RANDOM THOTS

By Chude Jideonwo A lot of Nigerians who want to try and change their country and who have a zeal to do so are being discouraged by the myriad of challenges that abound.  There’s the school of thought that there’s so much to do but few people willing and able to do them. The idea is that the situation in the country is so hopeless and there is nothing we can do. I have been there many times, and not too long ago. I have spent the past eight years of my life working for country in one way or the other, and trying to sell hope and working to build platforms for my generation to impact the country, but very frequently I find myself so terribly disillusioned. It feels like I cannot succeed where, to rely on recent history, Gani Fawehinmi, Chinua Achebe,Aminu Kano and others have failed. At those times, I have managed to inspire myself by reminding myself of five times in my life when I have felt such an incredible sense of hope and faith – in myself, in my countrymen and in change...

I get the whole prosperity thing, I really do. But whatever happened to contentment? Whatever happened to being thankful and grateful for what you have right now instead of perpetually clamoring for more? When is enough enough? When do you say, okay, I’m rich enough now. Lemme start to be content and start to help the less privileged? It does not exist! That time…not for everyone at least. A very small percentage of the world’s population controls half the wealth in the whole world. Truth is, nobody hands it to them and they know the price they paid to get there. But you, yes you! You want a private jet and you still want to sleep for 8 hours a day, and then spend 5 hours praying. Pray tell, how much time is left for you to work? But you, yes you! You want a private jet and you still want to sleep for 8 hours a day, and then spend 5 hours praying. Pray tell, how much time is left for you to work?You want to graduate with 1st class and you spend 6 hours at the prayer garden, ...

By Penshy The new year comes with its own brand of drama. The world is never really drama free is it? We find ourselves asking questions like- will Kim Kardashian ever marry again? How many men does it take to screw in a light bulb? Is it now socially acceptable to expose children to nudity? It’s a known fact that we should adopt some kind of caution when it comes to exposing children to matters of the opposite sex and sex in general, but it seems with the age we are in, extra care has to be taken. We have the fashion industry, which looks more like its American and French counterparts day by day, promoting the showing of more skin, and then the music industry that more often than not teach our kids words like: “sarkodie” which means a vulgar and inappropriate thing in English. Not that these songs aren’t hits, but they have PG written all over them. Your kids don’t know what PG means, but you do. My aunt would definitely agree with me after her 5 year old told her friends “my m...

Incredible life We go through life automatically everyday without thinking about how we sleep or wake up. Also we just say prayers automatically without giving it a thought. I once participated in an exercise where we were asked to time the exact moment we fell asleep, but alas !I can tell you that nobody could get the exact time! That exercise brought to my mind how this world we live in is nothing because on the long run every thing that happens we really cannot say this is how it really is, I seriously do not care much for scientific explanations "tongue out". The long and short of this is, this life is not explanable, it's to short and not so big. If you want to enjoy it, this is what you do: 1. Stop and smell the flowers once in a while 2. Go for Monthly or Quaterly medical check ups 3. Fall in love and enjoy it 4. Make love and kiss a lot 5. Quarrel less and make friends 6. Value your family and loved ones 7. Above all believe and love God your creator an...

RMG, the artiste management/record label that handles Munachi Abii, have released a statement in reaction to the viral video where Muna is seen to be arguing with Mode 9 during the final of ‘Nokia Don’t Break The Beat” Competition’. Muna is seen to oppose Mode 9′s verdict on TKO, one of the contestants and she makes her point boldly and emphatically. Mode 9 doesn’t take it lightly and repeats severally to Muna that he is an experienced hip hop head and that is why he is the chief judge on the reality show. The former MBGN however kept telling him to pass the microphone. The issue has been the subject of varying reactions on blogs and social media, since the video from Nigezie found its way onto the Internet. Now her management company has released a statement which reads: “To Whom It May Concern. It has come to my attention that the unfortunate incident that occurred at the Nokia “Don’t Break The Beat” competition on Saturday the 28th of April 2012, where RMG artiste Muna w...

January 9 th dawned on Nigeria as a day to remember. It was the day Nigerians decided to stand up to the government of the day in move known as #Occupy Nigeria. From Lagos to Ibadan down to kogi up to Abuja, Nigeria was occupied with protest led by the organized labor and the civil society groups. This protest was an offshoot from the government’s decision to end “subsidy” on fuel on the 1 st of January, 2012, there by increasing the price of PMS to N141. This decision by the government did not go down well with the people who felt that the “subsidy” was the only dividend they enjoyed from the only natural resource in Nigeria being utilized by the government. The Governments excuse is that it is losing money daily and that the country cannot afford to continue with the business of subsidization because it has so much projects to complete in the coming months which the funds formerly used for subsidizing would be used for. There is also the issue of deregulation of the down str...

After work yesterday, I had to do some sort of sober reflection on Nigeria’s nascent democracy; I call it nascent because we are still growing and not yet close to the proverbial Promised Land. I realized that besides the fall outs from the June 12 elections, nothing has ever elicited such a collective and emphatic stance from Nigerians as the removal of fuel subsidy right from 1960 up to this moment though I stand to be corrected. So, in my own little quiet zone, being not such a great fan of Nigerian politics due to many factors that has culminated in giving me a liberal standpoint politically, I decided that for the couple of days to come, I would be taking a look at some of the issues that has led to this rather unfortunate milestone in our political journey and how such future occurrences could easily be averted, though it would not be rigidly limited to just the removal of fuel subsidy. For me, I believe it’s high time our democratic ‘rulers’ ( I call them rulers because leaders ...