Between Yahoozee and Ms Winfrey

Oprah has made a handsome living from the power she has to use her couch to make or break issues . She does this for most part with a Lite touch to the acclaim of a lot of women across the world. She is greatly admired and incredibly powerful or so most surveys from the USA suggest. At the same time she rarely ever takes on anything without dumbing it down to a level that makes it only consumable as emotional fast food, emotive, hysterical and completely self serving. From Hip Hop to Racism she finds a point of under- intellectual departure from which her show is launched. My dislike now confirmed she picks on a very touchy subject so called Nigerian Internet Scam. Never mind that the follow up on her website suggests there are 13 million Nigerians, it seems if you are going to stereotype 140 million people you need not even bother with the facts to much.

Yes it is true that Nigerians are involved an awful lot in scams on the internet and the name is now Yahoo, Yahoo boys not 419, Oprah ( even the street issues are wrong). The numbers involved are less than 200,000 individuals as a percentage of 140 million this is less than 1%. Like her favorite Africans in the Mzansi she ignores that there are at least 2 Nigerians on the list of top 10 surgeons in America, that the largest most profitable African American Business of Black Enterprise top 100 is Nigerian owned, the country has produced at least 4 of the 10 most celebrated African writers and even more inventors and scientists. She champions Patricia who admitted she wanted to double her money and illegally help to transfer funds out of Nigeria. Her greed and disdain for the laws of other countries lost her the savings of her life. It reminds me of when I was scammed by a group of Irish lads in a white van my desire to buy a cheap TV and video set with high spec drowned out my normally eloquent intuition and I was taken for £120 pounds. The shame and pain still abides with me till date. If it seems too good to be true it is. There are no innocents in these crimes.

This does not absolve those who participate in this reputation destroying acts. Those of us who were fortunate to travel regularly in the 1970s remember a time when a Nigerian passport earned you respect, deference and even dignity. In the same UK where we are now met with sniffer dogs we were celebrated for our oil wealth as well as enterprise. We were widely known for our desire for education and upward mobility. The turning point was the Buhari/Idiagbon regime starting 31st December 1983. They could never have foreseen that their effort to restrict foreign exchange by cutting remittances to Nigerian students abroad would lead to a broad range of desperate actions including participation in Credit Card fraud. Once some of the brightest and best crossed over into crime the deterrence of shame and the taboo of risking family reputation had been broken so far it has not been restored. There is no excuse but there are always reasons . In a nation with a some of the highest ratio of young men in the world a culture of getting rich quick has used this approach to devastating effect on the reputation of the great country of Nigeria. In a society where conspicuous consumption is celebrated as well as rewarded and productivity ignored there is certainly a breeding ground for this behavior.

Oprah and as the recent Pew research on global attitudes show South Africans in large number paint this stereotype as a Nigerian rather than an human condition. They should know better. There is more per capita crime especially violent robbery leading to murder in Mzansi than Gidi. As Oprah's own life story shows and the treatment of African Americans in USA confirms there should be more caution exercised. Then there are the Nigerians quite a few who describe us by the worst amongst us and now put the celebration of this misguided young men to son. Most popular amongst this is the track Yahoozee. I like the music especially the use of Apala inflection in the chorus but I once again meet my 50 cent/Hip Hop is dead moment. If I buy this music am i glorifying what it celebrates or is it just a work of Art? Is the Godfather a glorification of the Mafia or a classic work of Cinema? Or both?

I know and teach enough about the power of stereotypes to know that when it is well packaged the very people who carry the yoke of being reduced and grouped in this way become the owners as well as enforcer of the label. We can see that in stereotypes such as 'Blond Bimbo' or 'Black super Stud'. It is the power of half truths to be used as the only truth. If only for that reason simplification, stereotypes and reduction the kind Oprah had on her show and the people who made Yahoozee track sell to the public must not be left to stand without challenge. Hopefully the fullness of our character as a nation both good and bad can be explored, understood and finally celebrated as it is for other great experiment in Nationhood. The enterprising and productive millions of Nigerians deserve no less.

The Solutions

'Free Your mind and the rest will follow'

Many little or not so little things have registered over the past few weeks but the point of this blog is to find the most powerful lens to view them from and give something meaningful to the readers. It is a time when a 3 year old 'British kid ' is kidnapped by 'rebels ' from the Niger Delta. A period when even though Senator Obama generated more donations about$32million dollars more than Senator Hillary Clinton's $27 million with over quarter of a million small donors he remains a distant second on National polls. More painful he could not get African Americans to see with a more holistic lens and cheer him on as they continue to be prisoners of their victim mentality. Watch ing the crowd of educated and enlightened Black people fall for Senator Clintons line on HIV/AIDS discrimination against black women. It made me cringe as they hollered for cheap shot and gesture politics as opposed to Obama's remarks designed to share responsibility and hopefully challenge them to recognize their own not so insignificant financial, emotional, intellectual and spiritual resources. It was a period when the New Nigerian Government of Mr Yar adua has allowed the debate about legitimacy and distractions and in fighting of the elite stop it from setting any agenda that captures the imagination of the Nigerian on the street. Here in Milton Keynes the local press put out a wanted ad on a mugger and their only description is ' Black man with big nose believed to be Nigerian'. My shopping basket was filled with many disparate ingredients and I now have a challenge on how can it be turned into a powerful meal? especially when some comments on this very small world we are creating here seeks solutions.

In the past four weeks I have also been involved in one of the most challenging aspect of my day job, teaching those who have authority in organizations in how to lead change that is sustainable. Usually there are three elements to this kind of workshop. How do you get people to participate, adapt and create a space for change emergence. In this case the client a local Council with one of the most diverse populations in the UK, has a cash squeeze, a demanding community and a pressing accommodation move. For most part of this three day training, delivered in groups of maximum 12, to about 47 participants over the 4 weeks we generally had a powerful transformative experience. It was quite draining however my most powerful revelation came with the last group. This was the group with the most senior participants and were beneficiaries of positive feedback from other Preceding participants. Never mind it is Sods Law, they were the most passive of the lot and took very little risk for their own learning. They wanted to be directed by me and also wanted me to extract conclusions for them. When this failed of course they saw it as my failure not something that they shared in creating. We as a group in that circumstance were underperforming and even though there was individual growth and learning the collective normed at the level of the cynics. It reminded me a lot about what I see happening with Nigerian as well as the African American political elites and thought leaders. They are committed to succeeding by default , no pain , no sacrifice, blame others and wait for the messiah who has no faults. Disdain the wisdom of the masses and project own failures on them so that they cannot succeed without your prescribed approach. Paralyze them with a sense of the impossible and constant of complaint even rewarding those with dysfunctional behavior by being an apologist for how they have no choice. All you have to do is look at the Niger Delta and the excuses people make for the abuse of other human beings .

So what can i suggest . First is we are all co creators of what we see as going wrong. We act as observers, commentators, participants and even critics . By just changing our own role into something that moves in the direction of what we desire we start to shift the architecture of the problems we help keep in place. So here goes:

1 ) Change your role if you do same thing for too long you lose your audience.

2) Get out of your bedroom of habitual meaning making or make new meaning of issues. For example my new meaning is around organization in Nigeria not Corruption . it is a powerful paradigm that has led to creating a Institute that has now been licensed by the Nigerian government called the Vocational Management and Organizational Development Centre (VMODC) more later. It has also led to seeing with deeper and more empowering lens.

3) Use many lenses to see the situation especially one that chooses your dreams rather than seeks your nightmare. Simply the eyes of what you love rather than what you fear. Some call it a the power of Attraction since what you focus deeply and meaningfully upon becomes your reality. it is the basis of the book 'the Secret ' but this is the basis of Yoruba Epistomology. The name Orisha is an example it can mean Ori ni afin sha nkan, we choose things with our 'head'. Built in is that we attract what we believe but of course we reject this powerful things. Then there is the power of suggestion that if you do not feel your thoughts with what you want then others will replace it with their own which might be designed to sell you a sense of failure and lead to out performing you. The Mohammed Ali name the round strategy or Rope a Dope . Whose dreams is it that Nigeria should be a failed state? Whose aspiration is it that Africa is the basket of destitution, disease and destruction? What role do we play in attracting these things and keeping them in constant rotation?

4) See the pattern that empowers and increases your possibilities. Have you heard of Ron Eglash and his study of African Fractals. One quote that emerges from this very powerful lens which see that Africans had developed the sophisticated Fractal geometry that is at the top of western aspirations today many years ago is this,

" When Europeans first came to Africa, they considered the architecture very disorganized thus primitive. It never occurred to them that the Africans might have been using forms of mathematics that they hadn't discovered yet"
Ron Eglash 2000

The shame is that it never occurs to many Africans that their continent has the leading competence for this adaptive Century strangely because of the very reasons that it is vilified or pitied that it has nor become so industrialized or engineered that it still uses the authentic capacity to self organize and space for emergence. For many who cannot imagine the genius of the African they will still await the West to declare the revolution.

5) Synthesis into action beyond what is accepted or defined into the world of new possibilities. We are going to use the VMODC to start a revolution. It is a Management revolution where we will use local genius as a catalyst in developing 100,000 new managers, facilitators or organization developers who will help to create 10 jobs through the improvements they create in productivity, creativity and interaction . This is effectively 1 million jobs over 10 years.

The only thing to fear is fear itself. The time is now and our people need pioneers . We need to move beyond the regular deconstruction to improvising if necessary our construction. We need to move beyond nations known for consumption to those who reward production.

The time is now.

Xenophobia in Mzansi

My friends in South Africa are a generation below me in age. They are incredible credit to their nation and to the continent of Africa. I attach a video about their views on the much maligned Nigerians in their midst. It is against this backdrop a new kind of crime emerges that builds on Xenophobia. One of the speakers, my brother and partner Siphiwe Mpiye wrote an article on Xenophobia in Y magazine recently in which he bigs this correspondent. He never told me about it but others did and I am privileged to count him as my brother. All must watch out he represents a future for his people and the continent that is huge.

Back to crime another similar brother who could be Siphiwe's twin Tade another future leader if there ever was robbed at gun point as he arrived at his Johannesburg hotel from the airport. This is not an isolated case as many Nigerians are targeted for being from that country not simply because of their nationality but what it represents. Nigerians visit Mzansi from a country with a cash economy, they have to declare the amounts they are carrying and their destination in Mzansi. I have no doubt that some unscrupulous official is disclosing this to armed co-conspirators who trail their victims or even wait for them at their hotel. This is a crime that draws little sympathy because of stereotypes of Nigerian. For Tade a telecoms executive, father , husband to be attacked on this level leaves scars not just of lost money but total vulnerability in a country where he has no friends. This must change and change soon even though CNN will not carry it neither will NTA or SABC broadcast it the real loser in the end will be Mzansi and as Siphiwe says we cannot afford such loss.

What did Aremu Do to you?

A government that delivers a home grown reform that increases GDP from average 2.5% till 1997 to an average 6% in 2007 including 10.2% growth in 2003. A three fold increase in Per Capita GDP at Purchasing Power Parity $1,800 . An average growth of Non oil sector of the economy at average 9% . Total eradication of Debt stock of about $38 billion dollars, both current account and trade surplus. The second fastest growing telecoms market in the world. A capital market that is reputed to yield returns up to 400%. Inflation reduced from over 20% to about 12 %. In any country someone who oversaw such a radical change in Macro- economic condition will be feted as an hero. Never mind that this same man was there to sign the peace agreement to end the Biafra war and oversaw the last time the country Nigeria had similar macro- economic direction. Many will say this is just good fortune nd a fluke for some of us people make their own fortune. Historians will look back at Olusegun Aremu Obasanjo and they will see a true Hero, a Nigerian Hero. Mrs Okonjo Iweala agrees with me in the video below.

The Blag Matrix 'Bye Blair'

For those of us who live here in the United Kingdom we are going through a changing of the guards like has just gone on in Nigeria only we do not get to have a say on who rules us. Never mind about flawed elections in Gidi how about no election at all. Talk of corruption after nearly eight years since applying to the British government for the Abacha millions, Nigeria has yet had its stolen money returned. The city of London remains the money laundering capital of the world. Add to it that the government that takes 40% of my income as basic taxes stopped prosecution of BAE Systems for bribery in the Al Yammemah defence contract with Saudi Arabia. In fact Bribes were tax refundable if they were paid abroad until 2002. The same Government has continued to keep the people of the Chaigos of their Island even though the House of Lords had ruled in their favour.

My point, what is it that makes the average Nigerian elite take all the stolen and earned money to send their children to be indoctrinated in this environment? As I got on my flight from Lagos to london on the 3rd of June I was amazed how full the flight was with teenagers apparently going back to school accompanied or unaccompanied, spread across the upper class premium economy and the rare economy occupant. Good old blighty seems able to blag its way into being considered world class even though it is a country which looks to its past for its best moments, where innovation is ridiculed, excellence despised and victimhood crowned. A country that continues to run a scam on the rest of the world by putting the word Great in front of its name because it manages to bluff others to think they are somehow inferior. If only the world did not buy into this bullshit but everyone does. Life is just a confidence trick.

Step in the greatest fraud of the lot, Tony Blair Esq. My son reminded me I was his greatest fan and surely some time ago I truly believed Mr toothy grin was really committed to helping this country get beyond its overdose of insecurity and reposition itself for the unique challenges of the 21st century. No he was only committed to retaining Power so he always changed structure of things so that it appeared new even if the inside was decaying. On any given day when it is either too hot or too cold our transport infrastructure here completely shuts down. Mr Man manages to claim things that are not even his success. Take Sierra Leone where Nigerian army died in abundance to protect the country guess who claims being saviour yes, Toothy Tony. Have you not noticed that he only speaks 'truth' to the weak or down trodden like the Palestinians never challenges the Israelis or his buddy George W.

Never mind Tony they will be singing your praises in Ajegunle and Gugulethu when you tell them you are going to be tough on poverty and the causes.poverty. I hope they have the good sense to look outside before you leave. God save us from those who seek to help us.

Join us

Yaw the writer and producer of this play is a Renaissance man, co-traveller who brings Africa alive in her majesty anywhere he goes. Lets support him as he opens a new path for others to follow with this project. If you can get to Milton Keynes, England join us at this celebration of life. More postings soon.

Election is not democracy.

"At this juncture one is tempted to ask, who is the Nigerian? My answer will not be for your comfort because I see the Nigerian as a materialist with yearnings for spiritual uplifment; a capitalist with socialist pretentions; a democrat with dictatorial traits of insufferable guile and intolerance, a welfarist with traits of sado-masochistic junketing who has raised philandering to an art form; he is a guru who dines with the devil, he is an intellectual with fear of flying beyond the horizon of mediocre intellectual aspirations; he is proud but has a sickening awareness of his inadequacies. He is, in short, a very normal person and a personality all of his own, which makes him stand out anywhere in the world as a Nigerian, regardless of his ethnic background".

by Phillip Effiong in Re-integration True or False.

A successful election is primarily a truimph of organisation and management not strictly speaking a moral process. The recent Nigerian elections were an honest reflection of the true organisational capacity of the country as a whole (not just government). Too much credit gets given to the the ruling party and the outgoing government for rigging the election while quite honestly they could not have organised it so well that the effort was that blantant. The questions critics never answer is that were they responsible for the many lives of Police officers lost? Did they organise the attempt to bomb their so called 'allies' in the INEC? A good friend once said to me when things fail in human affairs your character is reflected in your choice of the two options or explanation whether you choose, the Conspiracy or the Cock up. I see unfailingly that this was a traditional Nigerian cock up, fashioned by incompetence, grown by hyper competition and crowned by corruption. When you read the foriegn press especially the economist you read a lazy analysis and editorial that seems to equate successful elections with demoocracy. By that very token Iraq had a successful election which by all iintents and purpose was free and fair but so what? The only exception was the recent New York Times article that acknowledges that the institutional progress from the Supreme Court to the Military they all suggest that there are independent organizations that do not fold towards the creation or coronation of individuals. Successful countries are not just democracies but places where institutions represent the spirit of the people, protect their aspirations and embody their energies at its most productive. For many of us China has shown that success is not only western but it is actually about authenticity. In Nigeria as much as I dislike them the almost forever hysterical and incoherent Nigerian press which seems to have decided against the Obasanjo regime at any cost and gave so much free space to any innuendo or gossip, is an example of the health of the emerging country.

Nigerians made a choice even if they did not vote it. We all signed up for stability at any cost if not things would have been different. The many middle class people who did not register to vote, the many elites who jumped ship going abroad for premature summer holidays. Those who just could not be bothered to cast their vote at all. Many were tired of the hyper competition of the win at any cost political classes. Nothing in the election is different in fundamental nature from how election happens in many countries across the world even in Scotland where over 100,000 ballots were spoiled. The matrix for disorganisation was already in place from the hyper competitive politicos;the neopythe electorate; delayed list of candidates; the extreme lack of logistics, project and management capacity ; culture of owambe optmism or unrealistic last minute hopefulness; the fear of CIA break up prediction. It is in this cocktail of melodrama and incomptenece that many expected a open and free election? I often wonder where such expectations spring from. So is it as the Economist says it is or as the Chicage Tribune describes that Obasanjo is a disappointment and Nigeria an embarrasment?

In the 1960s India was all the hallmark of a failing state and would fall apart according to western press. The same people now cannot stop praising but then they used similar descriptions as they use for Nigeria. My view of Nigeria is as a work in progress. In some things we are worse than even our worst critics think, for one the failure to have a serious Vocational eduction regime and the fact that about 56 million young people have disappeared out of any education development after secondary and primary schools. On the other hand we wiped out nearly all of National debts, Per capita GDP growth of three folds passing the $1000 mark for the first time in over two decades, growth of GDP over 6% in the last two years, the fastest growing telecoms market in Africa, more than tripling of foriegn reserves and doubling of the record levels of Foriegn Direct Investment. In fact the remittances of Nigerian Diaspora far exceeded the levels of FDI and probably for the first time is rivalling the levels of Capital flight from the country. If that is not a vote of confidence then I wonder what is?

Something has changed forever and it might not show in the ballot but it shows in people getting motgages for the first time ever, safe enough to take money from cash points in the middle of the night, Nigerian businesses in aquisitions across West Africa , the middle class re emerging and the fastest growth of the non oil sector in nearly three decades.

So elections were not up to International standards so sue me. Lets get our country truly working through building capacity to truly organize and manage then eventually elections will be deliverered to the same international standards where rigging will be more sophisticated. Then we will debate hanging chards and computer glitches and not killing police officer and stealing ballot boxes. Then we would have achieved the international standards to the satisfaction of the Economist and its Nigerian acolytes.