₦airaland Forum

Nigerian journalist Sola Odunfa contemplates the invisible and unimaginable creativity of Nigeria's giant rumour mill, as part of our series of viewpoints from African writers.
There is only one industry I know in Nigeria which is completely immune to the vagaries of the national economy and the well-oiled machine of the government security and intelligence services.
It is big, it is strong, it never sleeps and it is unimaginably creative - but it is invisible.

No journalist worth the description should subscribe to the rumour mill and I try not to, but the Nigerian environment is different
I am talking of the Nigerian rumour mill.
Radio Nigeria describes itself as Africa's biggest news network - yet it is puny compared to the awesome rumour mill.
While the conventional, licensed media have to contend with laws and regulations and interests and finance, the Nigerian rumour mill is a wild industry which respects no conventions or authority or checks.
The butt of rumours
The rumour mill has no source. It simply exists with an arrogance drawn from its invisibility.
One day in 1989 Nigerians woke up to the news that one-time ceremonial President Nnamdi Azikiwe was dead.
Everybody who had ears heard it simultaneously across the country.
Dr Azikiwe himself read his own obituary! Subsequently the old man lived several years before reaching his bus stop.
Politicians are not the only butt of the rumour mill, and its scope may not always be national.
Who will question?
There are localised rumours - in small communities, in social clubs, in religious organisations.
They come with such authority that hardly anyone doubts them.

Gen Ibrahim Babangida - the rumour mill killed off his wife prematurely
Who will question the veracity of a story that an old or sick person has died? Or that a person whose source of wealth is unknown is indeed a drug baron? Or that a curvaceous Nollywood star is mistress to several adulterous men?
The mill in Nigeria is so powerful that it has permeated the conventional media.
Many newspapers and magazines publish products of the rumour mill as authentic news.
The less dishonourable of them publish retractions in obscure corners several days later.
The one factor binding all rumours is that they are fabricated to injure individuals or organisations.
They damage reputations and cause disaffection among people.
The Nigerian rumour mill gained ascendancy during the long period of military rule when the news media was castrated.
Information circulation went back to the old days of mouth-to-mouth communication.
Opposition newspapers were persecuted and, therefore, their journalists went underground.
'Street talk'
Since then many Nigerians, including the most educated, have relied on 'street talk' for what they regard as authentic information.

It became known that President Yar'Adua was not in fact performing the Hajj

Today Nigerians say that genuine official information is forced out by the rumour mill.
Poor Maryam Babangida.
The elegant and once powerful former First Lady was on her sick bed in the US last month when the rumour mill back home published her obituary. It was on the world wide web pronto!
Pray never to be in the shoes of her husband General Ibrahim Babangida.
Nigerians simply love to hate the man. They would do - or say - anything to hurt him.
For health reasons
That story had just been suppressed when I received calls last week from some of my friends abroad requesting me to confirm that President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua had died far away in Jeddah.
The callers were not frivolous persons but they sounded disappointed that I said, firstly, that I could not confirm and, secondly, that I did not believe the so-called news.
Popular reaction at home since the story was officially denied was that, to put it mildly, the burden of governing Nigeria should devolve only on a visibly healthy person.
Nigerians sympathise with him over his health condition as a human being but some of the more vocal are now openly calling for his resignation or removal for health reasons.


'Everything is OK, Jack'
As we say here, no rumour is built on vacuum.
Nigerians got to know officially that their president was ill only after wide publication of rumours - twice.
The latest was the third death rumour on the president and it succeeded in eliciting official information that the devoutly religious man had not gone to perform the Hajj but was indeed rushed to Saudi Arabia for urgent medical treatment.
No journalist worth the description should subscribe to the rumour mill and I try not to, but the Nigerian environment is different.
We have been watching the president on TV for three years and noticing the progressive change in his colour.
In our view he is neither becoming more handsome nor healthier, yet we are told: "Everything is OK, Jack."
If the rumour mill went to sleep there would be no communication whatsoever between the ruling establishment and the people.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8389020.stm

Right their we have a failure - A mere chairman promising 24 hour power supplly  - if i am from lekki  i would run far from this guy.

RichyBlacK:
Jarus,

Thanks for trying to calm down my sometimes boisterous 'children'; they like blaming 'dad' for every little thing.

Richy is now NL daddy - are u related to Daddy GO

why dont u lot start a riot - u can set your living room on fire lol

Jobless people

Fela  - The great Prophet .  His words are so relevant to the present times.

come and see american wonder

adventure:
@blacksta AND candylips TWO of you are the most stupid idiot i have ever seen on this planet, read your Bible and stop saying Nonsense, ' Even the Son of Man has Never Know when the Time is" End of Quate, so stop that your useless idiology.

@Chapelle.S ,, you are 100% right, Nigeria most surely Disintegrate on or before 2015.

See this yeye fake prophet - it is ok to condemn me for sugguesting a date but i guess to its all right for you suggest a 2015 date for nation to disintegrate.

As pointed out - It is known that this plant will implode by the 31 dec of 2012 - so 2015 is less of a worry.

okoya thomas = becomerich in disguise - French ke?

definitely - money miss road - while some people earn 75k per year and still much better . although i suspect that story is not really factual . Their is no way he would get paid 75k per week without the Government of U.K not first deducting tax and National Insurance he is probably left with about 45k weekly.

ikeyman00:
becomeich

till today im still questioning the stablity of your brain cell

u claimed to be rich?? and on that u are a man of of god

what have u done nothing

and this is how u gona lead 15 million people cuz the bible say so

well i dream on the day say 99% houses in lagos will be bought off by the igbos ahahhhhh just joiking

wel oboy i thank god for u; never worry and stay strong; a word from superman

^^^^

shut up and donate some money - This guy requires assistance - I tire for all u fake people.

platinumnk:
hmm im gonna speak with him today on that- im cool-

@blacksta a $100 option was added- letting you know.

sent already

One day - Nigeria will be delivered from the clutches of evil.

ABUJA — STILL recovering from the shock of Nigeria’s downward spiral in the ranking of Transparency International, TI, the Federal Government yesterday blamed the low rating on the Organised Private Sector, OPS.
The government maintained that while the menace of corruption is fast fading out in the public sector, the virus is eating deep into the fabric of the OPS.

The blame apportioning notwithstanding, government has expressed discomfort over the retrogression.
Nigeria had dropped in the latest ranking of Transparency International, released Tuesday, from 121st position in 2008 to 130, this year.
Minister of Information, Dora Akunyili, while reacting in Abuja yesterday, said it is a sad development.
Akunyili stated that it is discomforting to list the nation among the world’s most corrupt countries despite government’s efforts to sanitise different sectors of the economy.
The Minister who noted that the Federal Government does not dispute the ranking however revealed that the government is ignorant of the perimeters used in the assessment.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2009/11/19/corruption-rating-fg-blames-private-sector/comment-page-1/#comments
According to her, the government is set to make amends in all areas that had led to the sudden slump.
Also, the government stated that contrary to opinion being expressed in some quarters that there are sacred cows in the fight against corruption, especially corruption cases involving some former governors, nobody would be spared, no matter how close the person may be to the President.
According to the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, “nobody is going to be spared. The Ibori’s case trials have commenced both here and in London and now his fate is in the courts. If you commit an offence that is corruption-related, we charge you to court. Once the banking sector corruption cases are over, we will look at other sectors that are capable of undermining the Nigerian drive to move out of the list of most corrupt nations”.
He however explained “there is no way I can shut my door against anybody. If an armed robber today is charged to court, and he complains that his trial is unfair, would I say he cannot come to my office to lodge his complaint? He would lodge his complaint, I will go through his complaint, if the complaint lacks merit, I will dismiss it. The most important thing is that no Nigerian judge has ever accused me of interference.
The judiciary is doing their job and we abide by them.
Citing the recent Central Bank audit of banks, Aondoakaa stated that Nigeria’s rating would have improved greatly if measures taken to curb the evil in the public sector were replicated in the private sector.
“The corruption is in the banking sector. I have already been given a clear report of the problems in the private sector. And mind you, Nigeria has never had it so good. The first year we came in we brought it down to 147. We took it to 121 and then this corruption that manifested in private sector, the NDIC has confirmed that it happened from January, 2009”, he said.
He disclosed that before now, it was “only under the present regime that the country has recorded this great fit. The closest was when Nigeria was on number three in the bottom of the table. So we brought it down in the first year to 147, we moved it down to 121 and now we have a crisis in the banking sector which the people correctly recorded that there is crisis in the banking sector. People looted money in the banking sector which is a public knowledge. I gave a report and I think the rating must be based on the report I gave.
“Certainly that influenced the rating, which also Transparency International captured in their report. We were at Dubai and Nigeria was heavily praised for the reforms that we have carried out. The anti-corruption body did not complain about Nigeria, rather at the conclusion of the seminar in Dubai, we were co-opted to act in the drafting of the reform of peer review”, he said.
According to him “with what happened in the banking sector, you must commend the EFCC and the governor of the central bank for taking the bull by the horn. First, from the recovery we made, that shows clearly that people were really stealing money because we couldn’t have made such a quick recovery of over N170 billion in two months. That means that people were stealing this money and hiding it.
We are also targeting the assets of these people. We will get them both here and outside the country where they have gone. We will recover the money. The people will find this very unattractive”.

tpia no mind all this  yeye people - no body complained when threads were started dissing yorubas now one is started against Igbos  - we no go hear word anymore

jay bee:
should be around 65 pounds or thereabout.
plat set up options of 50 70 100 dols and lets get it rolling once again.

I am in

another idiot post - divided people.

Hi

Can somebody tell me what amount is Outstanding .

WilyWily:
blacksta, i'm not spreading hate about Yoruba, i hate no one, but what i hate, is the Bad behaviour in Yoruba.
[b]They are one of the Most Wicked Black Race. [/b]No difference between Yoruba Tribe and Hutu Tribe. No difference Between Yoruba People and Nazi Hitler, Himmler, Joseph Gobble, Josef Mengele, Saddam Hussein, Chemical Ali.

You have surely exposed yourself - Please explain how u arrived at the above conclusion.

Horus:
Do you have any links for this "information"?

links ke? The guys say he dey ground u dey ask for links

what about mekuslogon or mekuXXXXXXXXX, wilywily, that guy is constantly spreading hate about yorubas

abeg which song akon sing

abeg which song akon sing

FL Gators:
I hate acer laptops, they're so crappy and very slow

[img]http://bujirox.files./2009/09/acer-laptop1.jpg[/img]

me too - idiots and stupid of a laptop

presido1:
Its only one country that will come out victorious. Being there is what matters now and we did it.

The point is that we will be there come 2010. If you are not happy about that you have several options like Rope, Transformer, High Tension, Rat Killer, River Thames the list is endless. Sleep over it and please yourself.

Lol - Rather than give myself high blood pressure like the disasterous outing in 2002 wc - I am speaking the truth now

another wururu to the answer.  With the present style of play  - we no go pass group stages - so tell me what is the point.

Pharoh:
[size=20pt]Download And Install Sopcast

Tunisia Match Is On Kooora Tounsia

Nigeria Match Is On SudanTV[/size]

what is channel number

@poster

Unforgiveness is bad for the soul , mind and the body - Let it go.

can somebody ban this idiot

$20,000 ke  - the money i give to my fifth wife to enter taxi .

On a more serious note  - I wish to commend Ghana on this great level of accountability . 

Nigeria will be great -  I command satan to release his clutches of Nigeria in Jesus Name.