₦airaland Forum

With all your insults, it's apparent that you are looking for a cyber fight but I don't have time for that. Let me say this again, every team in the EPL that has high quality African players loses such players for about a month during the Cup of Nations. The exodus as you called it affects every team not just Manchester United. So for Sir Alex to use that as an excuse not to sign African players is not acceptable.

Again Chelsea lost 4 star players during last year's Cup of Nations and still won the EPL. If you must know, I am absolutely not new to football. The earliest remarkable match I remember watching was Rangers vs Mehala of Egypt in the mid 70s. For the record, Rangers lost 1 - 3 in Egypt and won 3 - 0 in Enugu. The match was so remarkable that afterwards a new hair style for women was named "Up Rangers, Down Mehala". If you were of age in the 70s, you must remember it.

What d o you get financially for supporting Arsenal or Chelsea or any of the above-listed clubs with African players?

It seems you are intentionally misunderstanding my point. I have not gained anything financially from any Nigerian or African player in Europe. But I know hundreds of others must have. For instance, I'm sure players like Kanu, Mikel, Osaze etc have mansions in their respective villages. Do you know how many Nigerians benefitted from building such mansions. Even if they hired foreign architectural firms, the brick layers, window makers, roof makers, cement mixers and a majority of the workers are sure to be Nigerians. And you don't think that is benefitting Nigerians.

It appears you don't find anything wrong with Sir Alex Fergusson, the coach of Manchester United saying as recently as last year that he will not sign African players? That is the crust of my arguement. I will like you to address that.

I don't think my call violates anybody's right of association since I am not compelling anybody to do anything. My point is that Nigeria and other African countries have nothing to gain financially for their fervent support for Man U.

All the African players I mentioned above earn a lot of money from their respective teams. A substantial percentage of that money is invariably brought back to Africa in the form of houses, investments, cars and financial assistance to relatives. You may say the money does not benefit you but if you are from the same village as any of those players, you have benefitted indirectly from their money.

I forgot to add that Sunderland also has Asamoah Gyan. I was about to write a diary titled "Is Gyan Worth 30 Million Pounds?". But from his performance against Tottenham yesterday, the answer in my opinion is "maybe".

For the record, he scored Sunderland's equaliser in the 1-1 draw at Tottenham.

Most teams in the English Premier League have one or more African players. The notable exception to this trend is Manchester United. Unfortunately, this is not by accident. Rather it is by design. Sir Alex, who calls the shots at Man U has made it clear that he does not want to sign African players. His reason being that he cannot afford to lose them during the African Cup of Nations.

Well Sir Alex, losing one or two African players for one month every two years will not kill your team. Chelsea still won the EPL last season despite losing Drogba, Kalou, Essien and Mikel during the Cup of Nations in Angola.

Knowing this fact, it is surprising to see the level of support Man U enjoys on NL and in Nigeria in general. Next time you’re looking for an EPL team to support, please look for one that at least employs Nigerian or African players. There are plenty to choose from.

Here are some EPL teams with their African players:

Chelsea – Drogba, Kalou, Essien, Mikel
Arsenal – Alex Song, Emmanuel Eboue
Manchester City – Kolo Toure, Yaya Toure, Emmanuel Adebayor
Newcastle – Shola Ameobi
Tottenham – Assou-Ekottu
Sunderland – Nedum Onuoha
West Brom - Osaze
Everton – Yakubu, Victor Anichebe
Fulham – Dickson Etuhu
Aston Villa – Gabriel Agbonlahor
Blackburn – Benjani, El-Hadji Diouf, Mame Diouf, Samba
Stoke City - Mamady Sidibe, Salif Diao
Wigan – Gohouri,
Wolverhampton – George Elokobi
West Ham – Nsofor, Ilunga

Source: BBCnews.com

tensor777:
And where exactly did you get that one from? Just mention a single statement or lyric attributed to Fela whereby he expressed support for Ojukwu and his policy.
He may indeed have been sympathetic to the plight of innocent civilians caught up in the war as any right thinking person should, but that is not the same thing as supporting Ojukwu.

My statement that Fela had sympathy for the plight of Biafra is correct. One can have sympathy for the people and not the government. If you want to know my source, here it is:

"Fela’s mistrust of new African governments especially that of Nigeria is born from this war (the Biafran war). It’s a mistrust that will soon grow into open war."

Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvd4VxcY_1k at the 9.20 mark.

Warning: This clip contains graphic images of the Biafran war.

It is true that Fela had sympathy for the plight of Biafra. But while the war was going on, he was actually in support of One Nigeria. In fact, he came out with a song in 1969 titled "Viva Africa" where he specifically called for One Nigeria.

The first two stanza of the song are as follows:

This is brother Fela Ransome-Kuti.
This is one time I will like to say a few things
Men are born, Kings are made, treaties are signed, wars are fought
Every country has it’s own problems.
So as Nigerians, so as Africans
Let us bind our wounds and live together in peace
Nigeria, one nation indivisible
Long Live Nigeria
Viva Africa

The history of mankind is full of obvious turning points and significant events
Though tongue and tribe may differ
We are all Nigerians
We are all Africans
War is not the answer
It has never been the answer
And it will never be the answer

You can listen to the song here:

http://nigeriawiki.com/Fela_VivaAfrica.htm

Well the big difference is that American and British politicians will 'chop' money and still do something tangible for their people. Our politicians are only after themselves.

The obvious answer to this question is ‘no’. However, since our elected officials in the past 30 years have clearly failed us, it is time we start thinking of unconventional solutions to our numerous economic and political problems. In this regard, I strongly suggest we recruit foreign politicians preferably from the United States and United Kingdom to help run our government.

Such politicians should be allowed to run for any elective office in Nigeria except the presidency. There is no doubt in my mind that having Americans or Britons serve as assembly men, senators, or governors in Nigeria will result in remarkable improvements in our standard of living.

I can be rightly accused of having a colonial mentality but I gave this idea a serious thought and came to this conclusion with a great deal of reluctance.

Maxidoe:
For those of you asking why he chose facebook ahead of Nairaland, am sorry to say thats a dumb question. Facebook is international and your message is better spread. The feel,look, navigation and everything about facebook is superb.

I don't know if you actually understand the arguement here. GEJ pointed out that Nigerians love most things foreign. He gave an example with football where Nigerian fans abandoned our local league for the English Premier League. Don't you think that by joining a foreign forum like Facebook, he is doing the same thing he is talking against.

Also we are not saying he should leave Facebook. He can be on Facebook and NL at the same time. Most of us are. If he comes here, I don't think the moderators will allow people to insult him left and right. You can criticize but not insult. That's how it is done in other popular forums.

The most popular forum in the US today is HuffingtonPost.com. If you leave a comment there, it does not appear immediately but rather goes to the "Pending Section". It will appear on the site after the moderators have looked at it and found it non-offensive.

Harus:
So d president have nothing to say abt ppl that died/injured from d independence bomb blast but to talk abt SPORT, ACTORS, MOVIES ,, Entertainment stuffs.
This is nonsence.
I doubt if this is frm d president.

GEJ posts new articles on Facebook regularly. He talked extensively about the bombing last week in a Facebook post titled "In Defence of Life, Liberty and Property". I summarized that article on Nairaland at the link below:

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria?topic=529446

@ Jabbok,

No, my real name is not Hi_Tek. But if I am the president of Nigeria, I will appear on NL as myself. A lot of people on NL are using their real names. You may have seen the user name "Seun".

@ Had_One,

If GEJ is on NL secretly, that does not count. I'm talking about him appearing as himself with his picture and other details on his profile. That's how he registered on Facebook.

We should now turn the question to "How do we bring GEJ to Nairaland?".

aminalib:
im sorry that is so ghetto, why can't he have his own website? your the president and posting messages on facebook ok

Please people, Facebook is no longer an exclusive site for college kids.

The German Chancellor - Angela Merkel is on Facebook
The British Prime Minister - David Cameron is on Facebook
The South African President - Jacob Zuma is on Facebook

Here is a paragraph from a recent article on CNN.com:

At over 246,000 and counting, he (Goodluck Jonathan) has more Facebook fans than the combined tally of British Prime Minister David Cameron, German chancellor Angela Merkel, and South African head of state Jacob Zuma.

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-10-01/tech/goodluck.jonathan.facebook.profile_1_facebook-fans-popular-social-networking-site-nigerian-president?_s=PM:TECH

@ Beaf,

That was funny. But on a serious note, what you have there is not IBB's real Facebook page. His Facebook page is here:

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Ibrahim-Badamasi-Babangida/16770650357

My problem with IBB's Facebook strategy is that he relies mainly on press releases, newspaper reports and campaign videos instead of talking to his followers directly.

I think people blaming GEJ for being on Facebook are missing the point. Most world leaders are now on Facebook or Twitter or both. In fact, CNN recently commended GEJ for having a large friend base on Facebook (more than 280K).

The question should be "Why is GEJ not on Nairaland?". He should practice what he preaches by joining a Nigerian forum instead of a foreign one like Facebook. The same goes for every Nigerian politician on Facebook. If GEJ joins NL, most of those 280K friends will follow him.

LouisThoru:
whats the point for this? People can read on facebook, why repost it here?

As I said in the beginning, this is a summary of a very long article. The actual article has 1200 words and I summarized it down to just 300. You can read the whole thing at the link I provided at the top.

Here's another section of the article I found interesting:

We have a lot to be grateful to God for. As I insist on a support of our football so we must support and protect our music and our movies. We are a nation of talented people: Tuface Idibia, D-Banj, Lagbaja, Zaki Adzee, TY Bello, Asa, Asu Ekiye or Nneka just to mention a few of the younger ones. And when you talk of evergreen stars, I dare you to compare Fela Kuti, Onyeka Onwenu, Rex Jim Lawson, King Sunny Ade, Mamman Shata and Christy Essien Igbokwe and many others, with their contemporaries around the world.

Does that mean that GEJ likes Fela's music? If that's the case, I'm voting for him.

As you may have known by now, Goodluck Jonathan is very active on Facebook and uses that medium to post messages frequently. Most of his messages are quite long. For those who do not have the time to read it all, I have provided a summary below.

[center]Nigerians Keep Your Culture[/center]
[center]by Goodluck Jonathan. 11 Oct, 2010[/center]

GEJ apologized for not updating his Facebook page in a week. He said he has been occupied by the events of October 1. He also said he has been visiting different parts of Nigeria to meet with the people. He again said Security Agents are working hard to unearth the perpetrators of the October 1 bombings.

GEJ decried the tendency for Nigerians to value things from foreign countries to the detriment of our own. He said Nigerians are creative and highly educated and have won honours including the “Nobel Prize, Booker Prize, Pulitzer Prize, Grammy Award, Olympic medals” etc. He blamed the poor condition of Nigeria on leadership and added that leaders must emerge through free and fair elections and not imposed.

GEJ said we should value ourselves if we expect the rest of the world to respect us. He gave an example of the Nigerian Football league which used to be great. According to him, Nigerian football fans have largely abandoned our local league for foreign ones. He said we should make our league good enough to attract players from other countries. GEJ also said we have talented musicians and actors. He said he has instructed Nigerian embassies and high commissions to promote Nollywood movies as part of their activities.

Finally, GEJ said:

We are the land of football (remember the miracle of Damman), the land of great music (remember FESTAC '77 when the black World stood still in Lagos), the land of good movies and television (remember that the first television studio in Africa was established in Ibadan) and the land of fashion (travel outside Nigeria and compare how Nigerians dress with the rest of the world) as such we should be grateful to God who has made us original pace setters in these areas by refusing to be copies of those who ought to copy us.

http://www.facebook.com/#!/notes/goodluck-jonathan/nigerians-keep-your-culture/161925910501719

As you may have known by now, President Goodluck Jonathan is very active on Facebook and uses that medium to post messages frequently. Most of his messages are quite long. For those who do not have the time to read it all, I have provided a summary below so you don’t have to. This was posted on Facebook on Wednesday 6 October, 2010.

President Goodluck Jonathan expressed sadness at the Abuja bombing and offered condolences to the families of the victims.

According to GEJ, Security agencies have been instructed to protect lives and property.
Also Security agencies within and outside the country are working round the clock to bring the bombers to justice. He Called on Nigerians to go about their normal businesses and not be intimidated by the bombers.

GEJ decried the fact that some people have politicised the bombing for their own selfish interests. He said families of the victims need compassion and empathy not politics. He added that the Federal Government will share in the pains of the bereaved and injured and that the best medical care possible will be provided to the injured.

Finally, he said “the Federal Government is very much aware of its most fundamental responsibility to its citizens: THE DEFENCE OF YOUR RIGHT TO LIFE, THE PROTECTION OF YOUR LIBERTY AND PROPERTY. On this mission, we cannot afford to fail.”

http://www.facebook.com/#!/notes/goodluck-jonathan/in-defence-of-life-liberty-and-property/160678637293113

My 2 cents: In addition to the “best medical care possible”, I think the families of the victims should be compensated for the lives of the deceased. It is difficult to put a figure on the value of a human live but it can be done. The individual lives of the 9/11 victims were “calculated” by Kenneth Feinberg and some families got up to 1 Million Dollars in compensation.

This sounds like a lot of money. But it was a good deal for the American government because if the victims’ families had sued, they may get much more than that. Accepting the money precludes them from suing. Some families rejected it in-order to preserve their right to sue.

~Bluetooth:
Yellow fever nkan ?

"Yellow Fever" is really a social not a political song. It dealt mainly on the dangers of bleaching creams. Many people may not remember this, but a great number of Nigerian women were using bleaching creams back in the day.

Pukkah:
What of the inimitable[i] zombie?[/i]

I think the Nigerian military is now more or less a professional military. So the zombie moniker may no longer apply.

~Bluetooth:
All the problem of this world na him we dey carry for Africa
you no go ask me which one
Problems of inflation,problems of corruption
of mismanagement,stealing by government,na him we dey carry allover Africa
Now the latest one na him dey make laff
Austerity Austerity
na him dey make lafff,why i dey laff
man no fit cry austerity
who be our teacher na oyinbo
All of us dey for the first election and the second election for nigeria
And the second election na him worst past
baba nla nonsense x2
he pass rigging baba nla nonse
he pass corruption baba nla nonsense
which kind election be dis baba nla nonse
people no go vote
them come get big big numbers
thousands to thousands
milion to millions baba nla nonsense
which kind election be dis
Na democracy be dat o

For the record, this song is "Teacher Don't Teach Me Nonsense", viewed more than a million times on Youtube.

"Authority Stealing" is one of Fela's songs that captured the essence of the endemic corruption in Nigeria. I have the lyrics somewhere and will post it once I find it.

@ Pukkah,

Confusion Break Bone has an ominous warning for Nigeria. In it Fela said:

Many people dey say Nigeria don dey
But me as I see am
I know Nigeria go go down
How country go dey make money
Make people of country no see money

One reason I respect Fela is that he was fearless. He will call you by name and bear the consequence.

NB: In "Coffin for Head of State", he mentioned Yar'adua several times. Some commenters on Youtube thought he was referring to Umaru Yar'adua. But he was actually referring to Umaru's elder brother Shehu who was a top military guy in the 70s and 80s.

@ Bluetooth,

Christains go dey yarn listen to every news

I think he said "Christians go dey yarn espiritum heavenus". Espiritum heavenus being latin for "Heavenly Ghost". That was a great song too.

semid4lyfe:
Hmmm. . .my favourite has to be Beast of no nation. He addressed so many issues in that song - his time in prison (and how the outside world isn't better IHO), Botha & the aparthield regime in South Africa, WAI in Nigeria, the UN (and it's hypocrisy) etc etc

I think Beast of no nation is Fela's best song "politically".

"Beast of No Nation" was a rare mention of apartheid South Africa by Fela. Throughout the struggle against apartheid, he never sang about it. Most musicians of that period had a "Free Mandela" song but not Fela.

His reason being that Nigeria had too many problems for him to worry about what was  happening in other countries. In fact he said that Nigerian leaders of that era were worse than apartheid South Africa. According to him, in apartheid South Africa, it was whites oppressing blacks but in Nigeria it was blacks oppressing blacks.

Ibime:
Unknown soldier is my favourite, especially the part he starts lamenting how dem kill in mama.

An American author who wrote a book on Fela argued that the soldiers did not really kill Fela's mother. According to him, she died months after they threw her from a second story window. In my opinion her death could reasonably be traced from that incident.

Fela's lifestyle in some ways clouded the economic and political messages in his music. When you sit back and listen to some of his songs, you will be surprised to see that a lot of the things he complained about in the 70s and 80s are still happening today.

Below are some of Fela's complaints through music which are still relevant today. If you have more, please add.

Fela on Water Scarcity (Song Title: Original Sufferhead)

Na so so water for Africa
Plenty plenty water for Africa
Water underground, water over ground, water in the air
Na so so water for Africa
Ordinary water for man to drink for town nko (e no dey)
E dey e dey (e no dey)
Where you go see am (e no dey)
Water for tap (e no dey)
Government sef e dey (e no dey)
Look left and right (e no dey)
I no see dem there (e no dey)
Dem dey tell us now (e no dey)
Na 1990 (e no dey)
Dem go give us water (e no dey)
From United Nations (e no dey)
Special Programme (e no dey)
For Third World Countries (e no dey)
I wan die o (e no dey)
Give me water drink (e no dey)
Wey the government now (e no dey)
Dem no dey e edey (e no dey)

1990 has long come and gone. This is 2010 and Nigerians are still living with water scarcity.

Link: http://nigeriawiki.com/Fela_OriginalSuffer2.htm. This stanza began at the 2.50 minute mark.

FELA ON ELECTRICITY (Song Title: Original Sufferhead)

Na so so sunlight for Africa
Plenty plenty energy for Africa
Energy for sun, energy for moon, energy for oil
Na so so energy for Africa
Na the big big people dem go dey get electric
If dem no get electric, dem go get plant
Light for ordinary man for town now nko (e no dey)
E no dey e dey (e no dey)
Where you go see am (e no dey)
E dey go dey come (e no dey)
E dey come dey go (e no dey)
E go bright gooh (e no dey)
E go bright small (e no dey)
If e no go, e go come (e no dey)
If e no come, e go go (e no dey)

Link: http://nigeriawiki.com/Fela_OriginalSuffer2.htm. This stanza began at the 3.50 minute mark.

I have heard many times that people like Nuhu Ribadu and Pat Utomi are what Nigeria needs now. If that's true, let's support one of them fully. If we lose, that's not the end of the world.

Any candidate that receives true grass roots support can win. When Obama declared his intention to contest the US presidency, nobody gave him any chance. In fact, in the beginning, the republicans were running campaign ads against Hilary Clinton believing that she will be the democratic candidate.

Do we as Nairalanders have a consensus presidential candidate for the 2011 elections? If so, who is he? If not, let us a select somebody and work towards his election. It is not enough to complain about the political process when we are not making any efforts to influence it.

I think any candidate we support will receive a big boost if we all spread his message via NL, Facebook, letters to the editor etc. All we need now is a way of coming up with a candidate that will be accepted by a majority of NLers.