ews of the gruesome murder of Bilyamin Bello by his wife, Maryam Sanda in the wee hours of Saturday, November 18 in Maitama Abuja, came to light early this week. This was no ordinary couple. The deceased was the son of the ex-chairman of one of Nigeria’s current foremost political parties, PDP. The alleged murderer was the daughter of Maimuna Aliyu, the former Executive Director of Aso Savings and Loans Limited. He had left his previous wife for her, the rumour mill said. And his parents had warned him about his new found love and her violent ways pleading with him to abandon the union.

The details of the murder was even more bone-chilling I felt like I was reading a script from an episode of a programme on DSTV’s Crime Investigation. The channel where they unveil the weird and horrible lengths humans go to kill people and hide it? Yes, that one.

Unfortunately, a similar event occurred in Zamfara. An angry wife had in the heat of anger, stabbed her husband to death with a broken bottle, street style. Unlike Sanda, the second wife from hell somehow left her husband fighting for life.

I identify as feminist but most times I wonder if this feminist path was a sensible one to take because for all it’s worth, I have learnt that most battles in life are really just a test of power and influence primarily, as against everything else like gender or race in and of themselves.

But then again, these things are as powerful as a people make them and for the African society, the gender card was played repeatedly in the favour of men that some societies began and still treat women like second fiddle hence the need to speak up. So yes, maybe the feminist movement isn’t entirely a waste of a life time.

But this? A revolution, really? A feminist revolution?

https://www.amore.ng/are-you-mad-i-am-a-feminist-there-is-no-fing-coming-revolution/

But asides making movies that went on to win countless Oscars and receiving more than 300 Oscar nominations in his career as a movie producer, Weinstein had turned his power and influence into a bargaining tool with the lives of young women who were eager for the big screen.

Sometimes out of pure force, or by the sheer theory of influence, power and manipulation, Weinstein had his way with these women.

Sadly, for more than a decade, acts like Weinstein’s had been ingrained into the fabric of Hollywood and was so much of a culture that those who knew turned the other way either out of fear for the sustainability of their careers or in the very Nigerian way that we like to ‘mind our own business’.

Farrow had launched an investigation that lasted for ten months, tracking down women who had worked at any of Weinstein’s production companies and actresses he had had encounters with at that time. A lot of them were willing to talk, some anonymously due to various legal backings that Weinstein possessed, some of them very brutally sturdy.

With an ongoing trial on former TV-sitcom ‘sweetheart’, Bill Cosby for the same reasons, some of the women felt justified that maybe Weinstein’s cup would finally get filled up enough with the strength of their narratives and will have no choice but to run over.

They were right.

It became a roller coaster downward spiral for the movie producer and a host of other ‘powerful’ men in Hollywood, in the US and UK in general, who had assumed that power and masculinity included objectifying women to sexual items and using either their desperation for fame or their weakness to fight sexual predators-cum-potential-life-changers off to their advantage.

Shortly after tons of these women had come out and more names were blacklisted in this sexual predator list, women started a #MeToo campaign on Twitter.


https://www.amore.ng/please-shift-why-on-earth-did-you-wait-20-years-before-speaking-up/

Zimbabwe’s military has seized control of the country in what bears the hallmarks of a military coup although they have denied it so far.

Military tanks have been reportedly deployed in the capital, Harare and President Robert Mugabe has been ‘confined to his home’.

The military had earlier this morning seized control of the state television and in a dramatic televised statement denied that a military takeover was underway.

But the situation bore all the hallmarks of a coup: The army was in control at state TV in Harare, there was a significant military presence at the international airport, and Mugabe’s whereabouts were unknown for hours.

The military is also reportedly littered in the capital Harare currently.


https://www.amore.ng/just-in-a-coup-might-just-be-ongoing-in-zimbabwe-mugabe-confined-to-his-home/

Watch my video on the above topic here and subscribe to our channel:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00cL-pvoFXU

I was initially going to title this article, ‘Why Buhari should hire a Sarah Sanders ASAP” but a headline on one of today’s dailies caused a last minute change of mind.

I wish all President Buhari needed was a Sarah Sanders, the incredibly grounded White House Secretary, who has perfected the art of diplomacy and deflection since joining the Trump administration.

I write as a concerned Nigerian who’s been promised that ‘things will get better’ in the shallow resolve that we are known for when it comes to our politicians and their excesses.

We say that we are thriving in spite of our government and that we don’t need them to function but we call down fire and brimstone when the creaky bus throws us unawares into a jagged, rusty end that leaves one with a dull ache. Or when a year after, you are left wondering if your car came with any shock absorbers at all.

We are quick to ‘find something’ for a law enforcement agent on the way home from a job we detest but can’t leave because we both know no one has broken any law but the one who’s supposed to uphold it but cannot. His pants are not holding up to his waist which has grown thinner by a few inches in the last few months after all. Why should he care?

President Muhammadu Buhari came with the promise of a man who had seen the best and worst of both worlds – military and democratic regimes – and had gained a wealth of experience that could move the country a few steps forward, at worst.

He dressed it up nicely and very simply too – change.

Change as a concept is quite ambiguous. In the backdrop of a security scandal as huge as the kidnap of over 200 girls from a school dormitory by Islamic militants that had over the period of time grown fiercer and invincible, Nigerians were keen on buying anything that signalled some sort of hope or a sense of it.

And having ran unsuccessfully at three consecutive elections – 2003, 2007 and 2011 – we were itching like we assumed he was, for all the concrete plans he had to ‘make Nigeria great again’.

So change it was.


https://www.amore.ng/nigerians-fools-buhari-proves-every-time/

The Heineken Lagos Fashion and Design Week 2017 (LFDW2017) just rounded up yesterday and whoosh! What a week it was.

I was at the LFDW2016 and then this one two days out of the four and I can tell you that humongous amount of work and detailing does go into planning and executing this event.

Annually. So kudos to the project managers, the technicians, the designers, the logistics personnel, the lighting and set designers, the graphics designers, the sponsors and of course, the DJ.

I’m talking about the runway DJ who ensures the music for each collection comes up at the right time and definitely the designers who select what songs their collections are walked to or possibly the assistants who choose them, or whoever really does that in the team.

On Day 3, I started paying attention to the music the models where walking to and the effects it was having on the overall perception of the collection for me and it was interesting to discover.

I cannot speak for the entire audience.

One designer on Day 3 started off with an interesting first look and continued to bring down pieces that were baffling, if that’s a safe word to use. I’m not calling names.

You know the general notion that designers hardly make items that are wearable in every day life? That was the feeling as one after another model came through the back stage in these pieces that were confusing and hard to envision their functionality.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am one of those fashion enthusiasts who realise that sometimes, designers are just trying to make art or at best design costumes that might interest movie or music directors.

But I tuned off anyways and while I worked on an article for the night ( I was here for work after all), I started paying more attention to the music the models were walking to.

Read more:

https://www.amore.ng/lfdw2017-music-fashion/

Don’t cringe, it's just a [color=#006600][/color]body part; a female body part and sadly, a controversial one at that. If you think patriarchy and feminism wars are consequences of senseless opinions and one-sided outlooks on life and society, think again.

Men dominate every sphere of a patriarchal society. Like racism, patriarchy has not been phased out as society makes us believe. It is present in our daily lives, subtly playing out in where we work, in our governments, in our churches and so many other societal circles.

Around the world, less than 20 percent of top management positions are held by women while 70 – 75 percent of women in the workforce receive lesser remuneration than their male counterparts in similar roles.

In extremely patriarchal societies like Saudi Arabia, women cannot carry out simple tasks like riding a car, choosing a life mate or a desired mode of dressing.

A senior colleague was invited to see a stage movie titled StoryOfMyVagina by the writer and obliged. He did a beautiful piece on the drama, its implications and impact on the audience that came out to see it.

With his permission, I’m sharing the article on my blog. Read, Like, Share and join in on the conversation.



An aspiration to become an astronaut soon morphs into the drudgery of child-bearing and managing a home. A physically abused woman seeks solace in the law but soon realises it offers pain, a child needing protection from a depraved father.

These are few of the themes chosen by Joy Isi Bewaji, unapologetic feminist, writer and entrepreneur to illustrate the tragedy of patriarchy in the Nigerian society in her play, ‘Story of my vagina’, directed by Segun Adefila and performed by Crown Troupe in Lagos on December 27 and 28.

“I thought it was time we attack this idea of shaming the vagina for no reason,” explains Bewaji, “The vagina had nothing to do with the situation but it had to be thrown in because they feel it is what silences a woman, the minute you call her ‘Ashawo’ (prostitute), she is supposed to shrink,”

Bewaji said she decided to embrace this attack and make it something phenomenal where people can look into it and stop being ashamed because there is so much more to a woman than her body parts.

The Editor of Happenings online magazine and mother of two began a movement on social media through The Conversation, an ongoing series of debates on gender in Nigerian society. In November 2016, she published ‘StoryOfMyVagina’, a collection of stories revolving around the perceptions of the vagina and developed it into a play.

The thirty minutes play throws up issues of abuse of the girl child, societal pressure on a woman to abandon her career for marriage, sexual abuse in the office, shaming a woman based on her inability to conceive and subtly tells society that patriarchy thrives because even the women encourage it.

A collective gasp went up from the audience in the scene where a woman who ran to the local police station bruised and battered was told that justice has a gender preference.

“You came to the police station to report your husband for beating you?” asked an incredulous police officer.

“Do you know how often I beat my own wife? Do you know how many women are happy they have a husband that beat them?”

Godiya Makama, in her research paper on patriarchy and gender inequality argues that the Nigerian society is patriarchal in nature which is a major feature of a traditional society.

Bewaji’s ‘Story of my vagina’ illumines the complex nature of patriarchy in Nigeria using music, drama and lightening. It sheds light on the very foundations of this structure in the scene where the news of the birth of a girl child is received by the father, with as much excitement as the news of a hen hatching a brood of chicks.

Sexuality was addressed in a frank and brutally honest manner but it seemed like what to expect from a play audacious enough to use vagina in the title, in a society that recoils at the mere mention of a woman’s body parts.

The scene where three young men concluded that a girl who loves sex cannot make a good wife speaks to the sad reality of a society long fed on the potpourri of deception sacrificing reason on the slaughter slab of religiosity and crude traditional practices.

“The play hit the note on a number of things women have been fighting for a long time – violence against women, blaming women for rape, molestation, sexual harassment in the place of work,” said Alero Okorodus, a filmmaker who watched the play.

“I hope this play will reach lots of people and help them understand that the woman is not the competition but as individuals we are striving to become better and do great things for ourselves, just as the men in the society” Okorodus said.

A critical challenge in addressing the challenge of patriarchy and the stereotypes that promotes it is that many people are unaware or didn’t think it’s an issue worth their time. Segun Adefila, the play director needed convincing that these were key issues before he could get on board with the idea.

“The first time I read it, I was unsure because I don’t understand the idea of feminism. I am an African and I know that in the Africa I come from, women are respected. I don’t get this new thought process that says women are being abused in Africa but when the playwright helped me understand that there is gender politics everywhere, people are going through it and we are speaking for those people, that is how I got in.”



What do you think? Is feminism truly another wish-washy movement by women who are thirsty for power and recognition or are these issues fueled by how mute and indifferent we have become to them?



Love,

TheQuietOne





Culled from www.noisesofthequietone.com