Diary of an Abuja Billionaire: Week 16

Jamal is an Abuja-based billionaire bachelor and businessman who works hard and parties hard. Welcome to his world.

Week 16

Monday

I was back in Abuja feeling stronger. Even though a shipment of luxury office furniture for one of my store was damaged and the store’s MD wasn’t picking up his calls, and even though I was still getting annoying emails and calls about the sex scandal, I was feeling on top of the world. I will soon marry the woman I love, the one who warmed my heart enough for it to spill its secrets, and who didn’t judge me for becoming rich off the proceeds of my father’s death. I arranged for Louis Vuitton representatives to bring their choice products to a private viewing for her, and told her to choose whatever she wanted.

Tuesday

ZeeGC’s 320 factory staff in Brazzaville were protesting poor working conditions, so I approved a salary increase and six buses for their transportation, calculating that the predicted profits from my interests in Congo will cover that shortfall. One of my drivers who I’d sponsored to Mecca absconded, and when he was caught he gave Saudi authorities my number. After I arranged for his return he begged for his job back but I refused. But the new driver that replaced him crashed my Rolls Royce today and abandoned the vehicle in fear, so I gave the old driver one his job back. At least he drove carefully.

Wednesday

I had dinner with Zainab’s parents and her four sisters including Halima, who never looked me in the eye. We discussed plans for the wedding, but when Alhaji asked about my mother, Zainab and I looked at each other in alarm, then I told him my mother will contact him soon. Zainab and I have decided not to tell anyone about my father’s murder, especially since Alhaji had known Uncle Gumbo in the past. Although my mother disliked Zainab’s family, if she doesn’t cooperate I’ll just tell them she can’t attend the wedding.

Thursday

I wore my Armani Herringbone-striped suit to a meeting at the UN headquarters to discuss a collaboration, and afterwards had lunch with Dr Bolagun and the Chens, who I hadn’t seen since our emergency meeting following the sex scandal. Today we discussed the divorce of a colleague who had impregnated their second housegirl in two years. I marvelled at how gossip travelled so fast among the business community, and I was happy I was no longer the topic of conversation.

Friday

Zainab wanted a wedding in Abuja, but I wanted it in Rome. My nightmares had stopped, but I was still seeing Dr Ferral whenever I could. He was the only other person who knew about the murder, and I spent our sessions recalling details I’d forgotten and talking about how badly I treated my mother afterwards. I’d concentrated my anger on her instead of Uncle Gumbo, and she reacted by letting me shut her out of my life. “Has she had any therapy?” Dr Ferral asked. I laughed. “Just because I’m talking with you doesn’t mean it’s normal for Africans to tell strangers their problems,” I said.

Saturday

Dr Ferral noted that I ended up resenting the girl in the room with me as well as my mother following my father’s death, and concluded that my love-hate relationship with women sprang from that night. I somehow blamed them for his death. Tonight at our engagement party at my house, Zainab agreed. “You enjoy women, but you don’t like them. Except for me,” she smiled sweetly and I laughed. I’d arranged for Tuface to perform tonight, along with fireworks, chocolate fountains, Chinese circus acrobats and the video of my proposal in Switzerland playing on a big screen in the garden.

Sunday

After a meeting at the House of Representatives, I had lunch with some associates before heading back to my office, and was reading an MOU when my assistant told me my brother was at the gate. Strangers often try and get through security by saying they’re family members just to beg for money, so I told him to refuse the man entry. “He said his name is Ishaya Gumbo.” I froze. Uncle Gumbo’s illegimate son had been in America with his mother since we were kids. When he walked into my office I was shocked: he looked exactly like Uncle Gumbo. It was like seeing a ghost.

Getting From There to Here

 

 How one woman battled to reduce her size and save her life, by Omonike Odi

In January 2013, Liz Taylor was at her heaviest, tipping the scales at 155 kg on a 5' 8" frame and with a Body Mass Index (BMI) that put her in the danger zone. She was pre-diabetic and hypertensive and her feet had swollen from a size 7 to a size 10. She constantly experienced body aches, migraines and fatigue and occasionally suffered bouts of depression over her weight.

But by June of the same year, Liz had lost a significant amount of weight and was in a healthier, happier place.

Things came to a head when Liz had a premonition that she wouldn’t live long if she didn’t do something drastic to reduce her size. She considered surgery and finally settled for a Sleeve Gastrectomy, a surgical weight-loss procedure in which the stomach is reduced to about 25% of its original size, giving it the appearance of a sleeve or tube-like structure.

But surgery was just the beginning. Liz also had to make difficult changes to her lifestyle as she had been warned by the doctors that surgery alone would not guarantee weight loss, but the right combination of consistent exercise and a disciplined diet will give her the results she wanted.

Liz learnt to use kettle bells and enrolled for swimming lessons, learning to swim several laps in six weeks. The scales soon started to agree with Liz’s new mindset.

She altered her diet; removing bread completely, swapping sweet drinks for tea and experimenting with healthy recipes. She soon developed her own nutritional dishes full of healthy Nigerian foods.

She was definitely far from the days when she couldn’t find her size in clothes stores, days when the automated voice in the anti-intrusion security doors of banks announced “One person at a time please” when she stepped in, days when people gave her telling looks, and days when her inner voice screamed “Fat and ugly!” when she looked in the mirror.

Eager to share her progress with others who have also struggled with losing weight, she started a blog called www.dropit4life.blogspot.com where she shares diet plans, recipes for the average Nigerian foodie, exercise and dressing tips.

To those women and men still struggling, she says “it is possible.”

These days Liz is able to affirm her strength, and when the inner voice of condemnation rears its ugly head, she returns in equal measure with affirmative thoughts like; "everyday in every way, I am getting better and better by the grace of God."

Losing weight is no easy feat and for Liz it has taken everything she’s got to accomplish this life-changing goal. She knows from experience that it is one thing to lose weight and another to keep it off, but she is positive that with deliberate lifestyle changes it can be done.

More pictures below:

Liz Taylor before her Surgery

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Liz Taylor after her Surgery

One Night as an Art Enthusiast

I am at the art exhibition organised by Achara Fusion Theatre, looking up at frames on the wall in the way I see people do on television-- arms folded, head cocked, observing with a calm intensity the works on display.

I am looking but I barely see, at least not as clearly, I presume, as do the other visitors who are ambling about the room, drink in hand, moving from wall to wall with a thorough appreciation of the works.

Art connoisseur, culture vulture, art broker, whatever sexy name applies-- I am none of these, just a wannabe. I have the urge to watch my back. I feel like an impostor, standing so in adulation of a work of art. But for a night I can pretend to be an art aficionado. I am a lady of culture.

Before me is an image of a man paddling a canoe on a river that is clean in parts and in other parts splashed with colours. That for me is the end of the story. But there must be aspects of the work invisible to the untrained eyes, hidden messages, connotations, themes, the essence of the work. I feel obliged to linger and contemplate the work.

I gaze at it, waiting for revelation. The artist is talking but understanding eludes me. He is explaining himself to me, trying to engage me in a conversation. How do I understand a language to which I have had little exposure? The room, though quiet, is filled with voices, the artists’ and their audience.

Boredom urges me on to another painting, a portrait of a woman and a toddler. Mother and child are smiling. The narrative is simple: it depicts the joy of motherhood. But it could be the focus is on infancy, not motherhood. How would I know? With my simplistic interpretation, I move on, happy with my version of the story, happy to have imposed my thought on the artist.

A monochrome photograph catches my attention, a candid shot of a lady and a horse in a desert. The horse is ahead and the lady, dressed in pants and long-sleeves shirt and a veil, is inches behind. She holds what looks like a plank. I cannot anticipate her intention. Poke the horse from behind? Not likely. The vagueness of the situation makes it even more interesting.

And then there is a statuette of lovers conjoined at the loins. This is readily open to diverse interpretations.

It is easier at the fabric section. Here I can feel the materials without fear of ruining them. I recognise the fabrics. Yards of aso-oke, tie-dye, and other local, handmade clothes. The textile artist is on standby for further education.

I have gone round and returned to the beginning and to the canoeist.

‘The medium is oil on canvas,’ says one of the curators, Godwin Tom, now standing beside me. This particular piece happens to be his work, so he explains at length the significance of every shade of colour applied. Summarily, it is about the effect of oil spillage in the Niger-delta. Finally, the truth is revealed.

We go on tour again. With his guidance, every work is illuminated, tricks are uncovered, intentions are laid bare. I learn to identify an artist’s work. That should be Adeshina’s work because it is rendered in a mixed medium, I say for instance, or because it is an impressionist painting. I learn more art jargon.

The Canadian Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Perry Calderwood, and Ken Saro Wiwa Jr are here. They are unanimous in their praise for Tom’s work. The water pollution painting, they say to me at different times, is the star piece of the night. I relate their opinion to the artist who must have been disappointed at my lack of recognition of his talent. Now he is elated.

From the strategic positioning of his work at the fore I should have known it was special. At subsequent exhibitions, it would be safe to assume that the work at the entrance is not kitsch. More, this popularly praised work is, at N80, 000, one of the most expensive on display. Henceforth, cost would be an indication of worth, except there is an admonition to not judge a painting by its price.

On the Grammys, Hip-Hop, and Femi Kuti

The major fallout from the 2014 Grammys, televised early Monday morning at 2am, concerns the victory of Macklemore and Ryan Lewis in the Rap categories. The duo won Best Rap Performance, Best Rap Song and Best Rap Album in categories with true hip-hop heavyweights like Jay Z and Kanye West, and also newbie Kendrick Lamar whom many felt deserved at least one of those awards. 

Although Macklemore was the only white rapper in that category, that is not exactly the reason for the trouble. The problem is the duo has a reach not many rappers have; they have many pop fans, which also probably mean they have many white fans. The Rap Committee for the Grammys were so conflicted they decided to not nominate Macklemore in the Rap categories, but they were vetoed in by the general Grammy committee.

So even before the awards, the band had caused controversy. And by the end of the Grammy season, starting with the announcement of nominees and ending at the conclusion of the televised show, the pattern would have repeated itself over and again.

The Grammys consists of an early untelevised show that has the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences handing out a majority of the awards; 82 this year. Only 10 awards were handed out during the televised show this year.

This means if you are in Nigeria and cared enough to stay up late to see the show, possibly to see our country’s only nominee Femi Kuti, by the show’s end your chagrin would be two-fold. Femi didn’t win, and if he did you wouldn’t have had the pleasure of seeing him receive the gilded gramophone. In spite of the Grammy publicity people’s claim of 1 billion viewers around the world, the televised show skewers in favour of the categories Americans may readily identify.

This brings up a question: considering how much hip-hop has taken over pop music, why were its categories relegated to the pre-televised show?

Short answer: too many performances— this year had about a dozen more performances than awards. The not-so-short answer: hip-hop has a tortuous relationship with the Grammys.

In 1989, when the first Rap Grammy (for Best Rap Performance) was handed to Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff, it was not televised. A decade later, Jay-Z boycotted the show, his reason being they didn’t give enough respect to the genre; in 2011, music executive Steve Stoute wrote an open letter decrying the treatment of rap artists at the Grammys. In between, Kanye West has whined, threatened, screamed and given interviews lamenting his inability to be honoured beyond the Rap categories.

These days the man just avoids the show.

Last year, Mr West, in an interview with the New York Times, noted that he had never won against a white artist. “I don’t know if this is statistically right,” he said, “but I’m assuming I have the most Grammys of anyone my age, but I haven’t won one against a white person.”

Typical Kanye, combining hubris with truth. Or mostly truth: in 2006, his “Late Registration” won against Eminem’s ‘Encore’ in the Best Rap Album category, but maybe Eminem is no longer considered white. And it isn’t just white persons, as he lost to Jazz musician Herbie Hancock in the Best Album category in 2008. But he has a general point, a point illustrated by Macklemore’s victory at this year’s ceremony.

Macklemore’s three rap awards have its antecedents in Eminem’s, the main difference being the latter is far and away a better rapper. Also Dr Dre, Eminem’s mentor, provided his protégée with an unassailable credibility while Macklemore might never get acceptance into the predominantly black culture that supports rap. Only the general fact of whiteness hitches them together.

Eminem has seven studio albums but his last wasn’t eligible for this year’s awards, and five Best Rap Album awards. In other words, the rapper has five Best Album awards for six eligible albums, beating off Jay-Z, Busta Rhymes, Nas, Mos Def and others in the process. Put another way, in a period that saw Nas’s ‘Stillmatic,’ Jay-Z’s ‘The Blueprint’ and Busta Rhymes’s ‘Extinction Level Events’ without Grammy validation, Eminem has had almost half a dozen gilded gramophones for albums not named ‘Marshall Mathers LP’ or ‘The Eminem Show’.

Now, Eminem is a great rapper, easily Top 10, dead or alive, in any rap fan’s list, and mainstream black publications rank him highly. Yet his race has bolstered his success. And he knows.

“Look at these eyes, baby blue, baby just like yourself

 If they were brown Shady’d lose, Shady sits on the shelf…

 Let’s do the math: if I was black, I woulda sold half

I ain’t have to graduate from Lincoln High School to know that…

 I’m like my skin is just starting to work to my benefit now?”

Like Macklemore’s now public apology to Kendrick Lamar after the award show, Eminem’s song ‘White America’ (quoted above) from 2002’s ‘The Eminem Show,’ shows the conflict white rappers face. They know these are stolen goods— Macklemore said “I robbed you” to Lamar— but the real owners are so vast and of uneven rapping prowess, it is impossible to return the loot. Besides, anymore public displays of contrition and their own authenticity stands to be questioned. And as every fan knows, authenticity is the lifeblood of rap.

The Grammys wouldn’t matter so much if rappers didn’t covet it so much. But they do. And it has become a status symbol, a little like what those white (or light skinned) girls are in the videos by Nigerian pop stars.

On ‘Paris Morton Music,’ after Drake received a nomination but didn’t win, he rapped:

“I never threw away that paper with my Grammy speech

Because I haven’t hit the pinnacles I plan to reach.”

On ‘Versace remix,’ after he won:

“The pillows’ Versace, the sheets are Versace, I just won a Grammy.”

Lil Wayne responds to been ignored with sadness: “Last year they had the Grammys and left me in Miami” ; Jay-Z named a song ‘Grammy Family’ in which he raps about success; Will Smith has bragged about being first to receive a Grammy for Rap.

By contrast, Eminem’s memorable Grammy line in ‘The Real Slim Shady’ are not rendered in reverence, but with a raised eyebrow:

“You think I give a damn about Grammy…

But slim, what if you win, wouldn’t it be weird

Why, so you guys could just lie to get me here?”

At the time, he hadn’t even won.

Macklemore’s “I robbed you” message is another white rapper treating a Grammy Award not with reverence but like just one more plaque in a room full of them. In America, the flamboyant rejection of awards is restricted to white artists. Marlon Brando, in 1973, rejected the Oscar for Best Actor for his performance in The Godfather, and before him, George C. Scott. The former was in protest of the treatment of Native Americans, the latter declined on philosophical grounds.

Knowing how difficult it is to be validated in America, the African American performer can hardly show anything but elation; only the Caucasian can be ambivalent. To be specific, black hip-hop musicians seek acceptance; white ones seek acknowledgement.

Perhaps this is the price hip-hop has to pay for its own success, for leaving pop music’s margins for pop central.

Over here in Nigeria, our dream of a Grammy win was rekindled when Femi Kuti was nominated in the Best World Music Album category. It was his fourth nomination. After his third nomination, he said he was never going to attend the show.

“If I win it, let them bring it here,” he said.

They wouldn’t be doing that.

Despite the happiness the man must have felt at the nomination— after all there are many musicians in the world— this year’s loss may be the hardest to take because it was a tie. This means there were two winners in a category consisting of four nominees: the South African group Ladysmith Black Mambazo— whom Nigerians may recall for their hit song ‘Homeless’— and Gipsy Kings; the other winless nominee was the late sitar player Ravi Shankar.

It must rankle to have two winners out of four — including one dead for more than a year­— and still fall short.

Nigeria, perhaps more than Femi, is eager for that validation. We famously love foreign praise. Those Laurels from Los Angeles have been sung about, most notably by 9ice on ‘Street Credibility’:

“Categorically, I’m the best, mentally…

Don’t doubt me, I go bring home Grammy”

In recent songs, 9ice has not informed his listeners on the state of his Grammy acquisition program. But that doesn’t mean the country has stopped hoping.

Where's My Kubwa?

This article, written by Collins Uma, won the First prize in our Writing Competition  

I lived in Abuja for over two years, from late 2007 when I graduated from Benue State University to 2010 when I got a job outside my Abuja. Yes, it is MY Abuja. I have lived in a lot of places but I've never felt at home anywhere as I do whenever I am in Abuja. In between these years I did the mandatory NYSC, Batch B 2008/2009. I was posted to Abuja so all I needed to do was take a bike from my house in Federal Housing, Kubwa, to the NYSC camp.

Being able to move around on bikes was one of the little 'perks' of living in a suburb like Kubwa, even car owners found it much cheaper than driving around. It still is. By the way, in the first place, living in Kubwa meant that one really cared about costs. A friend of mine who lived in Maitama and hadn't needed the services of a commercial motorcyclist for years often came over to visit because, according to her, getting on those bikes made her feel she was in Nigeria more than anything in Maitama did. I wouldn't know about that because, to me, even the air I breathe is somehow uniquely Nigerian, different from the air in other countries.

In the last weekend of November I was in Kubwa - the last time I visited was in 2011 - and I got a shock I'm yet to get over. Where were the dusty roads known as the Kubwa expressway that made me not wear white for two years? Where were the 'Gala' and 'Lacasera' and handkerchief sellers who ran beside the vehicles to sell their wares at great risk to their lives? How did these roads become four express lanes on each side? When did these neatly and aesthetically arranged yet fully functional streetlights arrive here? What in God's name happened to Dutse Junction? Who would have thought a flyover could be built between here and Kubwa Federal Housing junction? And all these in just two years?

The friend I travelled with could not believe it when I said it used to take me one hour to drive from Wuse to Kubwa. My brother tells us that they just woke up one morning to see a miracle of a road that led directly from the express into Phase 3. The miracle for me remains the disappearance of the dusty Kubwa express.

The two years I spent travelling on those dusty roads daily will forever remain in my memory. I guess I should have taken some pictures of that road, but who would have thought the dust, the traffic gridlock, and the market that was created by the holdup would disappear this soon?

As I write this we have just driven past the Lafia-Akwanga road, heading back to Abuja, from Makurdi. There is an accident on one side but the road is so narrow that we had to turn back and drive on the portion still under construction. The Lafia-Akwanga express has been under construction for as long as I can remember.

Successive administrations have raised hopes for its expansion and elimination of the dangerous bends. These hopes remain just that. Hope. One day contractors are mobilised, rocks are blasted and construction begins. The next day they're gone. After a while, that cycle is repeated. So much media attention has been given to the Lagos-Ibadan road, the East-West road, and even the Lokoja-Abuja road, but the Lafia-Akwanga road is equally important, regardless of the media neglect. Not a few lives have been lost on that road by commuters going into or leaving Abuja. 

I believe this same administration that took care of my dusty Kubwa express can do something finally about this road. Or should we wait for the railway? Abeg, leave stori. Meanwhile, Kubwa express here I come!

‘Abuja is a Great Place to Live and Work’

Araceli Aipoh is a Filipino married to a Nigerian who has lived in Nigeria for 27 years and in Abuja for seven years. She is the Editor of the blog ‘Inside Track Abuja’ and spoke to Alkasim Abdulkadir about life in the capital city 

What do you like about Abuja?

Abuja is a great place for the mind and body. I think it's because it is generally a peaceful city, it is not overcrowded, the people are friendly and polite, the roads are wide and you have almost all the essential things you need within your reach. I know it all depends on one's personal needs and priorities, but I like the fact that I don't have to worry about being stuck in a traffic jam whenever I go out here in Abuja, or that there are lots of fresh fruits at any time of the year. I have very simple needs as a person, so for me, life in Abuja is quite perfect. I have peace of mind here and that's one of the things I value most.    

In your experience, what’s the difference between Abuja and other cities in Nigeria?
 

Each city in Nigeria has its own unique characteristic. I lived in Lagos for about 10 years, I have visited Ibadan once and I often go to Benin City, but I guess the differences I see are very superficial. For example, the cost of living –  which is way more expensive here in Abuja compared to any other part of the country. Another difference is that we all know that Lagos is highly commercialised, which makes it a bit chaotic at times; while Abuja is more organised in many ways. Here in Abuja you see the difference between a marketplace and a residential area, and there is so much greenery within the city with all these gardens and parks and trees and shrubs along major roads. The founders of Abuja had envisioned a well-designed city, and so far, I think that is being implemented.

Which restaurants or cafes do you like going to in Abuja?

I always go to either the Bukka Restaurant or the Oriental Restaurant at the Hilton. Then also to Woks and Koi at Silverbird Entertainment Centre. And we have our private clubhouse/restaurant at Julius Berger, so I also spend a lot of my time there whenever my friends and colleagues want to relax and socialise. There are hundreds of restaurants and cafes in Abuja but I am not the adventurous type when it comes to dining. I go to the same place again and again. 

As a writer, what events do you attend in Abuja?

I try as often as possible to attend the weekly meetings organised by the Abuja Literary Society. But there are a lot of activities organised by other literary groups as well, such as the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) and the Abuja Writers Forum (AWF). Unfortunately I can't go to all these events as often as I would love to. There's just not enough time - and that's not an excuse.    

Why was the Expats Wives’ Association set up?

I don't know of any expat wives’ association in Abuja, but I know that there is an association of foreign women married to Nigerians and it’s called Nigerwives, which is a national organisation. In Abuja there is a group of international women that welcomes not only expats but Nigerians. It was formerly called the Abuja International Women's Club, but the name has been changed to the Ladies International Social Club of Abuja (LISCOA). Nigerwives and LISCOA were set up mainly as avenues for socialisation for their members and to give them an opportunity to network, to learn from one another, to share personal experiences and to relax. The choices for entertainment are limited here in Abuja, so people find a way to entertain themselves and forming clubs or associations is one of those. 

Do you drive in Abuja? If so, how has it being for you?

 

Yes I drive and I've not had any problems so far. I used to drive in Lagos which could be chaotic at times and really frustrating because of the traffic jams, but not here in Abuja. Every day the roads in the FCT are changing for the better, I mean look at the road going to Kubwa, or the airport road, which are just absolutely beautiful and driver-friendly. In fact, many roads are opening up and whoever is making all these possible should be commended. Money that is invested to create wider and better roads is never wasted.      

Do you visit any parks or gardens?
 

If you are talking about the bush bars, which are sometimes called parks and gardens where one can eat and have a drink and listen to a live band, then the answer is no. There are hundreds of these places in Abuja and I know that they are very busy at night but I haven’t been to any of them yet. I don't like loud music for one thing, but it will be worth a try sooner or later.  

Which organisations do you belong to?

 

I am a registered member of Nigerwives, which is only for foreign wives of Nigerian citizens. Then there is LISCOA and Pusong Pinoy Association (PPA) and also the Filipino Nigerian Families Association (FILGERIA). The last two have members only from the Philippines. There are lots of activities organised by these associations at one time or another including meetings, lunches, seminars, bazaars, fairs and holiday celebrations.

How do you relax on a typical weekend?
 

I go to the office on Saturdays so for me the weekend is just one day, which is Sunday. I stay in bed late and then have a long breakfast, watch TV, read a little and update my blog: simple things. Most of the associations I belong to have their meetings on a Sunday so I do my share of socializing during these meetings.     

What is Inside Track Abuja all about?

It's a blog dedicated to past, current and upcoming events in Abuja. It's a place where people go to when they want to know more about the city through the eyes of someone who actually lives here. It contains mostly my personal experiences, the events I go to and the things I do and see, but I plan to expand it to include other writers and make it truly diverse as far as content is concerned.    
 When did you start the magazine and blog and how has it been received so far?

Inside Track is now mainly online and it has been going since 2008. My co-publishers and I have plans of publishing the print edition again in the future, perhaps as an annual report of what's happening in Abuja. The feedback on the blog is great, with many people in Abuja and other parts of the world visiting it on a regular basis. People from other countries that are planning to relocate to Abuja either temporarily or permanently have found information from Inside Track that has helped them to make their decision, and I do receive requests for posting of events on the blog.

What advice do you have for those contemplating a move to Abuja?

Like I said, how you look at Abuja depends on your personal likes and dislikes. There's no place that you can call perfect, so come with an open mind and expect the best. Personally speaking, I have never had a dull moment here in Abuja so I don't regret coming here to live and work. Some people often say that Abuja is dull, but not for me. I have found ways and means not to make it dull.  

The President Nigeria Needs in 2015

If everything goes according to the plans of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the presidential elections will hold on the 14th of February 2015. Apart from the general needs of every country, Nigeria has essential needs that must be dealt with by the next dispensation. One of such needs is the fight against corruption.

Depending on who you ask, the current administration of Dr. Jonathan Goodluck has succeeded in transforming Nigeria or it has failed woefully. There would be a lot of context to that argument. There have been oil boom cycles that ought to have sparked major foreign reserves savings and the increased funding of the Excess Crude Account which ironically continues to suffer depletion due to yet unclear withdrawals.

The fact that the government had to deal with unprecedented levels of insecurity is likely to stand the administration in good stead about defending itself before those who say it has not done as expected. Few will argue against the fact that this administration has failed to fight corruption. Some will argue for the sake of it but the Jonathan administration has failed to keep up with the previous fight against top-level corruption.

Nigeria would need a president with the balls to take corruption head on. Dr. Jonathan even as he continues to deny the fact that corruption is a major issue in Nigeria will never be in a position to fight the scourge. His body language, to quote the Speaker of the House of Representatives, in fact shows that he subtly supports impunity as long as those involved are cronies and allies.

The next president of Nigeria must be ready to take on vested interests. Nigeria continues to suffer under the weight of vested interests across all the spheres of its polity. We have powerful cabals running our petroleum industry, powerful forces behind smuggling, highly placed individuals behind women and child trafficking and what have you. Nigeria needs a bold president who’d forget about his re-election and indeed be ready to not just step on toes but even on faces for the sake of the Nigerian masses.

Nigeria needs a leader the country can unite around. The last time Nigerians were united around a political figure was in June 1993. That was 21 years ago and the country has repeatedly suffered from ethno-religious challenges fueled by selfish and desperate politicians ever since.

Our people need a leader that one would not remember upon seeing him as being from one part of the country but as being a true nationalist, competent enough to steer the country forward and passionate enough to drive the country around the Nigerian dream. One that’d help define the Nigerian dream. We don’t need a president that’d see government positions as currencies to be traded for political favours. These things can only continue to run the country down!

In 2015, Nigeria would have suffered more years of socio-economic retrogression if somehow we end up with yet another leader who knows next to nothing about how economies are run or what it means to be the leader of the world’s most populous black nation. We need a leader that can answer the question, “what do you stand for?” in the most refreshing and articulate way possible. In 2015, we need a leader that’d speak and immediately inspire belief in the populace.

The year 2015 is upon us. We cannot afford to risk getting a president with any less than the values described above. If by now we do not know that religious background and ethnic affinity have no bearing on the performance of a leader, we will of course never know. Nigeria needs a leader in 2015 and now is the right time to ask, 'who will be that leader?'

 

By Japheth Omojuwa

Unearthing the Bwari Pottery Village

Unless s/he insists, a visitor seeking direction to the Bwari Pottery Village may be told there is no place so designated in Bwari. Yes, residents of the community know the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB). They know the Federal Government Girls College. And they know the Nigerian Law School. A pottery village?

While the Ushafa Pottery Centre has gained in status by the visit there over a decade ago of Bill Clinton, the presence of the earlier mentioned government institutions seem to have eclipsed the Bwari pottery.

The pottery is buried in the backyard of the Law School so that its location in the community is an uncommon knowledge. But how would anyone know? The tarred road on which these institutions are lined terminates at the end the Law School, warning, this is how far you can go, this is the limit of civilisation, the end.

The visitor will continue on this bumpy, dusty road and come shortly to a small white signboard with Bwari Pottery written in green block letters. S/he is indeed in the right place. Thatched, mud houses. Rustic and serene ambience. Heaps of clay. Logs of wood. Two shirtless young men covered all over with clay dust.

The young men look alarmed, perhaps thinking, to what do they owe this intrusion? They direct the visitor to Mr. Stephen Mhya, who introduces himself as the director of the pottery, and the young men as live-in workshop assistants.

Mr. Mhya, who works full-time at the pottery, takes the visitor on a tour of the premises, stating the obvious and explaining the obscure. Those are wood for the kiln and clay for the wheels. (Abuja is the clay pit of Nigeria. All six area councils in the territory claim to have large deposits of high quality clays, making the nation’s capital, theoretically, an 8,000 square kilometres of sticky, clayey landmass. This pottery however brings its clay from Dei-Dei and Zuba, a distance of about 35km.)

The tour turns into a lecture on pottery. The visitor nods all the time. Good clay, Mr. Mhya says, must be plastic and tenacious when moist. So identify a clay pit. Dig clay, soak in water, filter or decant, put in perforated pot for the moisture to evaporate, put on clay bed for drying, and then store in clay pit. The longer it stays in the pit the more plastic it becomes. The clay is then taken to the workshop to be shaped as desired. One of the workshop assistants demonstrates how the potter’s wheel is operated. From here it goes to the drying room and then to the kiln.

Because there is no money to fuel a gas kiln, Mr. Mhya uses a wood kiln he constructed himself, with help from his assistants. It has many chambers. Clay, he continues, is fired in it to 1,300 degrees centigrade, while terracotta, which requires less heat, is fired up to 900 degrees centigrade.

The next stage is glazing. A number of substances, including ash, clay dust, and granite dust, are used at this point, depending on the desired colour. He has an understanding with Julius Berger, the construction giant, for the free supply of some of the substances required in the process.

The ware may then be ornamented, using pigments. Whatever is inscribed at this stage becomes permanent. For Mr. Mhya, his clients, 90 percent of whom are expatriates, determine the design and decoration. He proudly announces that he supplies earthenware to Sheraton and Transcorp Hilton hotels.

Teaching pottery is something he does pro bono, as a way of giving back to society. He trained in the United Kingdom. Now for a period of six months each year, he trains about eight students from different universities.

Mr. Mhya had first established a pottery in Biu, Adamawa state before relocating in 1989 to the present location in Bwari where he built the pottery from scratch, deliberately with thatch and mud to give it a bohemian feel.

Letting Go

Sometimes it happens that deep within you is every feeling that you have publicly declared yourself superior to. The prejudices which you fight, the public habits you find intolerable in others, worrying about how others perceive you. This is what you realize when you find yourself resisting each time she offers to pay, when you feel irritated that she asks for the bill and worse when the bill is brought to her and not dropped in the centre of the table.

You like to think that your feet are firmly fixed in feminist shoes, though you try to avoid the title itself. It isn’t hard to sound presumptuous when a man declares himself to be a feminist or indeed when one who is not a victim of discrimination or abuse claims to be an activist for that cause like when a straight person declares himself to be a gay-rights activist.

At best you say you are a supporter of feminists. You espouse every theory or belief which empowers women and makes them equal in society to men. So you say, it is proper for girls to be raised to change their own bulbs and car tires and pay their own bills at the restaurant and not rely on men.

This is why it shocks you at first how you feel when she pays the entire bill or when the waiters do not see when you have dropped your own part of the bill and show up just when she is dropping hers.

Suddenly the eyes staring around feel like toothpicks in your side and you want to disappear. It does not occur to you that they are perhaps looking because Nigerians will stare unashamedly at anything that is different from them-- a fair-complexioned black person, an albino, a white person.

Now that you know you will both be going out quite often it is important that you settle this once and for all. It is not an option to say to her, I will get all the bills-- the feminist in you would find this abominable.

It is important to you that she pays at least sometimes. Yet again you cannot admit that it worries you that each time she pays you can almost hear the voices calling you a sharp guy who has found a white woman to take care of him.

You see it, how people are judged, even in Abuja, arguably the most cosmopolitan city in the country-- you see people instantly assume that the black girls who show up with white men are prostitutes, especially if the white men are older or those who show up in vehicles belonging to construction companies.

“You cannot always be getting the bills,” she says when you trick her into letting you pay the entire bill again.

“Don’t worry you can give me later,” you lie.

 

It feels wrong every time and today you feel like a hypocrite who preaches the things he is not willing to practice. The appearance matters much more than you can admit it does.

This is a situation you will have to deal with for a long time because you have just decided, both of you, that you will be in each other’s lives for a long time. It will not stop even if you decide to grow old together, even if you visit the same shops all the time.

It is Nigeria-- they will stare every time like you both just got off the plane from a different planet. You know that you must blunt the edges of the toothpicks that prick your side. You must let the things you believe matter to you more than the shameless stares.

On your way back home, you stop at a shop. At the till, as she reaches for her debit card, you instinctively dip your hands in your pockets.  As your fingers attempt to pull out the notes, you tell yourself to stop.

Stop letting the eyes of everyone at the till, cashiers and customers alike, prick you.

Stop being a goddamn hypocrite. Stop! As she punches in her PIN on the POS machine, you reach for the bags, all of them. You exhale and smile. She smiles back. And the eyes begin to disappear.

By Elnathan John

A Fashion Capital in the Making

Abuja is quickly asserting itself in the fashion world, reports Ladi Opaluwa

Anyone driving into Ascon petrol station on Adetokunbo Ademola Crescent in Wuse II may not expect to find a fashion designer’s workshop within its premises, but O’Godor Republic is there behind the pumps. Inside, the shop is in a flux: scraps of fabric lie around, unfinished dresses hang on mannequins, handbags are on display on the wall, piles of look-books are on the table and various publicity fliers abound.

Ifeoma Anyanwu of Fashion Label O'Godor Republic

Ifeoma Anyanwu is O’Godor Republic’s Creative Director and generally acknowledged as the pioneer fashion designer in Abuja, having launched her label in 2003. (Dakova is often mentioned in the same sentence but he made his fortune in Lagos before relocating to the capital). Fashion in Abuja has a history that spans only a decade, and prior to that, ‘Abuja fashion’ might have been an oxymoron.

“The city was critically under-populated [10 years ago], and that was a problem,” says Anyanwu, who has become so synonymous with her label that she is popularly known as O’Godor. Over the years, compulsory and compulsive migration has led to a growth in the population, and as more celebrities relocate from Lagos to Abuja and event organisers see a market for their concerts, award shows and film premieres, the balance has tipped in favour of fashion and designers are opening up shop in the capital to meet the demand for red-carpet stylists.

Prominent designers like House of Farrah, run by its Creative Director Fatima Aliyu Garba, and Ms Makor by Anita Adebisi feature alongside many upcoming designers making waves in the city. But the transformation in the couture sector is still new, and the emergence of fashion events even more so.

There were no major fashion shows in the city until 2009 when Runway started, broadening the market for models, designers, photographers, and other players in the industry. Then the first edition of the Muslim Identity Fashion Show, which promotes conservative dressing among Muslim women, was in 2010. That same year, the first edition of the Makeup Fair organised by Pop Concept was launched, creating a platform for manufacturers and retailers of beauty products to showcase their work.

Next came Trendy Couture in 2011, which seeks to give designers a platform to showcase their pieces. ECOWAS Fashion Week, which celebrates African designers, will launch next year, and exhibitions like the first annual Montage Africa Fashion and Beauty Expo, the Wedding Expo and The Business of Fashion conference are other notable additions to the Abuja fashion calendar.

Yet Henry Nwaeze of photography outfit Big H Studios doesn’t believe that the various components of the fashion industry are progressing at the same pace. Like Simi Vijay and Aisha Augie-Kuta, Big H is beginning to gain popularity in the capital’s fashion photography industry. He has been in the business for only a year but has seen it all through the lens of his camera, and the view does not impress him. He believes that the fashion industry – especially as it pertains to photography – remains underdeveloped.

An International Business graduate of University of East London, Nwaeze still holds a day job at an engineering firm because photography doesn’t pay all the bills. “You will hardly find anyone in Abuja who is exclusively a fashion photographer,” he says. “The market isn’t as big yet.” He has spread himself across different genres of photography, and fashion isn’t the highest paying among them. “I make as much from covering a wedding as I do from three photo shoots.”

Nwaeze developed a love for photography by taking self-portraits with his phone camera, before officially turning his narcissism into a business in 2012. But he is hard on himself and his colleagues: “We have not done anything deserving of the admiration of professionals from outside Abuja,” he said. For this reason, he collaborates regularly with stylists and models to create works that may not be financially rewarding but which will hopefully command the attention they need. “It is only in Abuja you will find a model working for eight years who still has a slim portfolio,” he says.

Building Structure

A model with ambitions of strutting the runway would have found Abuja to be most unfruitful before 2009, as it was the norm for designers and event organisers to bring in models from Lagos even though this costs more than using local talent. This may be because they didn’t have confidence in the models, but there was also no formal structure to engage them.

Godfrey Ibeakanma of GI Modeling Agency

Godfrey Ibeakama (who does fashion styling for this magazine) is a fashion insider who started out as a model but now runs GI Modeling Agency. He says that he went into the business because there were models all over who needed grooming and representation and an industry that needed more structure. He started the agency in 2010, and now has 60 models under his management.

Abuja, he says, presents its own unique challenges for his line of business. Scouting for models in a relatively conservative culture can be tricky as young people are inhibited by parental control, and it is hard to convince potential catwalk stars to agree to modeling as a career path.



 

Ibeakama is also a stylist and has worked with Banky W. and Eugenia Abu amongst others. In the beginning, according to him, clients were unwilling to pay for beauty services. “But people are beginning to realise the need to employ a professional stylist,” he says. It is this realisation that has made it possible for the young and talented Richard Akuson, CEO of VHC Styling to make a living out of his passion.

O’Godor is optimistic about the city’s fashion industry. “Fashion in Abuja is ready for the international market,” she says. “The only edge Lagos has over Abuja is the population, and they also have media coverage that creates the hype around their activities. The magazines are not here to feature our pieces regularly and the headquarters of most media organisations are in Lagos.”

The Future



 15 year old Onanma Okeke of Jess Stephanie

Onanma Okeke

is an Abuja-based designer behind the label Jess Stefanie. She exhibited her designs at the 2013 Lagos Fashion and Design Week and at two consecutive Runway shows, and her pieces appeared in the 2012 Vanity Fair Italian issue. She plans to hold her first exhibition in November 2014, yet she is only 15.

The SS3 student of Premier International School, Wuse was fully-made in Abuja. She honed her skills at the Flair Fashion Academy in Zone 4, and she hopes to acquire further training at the Parson New School of Design in New York after her university degree. Okeke is the voice of the new evolving fashion industry in the capital, and a sign of things to come. “My brand is young,” she says, “and Abuja fashion is developing, so we will grow together.”

Still on the Anti-Gay Law

President Goodluck Jonathan signed the Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Bill into law and inadvertently, perhaps, provoked arguably the biggest debate since the subsidy removal imbroglio.

Except it isn’t a debate. It is a shouting match between a very loud minority and a self-satisfied majority. The former has the media and the West, the latter claims religion, morality and culture— however those are defined— and never shall the twain meet.

The instruments employed so far— bullying, shaming, propaganda and, considering arrests made so far, the police— are not of debates, but of warfare. And the internet is the killing field. That may be innocuous save for the bruised egos and vanquished vanities. But from what can be predicted the violence would become concrete soon; from the internet to a road, a park, a market near you.

And it would be because President Jonathan has handed a people mostly intolerant of sexual deviation weapons by a simple turn of his wrist.

That is the pro-gay claim. And they are not wrong. Whatever the merits of the law, arming the most fearless, self-appointed "litigators of God"—as columnist Gimba Kakanda described Nigerians— is a consequence no one can deny.

The law has equipped some Nigerians with a loaded matchbox, tyres and several litres of petrol, with enough ammunition to transform litigation into execution. For if instances of lynching were common before the state criminalised the act, one shudders at what wicked wonders the people may now wreak on culpable or supposedly culpable folk.

Amid the ruckus few have read the law in its entirety. It is an internet-y problem that people react to the reaction some presumably informed person has, and some other person reacts to that received reaction and so on. In the process a reading of the initial document becomes passé— “Who does that?”

Upon reading the law, it is clear to me that both anti- and pro-gays should have a problem with a law so loosely worded that nobody subject to Nigerian laws is safe. It prescribes a 14-year sentence for one who “enters into a same sex marriage contract or civil union.” A civil union is defined as any arrangement for people of same sex to live together as sexual partners, and includes any of these descriptions:

i. Adult independent relationships

ii. Caring partnerships

iii. Civil partnerships

iv. Civil solidarity pacts

v. Domestic partnerships

vi. Reciprocal beneficiary partnerships

vii. Registered partnerships

viii. Significant relationships

ix. Stable unions

So encompassing and so vague, the list yields another contradiction: it is evidence of both the ingenuity and the inanity of politicians.

Even the most vocal supporter has to pause and consider how easy, based on this law, it is to accuse the rabid heterosexual of the newly criminal act. Who can define each of the nine items on the list without ambiguity? Aren’t these heavily skewed in favour of the accuser?

The argument can be made that judges would throw out many of these cases. True. Still in cases, such as this, with a substantial moral baggage, a conviction is unnecessary for effect; a mere trial, a newspaper headline declaring so and so ‘Tried for Gay Activity’ is sufficient to destroy so and so’s social and political standing.

This is the reason the opposition are yet to offer criticism. It would be easy to tag the bunch a party of homosexuals. Silence is the opposition’s only option, and they have embraced it unsurprisingly.

Reno Omokri, President Jonathan’s Special Assistant on New Media, in defending the law, wrote about how ‘democracy works,’ missing the irony in a law that contravenes and criminalises the right of an individual to Freedom of Association. But he is not the only one lecturing everyone into an alignment with his side of the discussion.

We have intellectuals, many overseas, mounting virtual soapboxes, hectoring everyone into enlightenment, ignoring the fact the near unanimity of Nigerians in this area of national life. They do not want gays. The end. No demurrals.

‘Bigot,’ ‘backward,’ ‘homophobe’— a word which, like homosexual, should be descriptive but is now pejorative— are labels set in wait for the man who doesn’t support the pro-gay brigade. Split into an axis of good and evil, one can only be passionately pro- or considered against. Everyone grouped into the latter risks having his or her religion, intelligence and exposure ridiculed.

This has made empathy difficult. You cannot undermine a man’s belief and expect fellowship or followership. It should be easy to hold a view, while another manages an opposing view without physical or emotional violence: many educated and resident Nigerians do not support the lifestyle but they wouldn’t go after gay people either. It is a country where people of one ethnicity distrust people from another ethnicity, but commute, work and live together.

It is early to say what can be done about the law. But between us, as citizens, as humans, who is to say some sort of compromise cannot be reached?

The bad news is the government has done its worst. But the good news is the Nigerian people can behave better. And thankfully, there is no law against that.