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Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 8:26pm On Mar 29, 2013
[quote author=ndu_chucks]I don't believe you can show that I insulted her hero. I have a right to my opinion.[/quote]I bet you are the sort who used to put bugs in people's shoes when young? In school you probably got caned regularly for mischief-making? Ndu Chucks, why do you like looking for wahala so much?
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 8:21pm On Mar 29, 2013
Aigbofa: Why don't you just tell her you love her instead of insulting her hero? Is that how you woo girls these days?
When I read from Ndu Chucks, I always think of those Nigerians flush with petrodollar, bored out of their brains and just happy to ferment mischief and wind everyone up to amuse themselves. Oni jogbon eniyan ni Ndu Chucks. grin grin grin
PoliticsRe: Mokola Flyover Bridge, Ibadan. Pics.. by Gbawe: 8:12pm On Mar 29, 2013
django1: The best thing a governor can do in Nigeria is to not do anything. People won't have cause to be asking you how much it cost to do what you do.

When previous administration did nothing, nobody asked any silly question of "okay, you've built a bridge, how much was it?"
I just don't get some Nigerians. Is it that suffering has turned many into dark souls who are forever given to complaining and focusing on the negatives? Governors who are doing nothing right now are not being asked silly questions anyone can gain answers to if really interested.

These SW Governors are delivering some much needed infrastructural projects with some projects even being first of its kind yet there is never discussions on the benefits of these project. Instead, all we hear are bitter, disgruntled sound bites when zero motion, infrastructure-wise, was the case in the past.
PoliticsRe: Jonathan To Eliminate Power Outage By 2012 by Gbawe: 8:03pm On Mar 29, 2013
lakhadimar: INSECURE9IGERIAN WHERE ARE YOU? THIS IS ONE OF THE MANY LIES YOUR MENTOR BEAF SPLASHED ALL OVER NAIRALAND LAST YEAR
Busy running away faster than Usain Bolt grin grin grin grin
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 7:39pm On Mar 29, 2013
sweetcheecks: Look I would rather have you not know or care about Mandela than show your care in this mannar. Let me repeat this, most SA's do not know or care about Achebe that is the truth. You can also stop your care for Mandela if you want but that is not an insult. Why should anyone care about someone they do
not know? Some of us only read about on this forum and respected him enough not to make stuupid comments about someone we do not know. Thai is what I am saying and stand on it.
I can see you have issues and just want to come here and fight Nigerians. Have you actually read my contribution here? What is wrong with you? Look, If you claim you and most South Africans don't care about Achebe then good for you. You have made your point and can leave issues as they are. Many of us do not agree with OP but you clearly want an argument with everyone that is why you seem to want to join issues with every poster here.
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 7:21pm On Mar 29, 2013
Aigbofa: What a bizarre thread. How can anybody who is not Mandela's immediate family or doctor speculate on his condition. And if he is still responding to treatment, why in the name of God should that be stopped?
That is Ndu Chucks for you. Too much 'Ashe ju'. He will never accept correction either. Can I speculate about his own ailing relative like that while insinuating him and his sibling are keeping the ill family member alive for "selfish" reasons?
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 7:17pm On Mar 29, 2013
sweetcheecks: You are the first to be all emotional butyour people are the ones who make insulting statements first. Anyhow where was Achebe insulted huh You should also be on something if you think I am insulting him when I say they must bury their hero and leave Mandela alone. We never commented on Achebe and never disrespected him but tgis rubbish that ia being written here is an altimate insult more especally when the old man is fighting for his life. What kind of thread is this anyway? Asking a loved family elder to be euthanased like an animal huh
Look, I am only telling you to direct your issues against the guilty Party and not Nigerians or her respected icons. I don't see how what you wrote below is not disrespectful:

We did not know or care what was up with him.
Why would you say that if a cultured person? I.e speak feudally and as if it is good for any African to spitefully claim he/she is not interested in one of the greatest icons of the continent?

There is nothing, no provocation at all, any South African can say that will make me say similar i.e "We did not know or care what was up with Mandela". Respect and affection for Mandela, for correctly 'calibrated' Africans, is above Nationalism and feudalism.

If you don't get it, then feel free to think it is a good thing to say you don't care about respected Africans who have done wonderful things for our continent as a whole and made us all proud regardless of our nation of origin. You will notice some of us do not agree with the OP and we have made this known so stop the ugly generalisation against Nigerians.
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 7:07pm On Mar 29, 2013
http://www.msafropolitan.com/afropolitan


Afropolitan Quotes

An afropolitan is anyone who is African and identifies with the African continent, either black or white. A person who shares the vision of a better Africa, whose sympathies and loyalties are with Africa. Anyone who happens to have a cosmopolitan outlook and is ambitious on a personal level, economically and intellectually is an afropolitan.
Tiisetso Makube, editor of The Afropolitan


At the same time they understand, it would seem, that their choices have weight. Postcolonial African art, wherever it is produced, is all but inseparable from politics. In Africa art has always played a social role, assumed moral status, a status that even physical distance …can’t erase.
And so Afropolitanism, young and cool, comes with responsibilities.
Holland Cotter, Pulitzer Prize winner, critic

As I see it, the vocabulary of racial freedom is not enough to deal with these questions. What needs to be done is to discover a language within which these fractured linkages can be understood and redeemed.
I suggest that Afropolitanism is that language and that concept.
Professor Achille Mbembe

Afropolitanism is ” a mindset rather than a project. A mindset of being ‘comfortably African’ in the way described above, driving a myriad of projects, collaborations and engagements. A strong pillar of Afropolitanism is our desire to specialise in knowledge on and about Africa. This is achieved through a variety of initiatives and engagements, from research collaborations to co-supervision of postgrads; from joint curriculum design to staff and student exchanges; from external examining to joint participation with continental partners in global networks.
Professor Thandabantu Nhlapo, deputy vice-chancellor, UCT

An Afropolitan, simply put, is an African who vests their identity in the African continent as well as in hybrid spaces of diaspora, migration, locality, globalism, multilingualism and so on. However, Afropolitanism is an evolving movement and a tricky idea to define conceptually. This probably has to do with scales, how much one sees Africa and how much one sees cosmopolitan in the term.
Minna Salami, editor of MsAfropolitan.com
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:59pm On Mar 29, 2013
berem: Oh now i understand! these people are more of celebrities than Afropolitans. or are both the same?
They are the celebrity faces of what an Afropolitian is. An Afropolitan, simplistically, is anyone who is an academically and professionally successful 'citizen of the world' with an African background they are proud of and identify with passionately.

In fact, one thing many Afropolitans will have in common is the passion for Africa that draws them into collaborative endeavours/association with the continent regardless of where they live. Afropolitan is simply a witty and thematic spin of cosmopolitan.
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:50pm On Mar 29, 2013
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/mar/22/taiye-selasi-interview-ghana-must


Taiye Selasi: 'I'm very willing to follow my imagination'
The 'Afropolitan' novelist on escaping a yoga retreat, rejecting routine – and the upside of heartbreak
Share 14



Interview by Tim Lewis
The Observer, Friday 22 March 2013 12.00 GMT
Jump to comments (2)

https://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Admin/BkFill/Default_image_group/2013/3/18/1363620140610/Taiye-Selasi-010.jpg
Taiye Selasi: 'I’ve often wondered if writing is just a socially acceptable form of madness.' Photograph: Nancy Crampton

Taiye Selasi is the embodiment of "Afropolitan", a word she coined. Born in London, to a Nigerian mother and Ghanaian father, the 33-year-old writer and photographer grew up in the States and now lives in Rome. Her debut novel, a sprawling, globe-trotting family saga called Ghana Must Go, has received enthused endorsements from Toni Morrison and Salman Rushdie, and she is one of the Waterstones 11 for 2013.

Ghana Must Go
by Taiye Selasi

Buy it from the Guardian bookshop


Is it true that the idea for Ghana Must Go came at a yoga retreat in Sweden?
Absolutely. It was 5am and I was in the shower and everyone in the novel was there in an instant. But the retreat didn't allow electronics, so I had this epiphany, this revelation – here's the novel, these are the people, this is their story – where's my laptop? Nothing doing, so my friend and I sort of escaped, took the train to Copenhagen, and that's where I began the novel.

We like to think that moments of inspiration will come on yoga retreats – is that your experience?
No, the thing that comes most frequently to me on yoga retreats is excruciating pain in my hips. Toni Morrison said that she wrote her first novel because it was the book she wanted to read; I think this novel came to me like that. It was entirely realised, like remembering a book I'd read, except I thought: No, I haven't read that. So I had to get to work.

That must often happen with debut novels – you pour your whole life into them…
To be honest, all my work comes that way. The big ideas always come in flashes. I don't really craft stories that much. I genuinely don't know where these people come from and I've often wondered if writing is just a socially acceptable form of madness.

Routine is important for a lot of writers, but you wrote Ghana Must Go in Nigeria, Ghana, India and Rome…
I found there were three things I needed and still need to do the work: silence, light and a sense of space. But I'm very willing to follow my imagination where it wants to go, rather than dragging it around behind me or unleashing it and teaching it to sit and roll over. I still read bits of Ghana Must Go – before bed, I sometimes open to a random page and gaze at it lovingly – and I think to myself: I don't know even know this. Genuinely, if I, Taiye, knew everything Ghana Must Go knows collectively, I would not suffer heartbreak, I would not suffer any of the petty human woes that I continue to suffer on a regular basis.

So you completed 100 pages of the novel, got a book deal and then there was the little block…
What do we call it? The little block! It was six months long, those were the dark days.

You thought you might never write again?
I did, but every blocked writer does. That's what makes writer's block so painful. You think the well has run dry, maybe somewhere in the heavens the tap has been turned off. That's beyond frightening. That has nothing to do with deadlines, contracts signed or advance money spent, that has to do with the fear of losing your joy, your love. I was heartbroken. But then of course I was really heartbroken. I was heartbroken by the man I was foolishly dating at the time. Then I was able to finish the book!

What do you do now when you're stuck?
I live in Rome and five minutes from my flat is a church where you can walk in and see this beautiful Caravaggio. Just the way this man uses dark paint: dark to create dark to create dark, the layering of the darkness in his work. I just race home: I want to create!
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:44pm On Mar 29, 2013
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/mar/22/taiye-selasi-afropolitan-memoir

Taiye Selasi on discovering her pride in her African roots
The debut author of the eagerly anticipated novel, Ghana Must Go, writes about her shame at her family history and how she learned to be herself in Africa



Taiye Selasi
The Guardian, Friday 22 March 2013 16.43 GMT
Jump to comments (27)

https://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Arts/Arts_/Pictures/2013/3/21/1363881699594/Tanye-Selasi-010.jpg
'My mother was seven months pregnant when she learned her lover already had two wives' … Taiye Selasi in Lomé, Togo. Photograph: Taneisha Kamali Berg 2012
The crisis began – as crises are wont to do – at my best friend's wedding. Jamaica wasn't the obvious choice for what Jess likes to call "the whitest wedding on Earth". But there we sat smiling at the Rose Hall Ritz-Carlton, the hotel's all-brown staff smiling too. The salad had been served, the bread rolls broken and buttered, and now the reception began properly with polite conversation: how do you know the happy couple, where have you flown in from? I'd been placed between Clara, fair fellow alumna of Milton Academy and Yale University, and Percy, the third and presumably final husband of Jess's grandmum. With graceful concision, Clara told our tablemates where she came from: Brookline, prep school, Harvard Law School. Percy turned to me.



Tell us what you think: Star-rate and review this book
"And where are you from?" he asked in that accent I've only heard on Beacon Hill, in films about the Kennedys, and drinking with my agent. Boston Brahmin, baritone. A bit of extra weight on "you", as if the question mark belonged to me (the questionable thing), not "from". I gave the answer I always give, the answer I'd give if you asked me now, refined by years of daily practice, available in multiple languages. "I'm not sure where I'm from! I was born in London. My father's from Ghana but lives in Saudi Arabia. My mother's Nigerian but lives in Ghana. I grew up in Boston." Here I'll pause for reaction – soft chuckles of confusion, some statement along the lines of "You're a citizen of the world!" – then open the floor to any follow-up questions about any of the countries I've mentioned. Until last autumn at my best friend's wedding, I'd never really noticed the shame in this answer – which isn't to say that I'd never considered my angst about the question.

I had thought about it most cogently in 2005, having abandoned a DPhil in international relations to follow my dream, then some 20 years old, of writing for a living. Taking baby steps from footnotes to fiction, I wrote a short and personal essay on Africans who shared my trouble with the question "where are you from?". The piece – "Bye-Bye, Babar: Or, What is an Afropolitan?" – struck a chord with young Africans and people who love us, and by 2011 I was watching in wonder as my personal essay grew wings. It was a writer's dream: to have put into words some single truth of individual experience, to watch those words find a home in the world, that truth a thousand mirrors. "I am not an alien!" my self rejoiced. "I am not alone! There are others!"

There were. But they weren't at the whitest wedding on Earth. And here began the crisis. "How in the world did Jess find you?" asked Percy, chuckling. I bristled. My rattling off of disparate countries, well rehearsed, was meant to speak of international savoir faire, not render me a "find".

Clara kindly intervened. "Taiye went to Milton and Yale with me."

Still, Percy furrowed his bushy brows. "So you didn't grow up with your parents?"

"My mother raised my sister and me in Brookline," I offered.

"Without your father?"

"He's lived in Saudi Arabia for most of my life." I drained my wine and looked for more. Only now did I notice the room's demographics. "He's about to retire to Ghana," I added.

"Retire? Oh my! How old is he?"

"Seventy-five next year. My mum's much younger. She came third."

"Your father had three wives at once?"

A Jamaican waiter arrived with wine. But I couldn't steady my wine glass. I excused myself to go to the restroom and stumbled down the carpeted hallway, kicking off my platform heels and trying not to cry. A waitress, passing me, nodded with meaning and I nodded equally meaningfully back, in that gentle way in which brown people often acknowledge each other's presence. The instant's exchange reminded me of what I often overlook: my minority status. I'd just locked the stall when I started to sob, without quite knowing why.



"Shame."

Thus spoke Ileane Ellsworth, my healer-cum-therapist-cum-psychic-cum-life-coach, attempting to release my solar plexus in her office on East 20th. It was an emergency session: I'd returned from Jamaica in emotional disrepair, unable to sleep or eat or stop crying, all because of one comment. "I wasn't ashamed! I was angry!" I raged. "He's a third bloody husband himself, for chrissake. If I were white, he'd never have thought my dad had three wives at once."

Ileane, beside me, pressed on my chest. "Why does this make you so angry?" she cooed.

"Because he's racist!" I cried. This may well not have been true. The truth came next. "And he's right."

Percy was right. My Saudi-based father, an incredible surgeon trained in Edinburgh, had two wives in Ghana when he proposed to my mother, his student in Lusaka. None the wiser, my mum said yes, and was seven months pregnant, in London, in love, when she learned that her lover was two women's husband and promptly went into labour. My twin sister and I arrived two months early, weighing three-and-a-half and four pounds respectively; our mum, herself an incredible paediatrician, nursed us back to health. Our father beat a swift retreat to King Faisal University in South Arabia to teach trauma surgery. Twelve years later we'd meet him again at Heathrow airport. Here – the year I transferred to Milton, befriending Jess my BFF – is where I first remember ever seeing the second of my parents. My mum had decided that it was time for us to know our progenitor and chose England as a halfway point between Al-Khobar and Brookline. Backstory: single, still living in London, she'd gone on a date with an American professor on sabbatical from MIT, visiting his cousin, the wife of the Senegalese ambassador. It was love at first sight. They married months later and returned to his faculty housing in Boston. A decade on, she'd left the husband but kept the job at Children's Hospital. So it was that I flew from Boston at 12 years old in LL Bean loafers, a British citizen with a suburban American accent, to meet my father.

Of course, all of this was missing from that standard issue answer in which I appeared a browner, younger Carmen Sandiego. "My father's from Ghana but he lives in Saudi Arabia" omitted the fact of his decade-long absence, while implying that I, too, was somehow "from Ghana", a tenuous claim at best. I was 15 years old when I first went to Ghana. I'd spent more time in Switzerland (where my godfather was a diplomat) and Spain (where my half-Scottish grandmum was mastering flamenco) than in Africa. I'd been to the continent only once before: to Nigeria, at seven and without my mum, whose painful adolescence in London and Lagos had left her with no love of home. "My mother's Nigerian but she lives in Ghana" omitted this fact: that she'd starved as a child, abandoned by her mother to fend for herself and her siblings on her grandfather's cocoa farm. It was my great-aunt who took me at seven years old to this family estate in Abeokuta, the famed hometown of Fela Kuti. I absolutely loved it. But my mum never taught me Yoruba – which I'd study, with comical results, at Yale – and I heard not a word of my father's Ewe until I turned 15. When I finally went to Accra that Christmas I discovered among other things: sugarloaf pineapple, hip-life music, and my father's other offspring. One was the child of his first wife Vivian; three of his (late) second wife Juliana; a fifth, of yet a different mum, had died under mysterious circumstances. As much as I adored the city of Accra, preferring it to Malaga and Lausanne by far, my first trip to Ghana was tainted by these fraught familial dynamics.

In the years to come I'd return for Christmases, not with my father but with friends of my mum. When she moved to Ghana in 2001 Accra became our base. My writing about Afropolitans took its texture from this sense of place, the tastes and smells and sounds that still make Ghana feel like home. And yet, hidden in my earnest exultation of Afropolitan-ness was an old and deep unease with being, very simply, African. In giving a name to a demographic, I'd assumed the role of advocate for more accurate portrayals of Africa – but wasn't sure I deserved it. Once, at a dinner for VS Naipaul, I was asked to toast Sir Vidia; I said, very genuinely, how much I admired how little he heeded his critics. Who was he to speak on behalf of the Caribbean, his detractors cried. Mine had a similar axe to grind: how African was I, really? Funny thing is, I'd resolved this particular identity crisis, at least for me. I was Afropolitan, dammit! I spoke for the Body AfroPolitic! It wasn't the identity issue – was I African enough to write about Africa? – that compromised my advocacy. No, the problem was my family.

There I was, heartily lauding Ghana in all of its peace-loving, hard-working glory, only to spiral out at one comment about my Ghanaian father. I was passionate about Africa, yes, but wasn't proud. I couldn't be. My tie to Africa – my African father – was standing in the way. Ileane was right. What I'd felt in Jamaica was shame about my family saga: the poverty, polygamy, one stereotype of African dysfunction after another. It had always seemed a matter of mere politesse to skip these sordid details when describing to a stranger who I was. But my grief at Percy's (spot-on) guess suggested something else at work: a need to obscure both where and who I came from. Intellectually, I perceived myself as a product and champion of modern west Africa. Emotionally, I perceived myself as a west African polygamist's daughter. What I needed was some other way to know myself as African, apart from as heir to my parents' hurts.

For this, I had to go home.



"Home."

That very heavy word, with all the flaws of all ideals, a standard nowhere ever meets, a gold and leaden star. For 15 years I'd gone to Ghana desperately seeking home writ large, ignoring my role in the relationship, the "I" in "I had to go home". For half my life I'd travelled home and left myself, my truth, behind: arriving in Ghana and assuming the role of (illegitimate) Prodigal Daughter. I was disappointed, naturally, in the ways that home-seeking prodigals are, dismayed to find my otherness in tact among my own. But I had never been myself in Ghana. The self I'd become in 30 years: the author, photographer, screenwriter, traveller, designer, thinker. I'd spent months at a time in Oxford, Paris, New York, New Delhi, and always felt at home: for I experienced those cities, experienced myself, as a creator, not a creation. Returning home after Jess's wedding – to Rome, my latest choice of city – I wondered at this: I'd never created an experience in Africa. My father had, my mother had; they'd dreamed and learned and loved, and left. I'd walked in their shadows, but not in my shoes. It was time for a trip.



The summer I finished my first novel Ghana Must Go, I drove across west Africa: from Accra to Lomé to Cotonou to the deliciously named Ouagadougou. This time I took myself along, my writer-traveller-photographer-self, with a project: photographing twentysomethings in 54 African cities. The stated aim was a photography book, a collective portrait of the young adults so conspicuously absent from western media's portrayals of urban Africa. The politically minded observer in me had grown weary of the imagery: the wizened elders, the wide-eyed children hugging volunteers. So I armed myself at B&H Photo and asked two friends to come along: Bliss Holloway the cinematographer and Taneisha Berg the documentarian. Our cheery if cash-strapped crew set off to capture the birth of my photo project – but six weeks in it was suddenly clear that there was a film to be made. We've now resolved to fundraise for a full-length documentary: a lively look at the days and dreams of African twentysomethings.

Of course, my deepest aim was personal: not to "find myself" in Africa but to be myself on African soil. This I did. And how. In Ouaga I danced until 5am at Allapalooza, a western-themed club, watched movies at a feminist film festival, wandered a sculpture park in the desert. Adama, our charming host, was an Afropolitan of the highest order: a Muslim musician with a Viennese wife, studying German at the Goethe Institute, uninterested in living anywhere else apart from Burkina Faso. Togo was a seaside treat: like Malibu with motorini, miles and miles of white-sand beach and perfect rows of palm trees. Thursday at midnight, we stood on that beach with hundreds of super-cool Togolese hipsters, assembled for the weekly late-night car tricks show and drag race. Cotonou was magic, too: I learned to sail in a hidden lagoon, swilled Eku (Afro-Bavarian beer) at Saloon, a riverfront bar. But the hometown – Accra – was the real revelation, what with its International Salsa Congress, midnight swimming at La Villa Hotel, guitarist Serwaa Okudzeto. The city had changed, but not so much; I felt it differently, intimately. I could see myself in these African cities: a designer in the vibrant clothes, a screenwriter in the desert scenes, a poet in the rhythms. I began to say that I wanted an "I ❤ Heart of Darkness" T-shirt, and only half in jest. The journey had cured my Percy Problem at last. This wasn't my parents' Africa, the past, that static site of hurt and home. It was mine: dynamic now. This wasn't some "real" west Africa either. It was my west Africa, my version of home, not just a place, but a way to be in – a way to know – the world.



Leaving Accra to fly back to Rome, I presented my passport at customs. The Ghanaian agent, reading my name, didn't bother with "where are you from?". "Selasi! So you're an Ewe!" He beamed.

"My father's …" I started, then stopped. I smiled. "Yes. I am."

"Safe journey," he said. "Come home soon."

"I will."
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:40pm On Mar 29, 2013
https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215112101-chris-ofili-no-woman-no-cry-vertical-gallery.jpg
Artist Chris Ofili was born in Manchetser, England to Nigerian parents. His work has drawn inspiration from a research trip to Zimbabwe. He is a former winner of Britain's prestigious Turner Prize for art, and his works include "No Woman, No Cry," pictured.

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120216094136-hazel-aggrey-orleans-vertical-gallery.jpg
London-based fashion designer Hazel Aggrey-Orleans was born in Germany to a German mother and Nigerian father, and grew up in Lagos, Nigeria. She says her colorful designs reflect her multi-cultural background and global travels.

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215111818-andy-allo-horizontal-gallery.jpg
Andy Allo is a Cameroonian singer and guitarist who's now based in the United States. She has performed with Prince and produces what she describes as "alter-hip-soul.

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215113307-hugh-masekela-horizontal-gallery.jpg
Now 72 years old, South African musician Hugh Masekela proves you don't have to be young to be an Afropolitan. "Hugh Masekela is definitely Afropolitan," says Brendah Nyakudya, editor of Afropolitan magazine. "He has traveled the world but has come back and lives in Soweto with his people."
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:35pm On Mar 29, 2013
https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/111103125024-african-voices-david-adjaye-buildings-00005330-horizontal-gallery.jpg

David Adjaye is one of the world's most sought-after architects. Born in Tanzania to Ghanaian parents he is now based in London.

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215111633-spoeke-mathambo-horizontal-gallery.jpg
South African vocalist and producer Spoeke Mathambo has pioneered a kind of "township tech" that incorporates elements of electro, house and dubstep. His tunes can be heard on discerning dancefloors around the world.

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215104805-andrade-horizontal-gallery.jpg
Singer Mayra Andrade is a true globetrotter. Born in Cuba, raised in Cape Verde, she has also lived in Senegal, Angola and Germany, and now lives in Paris. Her jazzy bossa nova ballads are winning her fans all over the world.
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:34pm On Mar 29, 2013
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/17/world/africa/who-are-afropolitans/index.html

Young, urban and culturally savvy, meet the Afropolitans
By Mark Tutton, CNN
February 17, 2012 -- Updated 1151 GMT (1951 HKT)


Time Magazine has listed economist Dambisa Moyo as one of the "100 most Influential People in the World." Born in Zambia, Moyo went to university in the UK and the United States. Her books "Dead Aid" and "How the West was Lost" have been controversial and influential.
HIDE CAPTION

https://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120215114610-dambisa-moyo-2-vertical-gallery.jpg
Dambisa Moyo

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
The term "Afropolitan" is often used to refer to young Africans with a global outlook
The editor of Afropolitan magazine says: "I've kind of been raised by the world"
Social media has been key to the movement, says blogger Minna Salami
Movement is associated with a certain cool and a style influenced by Arise magazine

(CNN) -- Young, urban and culturally savvy, meet the Afropolitans -- a new generation of Africans and people of African descent with a very global outlook.
Something of a buzzword in the diaspora, the term "Afropolitan" first appeared in a 2005 magazine article by Nigerian/Ghanaian writer Taiye Selasi. Selasi wrote about multilingual Africans with different ethnic mixes living around the globe -- as she put it "not citizens but Africans of the world."
Now the term has spread, used not just by New York hipsters and in trendy European capitals but in Africa's own multicultural megacities.
But just who are these Afropolitans?
Brendah Nyakudya is the editor of Afropolitan magazine, produced in South Africa. A Zimbabwean based in Johannesburg, who has lived in London, she has the kind of international background that typifies an Afropolitan.

"I have African roots but I've kind of been raised by the world, and that's helped form my identity," she says.
See also: Congo's designer dandies
[size=14pt]An Afropolitan is someone who has roots in Africa, raised by the world, but still has an interest in the continent and is making an impact.[/size]
Brendah Nyakudya, editor Afropolitan magazine
Her magazine is aimed at successful urban 30-somethings -- intelligent, upwardly mobile and politically aware -- most of whom she says can be described as Afropolitans.
"An Afropolitan is someone who has roots in Africa, raised by the world, but still has an interest in the continent and is making an impact, is feeding back into the continent and trying to better it," according to Nyakudya.
She also believes the term can apply to non-Africans. "We like to think that it doesn't matter where you were born, if you find yourself on the continent and you love the continent, that makes you an Afropolitan," says Nyakudya.
But for some people the term isn't so easy to define.
Tolu Ogunlesi is a Nigerian journalist who is based in Lagos. He studied for his Masters degree in England and last year chaired a debate at London's V&A museum on what it means to be an Afropolitan. He says it's a problematic term and its meaning is hard to pin down.
"It's one of those words that people invest with their own meanings, people interpret it as they want," he says. "Some people dismiss the concept entirely, saying there's nothing that people who are called Afropolitans share in common -- what they have in common is superficial."
He feels the term is too often applied only to those living in the diaspora.
"It's a problematic term because it's supposed to combine (the words) African and cosmopolitan," says Ogunlesi. "What it should mean is an African person in an urban environment, with the outlook and mindset that comes with urbanization -- people who live Lagos, Nairobi, and have this world-facing outlook.
"But people who consider themselves Afropolitan are not here in the continent, they are out there in the global capitals."
See also: Sounds of the Sahara
Minna Salami, who blogs as Msafropolitan, is a true global citizen. Born in Finland to a Nigerian father and a Finnish mother she has lived in Nigeria, Sweden, Spain and New York, and now lives in London.
She agrees that some people see Afropolitanism as existing only outside Africa, but says that, in reality, it applies just as much to people living in the continent.
Some people have interpreted it as a diaspora movement but it absolutely isn't.
Minna Salami - msafropolian
"Some people have interpreted it as a diaspora movement but it absolutely isn't," she says. "When you go back to the original term 'African and cosmopolitanism,' Africa has very many cosmopolitan cities ... and in those cities you have art scenes and music and all kinds of creativity that's influenced by cosmopolitanism."
For her it's a movement that is politically aware and has an obligation to correct decades of Africa being misrepresented as a "dark, failing continent."
"Afropolitans are a group of people who are either of African origin or influenced by African culture, who are emerging internationally using African cultures in creative ways to change perceptions about Africa," Salami says.
Salami adds that social media has been key to the movement, creating global citizens who are in tune with the same cultural trends and political issues.
Ogunlesi agrees. He says that while ordinary Nigerians don't define themselves as Afropolitans, the prevalence of the internet and satellite television means young Nigerians do have a global outlook and are exposed to much of the same pop culture as youngsters all over the world.
And social media also means that the coolest in contemporary African culture is quick to travel around the world. African and Africa-influenced pop culture is a key part of the movement.
Afropolitanism implies a certain type of cool, with an aesthetic influenced by African style magazine Arise and a soundtrack provided by anyone from Nigerian musician Femi Kuti to South African "township tech" producer Spoeke Mathambo.
But Nyakudya insists that to be a true Afropolitan takes more than a multi-cultural background and the right record collection -- it means having a commitment to making the continent a better place.
She says: "From philanthropic work to trying to lobby for political reform there's a lot that needs to be done in Africa and if you're going to call yourself an Afropolitan you need to show what you're doing to deserve to be called an Afropolitan."
PoliticsRe: Defining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op): 6:30pm On Mar 29, 2013
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afropolitan

Afropolitan


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Afropolitan combines the words African and cosmopolitan to describe a contemporary generation of Africans. The term was popularized in 2005 by a widely-disseminated essay, "Bye-Bye, Babar (Or: What is an Afropolitan?)" by the author Taiye Selasi.[1] Originally published in March 2005 in the Africa Issue of the LIP Magazine,[2] the essay defines an Afropolitan identity, sensibility and experience. In 2006 the essay was republished by the Michael Stevenson Gallery in Cape Town[3] and in 2007 by The Nation in Nairobi,[4] whereupon it went viral. Several communities, artists, and publications now use the label, most notably The Afropolitan Network,[5] The Afropolitan Experience,[6] The Afropolitan Legacy Theatre,[7] The Afropolitan Collection,[8] and South Africa's The Afropolitan Magazine.[9] In June 2011 The Victoria and Albert Museum hosted "Friday Late: Afropolitans"[10] in London. In September 2011 the Houston Museum of African American Culture convened the symposium "Africans in America: The New Beat of Afropolitans,” featuring author Teju Cole, musician Derrick Ashong and artist Wangechi Mutu alongside Selasi.[11]
PoliticsDefining The Afropolitan by Gbawe(op):
Any Afropolitans here?



http://www.ariselive.com/articles/defining-the-afropolitan/95788/

DEFINING THE AFROPOLITAN



DEFINING THE AFROPOLITAN


Image: (L-R) Yemi Alade-Lawal, Hannah Pool, Lulu Kitololo, Minna Salami and Tolu Ogunlesi. Photo credit: V&A Friday Late

Words: Minna Salami, founder of MsAfropolitan

Last month the V&A museum in London hosted What is an Afropolitan?, a panel discussion with myself, journalist and writer Tolu Ogunlesi, artist and designer Lulu Kitololo, Afro-Pop Live founder Yemi Alade-Lawal and ARISE’s new Features Editor, Hannah Pool.

We wanted to put our fingers on such topics as: what defines our generation of African diasporans? How do we incorporate the cultural voice of Africa with global and regional trends? And how are we changing socio-cultural perceptions of Africa?

I should first declare that we didn’t nail down a definition, and nor was that our aim. Rather, we participated in an exchange of perceptions, which was eagerly met by audience comments. It became clear that Afropolitanism means different things to different people – for some African is the more important element of the term, for others; cosmopolitanism. However, there was acquiescence that an Afropolitan is someone who vests part of his or her identity in the African continent.

Ultimately, the panel discussion showed a significant keenness to approach the topic and also that any conversation about Afropolitanism is inevitably connected to the African renaissance.

I’ll leave you with the words of Taiye Selasie, who coined the term. As the subculture develops, hers are sentiments that I hope it shall always harbour.

“What distinguishes [Afropolitans] is a willingness to complicate Africa – namely, to engage with, critique, and celebrate the parts of Africa that mean most to them. Perhaps what most typifies the Afropolitan consciousness is the refusal to oversimplify; the effort to understand what is ailing in Africa alongside the desire to honour what is wonderful, unique. Rather than essentialising the geographical entity, we seek to comprehend the cultural complexity; to honour the intellectual and spiritual legacy; and to sustain our parents’ cultures.”
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 6:08pm On Mar 29, 2013
sweetcheecks: Why is it only Nigerians that are so eager to bid Mandela farewell when his people still would like to have him with them

Why dont you die peacefully and leave Madiba alone huh I am sure no ne will try to patch you up couse no one cares. Besides when it is time no human hands can stop death. So just shut up joor, what is Mandela to you? Why are you bothered by whatever we do for him huh You not God you do not know what is the right time for anyone to leave. Jerrrrrrrr, you people are starting to irritate the hell out of me. Mind your business and burry your Achebe. Did you see us comment on him? We did not know or care what was up with him. huh
Look, two wrongs don't make a right. Don't come here and insult Achebe. OK? I don't know why Africans always get in the gutter like this. I can understand you may be angry at some perceived insult against Mandela but cool it and refrain from disrespecting a great Nigerian respected the world over. You can address utterances you don't like while still respecting the great Africans we have throughout the continent. Whether Nigerian, South African or Malawian, these men have done enough to command the respect of every sensible and cultured African.
PoliticsRe: Development Agenda For Western Nigeria (DAWN) - Progress Report by Gbawe: 5:55pm On Mar 29, 2013
[quote author=ndu_chucks]Where are the usually talkative and bright SWers like Uncle Gbawe and others? One wouldn't expect you all to shy away from this important topic.[/quote]grin grin grin grin Iwo omo oni Ijogbon yi. Otun ti de ibi? The essential character and aim of the DAWN initiative may be intangible if you are not of the 'disposition' to understand what DAWN is. To that extent you may miss its on-the-ground application. The essence of the DAWN initiative is aptly encapsulated in the quotes below from the speech by Governor Ajimobi.

http://www.oyostate.gov.ng/this-is-the-dawn-of-integrated-south-west-nigeria/

The key to integration and development among states that made up the erstwhile Western region is emphasis on quality leadership and collaboration among the states.
In the course of integration, we must look at areas of cooperation among states and share benefits of states’ comparative advantages.
The most important, and I dare say, the most formidable, of the strands of integration that we seek must be economic integration.
If you were not too given to a mischievous focus on the SW, you will note the above ideas, very simple in reality, being practised albeit intangibly. When, for example, Ogun conceded land to Lagos for agriculture, and you were on the thread arguing vacuously, what did you think that was about if not a deliberate drive to aid economic integration and cooperation? There are planned inter-State projects that owe their conception to this new dedication to integration, oneness and a SW beginning to think essentially as one expanded single State.

Is it till you see DAWN hospitals, DAWN university and DAWN bridges you will appreciate what DAWN is about? I know Nigerians like pictures and identifiable edifices but DAWN is more an idea to drive progress leveraging on mutual cooperation and interdependence. You will appreciate this is going on if not given perambulating back and forth obdurately.
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 5:29pm On Mar 29, 2013
[quote author=ndu_chucks]Have we met? you say I'm not a doctor, but would it be OK with you if I were a cattle rearer? smiley

It takes a special kind of rationalism to realize that the current steps being taken medically, are more, in the best interest of family members who are afraid to lose the man, than in the interest of Mandela himself.[/quote]I only hazard a guess you are not a doctor because of what you said that pays homage more to the sort of conspiracy theory Doctor themselves refute vehemently and feel is an insulting submissions going against everything their profession is about.

Technology has changed us so much to the point of having robbed us of the joy of dying peacefully. [b]They patch the organs of our aged parents and grand parents, keep them on drugs with painful side effects until they die without experiencing the joy of dying [/b]peacefully.
As for your take that Mandela is being kept alive to please his family, well let us just say I don't think it is sensible to speculate so ungraciously.
PoliticsRe: Jonathan To Eliminate Power Outage By 2012 by Gbawe: 5:10pm On Mar 29, 2013
Pukkah: Where are we on this?
grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin

Oga Pukkah, you wicked no be small grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin grin I hear the new date is now 2014.
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 5:03pm On Mar 29, 2013
[quote author=ndu_chucks]I don't know why you are being over dramatic about my opinion and implying that I am being disrespectful of the man and his family.

Earlier today, Zuma, speaking for Madela's family and SA, appeared to agree with the suggestion that South Africa should prepare for Mandela’s eventual death. “Is this a time for us to be aware of what is inevitable?” asked the BBC's Lerato Mbele. “Well, I would imagine so,” replied Zuma.

So Oga, my posts are based on compassion, respect, and nothing more. I am still of the opinion that they should let the man be and stop the drugs. Very powerful drugs are required to treat lung infections especially of a 94 year old patient with a history of Tuberculosis.[/quote]I am not being "over dramatic" as you put it. Merely showing you, as someone who believes in "live and let live", that you cannot speak as if things are not being done in the best interest of the man when he is surrounded by many who care about him and would , in no way, condone the man suffering unnecessarily . That is disrespectful to his family. Just accept that.

You are no doctor and you are certainly not a family member privy to his medical record. What is this then in aid of? Just pray for him, or wish Mandela the best, and leave it at that. Even if the end is near, the right thing will be done till he is gone. Ultimately, you cannot be about his best interest more than his direct family who are always around him.
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 4:57pm On Mar 29, 2013
Andre Uweh: It's true.
My brother, there is an arrogant and disrespectful perversion to discussing these things forcefully when , even as he is a global icon, Mandela will have very competent family members around him who love him dearly and will make the best choice for the man assuming the man himself can no longer do so. One thing that makes man considerate is the notion of him humbly knowing his place.

Mandela is an international icon but also a family man with many loved ones around him. We cannot assume so many people who love him are making the wrong choices for him and only our dear Ndu Chucks gets it.

Who would take kindly to me or you , from a position of ignorance, telling them they are not making the right medical choices for their elderly relative? Do we have more claim to Mandela than his direct family to be second-guessing their decision making?
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 4:41pm On Mar 29, 2013
[quote author=ndu_chucks]Painful Euthanasia is exactly the option being employed by the so-called medical intervention. The side effects of the drugs administered to treat his lung infections could actually cause more pain and ultimately kill Mandela. His 94 year old body is no longer capable of fighting these side effects without causing pain. The pain killers which will be prescribed to him will essentially keep him dazed and doped up, to the point of not recognizing his family members and being unable to communicate with them.

They should stop all treatments and let the man at peace.[/quote]Look, this man is a much loved international icon. You may care about him but not more so than his family and many competent friends and associates around him who want the absolute best for Mandela. It is insulting to suggest you get what is going on but Mandela himself, and all his many loved ones around him, do not.

Please respect the man, his family and the fact that, difficult as it may be for all to witness, the best is probably being done for Mandela. Do you even know what you are saying? Mandela is being kept in a painful, drug-induced comatose state and only you Ndu Chucks get that?

Can I, as an uninformed outsider not privy to all information, arrogantly pass the same 'not-doing-your-best' judgement against you and your siblings regarding an ailing relative you love far more than I ever can? Would I not insult you and your family doing that? What point are you making that, if true, those who surround him and love him dearly would not have responded to?
Foreign AffairsRe: Please Let Nelson Mandela Depart Peacefully by Gbawe: 3:45pm On Mar 29, 2013
Oga Ndu Chucks, it is a difficult one. The man is indeed old. We are all fond of him and wish him the sort of rest only the very best should experience. Nonetheless, he cannot really be in pain and discomfort while treatment is deliberately deferred. Painful Euthanasia, by deliberate lack of medical intervention, can simply never be an option in Madiba's case. I don't think anyone is "drugging" him.
PoliticsRe: Alamieyeseigha: Still Wanted In The UK - Envoy by Gbawe:
texazzpete: I can help you with this...he IS one of the resident GEJ apologists.

Confusingly, he's fond of raving and raging at 'whites' for historical suffering of blacks yet displays great pleasure and support for the torment and suffering of Black people at the hands of corrupt black tyrants in modern times. Go figure.
My brother, what makes their sort even more despicable is the fact they have nil investment in the continent they claim to love so much. Nada. Zilch. At the root of their rants is failure in the diaspora they blame on 'whitey'. I know them well. Sad, frustrated losers with total charisma bypass.

Ask them when they set foot on the African continent last or when they are even planning to go. Sad tossers. If some of us do not know the truth on the ground then we may well fall for the antics of these racist fools. As things stand, they are the biggest waste of space conceivable.

Outstanding, brave and upright Africans are getting involved and doing real things yet these racist losers, failures and cowards stay in the diaspora making the same noise they have made on different Nigerians blogs for the past 10 years without so much as setting foot in the continent or even improving the life of one single African over the years they have pathetically spammed various African discussion forums with their toxic, worthless, paranoid and racist messages. These fools are not worth anyone's time because they are losers. The inspirational Africans are those confident and secure in themselves. They are determined to succeed and have no time for excuses in an increasingly globalised world where merit and talent is gradually becoming the defining factor.
PoliticsRe: Alamieyeseigha: Still Wanted In The UK - Envoy by Gbawe:
ROSSIKE: Come on go and park your backside somewhere. Mr Businessman and investor. What is the nature of your business? What are you investing in? Why are you afraid to tell us? Idiaatttt. I bet it's something detrimental to the economy, hence your hiding it.
You better sit your azz somewhere and chill you silly empty barrel. You are totally irrelevant and a waster drifting in the wind. Don't make a f00l of yourself and be exposed for the silly fantasist, empty noise maker, loser and dreamer you have always been. A word is enough for the wise.
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:51am On Mar 27, 2013
More example of the work of the governor with comments from real stakeholders and primary users of the State:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=524736167536418&set=a.414047528605283.107568.414038215272881&type=3&theater


Health in Ogunstate: One of the ongoing 9 secondary health care centers being constructed by the Ogunstate govt in each of the 9 federal constituencies.


https://sphotos-a.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/46221_524736167536418_523300109_n.jpg





Awokoya Michael, Adeyinka Adeleye, Bankole Lukman Ayinde и 7 други харесват това.

Asimonye Jerry Chiedu My governor, abeg give us dis kind hospital for ifo.
12 ноември 2012 г. в 07:07

Akinrinlola Eniola dis is wot we av bin xpectin since from past governors; sia e ku ise takuntakun allah mbe leyin re
12 ноември 2012 г. в 10:16

Adebayo Rahman abegi were is this one they our governor SIA ma ba ise relo jooooooo
12 ноември 2012 г. в 13:17

Iskilu Olaniyi Muraina ride on gov
12 ноември 2012 г. в 14:09

Adeyinka Adeleye health is wealth,gud job frm SIA
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:45am On Mar 27, 2013
Pataki: This is the Politics section. No one cares if you are male or female. In as much as you drop a contribution here, be ready to either be applauded for an intelligent comment or be ridiculed for disgracing yourself.

Your first comment on this thread was utterly disgraceful and smacks of one who talks before thinking.

The State Governor is not responsible for ensuring your Mother's house has electricity. Please educate yourself next time before making ignorant comment here.
You should ignore those with nothing to say. They want to take the thread in a certain direction. My brother, just like you pointed out sarcastically earlier, I guess what is shown below is not massive construction. It is a "bicycle path". Honestly, some should just go and work on their own mental health instead of coming here to show the entire world they are damaged good. Stakeholders and users of a State are expressing joy at[b] unprecedented[/b] development they are seeing and you who should be minding your own business, in your state thousands of kilometres away, is castigating them. Welcome to Nigeria the home of many sick 'puppies' with unresolved issues.

http://sphotos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/148156_525859924090709_237547943_n.jpg

https://sphotos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/148156_525859924090709_237547943_n.jpg
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:35am On Mar 27, 2013
This is why it is important to ignore non-important haters and those who are not stakeholders. Their bitter and negative comments are only reflections of their frustration. Below are the submission of genuine stakeholders regarding the Ibara flyover delivered by the Amosun government. Good folks can listen to folks like that or entertain the bitter and hate-motivated vituperations of those who have no connections at all to the SW.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=560258540650847&set=a.414047528605283.107568.414038215272881&type=3&theater

https://sphotos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/398980_560258540650847_1570985532_n.jpg



View 1 more comment

Olashile Kehinde God bless Nigeria. God bless me @ u
24 януари в 10:25

Onabolu Adebayo Onabolu We must not say it in public, but the truth is that democracy is helping Nigeria to move forward
24 януари в 11:39

Kanji Ojelade This is really commendable. I still believe there is need to develop the outskirts of the City. Let new infrastructures be established toward Ibadan, Ijebuode/Owode axis of the state. God Bless you all, God Bless our foremost state.
24 януари в 20:45 · 1

Kehinde Joseph Kashimawo This is a welcome development, but hope the structures will be well maintained. D pedestrian crossing needs to show the stop line for the traffic. Hope attention be focused on adequate and uninterrupted water supply.
25 януари в 08:57

Semiu Ogunwolu The Egbas in America even saw it before us in Nigeria!. Amosun is determined to do all that, we will continue to pray for him and have plans to join him so that he will have good hands to hand over to, for consistency in the developments of Ogun state.
26 януари в 05:07 · 1

Zents Kunle Sowunmi The oracle is happy with this development.
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:26am On Mar 27, 2013
I remember mentioning the foundation-laying ceremony for this last year. Now at 90% completion. These are the sort of things informed folks rate Amosun for i.e plans and commissioning becoming reality.




https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=578059755537392&set=pb.414038215272881.-2207520000.1364379880&type=3&theater


The 90% complete advanced four technical workshops for heavy duty trucks at the mechanic village Obada Oko to be fitted with advanced technical equipment. Powered by TATA. Ogun Standard. God bless Ogun State


https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/480181_578059755537392_422703278_n.jpg
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:16am On Mar 27, 2013
AjanleKoko: You'd find out that most of the complainants are not from the South West, don't live in any of the SW states, and are just complaining for the sake of complaining.

A lot has been said about transformation in Rivers and Akwa Ibom, but I declined to comment until I had the opportunity to visit both states. And I was impressed overall by what I saw. People should adopt same attitude and refrain from commenting for the sake of commenting.
Indeed. Positive news and development should always be celebrated by all secure and balanced people. Yet it is those not from the SW who appear most bitter and most rabidly hateful on these sort of thread. If they could they would probably demand OP be hanged merely because, as a stakeholder is allowed to do, he expresses joy at development he is witnessing.

These hateful posters don't realise that balanced folks can discern that it is not the OP who has a problem. It is those who show inferiority complex, neurosis and malevolent obsession with others with how, like white on rice, they are quick to jump on anything concerning the SW 24/7 with nothing but hateful and derisive contributions.
PoliticsRe: Massive Construction Going On In Ogun State (Pictures) by Gbawe: 11:07am On Mar 27, 2013
Geomac: I think you are right. I visited a friend in Lagos last weekend, we drove to his new project site in Ijoko. The road from Sago - Ijoko - Agbado was horrible. Anybody in that axis can confirm.
It will take time. The entire State cannot be developed at once given that funds are not limitless. Nonetheless, a good plan, anyone interested can gain access to, is in place and being followed.

https://www.facebook.com/OgunIndicator/timeline

The construction of pre cast drainage is ongoing at the 6 lane Ejinrin - Oluwalogbon junction in IjebuOde which will also have a flyover bridge to ease the traffic at the round about. Quality at its peak. Ogun Standard. God bless Ogun State
https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/c0.0.403.403/p403x403/602070_584205108256190_423628896_n.jpg

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