Permit me, if you please to be as long-winded as ever
freedom of speech and this ain't no filibuster.
Sure, just as Elie Wiesel protested, "There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest."
Protest we must. On the inter-national scene some can threaten to misuse their nuclear bomb. Every man protests in crowds or alone, in his own fashion and according to the limited means available to him, the least being to at least protest in your heart, to wit and according to this hadith:
"On the authority of Abu Sa'eed al-Khudree (may Allah be pleased with him) who said: I heard the Messenger of Allah (the peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) say, "Whosoever of you sees an evil, let him change it with his hand; and if he is not able to do so, then (let him change it) with his tongue; and if he is not able to do so, then with his heart — and that is the weakest of faith." (Sahih Muslim)
In the protest in your heart (and I assume that jihad is stronger) we are not only defending Islam or any other religion, but protesting on behalf of the sanctity of all life.
On another practical level as our latest Nobel Laureate in Literature (poetry) put it:
"So when you see your neighbor carryin' somethin'
Help him with his load
And don't go mistaking Paradise
For that home across the road"
(The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest)
With all of the above intact and inviolable, sometimes, I fail to see what our loquacious Kennedy (Emetulu ) is all about. Whether with some specious argument or lack of it, he sheaths his sword or, "favourable or not to Nigeria" it's his latest diatribe about Nigerian misconceptions and misreadings of what's happening on the world stage and how it relates or should relate to them or he's talking about Brexit and why it is or was imperative that all "Nigerians and all other ethnic minorities in the UK" - should vote against Brexit - "Nigerians" (occasionally a fairly monolithic group to be sure) "and all other ethnic minorities in the UK" (and that was not only being inclusive, but taking the five continents and their Diasporas domiciled in the British Isles to a more universal level) in short why in good conscience, every dark-skinned, as dark as Adam, foreign-born light skinned black man or dark- skinned white man or at least with some darkness in the gene pool or the cultural jinni, should join forces in determining their collective destiny by voting against Brexit. ( The colour categories are mine and may have nothing to do with anything)
British to the bootstraps, to be sure, it's not every Brit that knows how it feels to be thick as a brick (prick?) and maybe if you didn't hear it correctly, the lyrics will help?
Now, because he could have changed his mind during the intervening months (and you can't take a dip in the same river twice) I'm not sure if it's exactly the same anti-Brexit Kennedy and that particular old mindset of his that is still expatiating here, in which case in addition to the " I am", he fulfils the unity of time and place - place being the United Kingdom / Great Britain, from where now and then he writes much of the trash and this country of USA-Africa Dialogue in cyberspace where we sometimes have to read it.
Kennedy Emetulu is "quite amused" by some of his unfortunate Nigerian countrymen. "I am quite amused" he laughs or smiles, " by a lot of Nigerians who see the world through the foggy prism of their national condition."
Fie ! Brother Emetulu, this is nothing to be quite amused about. Nor is the miserable national condition to be superiorly disdainful about. But as Mr. Emetulu says, "people are entitled to their wilful ignorance", so, who am I to say what someone else should feel remorseful about? As the bard crooned, "Don't wanna amuse nobody, don't wanna be amused."
And what does it matter what or how Nigerians think about the US elections or about Trump and his travel bans in as far as Boko Haram does not directly affect US national interests in either Nigeria or the lake Chad region – unless of course China were to enter the scene or any US citizens were to be harmed in Maiduguri - then Trump would be suddenly electrified and terribly interested. But Trump should already be terribly interested without any extra solicitations from Nigerians, if it's on his agenda to wipe out Radical Islam from the surface of the earth, assuming that the death and destruction Boko Haram still spreads and their alleged oath of fealty to Islamic State , is part of Radical Islam's international / global agenda. In which case I presume that President Buhari could solicit all he help he can get from Trump , to fight the good fight – although I'm not even sure of that - not sure, because Boko Haram's aim is to raise the black flag over all of Nigeria in itself not a criminal idea - it's only their method which is so harmful to fellow Nigerians and to their cause – the idea of spreading Islam further by the sword. I can't understand Boko Haram : since they already have Sharia Law in Borno and twelve other states in Nigeria I would think that a much better way would be by peaceful dawah and they know better than everybody and should know since the Quran says that " There is no comparison in religion.
But to return to Emetulu's main thesis. The people's belief naive as it may be (no cause for amusement) could be predicated on the understanding - superpower or not – that your friend's friend is a friend and your friend's enemy is your enemy. This may be true in many cases, although there can be exceptions such as some of these particular cases of the enemy of my enemy - is not a friend
(Generally speaking, I would say that the Swedish Conservative Party/ Parties, have more in common with the Republican Party in the USA, private capitalism's big shots forever for lower taxes etc. The Democrat Party in the US, especially the Bernie Sanders faction obviously has more in common with Sweden's Social Democrats. But on this occasion in Brother Obama most people in Europe, Sweden and almost all of Africa, the Middle East, Asia and South America saw change on the horizon , so, in the 2008 American presidential elections both lower taxation's Fredrik Reinfeldt the then Conservative Prime Minister of Sweden and (of course the leader of the Social Democrat then in opposition, supported Brother Barack Obama). Reinfeldt probably because of other factors such as on the horizon the fulfilment of the promise of easing tensions between East (Russia) and NATO America in Europe and winding down the US military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan - on which premises Brother Obama was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2009.
All but the self-hating Negroes of Africa supported Brother Obama – of course for being black and beautiful...
"They jump on false news that supports their notions" ( Emetulu ) sometimes true as when many ("they") jumped on the false news that Trump had proclaimed that "he was going to deport all Nigerians"
From speculative abstraction and false news to actual possibilities. Some more drivel, this time, indeterminate. Is it still true that "We have a very selfish political elite that's only thinking of draining the nation, an elite that has no compunction." Is this true of the APC's political elite under Brother Buhari's watchful eyes or is it just the other guys, the PDPs ? Again, as the bard sings,
" But the enemy I see wears a cloak of decency "
It is perhaps no coincidence that Emetulu's article comes to us at the heels of the more clearly articulated Reuben Abati's vis-a-vis the hope and vision of the anti-Hillary factions, that Trump the great Islamophobe would prove to be very supportive of their various unIslamic causes in Nigeria, namely, not the separation of church from state but some kind of territorial separation of the largely Christian South , especially as sometimes, various expressed by the largely Christian, the South-Eastern Christian enclave, their wish for separation from the Muslims , the Muslim North - in other words, from the rest of Nigeria and with regard to that South Eastern enclave – by implication, in not so many words, ( but not separated by a Trumpian wall, speaking Igbo and what in time, Professor Kperogi could term "Biafran English" ) the new territory to be renamed either Biafra, "Christian Biafra" , the Christian Republic of Biafra or some other name, Mr. jive as nigger the first Christian theocracy of its kind, in modern Mama Africa...
In Sweden, practically everybody I know from the vast political spectrum from left to right including many a Swedish journalist, activist, artist, musician, painter, politician, actor/ actress, entrepreneur, with a few White American exceptions among my friends and acquaintances, were against Trump. The main Swedish papers ( the ones that I read everyday) are still carrying on a crusade against Trump. What I observe is that since Trump's victory through the electoral college many pro-Biafra proponents and all manner of Trump bashers maybe not including Kennedy Emetulu himself, and quite unabashedly so, have suddenly changed colours and have jumped on the Trump bandwagon, ostensibly to drum up support for their Biafra cause, kiss Trump's ass so that he can kick some ass for them, are now giving the impression that they were always Trump partisans...
Just like tribalism, racism and colonialism seen through the same narrow prism of personal or national self-interest or the mere all-in-all colour dimension or even religion, can assume many disguises. Take these Emetulu exaggerations as statutory examples ( there are many but I'll just take these three:
(1) "It's funny that Trump who has no idea of the Bible..." For Christ's sake, how can you say that? Not only was Trump very strongly supported by Evangelicals – not without cause, the pussy-grabber took his oath of office on the Bible - the same Bible that Abraham Lincoln took his oath of office.
(2) "what do we think will happen to Nigeria if we go the Rwanda route? Or is there anyone thinking we cannot go that route? Please, go read the history of the Rwandan genocide and you will know we are more than three-quarters of the way there already!We are close, very close .." Emetulu! EMETULU! And who are the Hutus? Emetulu, thou shalt not exaggerate ! No more war!
(3) Like Toynbee , Emetulu opines about cyclical history: "They must understand that history is cyclical and that we have been here before leading to two World Wars at the end of which only countries and peoples who thought beyond themselves came out of it stronger and prosperous" - except that I doubt that Toynbee would be in wholehearted agreement with the latter part of that statement, that " at the end of which only countries and peoples who thought beyond themselves came out of it stronger and prosperous"
Kennedy E, you know how I like to tickle your funny bone with some of my own, little tittle-tattle.
Will you be helping to organise the reception committee when President Buhari arrives in the British Isles for his annual medical check-up
With a pinch of salt, take some of the links as footnotes.
Cyberspace
CH
From a wintry
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