I lost my Uncle Tunde two months ago ( my mother's older sister's son) May his soul rest in the peace that passeth all understanding. His father was Ga. He was very religious, sang gustily in the Christ Church Choir. He studied electrical engineering in the UK, where his first son Adebayo was born and after his return to Sierra Leone, for many years he was responsible for supplying Freetown with electricity….
There's precious little to add after Rev. Prof Akwasi B. Assensoh's peace-making plea except that in this his latest gesture he reminds me very much of another peacemaker the Rev. Prof. Canon Harry Alphonso Ebun Sawyerr, the maternal grandfather of my two daughters and someone I knew very well, someone I venerated, and someone I now miss enormously much and with whom I could have had many enlightening theological discussions, now that for the first time in my life, I'm taking a closer look at Christianity, with of course a solid Jewish background, perhaps a scholarly Jewish background since I spent more than twenty-two years in the synagogue library and have also learned a lot at other places of worship, at so many courses, festivals, celebrations, Yom Kippurs, lectures, seminars, discussions, debates…
Some of the plebeians as well as some of the Creole elite who knew no better would joke that Canon Sawyerr usually enquired, "Any letters from home? ", by which they surmised he meant, "Any letters from the UK?". So thought people who did not know him or only knew him, like the stars, from a great distance. He was not like that. But there are and there were and will be bone fide Saro Englishmen. I was once one (a bone fide English schoolboy, no big deal.) I know more than a few such men and women and children in my family and there are also people such as Anthony Joshua
Wofa Akwasi, "Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God." ( The King James Version ( 1611) - which we studied as part of English literature and as an outstanding specimen testifying to some of the stages, state and status of the English Language of that period – which is of immense importance to the state of e.g. the Sierra Leone Creole Language which at around the time I leaned it (early 1960s) was still at a very Victorian stage of development - the educated elite mostly spoke and wrote a Victorian kind of English - for the simple reason that the Creole descendants of the Black Poor, some of whom must have been valets, butlers, coachmen – apart from lawyers, doctors, and clergymen, plus the Nova Scotian immigrants, and the rebellious Jamaicans mostly had one thing in common - the English language which morphed into Creole/ Krio, so, around the time I learned or relearned it , because of the many conservative forces at work in Creoledom, it was still in the Victorian stage of evolution, and even more than that, whereas the Yoruba and the Igbo have their countless proverbs for every situation and every eventuality, the English-Speaking Creoles of Sierra Leone (at least up to fifty years ago when I was there for ten days - and back to Ghana) the English speaking Creoles still spiced and peppered their speech liberally with quotations from Ecclesiastes, the Proverbs of Solomon, the Psalms of David – quoted these Verbatim ( the King James Version) and from every known part of the Bible, so not surprisingly you would hear someone railing against Nebuchadnezzar or someone cursing someone else as " Beast of Ephesus" .
Yes, all the above has been like carrying coal to Newcastle or Enugu, but at this juncture of absolute relevance (it's delicious reading): Part G: POLITICS AND MODERNITY (the poems on pages 319 – 373) of Oga Falola's Etches on Fresh Waters.
There's precious little to add, that's what they always say, and here we go again, just as 'Tony ( of Oxford) and Shakespeare's Mark Antony, could start off, " I come to bury Cesar, not to praise, him " - and then go on - as planned, to set the crowd ablaze by doing just that, praising Caesar, so too in certain circumstances, the very modern 21st century English Cornelius Ignoramus could start off, " I come to bury Caesar, not to piss on his grave ! "and follow that trajectory…
In Judaism, we have the sixth commandment : Thou shalt not murder
We also have the laws of Lashon Hara ( evil speech)
There's an Islamic or maybe it's a Persian saying that if you have an enemy (just one) in the town, village or city in which you live, an implacable enemy, you had better leave that town, village or city...
And lastly, about humiliating anyone the worst example I know is not the Anansi tale about why the Chimpanzee losing his tail, painful as that must have been for the poor chimp ( the evolutionists could also come up with a similar tale of why, juts like the chimp, Fatface Baruba or Man Friday the pseudo-Englishman doesn't have a tail either, but much more painful and to the point is The story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza – how, due to the humiliating of one man – due to mistaken identity ( like Cornelius and Kadiri) the Second Temple was destroyed and why we should all be careful about Sinat Chinam
I talked to my Orthodox Christian mentor this evening and he tells me that the Eastern Orthodox Church is now celebrating the resurrection of Jesus and that in this period, we should not think about those who have passed away.
Thanks Prof-always a word of wisdom from you.Regards,Anthony--On Sun, Apr 26, 2020 at 1:34 PM Assensoh, Akwasi B. <aassenso@indiana.edu> wrote:--
Brothers Farooq and 'Tony (of Oxford):
The following may be for comic relief but, in the era of COVID-19, nobody knows about tomorrow!
Thank both of you very much for your timely posts. I, too, admire SIR Toyin (TF) for his restraint whenever someone dies and, in fact,he either has little or nothing good to say; often it is like: "John Doe passes on. May he rest in peace!" That is majestically astute andhumane!! After all, as my Legendary Baba Ijebu would say, "Speaking ill of the dead is everybody's waste of time." Therefore, to writedetailed diatribe or insults about the dead, to say the least, is like showing one's ignorance beyond description. After all, the deridedperson is not around to read or hear the diatribe and, also, if there is a falsehood in what is being said, the dead person -- like the nobleblind and innocent deaf -- can neither see nor hear to issue either a rejoinder or a correction.
As I know, when my day comes for me to march on to God Almighty's Kingdom to meet our waiting "good" Elders, there are several of our brothersand sisters of this great Dialogue (and a few other colleagues), who will have something good to say to my surviving Iyawo and, of course, our dearchildren!! However, if anyone, who dislikes me, appears at my funeral service to try to make my nuclear and extended families feel worse with what BabaIjebu would describe as "yeye message", I will surely open my large Ashanti eyes and, from my casket, scream: "Enough is enough; just let me restin peace!" In fact, that will also be the day that SIR Toyin (TF) -- supported by VC Aluko, Lady Nnaemeka and a few others -- will blow a trumpet to lead a DialogueChoir with the singing of the songs: "Lead kindly light..." , and end with "Blessed Assurance..."!!! Then, I will go in peace. If not, I may ask my Iyawo to just play, at theservice, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Drum Major Sermon".
A.B. Assensoh.----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Anthony Akinola <anthony.a.akinola@gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, April 25, 2020 12:09 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: [External] Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Psychology Behind the Unexpected Beatification of Abba KyariThis message was sent from a non-IU address. Please exercise caution when clicking links or opening attachments from external sources.
You can celebrate people when they are dead, what you must not do is permityour celebration to contradict what honest views you had about them.If you genuinely believe someone was flawed while alive, it would be better to keep quiet thanmake a saint of that person.Of course, we must not gloat because someone we do notlike is dead.Anthony Akinola
--On Sat, Apr 25, 2020 at 4:37 PM Farooq A. Kperogi <farooqkperogi@gmail.com> wrote:
Excellent thoughts, Oga Michael! That's why I adore Oga Falola's practice of periodically celebrating people here while they are alive. That's a admirable, praiseworthy endeavor. Celebrate people when they are alive, not just when they are dead.
Farooq
Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.School of Communication & MediaSocial Science BuildingRoom 5092 MD 2207402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogiNigeria's Digital Diaspora: Citizen Media, Democracy, and Participation
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
--On Sat, Apr 25, 2020 at 10:52 AM 'Michael Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> wrote:
--Farooq -
Thanks again for another interesting, albeit controversial write-up.
I have a different perspective on this whole matter and it is rooted in the Yoruba saying that, "Ìgbà a kú l'àá d'ère; èèyàn ò sunwòn l'áàyè." This simply means that humans are often deified at death; when alive, their imperfections are all that are seen, heard, and spoken of. This belief speaks to the hypocrisy of humans who would not sing praises of their so-called friends when those friends were alive but would start to blow the vuvuzela of their "niceties" and close affiliations to the friends as soon as they are dead. The questions to ask all those friends of Abba Kari would be where they were when Kyari was facing the barrages of criticisms of his obsessive compulsive monopolization of the Aso Rock presidential power. Where were they when the man was facing the fiery darts of endless criticism for flying out of the country in official state jets and marginalizing the Vice-President and cabinet members in decision-making? I bet, a good number of them were among the peddlers of those news and accusations (whether real or fake). But now, the "friend" is dead and the "gospel" of holy alliances and unparalleled fraternities must rend the air. We are no fools!
I think we Nigerians generally have a penchant for such behavioral deficit. I have read so much good deeds about dead Nigerians on our social media, which I never knew of such individuals in their lifetimes. You could not but resort into the American street lingo, "Gimme a break!"
Nigerian academics are the worst offenders of this culpable self-deceiving malady. Imagine the enormous amount of eulogies that rushed into our print and electronic media spaces as soon as announcements were made of the deaths of folks like Chinua Achebe, Isidore Okpewo, Abiola Irele, Akinwumi Isola, etc. You could not but ask, "Really? If these folks were so good and you were so close to them, where were you when for years they languished in pain on their death beds and no one, except close relatives, was there to lend them a helping hand?" "In your true conscience, when was the last time you had a real meaningful dialogue, or even mere talking relationship with that so-called "friend"? "Oh, did your close friend remember to tell you how much debts he incurred in the last ten years of his life, which may even be a part of his demise?" Now is time to praise him when he is gone? Arrant nonsense!
Look, I have no reason to disbelieve that there might be some genuine ones; yet, I dismiss almost all eulogies from friends who never wrote one line of their friends' positive deeds when alive with a wave of the hand. In fact, as far as I am concerned, many of those posthumous epistle-like eulogies would have probably lengthened the days of their friends or aded qualities to their lives if indeed the dead friends had read them or heard of such when alive. Many of those all-of-a-sudden friends belong in the diabolical pantheon of folks we call "Friends of Job", friends whom once you have, you no longer need enemies. Their posthumous writings are, in the words of William Shakespeare, "the unkindest cut of all!"
Michael O. Afolayan
On Saturday, April 25, 2020, 3:02:29 AM MDT, Farooq A. Kperogi <farooqkperogi@gmail.com> wrote:
--Saturday, April 25, 2020
Psychology Behind the Unexpected Beatification of Abba Kyari
By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Many people are troubled by what appears to be a carefully coordinated cascade of cloying, revisionist, and, in some cases, outright mendacious posthumous rhetorical rehabilitation of Abba Kyari by people who had misled their readers into seeing them as disinterested sentinels of the wielders of power.
The summary of all the gushy Kyari tributes is basically this: Abba Kyari was an uncommonly kind, deeply intellectual, obsessively bibliophilic, fiercely loyal, hardworking, cosmopolitan Nigeria who had more loyalty to Nigeria than he had to his primordial ethnic, regional, or religious constituencies, and who didn't have even a fraction of the power and influence often attributed to him.
Every empirical evidence that contradicts the torrents of synchronized, saccharine, superhuman portraits of Kyari, his friends want the world to believe, is mere conspiratorial whisper that is wholly dissociated from reality.
Kyari, his friends imply, was a nearly flawless saint. Lack of access to him caused some people to unjustly demonize him. But his confidence in the favorable judgement of history—and of his boss, to whom he was loyal like nobody had ever been in human history—restrained him from correcting reputationally injurious falsehoods against him that took firm roots in the media and in the national popular imagination.
If my recapitulation of the tributes strikes you as annoyingly hagiographic, exaggeratedly mawkish, and overly disingenuous, it is because they really are. And they are dangerous for at least three reasons.
One, there is no one on the surface of this earth who is that perfect. Most people are smart enough to know that. People who peddle a narrative that a human being is untouched by any stain, and that evidence to the contrary is a consequence of "sponsored attacks," are two-bit spin doctors. It's worse if they're journalists.
Two, the minority of people who believe effusive, sanitized, pumped-up portraits of people often suffer self-esteem deficits. They vicariously compare themselves to the perfect person and come up short. They can't relate to perfection because perfection is not a human quality.
Third, when unassailable and irrefutably firm evidence emerges that contradicts the unrealistic idealization and deodorization contained in posthumous tributes, the reputation of the target of such tributes falls precipitously and irrecoverably.
Nonetheless, I know why people who personally knew Abba Kyari have chosen to venerate him after death. Personal access reveals a part of people's personality traits that is often concealed to the public.
The English proverb that says "Familiarity breeds contempt" is not always true. Familiarity can also activate warmth and deep connection. It allows some people to become captives of other people's charm offensives.
In the late 1990s, a senior northern journalist who used to be censorious of Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida finally met him for an interview. That meeting radically overhauled his opinion of the general. He told me—and other young reporters—that anyone who wanted to sustain his hatred and resentment of IBB should not get close to him. "You might go from hating him to loving him," he said. For some reason, those words have stuck in my mind like glue.
Personal familiarity with people changes perspectives about them. I can guarantee that people who have met Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau have a view of him that departs radically from the mainstream characterizations of him.
This might seem like a wild stretch, but people who want to engage in a guilt-free denunciation of Shekau for all his atrocities should do so now while he is alive because in the aftermath of his death, we might be deluged with a cornucopia of syrupy tributes from people who had personal access to him and who can attest to his charm, warmth, humanity, faculty of humor, pan-Nigerianism, and intolerance to injustice. We might read how he was misunderstood and maligned by people who didn't know him.
No one—not even Shekau, Hitler, Mussolini, etc.— is entirely bad. Personal, often privileged, access to otherwise notorious, reviled personages allows us to see their good sides. But should journalists court and cultivate the friendship of people in power to the point of becoming their spin doctors?
Anyone with even the most rudimentary familiarity with the ethics of journalism would know that journalists should not be chummy with the people they cover or comment on. The Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics enjoins journalists to "Refuse gifts, favors, fees, free travel and special treatment, and avoid political and other outside activities that may compromise integrity or impartiality, or may damage credibility."
Many of us who write critical commentaries about governance have rejected opportunities to have privileged personal access to the people we write about. For instance, between 2018 and 2019, I repulsed invitations to meet with Atiku Abubakar or to join his campaign.
Similarly, a few northern governors and a minister had told me they had arranged a meeting between Buhari and me to "reconcile" our "differences." I politely rebuffed their overtures. Sometime last year, a friend who is close to the inner circles of power in the Villa told me Abba Kyari had proposed to give me a "juicy" appointment that I couldn't resist but that a minister and a top Buhari aide who know me personally said I would not only reject the appointment, I might disclose it publicly.
I don't know how true this claim is, but the minister and the presidential aide certainly know me well enough to know that my criticism of government isn't animated by self-aggrandizement. If I wanted to be wealthy from access to people in government, the Buhari regime is one government where I would have "hit it big."
I know more people at close quarters in the regime than I ever did in any government in Nigeria. I admit, though, that it is easy for me to sustain my independence and spurn invitations to partake in the looting of the public treasury because I have an independent source of livelihood as a university teacher in America.
You can't say the same of journalists who work for newspapers that don't pay salaries and that brazenly tell their reporters and editors to use their work ID cards as their "meal tickets." For such reporters and editors, privileged personal access to people in power is an existential necessity. Their very survival depends on it.
The flurry of frenzied posthumous canonizations of Abba Kyari—and the revelations of the privileges that access to Kyari conferred— by supposedly detached, non-partisan journalists speak to the death of any pretense to ethical journalism in Nigeria.
Nonetheless, I'm generally an advocate for posthumous kindness to the dead, not so much because of the dead for whom such kindness is actually pointless but for the survivors of the dead. I lost my wife to a car crash in 2010. I can't tell you how much the kind words written about her sustained me in my most difficult moments.
Whatever Abba Kyari was, he left behind a wife and children who didn't make for him the choices that made him a byword for scorn and opprobrium. His family members deserve to read celebrations of his good deeds from people who are familiar with them.
In my December 3, 2011 column titled "Femi Kusa's Perverse Dance on Ibru's Grave," I wrote that "it's distasteful and insensitive to the survivors of the dead to so carelessly traduce their departed kin just days after his passing. Of course, clearly evil people who brought death and misery to large swaths of people are exempt from this consideration."
Abba Kyari was a public official who directly influenced public policy, whose choices had consequences for millions of Nigerians. I have no problems with people who traduced him in death even though I wouldn't do that, but I also have no problems with people who have chosen to celebrate the good sides of him that weren't available to the public.
What I have a lot of problems with is bending the truth to defend him, such as saying he had no influence in the Buhari regime, which is undermined by the fact that even serving governors, ministers, and senators want to occupy his position.
I also have problems with the demonization of people who are giving expression to their genuine angst over the untoward choices he made when he was alive. Kyari might not have been the devil, but he was no saint either.Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.School of Communication & MediaSocial Science BuildingRoom 5092 MD 2207402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogiNigeria's Digital Diaspora: Citizen Media, Democracy, and Participation
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
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