₦airaland Forum

BrokenCock:
I'm neither a rubbish igbochriatian cos I dunno wat da 4k that is nor im I a jaw dropping -mouth opened ofonja, just relax.

Employment, Unemployment and Underemployment Rate By State
www.nigerianstat.gov.ng/download/694

beatiegirl:
Always igbo and yoruba rivalry.
Yoruba posted this to show superiority over igbos, while igbos are trying to overlook all these achievements and undermine them.

It's so childish

Truth is both tribes are equally outstanding. Have their strengths and weaknesses.

The igbos have the least amount of people living below poverty line (In Nigeria). That means they have individually rich/comfortable life going for them

While the Yorubas have a higher number of multinationals and lower class as well.

My piece.

Naijazeus:
No. He's ibo Muslim

BrokenCock:
So in the nearest future Brazilians will be talking with wide mouths.

They will start exclamating words like ; aaargh! Jooor oh! Mo fo she mi ni! Changey ni! Aaaaaargh! E gbon mi! Ki lode fuk mi ni!

ORIENTATION101:
that guy is ibo jews not christain

Nonnyflex:
Is it only on tribalism that you must survive?... In fact don't stop exposing your foolishness

MayorofLagos:
Your observation is correct, but the insult you noticed is also ethnic and only to IboChristians. You will never hear Yoruba, muslim or christian deride or belittle anyone's religion or culture, whatever it is.

MayorofLagos:

IboMuslim
BiafranMuslim
IPOBMuslim
NdigboMuslim
IberiberiMuslim

Demmzy15:
Ipob yoot, no one is talking about killing here. When Yorubas killed Hausas in Lagos and Sagamu, do you know the Hausas didn't retaliate? The north of the today is different from that of the 60s where people go savage under small provocations. Though, they still have a long way to go, but they aren't like before who always want war.

Anyways, face the topic. It's God we worship not Hausa, Arab, Turk, Yoruba or Fulani.

Igbo Muslims Amaka

MayorofLagos:

MayorofLagos:
They therefore urged the security apparatuses in the country to grant quick responses to complaints of threats to life received by some members of Ndigbo Muslims.

It read: “We specifically call on the Honourable Minister of Interior, Abdurrahman Dambazau, the Nigerian Army, the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Ibrahim Idris and the State Security Services (SSS) to ensure that Muslims of Igbo extraction are guaranteed security of their lives and properties as any other citizen of Nigeria. Urgent measures must be taken before it is late.”


https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/igbo-muslims-decry-neglect-threats-to-lives.html

MayorofLagos:
ALHAJI SULEIMAN ONYEAMA, A true Pioneer in Igboland! Read about his family below.


When a particular family has the record of producing the first Nigerian judge at the International Court of Justice, the first Igbo man to visit England as a free man (in 1924), the first Igbo medical doctor, the first Igbo man to bring Catholicism to Northern Igboland, the first Igbo man to bring Islam to Northern Igboland, and many other firsts, then that family is by no mean feat one to be reckoned with.

This is the story of the Onyeama family of Eke in Udi Local Government Area of Enugu State. A slave dealer, a known tyrant who tolerated no opposition, the late Paramount Chief Onyeama, established the Onyeama dynasty, which reigned for about 23 years with all its good, bad, and ugly sides – a dynasty from where Nigeria’s current Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama comes.

According to “THE STORY OF AN AFRICAN ‘GOD’ – Life and Times of Paramount Chief Onyeama,” a concise biography written by one of his many grandchildren, the Eton College-trained novelist Dillibe Onyeama, the paramount chief was born in Amankwo Eke at a time when births in Nigeria were not recorded. His father’s name was Ozo-Omulu Onwusi – a polygamist with 10 children (six boys and four girls) and Onyeama was the youngest of the children. The chief’s age when he died in 1933 had been put at between 50 and 60. Before Chief Onyeama’s visit to Britain in April 1924, one N.C. Duncan, a District Officer at Enugu and a personal friend of Onyeama, interviewed the chief on his background and family history, and from the information supplied, he recorded in Onyeama’s passport the year of birth as being 1874.

The infant Onyeama was about 7 when he was initiated into the masquerade cult – an act that helped in shaping the future paramount ruler of Eke Kingdom. The initiation ceremony involved a test of toughness, endurance and courage during which the initiate is expected to swallow in one fell swoop a big lump of pounded yam and take several strokes of the cane without blinking an eye. Onyeama suffered bereavement early in life because he lost his parents before attaining the age of 10. In order to save him from being sold into slavery as was the order of the day at the time, his half-brother, Amadiezoha, a known slave trader and his partner, Okolorie Nwamadingam introduced him to the slave business since they saw in him the dedication, hard-heartedness, smartness and sturdiness needed in the trade.

During Onyeama’s apprenticeship in the slave trade mainly dominated by the Aros, said to be the originators of the trade in the entire Igboland, he travelled to popular trade markets at Bende, Uburu, Uzoakoli, Arochukwu, Ohafia, Oguta, Abiriba and Ndizuogu. Having spent about six years in apprenticeship, Onyeama was left by Amadiezoha to slug it out alone since he had come of age, and he (Amadiezeoha) on account of old age, retired to less stressful demands of farm work.

When the British abolitionist movement against slavery was having impact on the business, it never mattered to Onyeama since he had earlier combined the trade with other lucrative commerce in ivory, tobacco, ornaments, cream for women, mirror, gin, cotton and other items.

Trading on his own for about a year, Onyeama attained an enviable height in financial status, and before the colonial masters came to Eke in 1908, he had acquired sufficient wealth to mark him out as one of the richest natives. At the time, Onyeama had taken the Ozo title and gotten married to his first wife, Afia Nwirediagu. He took a second wife called Gwachi (who was later christened Josephine) in 1910.

According to Novelist Dillibe Onyeama, “Well, the original Onyeama was my grandfather. I heard his father’s name was Onwusi, but those days, people retained their own individual identity. His descendants are now answering Onyeama. He was essentially a slave dealer in those days, travelling to the coast, selling slaves and general business. So he had early contact with the Europeans in the coastal region.

“When the British colonialists took over Nigeria, having been exposed by trade to the Europeans, he found it easy to reach out to them because a military incursion was in progress in Igboland,” Dillibe told Daily Trust in an interview.

When the young Onyeama learnt of the arrival of white soldiers in Eke in 1908, he unlike the rest of the Igbo people, persuaded his Eke natives not to put up any resistance to the white people since they possessed superior fire power. In the neighbouring Aniocha and Oghe, the stories were that the white soldiers never spared those that challenged them. Onyeama’s influence and wisdom saved the Eke natives from confronting the white soldiers and, inevitably paying dearly for it.

“Not only did Onyeama subsequently become a regular companion to the white visitors, but took it upon himself to be their welfare officer. This receptiveness served to convey to the white visitors the impression of his status as some authorized representative of his people,” according to Dillibe, who added that “Onyeama became the most common black face in white assemblies, winning the confidence and trust of the future governors.”

With the introduction of the indirect rule system of government in Igboland, Onyeama was, therefore, appointed the Warrant Chief of Eke community 1910, and he did not waste time in asserting his totalitarian authority to rule over the Agbaja area. Soon, Onyeama set up the action wing of his secret service called Ogwumili, which comprised of about 20 able-bodied men who he used to instill fear in natives and forced them to pay taxes. The Ogwumili members were more like thugs and hangers-on who reportedly played the role of personal servants and tax collectors. Ogwumili literally means ‘one who is able to move in the rain and fish out the target once the order was given’. There were a series of allegations of crimes , including murders with impunity against the Ogwumili, but the British administrators never treated such complaints with seriousness throughout the large area called Agbaja.

Again, author Dillibe provides further insight into the executive administration of Onyeama as a Warrant Chief who quickly turned a dictator of Adolf Hitler’s type. “He was a power monger; a ruthless one. And he deployed his power without looking back. He curried the favour of the white man and was able to establish peace in those areas where he held sway. So while other parts of Igboland were resisting the Europeans incursion, the fear of Onyeama kept people in quickness of service.

“There was no trouble in the area he ruled at all. That suited the British well. They kept him in power for 23 years and he used the power and placed emphasis on education. He was able to influence his entire subjects to go to school and to Church.

“In fact, it was he who brought the Catholics into power in Igboland. Eke was the centre of Catholicism in Igboland – extending to Ogoja; the whole of the area, through Onyeama’s influence. They gave him Ugwu Di Nso; his land there. He entrenched Catholicism in Enugu State.

“He was a no-nonsense man; he didn’t want to hear that you are not doing your work; you are lazy. He used to be very, very punitive. And he used to apply corporal punishments if anybody played truancy. He kept his whole family in check and he was able to pay for the education of the first Igbo medical doctor. And after him, my father, Dadi Umahi Onyeama became a judge of the International Court.”

Alhaji Mohammed Abas Onyeama, a legal practitioner in Enugu, is one of the grand children of the paramount ruler. His father, Alhaji Sulieman Onyeama, was among the famous five sons of the native ruler. Mohammed told Daily Trust that the name Onyeama evokes feeling of greatness once it is mentioned, although he added that it could also inspire a feeling of dislike or fear to some others depending on one’s standing.

Mohammed said: “My grandfather, the Okwuruoha of Agbaje was a great personality, an enigmatic colossus. He didn’t go to school, which is hard to believe for most people, but he had the highest respect and regard for education. Not many people who didn’t go to school appreciated education the way he did. And he trained a lot of people, his children and even people who were not his children, from other towns and villages. He made sure that they got sound education and he kept on hammering that as soon as you come out of school, you had to train other people. That was his greatest legacy.

“He accepted the Roman Catholic system because of their educational possibilities. As a matter of fact, he was the one that brought Roman Catholic to Northern Igboland and spread it up to the Middle-Belt; because I recall that St Peter and Paul Parish in Eke was controlling up to Roman Catholic Church in Mada and elsewhere in the Middle-Belt. That is a very colossal achievement for a man of his character.

“As the traditional ruler of Wawa land in those days, people had mixed feelings about him. Some people say he didn’t do well; he was terrible. Some people say he was nice; he brought civilization. And I think that he actually brought civilization to Northern Igboland.

“The cession of the coal mine to the English men, the stories of that abound; if you read the literature, you see what happened on that occasion. And he wasn’t doing those things because he was thinking personally or selfishly, the construction of the Milikin Hill Road, which he did singlehandedly; he was not doing it because he alone was going to use the road. He was doing it because it opened the frontiers of his people to actually get exposed to civilization. And a host of other things that he actually did.”

Does the name Onyeama open doors for members of the family? Mohammed believes there is no reason it should not open doors, though depending on where the individual wants the doors to open.

“Well, yes, depending on whom you are dealing with, as I said earlier on. If you meet intellectuals, doors are opened with very high expectations. And some people, when you meet them, you meet frustration because they are thinking that somehow, may be one of Onyeama’s activities or actions has inhibited them; I don’t know how that would have been possible – but these are human feelings. Basically, the good, the bad and the ugly of it all will affect you, but generally, his children, too, actually had a lot of reasons to make the name open doors.

“Take Justice Dadi Onyeama, for instance. These children projected the name to the point where it should be able to open doors. Having risen up to the World Court, there is no reason why if you identified with him, you won’t have doors opening. Then my own father, Alhaji Suleiman Onyeama, just like their father who brought Roman Catholic faith, my father brought Islam to Northern Igboland. As a matter of fact, yes, he spread Islam up to the old East Central states, and he rose to become Vice President of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs for Eastern Zone. He was a member of the World Muslim League. To that extent, depending on whom you are talking to, for instance, you still have doors opening. But I also think that doors opening has a lot to do with individual disposition, and where you are actually looking for the doors to open.”

But Warrant Chief Onyeama’s style of ruthless and dictatorial administration appears to be hunting his children many decades after he passed on. Dillibe confided to our reporter that there is an anti-Onyeama feeling to the extent that there is a sort of government policy, especially by the Enugu State government, to completely exclude anything Onyeama from what it is doing.

Several times the federal government had tried to give appointments or national recognition in form of post-humous national honours to few of the Onyeama family members, but the attempts were scuttled by “those who feel they should decide the fate of Enugu State.”

In the booklet produced by the Enugu State government during the Centenary celebration of Enugu under the then Governor Sullivan Chime, the name Onyeama was never mentioned anywhere. “And it was deliberate,” remarked Dillibe sadly. “How can you ignore the name that produced the first Nigerian judge to be called to the International Court?” he asked.

“And then when my brother Jeff Onyeama got a position through his friend – Chief of Staff, you saw the volcano it erupted. You saw the trouble everywhere, the infightings,” said Dillibe, who also added that when his father’s name, Justice Dadi Onyeama, was nominated for a national post-humous (CFR) honour, “the person who thought he had power over anything that happened in Enugu State at the time, after reading it, tore the list into shreds because it contained the name Onyeama.”

There has always been a rumour that Onyeama had 78 children but Dillibe said: “I think it was more like 64 identified. He had many wives, 56 wives. It’s a big family; the biggest compound in Igbo land. And I was told that he was the first Igbo man to go to England as a free man; not as a slave.”

Could it be that people are still afraid of Onyeama or they want to visit the sin of the father on the coming generations? Dillibe replied: “Chief Onyeama wielded power and he destroyed many powerful people. He cracked so many heads. He sent many to jail, many of them. We have enemies. We have enemies all round.”

One of the regrets Mohammed has about the Onyeama saga is that “the war really caused a lot of confusion in the family. First of all, it made members of the family to turn to Europe and America. A lot of them went there. There are some of my uncles I’ve never set eyes on over a long period of time – who are in the United States or United Kingdom – and they have forgotten about this place; may be, they are scared about the system here. The family is suffering from such kind of negative tendencies.

“And then the next thing one may want to talk about is that in a densely polygamous family like that, with the sudden demise of the king, a lot of ugly things happened which we have accepted as civilized persons to forget about. When the chief left, it was impossible for any single person to control the family as he did. So it introduced a lot of idiosyncrasies.”

[b]Even the many of people/bodies who lauded him and spoke in glowing terms have had to beat tactical retreat.....I believe we can conveniently summise that they discovered they had been misled

5. on CNN, Time up to Toyota

Mr. emeagwali’s Internet self-promotion has earned him a lot of attention. He branded himself so well that he became subjects of CNN, BBC, and TIME magazine articles and was able to get on United Nation’s list of former refugees who have achieved special status within a community due to their achievements. He is also widely celebrated in Nigeria and America, where he is a consistent feature of the Black History Month.

In February 2005, Ebony magazine ran a Toyota advertisement describing Mr. emeagwali as one of the founders of the Internet and as having a PhD; whereas, he never earned a doctorate because the University of Michigan did not find his dissertation good enough.

Responding to a NEXT inquiry regarding why it misrepresented Mr. emeagwali to the world, Toyota simply dissociated itself from the Nigerian scientist.

“Toyota has no connection to Mr. emeagwali and is not responsible for his credentials. In addition, Toyota had no involvement with a ‘Gordon Bell Prize.'” said Mike Michels, the company’s vice president, communications.

6. On Bill Clinton's statements, even the American government could not even own the statement, as such referred to it as Mr. Clinton's personal statement

Mr. emeagwali was also once described by former President Bill Clinton as one of the great minds of the information age.

The U.S State Department would not comment on why Mr. Clinton described the Nigerian scientist in that way. It simply directed inquiries to the former president himself. Mr. Clinton’s office is yet to respond to NEXT’s questions as at the time of this report.

Let's start deconstructing the lies which emeagwali himself had abandoned, yet you carry on your head like harvested crops. First let me first point out factually incorrect statements
1. Gordon Bell's price is NOT the Nobel prize of Computing. Rather the Turing Award(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Award) is.

The Turing Award is generally recognized as the highest distinction in computer science[3][4] and the "Nobel Prize of computing".[5][6]
. emeagwali's name is not associated with the Turing Award.

Let me also refer to some quotes to give you perspective

1. What are the facts?

There are certain things that emeagwali's name should never be
associated with, among them being -
1) A claim to have won the "Nobel prize of (super)computing". (He
never won the Turing award, universally accepted as the highest honor
in computing).
2) A claim to have "fathered the internet". (No part of his work was
ever used, even remotely, in the invention or development of the
internet).
3) A claim to have acquired patents. (He has no patents in the USA or
anywhere else in the world).
It is these fundamental issues that have set him apart as a fraud, not
the tooting of his horn, not the color of his underwear.

http://coding.derkeiler.com/Archive/General/comp.programming/2004-07/0699.html

The Gordon Bell Prize is one of many smalltime prizes that people who use computers can win, and it is the basis for a lot of bogus or hyperinflated self-promotional claims that emeagwali later made.

The Jewsmedia, including CNN, picked up on emeagwali's antics and gave them uncritical prestige. Suddenly, we were hearing that emeagwali invented the idea of parallel processing. He did not. We heard that emeagwali invented the supercomputer. He did not. We heard that he invented the Internet. He did not. We were invited to believe that emeagwali's Gordon Bell Prize was some kind of major achievement, on a par with the Nobel Prize. It is no such thing. There are even pseudobiographical anecdotes about emeagwali to be found online, many of them intended to convey the idea that emeagwali is one of the most brilliant men ever to live, on a par with, say, Karl Friedrich Gauss. He is not.

It's all lies, mostly invented by emeagwali and the Jews, and amplified by the Jewsmedia. I should have known better than to believe it. Well, I do know better now. emeagwali has no Ph.D., having failed twice to convince the University of Michigan that he deserves one. He failed to convince a judge that he was the victim of racism in the matter of his being denied a Ph.D., so he wasn't even able to use the courts to force the University of Michigan to give him a doctorate, which probably means he fell far, far short of deserving one.
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080314154700AA1OBPC



2. The award he won has little to do with computing. He only used computing(parallel processing ) in simulating Oil reservoir models. Hear what Gordon Bell, the owner of the award had to say wrt to emeagwali

Gordon Bell, 76, a pioneer in high-performance and parallel computing for whom the prize won by Mr. emeagwali is named, said the entry that earned the Nigerian scientist the award had nothing to do with the Internet.

“He was able to get time on the Connection Machine at the right time and run a large program of oil reservoir modeling,” Mr. Bell, a principal researcher with Microsoft Silicon Valley Research Group in San Francisco, said in an email to NEXT.

“The Internet is another thing. No evidence that he had anything to do with the Internet,” he said.

Mr. Bell, who provided the financial support for the annual Gordon Prize, is an influential fellow of the world’s two largest professional associations of computer experts – the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, and the Association for Computing Machinery.

But when asked whether he was aware of Mr. emeagwali’s contribution to the evolution of the Internet, Mr. Bell said, “Not that any of my friends who worked on the Internet recall. His bio on Wikipedia is most interesting and in itself seems to be controversial,” he said, in reference to the Wikipedia article on the Nigerian scientist, which only stopped short of calling Mr. emeagwali a liar.
http://www.cbwlondon.org/the-lies-of-philip-emeagwali/

3. A claim that he had many inventions and he is one of the greatest scientists is also utterly false and more of emeagwali and his spin Doctors playing publicity stunts

Although he is not known to have made any other contribution to science or invented anything since he won the Gordon Prize 20 years ago, Mr. emeagwali travels around the world, giving speeches and portraying himself as one of the greatest scientists in the world.

Speaking during a visit to Switzerland in April 2009, Mr. emeagwali said he was the first to program an hypercube “to solve a grand challenge defined as the 20 gold-ring problems in computing. That discovery, in part, inspired the reinvention of supercomputers as an Internet.”

He claimed that by his effort, he was able to set three world records and improve on Newton’s Second Law of Motion.

But of late, Americans and Nigerians alike have raised questions about the claims. Alan Karp, a principal scientist with Hewlett – Packard Laboratories, and one of the judges who selected the Nigerian scientist for the Gordon Bell prize in 1989, said Mr. emeagwali’s claims were false and exaggerated.

In response to NEXT’s inquiries, Mr. Karp wrote, “To the best of my knowledge, the work he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize had no influence on the Internet. The material he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not address adjustments to Newton’s Laws.

“Many people programmed the Connection Machines, both the CM-1 and the CM-2 that Mr. emeagwali programmed. To claim that sending emails programmed is misleading. The work Mr. emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not set a world record. In fact, another team produced better performance and better price performance that same year and was awarded the Gordon Bell Prize for performance.

“There were other hypercube machines in use before the CM-2, and others had programmed them to solve important problems. Today, a supercomputer is not a union of supercomputers communicating as an Internet. Individual supercomputers with proprietary internal networks do sometimes coordinate over the Internet, but the work Mr. emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not do this,” Mr. Karp said.

4. On his media packaging her this

Because his claims had bounced around for long without any major challenge, many people around the world believe them as true, and Mr. emeagwali enjoyed celebrity status. And from time to time, he adds new layers to what many scientists now believe to be a pack of lies.


Even the many of people/bodies who lauded him and spoke in glowing terms have had to beat tactical retreat.....I believe we can conveniently summise that they discovered they had been misled

5. on CNN, Time up to Toyota

Mr. emeagwali’s Internet self-promotion has earned him a lot of attention. He branded himself so well that he became subjects of CNN, BBC, and TIME magazine articles and was able to get on United Nation’s list of former refugees who have achieved special status within a community due to their achievements. He is also widely celebrated in Nigeria and America, where he is a consistent feature of the Black History Month.

In February 2005, Ebony magazine ran a Toyota advertisement describing Mr. emeagwali as one of the founders of the Internet and as having a PhD; whereas, he never earned a doctorate because the University of Michigan did not find his dissertation good enough.

Responding to a NEXT inquiry regarding why it misrepresented Mr. emeagwali to the world, Toyota simply dissociated itself from the Nigerian scientist.

“Toyota has no connection to Mr. emeagwali and is not responsible for his credentials. In addition, Toyota had no involvement with a ‘Gordon Bell Prize.'” said Mike Michels, the company’s vice president, communications.

6. On Bill Clinton's statements, even the American government could not even own the statement, as such referred to it as Mr. Clinton's personal statement

Mr. emeagwali was also once described by former President Bill Clinton as one of the great minds of the information age.

The U.S State Department would not comment on why Mr. Clinton described the Nigerian scientist in that way. It simply directed inquiries to the former president himself. Mr. Clinton’s office is yet to respond to NEXT’s questions as at the time of this report.

Innovators who break barriers
http://cnnstudentnews.cnn.com/fyi/
interactive/specials/bhm/story/
black.innovators.html
Posted by Anonymous at September 16, 2006 12:47 AM
Anonymous:

I believe Bill Clinton's speech writer, like the Nigerian government and New African Magazine were all fooled by the fraudulent information on Mr. emeagwali's website. The video is however authentic. I wrote to New African Magazine a while ago, requesting for the source of their information on philip emeagwali. They are yet to reply. I made an attempt to contact Mr. emeagwali himself, putting questions about the authenticity of information on his website before him, but was turned down.

Concerned, London UK
Posted by Anonymous at September 16, 2006 12:35 AM
If emeagwali is fake. Are all these fake?

Inventing against the odds
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/10/sprj.bhm.innovators/index.html

Innovators who break barriers
http://cnnstudentnews.cnn.com/fyi/interactive/specials/bhm/story/black.innovators.html
Posted by Anonymous at September 16, 2006 12:46 AM
Inventing against the odds
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/10/
sprj.bhm.innovators/index.html

Innovators who break barriers
http://cnnstudentnews.cnn.com/fyi/
interactive/specials/bhm/story/
black.innovators.html
Posted by Anonymous at September 16, 2006 12:47 AM
Anonymous:

I believe Bill Clinton's speech writer, like the Nigerian government and New African Magazine were all fooled by the fraudulent information on Mr. emeagwali's website. The video is however authentic. I wrote to New African Magazine a while ago, requesting for the source of their information on philip emeagwali. They are yet to reply. I made an attempt to contact Mr. emeagwali himself, putting questions about the authenticity of information on his website before him, but was turned down.

Why don't you try tracking down Bill Clinton's speech writer and sending him/her an email requesting for the source of his/her information on Mr. emeagwali? This could help clear a lot of your doubts.

As for the CNN links you quoted above, they appear to have relied on information presented by Mr. emeagwali himself. Why don't you send emails to their authors and request where they got information on emeagwali?

All information about emeagwali as a great scientist or an inventor originate from his website. And I believe that in the article above as well as this, I have clearly shown that I have been unable to verify the claims he makes. And I am yet to come across ANYONE who has been able to verify them.

A few months back, I was contacted by the Wikipedia author on supercomputing (a researcher in Australia). He was surprised about emeagwali being called the "father of the internet" and a significant contributor to the field of "supercomputing." In his opinion, emeagwali was virtually unknown in these fields. He was trying to verify from independent sources what emeagwali's contributions have been. In the long run, he too was unable to verify any of the so-called claims on emeagwali's website.
Posted by Chippla Vandu at September 16, 2006 1:23 AM
yeah man and all the other black people know why yall are putting up this fus its because he's black and yall still think that all blacks are stupid if yall still think that yall are stupid because you and any other white person has another thing coming for you cause i have friends and we are on the rise blacks are getting smarter and smarter every day yall havent seen nothing yet/ and i know i didnt use any end marks its because me and all of the other blacks are going to get you bye surprise dont be scared we dont kill im saying we are the future that tomorrow holds not you
Posted by Anonymous at September 24, 2006 10:39 PM
Dear Anonymous. Whilst not wanting to insult you, have you asked yourself the valid question that the blog creator is himself black? And it is this backward mentality that doesn't seem to allow black people progress in the first place by making statements like this.

I have followed the fake Doctors achievements quite extensively. And like the researchers have made my own research and gained my own knowledge which shows beyond any reasonable doubt that the guys is a 419 scientist and can not be called that.

Like other contributors have stated, there are several unrecognised people doing great feats and they do not neccessarily have to create websits of themselves and what they have / have not achieved. The worst thing is that the gentleman has not achieved anything.

All the man has achieved so far is showing to the world that Nigerians can achieve anything by doing 419 i.e. lie there way to the top and make claims upon claims. You can apply for a job and saw that you are a pilot and be given the job without anyone checking your credentials; only to end up crashing the plane and everyone finding out that you were a taxi driver who has some knowledge of aircraft engines.

All this does is tarnish the image of Nigerians abroad. This fraud appears on our national stamps; has his named emblazzed on a popular Nigerian Magazine, which ends up pointing to the world that Nigerians are illiterate i.e. tell them that you have developed a simple program in SQL or VBBASIC or PERL and the ones that dont have a clue about computing will end up celebrating you.

Well, a lot of us Nigerians and like the blogger are educated and end up checking the facts.

This is not racism; This is about being proud of our National achievements and the only National achievement that emeagwali has made is conning a whole nation as well as the educated types. I guess if this is how one can get away with it, then I guess its a pity that Nigerians, Africans and black people as a whole are being let down by this fraudster.

The more people know, then the better. But you know our people - they will end up saying 'wetin concern you', go do your own'.

One final note, why doesnt emegwali sue the blogger as well as the wiki encyclopaedia owners for perjury and slander. Why doesn't he even make an attempt to have citation placed on the wiki site for slander.

Its only a matter of time before one of the Americans decides to take him to court for making outlandish claims about being the father of computing.
Posted by Yemi at October 18, 2006 4:56 PM
God, do people really write this kind of rubbish. God, alot of Nigerian do really live in the dark ages.

I am a computer expert myself, brought up, study in the UK and live in the UK. MENSA is the world authority on human IQ, they have called philip emeagwali, the smartest man on the face of the earth, yet a primitive Nigerian is writing bile.

My God, alot of you belong to the dark ages, especially that slowpoke who wrote the main blog.

If any of you have gone to any university that worth it's name, in computing, especially computer communications and networks, once you begin the internet addressing system the first name that comes up is philip emeagwali. So is the internet synchronising and sequential programming, where he first archieve the 3.1 billion per second execution feet.

The software used to calculate, the oil flow under the soil is also emeagwali patent.

The leader of the free world at the time and the most powerful man on the planet at the time Bill Clinton, have been called a liar by a primitive idiot who wrote the main blogg, probably mentally deranged. And some slowpoke are equally supporting his absolute stupidity. You are all still living in the dark ages, with a small mind unable crasp any logical advancement.

Lets put it this way: CNN is a liar, Bill Clinton is a liar, so is IBM, philip emeagwali built super-computer for, so is MENSA in the UK. Yet a primitive idiot in Nigeria, backward and stupid is correct.
Posted by Broderick at October 26, 2006 2:09 AM
That degree if at you got in 1990's is a degree that is not worth the paper it was written on. I wonder if your IQ is not of the same level, needed to bemused and totally confused.

When the BBC here in the UK, called Bernard Lee, the guy who coined www and evented the hupertext, the eventor of the internet, i wrote to BBC, to inform them Lee was a light weight when it comes to inventing the internet and reminded BBC to coin is different from to invent, that philip emeagwali's 65000 processors working together to share resources is what is today the internet. BBC did not dispute this claim.

Yet, a Nigerian that went to a Nigerian university, with a proper lab, book stock etc, can vomit crap.
Posted by Broderick at October 26, 2006 2:23 AM
Broderick,

Despite calling me a 'slowpoke', a 'primitive idiot' and a person of 'absolute stupidity', I have chosen to address the 'issues' you raised, not to convince you, but to aid others who might be interested in knowing more about philip emeagwali and his so-called achievements.

Before doing that, I must reprimand you for presenting logically flawed arguments. If you happen to be both well trained and schooled (in comparison to the 'primitive' Nigerian education I received), you must have heard about something called logical fallacy. Your arguments fall under what I would very much classify as argumentum ad hominem. Rather than addressing the issues in the write-up, you chose to spew out insults and vile language against not just the author of the write-up, but also individuals who left comments.

Hiding under the cloak of anonymity appears to bestow on you the comfort of saying things you most likely would be unable to in the real world. Cyber space does have a way of revealing different characters! Now, back to the real issues at hand.

Mensa called philip emeagwali the smartest man on the face of the earth? Could you kindly provide me with a verifiable source of this information? I did an online search for this and found no information about it with the exception of an article written by a Dr. philip Chukwurah, which quotes a 2002 edition of the Sunday Herald, Glasgow as its source. The Sunday Herald article (if it exists, for I cannot find it) could pretty much have relied on information from philip emeagwali's website—a website filled with fraudulent and unverifiable information. I have written to Mensa to inquire if they ever voted for philip emeagwali as the smartest man alive. The moment I have their response, I will make it public on this weblog.

Mr. emeagwali's 3.1 billion computations per second feat in 1989 had nothing whatsoever to do with Internet synchronizing and sequential programming. Neither was it the fastest computation performed that year. The Gordon Bell prize, which philip emeagwali won, was NOT for the fastest computation but for a prize-performance of an oil reservoir modeling on an EXISTING Connection Machine supercomputer. This was addressed in a previous write-up with a relevant link to the Gordon Bell website (read the comments section).

You claim that the software used to write the computer program was patented by philip emeagwali. Could you kindly provide the source of this information (apart from emeagwali's fraudulent website)? As indicated in a previous write-up, philip emeagwali has NO KNOWN patents in the database of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Where then is this patent held? In addition to searching the USPTO website, I have also been able to verify that emeagwali has NO KNOWN scientific publications, by searching the global database of scientific publishers.

I also addressed the article on the CNN website about philip emeagwali in a previous-write-up (see comments section). And, O yes, Bill Clinton's speechwriter and the Nigerian government appear to have been fooled. I make no apologies for saying this. That's what happens when people fail to verify information at hand.

The Connection Machine supercomputer, which philip emeagwali used, had nothing whatsoever to do with the invention of the Internet. It was an existing computer at the University of Michigan. There is no basis for comparing philip emeagwali to Tim Berners-Lee when it comes to the Internet.

I understand the anger and pain one feels when one's view of reality is suddenly called into question. You have presented mere statements, with no evidence whatsoever to back up your claims. I have provided more than statements. I have provided evidence—the Gordon Bell website, a search on the United States Patent and Trademark Office and a search of the global scientific database using SciFinder. What these indicate is that philip emeagwali makes fraudulent claims on his website.

I do not know what sort of university you happen to be studying at in the UK. I ask this because for someone brought up and studying in the UK, your command of the English language is nothing to write home about. But then, should I be any surprised? Your university mentions philip emeagwali as the prima donna of computer communications and networking. And…what would the name of that university be?
Posted by Chippla Vandu at October 26, 2006 1:14 PM
If it's really true that he's fake, how he has been able to deceive thousands (or millions??) of people may forever remain a mystery to me. Afterall, for him to have made unsubstantial claims, there should have been people, who could have debunked them long ago. I mean, starting from the Science bodies, to the US government, and even other invstigative personnels. How come people, even top bodies, have not raised any refutations to this issue until now that a regular blogger just spilled it out? I'm really baffled.
Posted by Segun at November 28, 2006 10:48 PM
simple,

Because most people (like some of the people on this forum) do not have relevant & sufficient knowledge in computing (i.e.35 years of computing history)and seem to think the world of computers is all about your PC and Microsoft Windows.

Secondly, the majority of people (including Nigerians) never bother to check facts out and thats why any Nigerian can do any sort of 419 to unsuspecting indivdiuals.

Thirdly, ask yourself the question - why is it that 419'ers(fraudsters) rarely get caught by the system i.e. FBI, CIA and s called Science bodies? Simple - not enough resources to catch the multitudes of scammers, and not enough people to verify the facts (hence there is only one person verifying all of the Professors' claims, and its a crying shame that our fellow Nigerians even try and pull him down for asking a valid question - shows how sorry we can be).

Ok! Let's start deconstructing the lies which emeagwali himself had abandoned, yet you carry on your head like harvested crops. First let me first point out factually incorrect statements
1. Gordon Bell's price is NOT the Nobel prize of Computing. Rather the Turing Award(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Award) is.

The Turing Award is generally recognized as the highest distinction in computer science[3][4] and the "Nobel Prize of computing".[5][6]
. emeagwali's name is not associated with the Turing Award.

Let me also refer to some quotes to give you perspective

1. What are the facts?

There are certain things that emeagwali's name should never be
associated with, among them being -
1) A claim to have won the "Nobel prize of (super)computing". (He
never won the Turing award, universally accepted as the highest honor
in computing).
2) A claim to have "fathered the internet". (No part of his work was
ever used, even remotely, in the invention or development of the
internet).
3) A claim to have acquired patents. (He has no patents in the USA or
anywhere else in the world).
It is these fundamental issues that have set him apart as a fraud, not
the tooting of his horn, not the color of his underwear.

http://coding.derkeiler.com/Archive/General/comp.programming/2004-07/0699.html

The Gordon Bell Prize is one of many smalltime prizes that people who use computers can win, and it is the basis for a lot of bogus or hyperinflated self-promotional claims that emeagwali later made.

The Jewsmedia, including CNN, picked up on emeagwali's antics and gave them uncritical prestige. Suddenly, we were hearing that emeagwali invented the idea of parallel processing. He did not. We heard that emeagwali invented the supercomputer. He did not. We heard that he invented the Internet. He did not. We were invited to believe that emeagwali's Gordon Bell Prize was some kind of major achievement, on a par with the Nobel Prize. It is no such thing. There are even pseudobiographical anecdotes about emeagwali to be found online, many of them intended to convey the idea that emeagwali is one of the most brilliant men ever to live, on a par with, say, Karl Friedrich Gauss. He is not.

It's all lies, mostly invented by emeagwali and the Jews, and amplified by the Jewsmedia. I should have known better than to believe it. Well, I do know better now. emeagwali has no Ph.D., having failed twice to convince the University of Michigan that he deserves one. He failed to convince a judge that he was the victim of racism in the matter of his being denied a Ph.D., so he wasn't even able to use the courts to force the University of Michigan to give him a doctorate, which probably means he fell far, far short of deserving one.
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080314154700AA1OBPC



2. The award he won has little to do with computing. He only used computing(parallel processing ) in simulating Oil reservoir models. Hear what Gordon Bell, the owner of the award had to say wrt to emeagwali

Gordon Bell, 76, a pioneer in high-performance and parallel computing for whom the prize won by Mr. emeagwali is named, said the entry that earned the Nigerian scientist the award had nothing to do with the Internet.

“He was able to get time on the Connection Machine at the right time and run a large program of oil reservoir modeling,” Mr. Bell, a principal researcher with Microsoft Silicon Valley Research Group in San Francisco, said in an email to NEXT.

“The Internet is another thing. No evidence that he had anything to do with the Internet,” he said.

Mr. Bell, who provided the financial support for the annual Gordon Prize, is an influential fellow of the world’s two largest professional associations of computer experts – the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, and the Association for Computing Machinery.

But when asked whether he was aware of Mr. emeagwali’s contribution to the evolution of the Internet, Mr. Bell said, “Not that any of my friends who worked on the Internet recall. His bio on Wikipedia is most interesting and in itself seems to be controversial,” he said, in reference to the Wikipedia article on the Nigerian scientist, which only stopped short of calling Mr. emeagwali a liar.
http://www.cbwlondon.org/the-lies-of-philip-emeagwali/

3. A claim that he had many inventions and he is one of the greatest scientists is also utterly false and more of emeagwali and his spin Doctors playing publicity stunts

Although he is not known to have made any other contribution to science or invented anything since he won the Gordon Prize 20 years ago, Mr. emeagwali travels around the world, giving speeches and portraying himself as one of the greatest scientists in the world.

Speaking during a visit to Switzerland in April 2009, Mr. emeagwali said he was the first to program an hypercube “to solve a grand challenge defined as the 20 gold-ring problems in computing. That discovery, in part, inspired the reinvention of supercomputers as an Internet.”

He claimed that by his effort, he was able to set three world records and improve on Newton’s Second Law of Motion.

But of late, Americans and Nigerians alike have raised questions about the claims. Alan Karp, a principal scientist with Hewlett – Packard Laboratories, and one of the judges who selected the Nigerian scientist for the Gordon Bell prize in 1989, said Mr. emeagwali’s claims were false and exaggerated.

In response to NEXT’s inquiries, Mr. Karp wrote, “To the best of my knowledge, the work he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize had no influence on the Internet. The material he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not address adjustments to Newton’s Laws.

“Many people programmed the Connection Machines, both the CM-1 and the CM-2 that Mr. emeagwali programmed. To claim that sending emails programmed is misleading. The work Mr. emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not set a world record. In fact, another team produced better performance and better price performance that same year and was awarded the Gordon Bell Prize for performance.

“There were other hypercube machines in use before the CM-2, and others had programmed them to solve important problems. Today, a supercomputer is not a union of supercomputers communicating as an Internet. Individual supercomputers with proprietary internal networks do sometimes coordinate over the Internet, but the work Mr. emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not do this,” Mr. Karp said.

4. On his media packaging her this

Because his claims had bounced around for long without any major challenge, many people around the world believe them as true, and Mr. emeagwali enjoyed celebrity status. And from time to time, he adds new layers to what many scientists now believe to be a pack of lies.


Even the many of people/bodies who lauded him and spoke in glowing terms have had to beat tactical retreat.....I believe we can conveniently summise that they discovered they had been misled

5. on CNN, Time up to Toyota

Mr. emeagwali’s Internet self-promotion has earned him a lot of attention. He branded himself so well that he became subjects of CNN, BBC, and TIME magazine articles and was able to get on United Nation’s list of former refugees who have achieved special status within a community due to their achievements. He is also widely celebrated in Nigeria and America, where he is a consistent feature of the Black History Month.

In February 2005, Ebony magazine ran a Toyota advertisement describing Mr. emeagwali as one of the founders of the Internet and as having a PhD; whereas, he never earned a doctorate because the University of Michigan did not find his dissertation good enough.

Responding to a NEXT inquiry regarding why it misrepresented Mr. emeagwali to the world, Toyota simply dissociated itself from the Nigerian scientist.

“Toyota has no connection to Mr. emeagwali and is not responsible for his credentials. In addition, Toyota had no involvement with a ‘Gordon Bell Prize.'” said Mike Michels, the company’s vice president, communications.

6. On Bill Clinton's statements, even the American government could not even own the statement, as such referred to it as Mr. Clinton's personal statement

Mr. emeagwali was also once described by former President Bill Clinton as one of the great minds of the information age.

The U.S State Department would not comment on why Mr. Clinton described the Nigerian scientist in that way. It simply directed inquiries to the former president himself. Mr. Clinton’s office is yet to respond to NEXT’s questions as at the time of this report.

TundeBricklayer:
Afonjas are not happy greatest mind from African Igbo man

mapet:
Ok! Let's start deconstructing the lies which Emeagwali himself had abandoned, yet you carry on your head like harvested crops. First let me first point out factually incorrect statements
1. Gordon Bell's price is NOT the Nobel prize of Computing. Rather the Turing Award(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Award) is.

. Emeagwali's name is not associated with the Turing Award.

Let me also refer to some quotes to give you perspective

1. What are the facts?









2. The award he won has little to do with computing. He only used computing(parallel processing ) in simulating Oil reservoir models. Hear what Gordon Bell, the owner of the award had to say wrt to Emeagwali



3. A claim that he had many inventions and he is one of the greatest scientists is also utterly false and more of Emeagwali and his spin Doctors playing publicity stunts



4. On his media packaging her this




Even the many of people/bodies who lauded him and spoke in glowing terms have had to beat tactical retreat.....I believe we can conveniently summise that they discovered they had been misled

5. on CNN, Time up to Toyota



6. On Bill Clinton's statements, even the American government could not even own the statement, as such referred to it as Mr. Clinton's personal statement

By Musikilu Mojeed
Next Newspaper
November 7, 2010

Philip EmeagwaliLeading American computer experts, including the man after whom the prize he won in 1989 was named, have lately pooh-poohed claims by Nigerian American-based scientist, Philip Emeagwali, that he was one of the fathers of the Internet.

In 1989, Mr. Emeagwali won the $1,000 Gordon Bell Prize, which is awarded each year to recognise outstanding achievement in high-performance computing.

His award was for an application of the CM-2 massively parallel computer for oil reservoir modeling. Following the feat, Mr. Emeagwali proceeded to claim, for several years, that he was a father of the Internet; that he improved upon Isaac Newton’s laws of motion; that he owned the world’s first personal website; that American computer giant, Apple, uses the microprocessor technology he pioneered in its Power Mac G4 model, among many other claims.

But responding to separate enquiries by NEXT, some of the world’s leading computer experts said there was no truth in most of the claims that Mr. Emeagwali had propagated about himself over the years.

Gordon Bell, 76, a pioneer in high-performance and parallel computing for whom the prize won by Mr. Emeagwali is named, said the entry that earned the Nigerian scientist the award had nothing to do with the Internet.

“He was able to get time on the Connection Machine at the right time and run a large program of oil reservoir modeling,” Mr. Bell, a principal researcher with Microsoft Silicon Valley Research Group in San Francisco, said in an email to NEXT.

“The Internet is another thing. No evidence that he had anything to do with the Internet,” he said.

Mr. Bell, who provided the financial support for the annual Gordon Prize, is an influential fellow of the world’s two largest professional associations of computer experts – the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, and the Association for Computing Machinery.

But when asked whether he was aware of Mr. Emeagwali’s contribution to the evolution of the Internet, Mr. Bell said, “Not that any of my friends who worked on the Internet recall. His bio on Wikipedia is most interesting and in itself seems to be controversial,” he said, in reference to the Wikipedia article on the Nigerian scientist, which only stopped short of calling Mr. Emeagwali a liar.

“Apart from the prize itself, there is no evidence that Emeagwali’s work was ever accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, nor that it had any other lasting impact on the field of high-performance-computing or the development of the Internet. Neither does he hold any recognized patents for his results,” the article said.

Asked whether Mr. Emeagwali is qualified to be regarded as one of the great minds of the Information Age, Mr. Bell said,

“Like many of us, in each of our minds, we may all think of ourselves as “one of the great minds of the information age. The real question is ‘does anyone else, besides our mothers, fathers, spouses, children, relatives, and friends think of us in this way?'”

Mr. Emeagwali is often celebrated in his native Nigeria and Africa as a computer genius who invented the Internet and is often listed among leading and globally respected icons such as Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, and novelist, Chinua Achebe. He was so well respected that he once got on the Nigerian stamp.

Although he is not known to have made any other contribution to science or invented anything since he won the Gordon Prize 20 years ago, Mr. Emeagwali travels around the world, giving speeches and portraying himself as one of the greatest scientists in the world.

Speaking during a visit to Switzerland in April 2009, Mr. Emeagwali said he was the first to program an hypercube “to solve a grand challenge defined as the 20 gold-ring problems in computing. That discovery, in part, inspired the reinvention of supercomputers as an Internet.”

He claimed that by his effort, he was able to set three world records and improve on Newton’s Second Law of Motion.

But of late, Americans and Nigerians alike have raised questions about the claims. Alan Karp, a principal scientist with Hewlett – Packard Laboratories, and one of the judges who selected the Nigerian scientist for the Gordon Bell prize in 1989, said Mr. Emeagwali’s claims were false and exaggerated.

In response to NEXT’s inquiries, Mr. Karp wrote, “To the best of my knowledge, the work he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize had no influence on the Internet. The material he submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not address adjustments to Newton’s Laws.

“Many people programmed the Connection Machines, both the CM-1 and the CM-2 that Mr. Emeagwali programmed. To claim that sending emails programmed is misleading. The work Mr. Emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not set a world record. In fact, another team produced better performance and better price performance that same year and was awarded the Gordon Bell Prize for performance.

“There were other hypercube machines in use before the CM-2, and others had programmed them to solve important problems. Today, a supercomputer is not a union of supercomputers communicating as an Internet. Individual supercomputers with proprietary internal networks do sometimes coordinate over the Internet, but the work Mr. Emeagwali submitted for the Gordon Bell Prize did not do this,” Mr. Karp said.


Many disputed claims
Mr. Karp also debunked another oft-repeated claim by Mr. Emeagwali that the prize he won was the Nobel Prize of computing.

We also sent a list of Mr. Emeagwali’s numerous claims, gleaned from his speeches, interviews, and articles, to Jack Dongarra, another widely respected American computer scientist, and a judge on the panel that awarded the Gordon Bell Prize in 1990.

But Mr. Dongarra, a professor at the Innovative Computing Laboratory at the University of Tennessee, simply carpeted the claims in a two-sentence response.

“This was over 22 years ago and I really don’t remember,” he said. “I would disagree with much of what you have written.”

Because his claims had bounced around for long without any major challenge, many people around the world believe them as true, and Mr. Emeagwali enjoyed celebrity status. And from time to time, he adds new layers to what many scientists now believe to be a pack of lies.

On his poorly designed website, Mr. Emeagwali claims he has been ranked number one in computing in the past five years. He looks forward to being named again in December this year, although he is not known to have done or be doing any work on the subject since the 1989 prize.

He also claimed, in a June 2007 interview with BusinessDay, that the Nigerian government was owing him for the investigation he conducted into the country’s diminishing resources. Yet, the last time he visited Nigeria was over 20 years ago.

He said his technology is being used to forecast the weather and to predict the likelihood and effects of global warming. At a point, he claimed he was working on a fibre optic cable for Africa that will make calls to the continent not to be routed through Europe. NEXT sent Mr. Emeagwali a 14-question inquiry on his claims. But his response did not address any of the questions.

“The most important questions, such as his twelve years of postgraduate education, Newton’s 2nd Law of Motion, discoveries and inventions, 41 patents [that he never claimed, he claimed 41 “patent claims”] and father of the Internet,” said Donita Brown, who responded on his behalf.

“For example, he will explain that “the internet” is to “an internet” what the supercomputer is to a computer. That is, both are equivalent technologies,” Ms. Brown added.

Mr. Emeagwali said he would provide details in two weeks.

Ms. Brown, who is Mr. Emeagwali’s wife, has double identities as well. She is widely known as Dale Emeagwali. But in correspondences and on her husband’s website, she is identified as Donita Brown.

For two weeks, NEXT had consistently made efforts to talk to Mr. Emeagwali on the telephone. But each time, a telephone operator would say he was not available. The four telephone lines on his website are usually diverted to the same operator.

On his Facebook page, Mr. Emeagwali listed +4402070787400 as his mobile line. But our checks indicated that it was a landline in the United Kingdom, which was again diverted to the same operator in Washington.

Mr. Emeagwali was of recent a subject of debate on Nigerian Internet discussion groups and the preponderance of opinion was that his claims were fraudulent.

“The ‘debate’ on Emeagwali’s intellectual fraud has long been settled in the Nigerian cyberspace,” said one Moses Ochonu.

“Only the most fanatical Nigerian and African American sentimental (as opposed to a rational) investors in black scientific heroism still take the fool seriously,” Mr. Ochonu said.

In his own contribution to the debate, Ola Kassim, a former leader of Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation, said, “I have always stayed away from the Emeagwali controversy simply because I do not enjoy watching Nigerians/Africans pull each other down.

“However, there are some instances when we must speak up, or else the work of our true heroes – the genuine achievers become rubbished by association when the falsehoods perpetrated by some of us are finally discovered,” he said.

Self promotion
Mr. Emeagwali’s Internet self-promotion has earned him a lot of attention. He branded himself so well that he became subjects of CNN, BBC, and TIME magazine articles and was able to get on United Nation’s list of former refugees who have achieved special status within a community due to their achievements. He is also widely celebrated in Nigeria and America, where he is a consistent feature of the Black History Month.

In February 2005, Ebony magazine ran a Toyota advertisement describing Mr. Emeagwali as one of the founders of the Internet and as having a PhD; whereas, he never earned a doctorate because the University of Michigan did not find his dissertation good enough.

Responding to a NEXT inquiry regarding why it misrepresented Mr. Emeagwali to the world, Toyota simply dissociated itself from the Nigerian scientist.

“Toyota has no connection to Mr. Emeagwali and is not responsible for his credentials. In addition, Toyota had no involvement with a ‘Gordon Bell Prize.'” said Mike Michels, the company’s vice president, communications.

Mr. Emeagwali was also once described by former President Bill Clinton as one of the great minds of the information age.

The U.S State Department would not comment on why Mr. Clinton described the Nigerian scientist in that way. It simply directed inquiries to the former president himself. Mr. Clinton’s office is yet to respond to NEXT’s questions as at the time of this report.