₦airaland Forum

I love tattoos. There is nothing irresponsible about adorning your skin with a well crafted one. The ones that are disgusting are those that are self-made because they make you look like an ex-con. I have three tattoos. A snake on a cross to represent the message of salvation to the world by Joshua the Christ; An X which stands for my boy Malcolm; and an eye which stands for the I in Ivy,my girl. And I also have plans to have more in future. Like: the zodiac signs of libra and scorpio,for my babyand myself. And then, finally the sentence MEMENTO MORI inscribed somewhere on my back or arm. It means : REMEMBER, YOU MUST DIE.

The protagonist of this issue definitely knows that life abroad is better than life back home. The truth is both visible to the blind and audible to the deaf. When I was living in the good ol' Naija, I could never afford to make a dash of five thousand naira to any of my friends. And when it happened that I had to see a doctor, it was always difficult to cough out the money for medical expenses. I couldn't afford back in the early nineties to pay 19,000 naira for an HNO operation which was now carried out in Berlin with my medical insurance footing the bill. And then again, I was never able to sleep at night, not because of power disruption, but because of the menace posed by armed robbers. Needless to say I sleep here with my windows wide open in summer.

All di same sha, I always long to visit good ol' Naija. And you will never believe this: the first places I always go to are two small bukas where the specialties are eding kan kon and nkobi. In Festac, Lagos state.

Tell me something. If Oladipo Diya had succeeded in eliminating Abacha, or Mamman Vatsa , Babangida, would it have been at the request of the persons targeted for elimination? Even though the analogy is a little bit far-fetched, methinks that it is poetic justice to see the habitation of all betrayers become desolate and their offices taken up by other more trust-worthy people.

za ga wuchi abi kaba kwomi. General Sanni Abacha yamutu.

Once upon a time, as a military head of state, the current civilian president captured my admiration as I watched him do away with the umbrella that was held over his head while delivering a public address at Ogbemudia stadium. Then, I was but a little teenager in the primary school and even though I reasoned and thought like a child, that moment in which OBJ opted to be drenched by the rains like all his fellow citizens that had gathered to welcome, entertain and listen to him, made an indelible impression on my mind. Fast forward to the present. Listening to the news every night on CNN has made me to become acquainted with the tourist potential of countries that thrive on tourism as the mainstay of their economy. But never have I once been subjected to the spectacle of an incumbent or a highly-placed official croaking off from somewhere on a public relations mission. It is my opinion that such things should be left to the experts. I invite readers to comment on the totalitarianism of Obasanjo vis a vis the CNN adverts lauding Nigeria to the skies as 'the heartbeat of Africa'.

You people got it all wrong. The richest Nigerian is that underprivileged victim of social inequity who is eking out a precarious existence somewhere in the hinterland and still manages, somehow to keep a smile on his face. I am surprised to see certain names being touted here as the richest persons when we all know full well how these individuals got their wealth, IBB for example. This is a true reflection of the Nigerian attitude towards wealth and wealthy people. Are we wealth worshippers?