RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Fwd: [NIgerianWorldForum] ADAMU'S IDIOTIC TIRADE AGAINST WOLE SOYINKA

Opinion and commentary like SO’s below is one reason Nigeria is the near mess of an abundantly endowed country that she is today. One suspects that the great Wole Soyinka  will be mostly amused by Abba’s tirade against his person. He must know that it is not possible that everyone would agree with his views. He probably appreciates that there are people that share his views while he may not really care that they do. He probably would be dismayed that one of his so-called defenders seized on Abba’s tirade as an excuse to relieve his frustration with Abba’s “family”, “tribe”, and “region”.

Abba’s criticism of Wole Soyinka is no more than a personal disagreement with the latter. Abba is entitled to his thoughts and opinion as much as everybody else is. Abba’s criticism should not be construed as criticism of Wole Soyinka’s ethnicity of ethnic group.

I have followed Wole Soyinka for many years now. I believe that the man’s mission for many years now, has been an enlightened search for the truth and the desire to share it with others. Wole Soyinka, like many concerned Nigerians is disappointed with Nigeria and what she has become. He knows that that one reason for Nigeria’s failures must be the dishonesty, insincerity, and unfaithfulness of both Nigeria’s leaders and followers on grave matters of state.  Wole Soyinka Knows that there are many who are deserving of the Nobel prize and other prizes that are not recipients. Any  professor would be expected to know this.

SO reminds one of the failure of the Nigeria project as it pertains to education. Nigeria has and continues to produced an educated class that is unable to see issues and appraise the opinion of other Nigerians with the ethnic prism. Nigeria is not alone in being a heterogeneous contraption of a country. There are indeed few truly homogeneous countries in the world. There are differences and disagreements in every country. There are intra and inter communities’ competition driven by different interests. Countries become great because their different communities choose to live and work together, acknowledge a common and shared future, and are respectful of one and each other in spite of perceived and real differences.

There is presently a movement to break up the United kingdom. All discussions and disagreement s are civil with no recourse to abuse and insult of each or one another. There is agreement that as has been the case in the past, a referendum in 2014 will decide the issue.   

Nation building is  work-in-progress. It is a tough project. It is made tougher by intemperate language especially when applied to other communities. The level and pace of development is never even in any country. Some parts have a head start and are ahead for some time. Other parts catch up in time and may in fact overtake early starters. There are people alive today who remember when the Ekiti Yoruba were thought to be the “backwater” Yoruba because of their late start in western education. Who is laughing now?

The under-development of any part or people of Nigeria should be a matter of concern to all Nigerians. The country without question, pays a high price for it. An army as they say, marches at the speed of its weakest soldiers.

 

oa

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Prof Segun Ogunbemi
Sent: Tuesday, February 21, 2012 6:39 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Fwd: [NIgerianWorldForum] ADAMU'S IDIOTIC TIRADE AGAINST WOLE SOYINKA

 

I want to know how many people in Abba's family or tribe have won any form of awards in academia? And how many of them in his family and tribe have won a Nobel prize? You can begin to award Achebe on your own but as far as those who are in authority to award Achebe the prize have not done so, it means he does not meet the standard hence he does not deserve it yet. Maybe in future he may be lucky and everyone will rejoice with him and until that day comes, we must hold on proudly to what Wole Soyinka has gloriously given to Nigeria and Africa. For Adamu, his tribe and region that are mostly Mulims in Nigeria worship Arab's god and they go to Saudi Arabia to stone the devil leaving the devil in their home behind. Intead of stoning the devil in their land to ward off ignorane, poverty, underdevelopment etc they go to Saudi Arabia to stone the devil to ward off evil of in Arab land. His people are backward and many of them roam about everywhere in the country as beggars and destitute. Adamu does not see anthing wrong with that. He is truly an idiot. He cannot appreciate good values because it is not in their tradition to do so. It is in their tradition to destroy, kill and maim people. The latest example is their political Boko Haram sect. In the 21st century when people of rational consciousness engage in development the best they can offer is 17 out of 18000 students who managed to qualify for admission in Gombe State. All the money their leaders have stolen from public treasury never got invested in education of their children. No development has come significantly. What they wait for every month is the federal allocation no more no less. The idea of self development is not in their Koranic school dictionary. Their religious language  is couched in foreign language which they don't understand. They impact the irreverent language of their religion stupidly. The Hausas have lost their own cultural values and morals and embraced Arab's. Adamu should rethink the loss over the years and find a way of reinventing their own. Because the Hausas where Adamu comes from have no cultural values to be proud of, he denigrated the Yoruba cultural values and aesthetic. The Yoruba cultural values are kept alive in the world but that cannot be said of the Hausas. Adamu and people of like mind who are envious of the progress and achievements of the Yoruba elite, intellectuals and scholars should have a rethink of what they say and write. We are proud of our Wole Soyinka and nothing anyone can do about it. Prof. Segun Ogungbemi. --- On Tue, 2/21/12, OLUWATOYIN ADEPOJU <toyinvadepoju@gmail.com> wrote: From: OLUWATOYIN ADEPOJU <toyinvadepoju@gmail.com> Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Fwd: [NIgerianWorldForum] ADAMU'S IDIOTIC TIRADE AGAINST WOLE SOYINKA To: "wolesoyinkasociety" <WoleSoyinkaSociety@yahoogroups.com>, "usaafricadialogue" <USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com> Date: Tuesday, February 21, 2012, 11:04 AM   ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Abba Date: Tue, Feb 21, at 2:08 PM Subject: Re: [NIgerianWorldForum] ADAMU'S IDIOTIC TIRADE AGAINST WOLE SOYINKA To: NIgerianWorldForum@yahoogroups.com   Nafata,   With all due respect to Wole Soyinka, but his Nobel Prize (in literature) isn't exactly anything to brag about in the grand scheme of things.  If he had won on subjects that truly matter...such as Chemistry, Physics or Medicine, then yes...we will all shout hooray (the Nobel in Chemistry, Physics, Medicine, and to some extent, Economics are the ones most celebrated...I cannot recall anyone who pays much attention to awards in Literature; and if you press me, I cannot name two winners in the literature category).  What Africa needs is real advances in science and technology...and not the art of story telling (with all due respect to those whose job/hobby it is to tell stories or to entertain us with their prowess in the language of Shakespeare).  Besides, there are many others in Africa who are probably as, or even more, deserving of the literature prize (Achebe is surely one).   Disclaimer:  I consider Soyinka to be a tribalist of the highest order.  So, you may wish to read the above bearing this in mind.  I strongly doubt, though, if my view about the importance of the literature prize (vis-a-vis Africa's development) will change regardless who the recipient is.  I like and respect the art...greatly; but I also know that what we do need, and need desperately, at the present time in Africa is excellence in science and technology...Nobel prizes in those areas are the ones that truly matter to us (and dare I say everyone else).   Netters, I do not intend to offend anyone...I just felt we should place things in proper context.   Abba On 21 February 2012 07:42, Nafata Bamaguje <bamaguje@googlemail.com> wrote:       ADAMU’S IDIOTIC TIRADE AGAINST SOYINKA   Adamu Adamu’s recent virulent attack on Black Africa’s only intellectual Nobel laureate was immature, abusive and totally uncalled for.  It revealed a disturbing shallowness of mind unbecoming of even the pretentious pseudo-intellectual that he is. I am not privy to the full comments by our esteemed Nobel laureate on the murderous Boko Haram that seemingly provoked Adamu’s uncouth ill-informed diatribe - Soyinka: Still in Bo-ro-no state (whatever that means) – published in the Northern Islamist rag – Daily Trust.   But going by the thrust of his article, it appears Adamu has been nursing a grudge against Professor Soyinka and spoiling for a fight.  The Prof’s reported comments holding the northern leadership responsible for Boko Haram, was just a convenient pretext for Adamu to vent his simmering hatred and discomfort with the fact that in a nation in which over 99% of the people identify themselves as Christian or Muslim, a pagan African traditionalist emerges as the Black world’s only Nobel laureate that earned the accolade for intellectual pursuits.   Hence instead of specifically refuting whatever he disagreed about Soyinka’s Boko Haram comment, Adamu deviated from the issue, abandoned all sense of decorum and launched into an unprovoked malicious tirade against traditional African spirituality, Yoruba culture and Soyinka, with slanderous personal attacks – variously accusing the Prof of superiority complex, hubris, paganism and other such balderdash.   The closest Adamu came to rebuttal of Soyinka’s stance on Boko Haram in his hogwash, was an off-hand remark that “Boko Haram... is opposed to all constituted authority including that to be wielded by the Northern leaders that were supposed to have founded it...”   As if that would be the first time politicians in this country created a monster they can’t control. It is common knowledge that many Niger Delta militants started out as thugs for local politicians hell bent on ‘winning’ elections, and several northern commentators pointedly state this fact. But when it comes to Boko Haram, they put on their blinkers and can’t see the clearly evident culpability of short-sighted parochial northern leaders.   Fact one: Boko Haram’s agenda to impose Sharia is exactly the same as that of northern politicians who have repeatedly rejected secularism, and nearly tore this country apart a decade ago at the peak of the invidious Sharia agitation.   Fact two: The late Alhaji Buji Fai, former Borno state Sharia commissioner appointed by then governor Ali Modu Sheriff, was a known sponsor of Boko Haram.   Fact three: The late Boko Haram leader, Mohammed Yusuf was reportedly killed in custody after a jail visit by the former Borno governor Ali Modu Sheriff, which suggests a cover-up to avoid Yusuf spilling the beans during any court trial.   Fact four: Madalla bomber, Kabiru Sokoto was arrested in Borno governor’s lodge in Abuja.   Fact five: In the months preceding last year’s election, several northern leaders repeatedly threatened fire & brimstone if Jonathan became president. Hence the subsequent post-election violence and present escalation of Boko Haram insurgency.     Fact six: By persistently refusing to embrace secularism which compels moderation for religious harmony in our multi-religious nation, northern leaders wittingly & unwittingly encourage the religious extremism that has erupted in incessant orgies of religious violence over the last 3 decades, now culminating in Boko Haram.   Fact seven: By condoning the culture of institutionalized child abuse (Almajiri) that deprives our children of proper education required to function in a modern society, the northern ruling class has unwittingly provided a powder keg of disgruntled recruits for Boko Haram.   Now to the thrust of Adamu’s detestable diatribe; his unwarranted incredibly asinine attack on Professor Soyinka and traditional African spirituality. The pseudo-intellectual nitwit misconstrues Soyinka exemplary exposition of Yoruba culture in his literary works as Yoruba supremacy:   “Going by the themes of his literary output, he seems to believe that his race is the greatest and the most cultured.”   By the same token Chinua Achebe’s brilliant exposition of Igbo culture in Things Fall Apart and Arrow of God makes him an Igbo supremacist. If the accomplished Igbo author who has severally extolled pre-Christian Igbo culture, openly declares for traditional African spirituality, Adamu would be compelled to go after him.   As a Muslim and clueless victim of Arab cultural imperialism, Adamu has no problem with worshipping an Arab god, bearing Arab names, facing Arabia when he prays to a false god that only understands Arabic. It’s alright for Arabs to promote their vicious hate cult around the world, but it’s wrong for Soyinka to proudly to do the same for our African heritage. It takes mindboggling stupidity unbecoming of even a pretend intellectual like Adamu to be oblivious of this blatant nonsensical double standard – Arab good, Africa bad.   By the way Soyinka isn’t the only Yoruba traditionalist to have received notable international acclaim. The late Afrobeat maestro, Fela Anikulapo Kuti was another such icon. It is unfortunate that de-Africanized Arab wannabes like Adamu can’t appreciate the obvious lesson in this - Yorubas who more than any other Black African people have best preserved their indigenous African heritage, have also produced some of Africa’s greatest minds.   While Hausas whose indigenous culture has been virtually wiped out by the violently intolerant Arab pseudo-religion they now subscribe, are among Africa’s most backward people with incessant religious violence and a culture of institutionalized child abuse (Almajiri) that has rendered over 10 million children destitute…all in the name of the retrogressive Arab pseudo-religion they stupidly embrace – Islam.   Given this appalling baggage of Islam in Arewa and the ongoing global Islamist menace, Adamu has the impudence to deride African spirituality as primitive paganism:    “what Soyinka holds aloft is not culture: it is paganism...But the possession of a pagan past is no accomplishment. It is there at the centre and origin of every type of primitiveness.”   What the chic!!  Someone who subscribes to a false religion that is defined today by violent intolerance, terrorism, honor killing, rape, paedophilia has the temerity to call we African Traditionalists who never degenerated to such barbarism, ‘primitive.’ Does Adamu really understand the meaning of the word ‘primitive?’                                                                                                                                    Nations like Japan, China, Korea, India which have retained the essence of their pagan heritage are far more scientifically & technologically advanced than any Muslim or African nation. If we Africans had done the same and stuck to our rich indigenous traditions rather than mindlessly ape Arabs, Jews & Europeans; we would have been much better off.   Even the nominally Christian West has a healthy relationship with its pre-Christian pagan past that is sometimes celebrated in modern pop culture. The annual Halloween festival, movies like the Harry Potter and Thor, as well as several TV series are all rooted in their pre-Christian pagan heritage.   It is only here in culturally disoriented Black Africa where we have been brainwashed to despise our ancestral heritage that a blithering idiot like Adamu masquerading as an intellectual would publicly on the pages of a major newspaper shamelessly blurt out this inanity:   “what is this Yoruba culture in which people like Soyinka take so much pride?”   Since Adamu has no Hausa culture to be proud of - as it has all been obliterated by the violently intolerant Arab creed he now espouses – Soyinka’s erudite exposition of Yoruba culture is completely lost on his retarded mind. He fails to appreciate that for those of us whose African heritage have been lost to the systematic onslaught and cultural genocide by intolerant alien creeds (Islam & Christianity), scholarly works like those of Soyinka and Achebe provide valuable insight to our collective African heritage.   Yorubas after all can be considered a microcosm of black Africa. Stripped to its fundamentals, Yoruba culture isn’t that different from Igbo, Nupe, Edo, or even pre-Islamic Hausa. Hausa historical tradition even asserts that our South West kin are part of the larger Hausa family – Banza Bakwai. It’s not for nothing that the Dagi Arewa, a traditional motif that is emblematic of the North, is also commonly embroidered on Yoruba agbadas.                                                                                                                                   Even non-Africans appreciate that the insightful works of Soyinka and Achebe enrich us all, hence their international acclaim. But narrow minded bigots like the Daily Trust Islamist hack can’t see beyond religion, hence this idiocy - “After the advent of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, there is nothing more to glory in animistic heathenism”   Really!! Somehow Africa’s paganism which is defined by religious tolerance that allows for harmonious peaceful coexistence of differing spiritual traditions (ignorantly derided as polytheism); is inferior to the monotheistic intolerance of Islam and Judeo-Christianity that have over several centuries killed a hundred times more people in the names of their false gods (Allah, Yahweh) than all pagan religions combined.   As for ‘animistic heathenism,’ how does one describe mandatory Muslims prayers towards a stone (Kaaba) in Mecca, if not animism? It’s alright for Muslims to venerate a rock in the desert, but if for some historical reason we African traditionalists do the same, its ‘animistic heathenism.’   The truth is that pagans pioneered human civilization and laid down the values that now define the so-called Western civilization. Pagans in ancient Egypt, Greece, Persia, Babylon, India, Rome and even here in sub-Saharan Africa pioneered mathematics, astronomy, medicine, physics, democracy, religious freedom and all other positive human endeavours that define modernity today.   On the contrary, when allowed free reign both Islam and Christianity have historically stifled intellectual advancement and societal progress. After Christianity was imposed on Rome as state religion, an inexorable decline followed as Christians persecuted non-Christians into extinction. Rome soon fell to the barbarians and Europe lapsed into the Dark ages (400-1100AD) during which it stagnated as the Church had absolute control. Galileo was imprisoned, Giordano Bruno was executed and countless others were burnt at the stakes as ‘heretics’.   Similarly, Medieval Islam’s so-called ‘Golden age’ which largely thrived on the rich intellectual traditions of conquered non-Muslims (Persians, Assyrians, Indians, Spaniards etc), was relatively short lived. With the forced Islamization of these conquered non-Muslims and persecution into extinction of the Mutazilites – an ancient Greece influenced unorthodox Muslim sect that ranked reason above the Quran - scientific and technological progress in the Caliphate came to a screeching halt. Hence Pakistani physicist, Pervez Hoodbhoy rightly points out that “No major invention or discovery has emerged from the Muslim world for well over seven centuries now."   In an unusually candid 2009 interview, Sheik Ibrahim Al-Bulehi, a former member of the Saudi Shura council acknowledged that the intellectual accomplishments of the Muslim hyped ‘Golden age’ had absolutely nothing to do with Islam:   "What I want to clarify is that those achievements were not of our own (Muslim) making, and those exceptional scholars were not the product of Arab (Islamic) culture, but rather Greek culture. They were outside our cultural mainstream and we treated them as though they were foreign elements. Therefore we don't deserve to take pride in them since we rejected them and fought against their ideas. Conversely, when Europe learned from them it benefited from a body of knowledge which was originally its own because they were an extension of Greek culture, which is the source of the whole of Western civilization."   As Al-Bulehi rightly points out above, Western civilization has become the dominant force it is today largely because it returned to the rich intellectual traditions of its pagan roots in ancient Greece. Today that pagan tradition of unfettered religious & intellectual freedom is captured in secular democracy. By the way, historians as far back as Herodotus assert that the intellectual prowess of ancient Greece had its foundations here in Africa – Kemet (ancient Egypt).   Muslims on the other hand who refuse to embrace secularism with its attendant religious & intellectual freedom have not only remained backward relative to we infidels, but have also become an impediment to human progress. It is because of Muslims we have to endure long hours of arduous security checks and invasive body searches at international airports. It’s because of Muslims several Western nations have promulgated draconian legislations like America’s Patriot Act that infringe on civil liberties. It is because of Muslims and their absurd conspiracy theories about Jewish vaccines that we can’t eradicate polio in Nigeria. It’s because of Muslim paedophiles several northern states have blocked the Child Rights Act intended to protect our children.   Worst of all, Islam is the greatest threat to world peace today as it is the number one cause of violent conflict around the world – Somalia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Middle East, Russia, Phillipines, Thailand, USA, Europe and of course here in Naija where Boko Haram threatens the continued unity of our dear motherland.   With such deeply entrenched Muslim aversion to intellectual freedom required for societal advancement, it’s no surprise they lag behind we non-Muslims in all positive human endeavours - science, technology, democracy, human rights etc. It’s also no surprise our Islamist north is unable to produce intellectual giants like Soyinka and Achebe. Not with small minded pseudo-intellectuals like Adamu Adamu perpetuating the mental enslavement of our people in intolerant bogus alien creeds.                                                                                                         Nafata Bamaguje       __._,_.___ Reply to sender | Reply to group | Reply via web post | Start a New Topic Messages in this topic (2) Recent Activity: ·         New Members 64 Visit Your Group Switch to: Text-Only, Daily Digest • Unsubscribe • Terms of Use . __,_._,___   -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin. 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