir, this is the point at which we expected the commonsense voice to be loudest but we couldn't hear as loud as a mosquitoe's sneeze on that. I still don't want to believe that all that happened without your knowledge. Information of that magnitude is not expected to elude you. If you question the essence of the presence of other senators from that region in that chamber, you have done well, but a greater good is you being at the forefront of the campaign against that removal in the first place so that posterity would continuously remember that, there was a vibrant Uncle Ben.

When two siblings get out of a discussion room with bold faces trying in vain to conceal the red eye balls, they have been honest with each other. That might just be all I have for you now.

I hope to continuously serve in a capacity as an adviser on any movement the Nigerian Youths could benefit from. Just before I say 'good luck with your commonsense movement', I suggest we see more of actions (like the alternative power source bill) from you in the esteemed chamber and less on the social media.

Good luck.

Stupid APC supporters want an opposition senator to protest on their behalf. Don't you people have senators representing you?