The Grandson of A Barren Woman

My late grandma "Sabitiu Cecilia Oderinlo" aka "Iya Alaté" (Business Woman) aka "Iya Onidiri" (Hair Stylist) aka "My First Wife" was called "BARREN" for the better part of her youthful and adult years in marriage. Was she really barren? Yes she was.

My granddad was polygamous so she nursed and raised the children of all the wives of "Pa Eniola Augustine Oderinlo" aka "Baba Ori Oke" (The man that lives on the hilltop) aka "Awole Esu" (The Destroyer of Devils House) my grandfather like her own without having a child of her own. She was called barren the abusive way and she lived with it for years and years because her husband only saw the wife of his youth and not a barren woman and that was good enough reason for her to ignore everything else and love everything that has the breathe of her handsome husband on it.

Then heaven opened up her womb after decades of waiting and she got pregnant with her first. Her first child was named "Oluwarantimi" meaning "God Remembered Me". She was so old and the child was so handsome that the missionaries (Rev. Sisters) at the Sacred Heart Hospital, Itesi, behind Ake Palace in Abeokuta, Ogun State in Nigeria offered to help her take care of my dad until she could learn to take care of a child on her own, little did they know that she was an expert at it already, she's been nursing her husband's children even when there was no hope of her ever having one of her own. A few years later, she had another child "Olatundun" my aunt and by then, the woman that was once a "Barren Old Bat" was the mother of two children of her own, and the many other her lovely husband had managed to born for her to care for. She told us her grandchildren the many tales of her tormentors and accusers, their show of madness and how she realised that being called "Agan" i.e. barren was just a word describing her present condition and not her final destination.

The bible described the likes of Sarah, Leah, etc. has barren... The birth of Ishmael was almost a proof of Sarah’s total bareness but God proved everything right with Isaac. Same situation for my Sabitiu but I'm a proof that the word "BARREN" is used to describe a woman that is yet to give birth to a child and not a woman that can't have children.

I wrote a creative piece recently and in it, I talked about Patience Goodluck Jonathan's being without a child of her own. I thought up a very unusual reason for it, not with the intent of mocking her, just a product of my creative energy, all in a bid to pass a message about the decay in Nigeria’s academic environment and everybody just felt it was insulting, abusive, offensive and every other word that ends with "ive" without noticing the message of my art. I sat to think of it afterwards and imagined, "what if it was a comedian that shared the narratives I did, won't we all laugh about it and call it a crazy joke?", my answer to that was yes and it was scary. Wow! Ain't We All Hypocrites?

My initial creative expression was filled with narratives of Patience’s bareness and how D&C aka abortion could be the cause and nobody is looking at the text holistically to see the lessons, rather we are all more concerned and consumed by the fact that I mentioned real names and used real life examples. Please tell me, if I can't use Gooduck and his wife to illustrate our inherent problems as a people and nation, who could be more suitable?

My art addressed the issues of lecturers sleeping with students to award them unearned marks but because my specimen was Goodluck and Patience Jonathan, everybody seems to be blind to the facts of my narratives. Someone should please tell me, how Patience Jonathan pass Biology in College under her lecturer GEJ? If Patience can't read or deliver a complete sentence without shooting down the walls of Jericho with grammatical blunders, how did she graduate with a degree in Biology and Psychology? We are all busy asking for Buhari's certificate, how did Patience Jonathan who has one pass her General Studies courses like English Language, not to imagine the complex field of biology and its many jargons that requires you spelling each word correctly. I did study Biology in my Secondary School days and I am almost sure she would have failed Biology at that level if she attended Awori Anglican Comprehensive High School my alma matter, so I'm wondering how she passed the same subjects at tertiary level in Rivers State College of Education and University of Port Harcourt (UniPort), your guess is as good as mine. No wonder GEJ got a 1st Class PhD from the same UniPort, did I hear somebody say "settlement & runs", and it is possible because he and she seem to be good at settling and runsing things.

What will you do if you walk into a psycho session and your shrink is Patience Jonathan, will you sit down and talk to her as your psychologist or run out screaming? What language will she use to communicate and administer the therapy, pidgin or Ikwere or Igbo? These are the questions we need to ask because my post was only addressing the decays in our academic community, the community that serves as the building block of our society.

Bareness is not a problem because it has a solution. It is either you get pregnant and give birth to your own children like my grandma did eventually, adopt or allow your husband have one or two outside your marriage and you take them as yours like Sarah in the scriptures or Patience Jonathan did, or you live with that reality. It's hard I know but there is always a way out of bareness. There is no easy way out of the decay our academic communities are producing, that's why we have a Dr. and an Arc. as Presidents and the top still feels empty because there is no real value driven individuals up there representing the interest of the people, that is why we have so-called graduates that are unemployable, graduates who can’t deliver a minute worth of value in the subject matter they claimed to have earned a first or second degree in.

Barren is an insultive word, D&C is f**ked up according to my cousin but it's tight lyrics when MI Abaga uses D&C in almost every song he's written and released, all we do is sing along. In fact rape is cool when Olamide sings about it; it is “story for the gods”. It's excellent when lecturers award marks for sex and make life a living hell for those that can't use biology practical to pass mathematics. Abortion is a cure for sexual mistakes but "barren" is bad word even when most of it is caused by abortion, I wonder why the word exists.

Our society can only change in the future if parents will slow down and start training their children instead of saving up for special centres. A child whose WAEC and JAMB results was purchase by her parent will gladly use biology practical (sex) to pass any course she can use it to pass, or use it to get money to buy the marks when biology practical can solve it, it's called runs.

I feel no remorse talking about a woman being childless, it is the problem of humanity and nothing can stop bareness from existing, after all, I am Abidemi Babaolowo Oderinlo the grandson of a barren woman.

I Write What I Like

Dear MTN Nigeria

Dear MTN NIGERIA,

It's been four five years since I last won anything from you guys, yes five good years and it was a bag that I won for writing my beautiful Iya Toyin a beautiful poem on Mothers Day. Ever since then, i have tried everything within my power to add another feather to it but with no success. A recap of some of the things i've done in defence of MTN Nigeria over the years scares even men.

In 2009, a fought a friend of mine for turning that your logo tune "do re mi re do re do" to "Dem dey give us wahala o". Not for once did I get a single min of free call for my wahala, not a minute more for XtraCool at night.

2010, I slapped a bus conductor and pushed him out of a moving bus for referring to MTN's network as "network oshi" meaning "rubbish network", i was never compensated for the heroic, a single minute would have made me throw a pilot out the plane for MTN, so sad i got none.

2011 was the year I road a bicycle from Fandum to Hadejia in search of signal so I could call Lagos, even though their was network on the Glo lines of my colleagues, i refused their offer to use their phones to make the call. I even received calls in Germany without roaming in thesame year with my hard earned credit and tweeted at MTN from Frankfurt in September in attempt to win free recharge card during your 10years anniversary to no avail, infact i didn't get a retweet but still I stayed with you. You can check your records, my twitter hand is @enyola.

In 2012, I bought a blackberry and subscribed every month of the year from April, I looked forward to more but the best I got was extension of BIS, not even a minute of free call, none that I know of. Even when I texted WIN to those number, I only got debited, I didn't win "shishi". I was hoping I would win the aeroplane on offer sef, in fact I went to Yaw's house to ask if I needed to text the entry in his accent to win the aeroplane but instead, you gave the Cessna 182T aircraft of the MTN Ultimate Wonder promo to Ebube Essien-Garricks, was it because her surname sounds like "Gatwick Airport"?

2013 was amazing but you guys didn't offer us another plane. Don't pretend like you are afraid of NCC, you've not stopped sending us the SMS even after you've been warned never to send it to us again. I have never complained, in fact, i read every SMS you sent, hoping to find info that i've won your head office since that's the only thing that could be bigger than winning an airplane.. becoming your landlord would have been perfect.

This is 2014 and today is Dec. 2nd, Are my not going to get the chance to win something this year? When will I win again? I have considered two possibilities, I changed my nickname to "Odeku" and started drinking only Big Stout "Odeku" just in case last years promo was going to be something related to winning your head office; going in sync with Garricks/Gatwick experience. I also added Diamond to my real name and I opened a y'hello account and I've been listening to only music from MTN ambassadors, adding only Diamond Platinumz songs to my playlist with the hope that this year 2014 will be the opportunity to WIN Diamond Bank your new partners. I'm patiently waiting for you guys to roll the promo out, it's December already and the new year is just a few days away.

I've defended MTN even when there was no network on my phone, bought recharge card even when I'd not eaten and refused to borrow airtime even with the text I get everyday congratulating me that I'm eligible, so you'll know I won't be borrowing money from Diamond Bank when I win it in the MTN Promo.
Dear MTN South Africa please notify MTN Nigeria that I'm ready to win Diamond Bank. If they don't want to make it public, they should contact me here so we can start making arrangement for the handing over. I will like to be just though, I want everybody to know that I won it, I don't want it to look like I did ojoro so please contact me before Santa chooses to offer me something bigger and I will be forced to reject your offer.

Don't thank me for choosing MTN.
Sincerely,
Babaolowo

PS: On the evening of the day I wrote and posted this on Facebook, MTN sent me a text, asking me to spend N7000 in other to enjoy Awoof on Jumia! Walahi, this is height of wickedness

I Write What I Like

THAT RELIGIOUS DEMON CALLED "WOMEN ABUSE"/"DOMESTIC VIOLENCE" IS NOT AFRICAN

I recently came across a Facebook status on a female friend's page claiming being "misogynist" a Nigerian culture and an African thing. 90% of the comments on the post described an average African of being vindictive of women rights, denying them even the humanity that is free for all. All the negative comments in support came from women who probably have sons, brothers and fathers who they describe to be good men in the same comment box, a submission which immediately reverses their well painted picture of a vile African male. I found this almost unbelievable because I am African, I grew up in a rural and very rustic environment where every woman was a jewel. I began to wonder, "Is she referring to the Nigerian culture I know or there is another Nigeria somewhere in Asia". Even if this claims are true, an average African male is raised by a women, it this not a submission that African women are experts at raising misogynists.

The African culture that I know is one that strives to preserve her women from childhood, protect and re-present them at adulthood with pride. Where I grew up in Nigeria, it's a place where the sun wakes up with pride and goes to sleep with grinning smiles, our women define everything, they define the parents and they are basically the yardstick for assessing the standard and morality of every home that has one in it.

Man stands while his wife takes the confort of the seat--source: alexandraphanor.com

It is confusing when you see Nigerians, Ghanians, Kenyan, Somalian and Africans in general taking responsibility for crimes they didn't commit or an identity that is not their own. I am a bit livid when Africans attribute wrong doings to their Africaness, terms like "Africa Time", "Africa Style", "Nigerian Factor" and other submissions that directly negates being black leaves me in a rage like a mother who knows his son is still alive but can't do anything to stop his being buried alive. It kills and burns me from the inside, therefore I must speak against it.

Domestic violence is as universal phenomenon and women being subordinated is a worldwide situation and has nothing to do with BEING AFRICAN. I don't support abuse in any way and never will. I believe the place of a woman in a family is to be the support structure and mechanism, not the spearhead. Although women are the stronger element in a family system if we analyze critically, I personally from my experience believe their emotional chemistry is perfected to complement and my opinion has nothing to do with being a Christian, Muslim or African... It is my understanding of human nature.

I grew up in a African home where my mum doubled as dad when I was younger, my dad was a regional officer for a food and beverage company so he traveled a lot. My name Abidemi simply tells the tale that my dad was away when I was born, a reflection of the daunting responsibility my mum had to bear because I was the fifth of six children. I pounded yam with my mum and sisters and uncle, not because my dad demanded pounded instead of "Poundo", it was my mum's choice because she's from Ekiti. In fact my mum sold "Poundo-Yam" in her super-store but we still pounded because she loved the real thing better. The beauty of this pounding experience is that my dad can pound too and he does wherever he was then… It was never my mum or the girls responsibility to cook, it was everybody's duty and as I grew up, I got on the kitchen roaster. Even as hard as it was to have the time, there were those magic moments when daddy got in the kitchen, yes he gets his turn too. Maybe we can say she abused my dad in this situation. If my dad finds a shirt on the ironing board, he irons it before asking "whose shirt is this" and that is probably in process of ironing his wife's clothes. Cooking and laundry was a collective work, not just in my house but in almost every home I know, and that is a very wide network, across states and regions, there was never a case blatant subordination.

Here in Lagos Nigeria where I live, you see fathers dropping off and picking up their children from schools, they take their children to the salon for haircut, they bath their children, tell bedtime stories, swing them to sleep and sometimes back their children when mummy is probably busy doing other things. An average home is a typical team of father, mother, grandmas, aunties, cousins and maids (for those that use maids), trying to support each other and raise the children against all odds, and the mother is always the nucleus. I am surprised when the tag "Africans" or "Nigerians are misogynist" is used. How will you tag a man whose house is naturally filled with women a hater of women? It is a paradox.

I have heard and heard horrific tales of domestic violence and abuse from around the world, I heard of situations of abuse with people that are close to me but I am yet to see an horrific situation within my community and I am Nigerian and African. Even the thugs on the streets respect women, and it is no gain-saying when you hear gist about thugs hiding their guns from their mum or girlfriend.

I am Nigerian, 100% African and I don't see anything African about being abusive or vindictive in relationships or family. Just the way the Europeans can boast of kings and queens, we Africans have a rich history of queens and powerful women that still walked and still walk our continent, so much that even the Bible recorded during the days of Solomon and of the Persian king who made Esther his queen. The practice of women subordination is a religious import from the Arabian gulf and not an African identity. Before Christianity and Islam came to Africa, our lives were built and patterned around our women, they were the centre of everything and there was no King without the exalted office of a Queen and a King's Mother, there was no place for a King's father. Maltreatment of women is not African, it was never in our culture and not in the dictates or our tradition as far as I know, ours was a world built around the beauty of our women in all its form.

African women were the crown of their men's head and the pride of their children. Everywhere else, they had gods and gods alone, here in Africa, we had gods and goddesses, and the beauty of the gods was that there was none without a goddess beside him, and we had goddesses without gods to match and still we worshipped them without discrimination. Ever heard of The Queen of Sheba, Kandake or Kentake of Kush, Queen Amina, Cleopatra, Moremi et al… Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti was on the entourage of great Nigerians that gave Nigeria her freedom, the richest black women are Africans living in Africa… so if we empower our women so much, where on earth did it become the culture of Africa to subordinate the women we worship and adore?

Here in Africa, our women are independent, but in the Arab world, women have no rights, women are not even allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia, so how did subordination become our own? It doesn't look like the women in the West Bank and Middle East are doing better, nor the women in other parts of the world. I've seen abuse in the United Kingdom even under the reign of her majesty and nobody seems to call it an European or English thing. There are videos across the internet of both white men and black women abusing men and women in the Americas but nobody has tagged it an American thing, why do we Africans now readily accept to be bad and are eager to claim the forced identity the western world has placed on us with a faulty h cooked up history, cooked up about the beautiful Africa they met, and has worked hard to belittle and destroy. If the libraries of Mansa Musa are still lined with our great scientific and explorative exploit, why then do we still see so little of ourselves. Abuse is an international behaviour and it is majorly fueled by religions that are not native to Africa so I dare say nobody should make it an African identity. Black is Black and not bad.

In Africa , our culture is to love and respect our women. Ask an Igbo woman whose parents value more than a thousand male son or the Calabar bride in a fattening room. The "Jigida" is not for tying but for adorning our women, the "Ileke" is not a shackle, it is a jewelry and all of this were invented to appreciate the beauty of our African woman. Women abuse to my understanding is a foreign culture that was passed into the African system through religion (Christianity and Islam) it has never and will ever be our identity. Even if our culture and tradition places a man as the head in Africa, it recognises our women as the priceless pillar and body, without which the head is a decoration, and more importantly the heart of all our being. Our culture is designed to keep them that way, It is religion that has "Yerima'd" our culture.

Here in my part of Nigeria, here is a song we sing for our brides "Ile awa dun, oko ni fo aso... Ile awa dun, oko ni n ponmi... Ile awa dun, oko ni n lota..." (Our home is lovely, the husband takes care of all domestic responsibility).

I am Abidemi "Babaolowo" Oderinlo

I Write What I Like, I Live What I write

Twitter: @enyola

WILLIAMS J.K.F WRITES TO THE “DEFENDERS” OF MR. PRESIDENT

After barrages of attacks from the defenders of Goodluck Jonathan’s administration in Nigeria, the fearless Williams J.K.F who has been inking his opinion in response to the address of Goodluck during his 2015 ambition declaration takes on the defenders of the Nigerian president in another classic, insight-filled letter. This patriotic Nigerian seems to be loaded with the right antidote for mediocrity, here the juice of the letter begins on the next line you will be reading.

“Good morning “defenders” of our president and finally, good morning, Mr. President. The calls and messages I received yesterday was overwhelming just because of “simple” questions we asked our president. But instead allowing Mr. President to reply our questions himself or even through Mr. Rueben Abbati, the “defenders” took it upon themselves to accuse and abuse me. None of them mentioned anything reasonable, the only rant I’m hearing is that I’m inciting the youths against the president. It’s either I don’t know the meaning of the adjective (incite) or it was just wrongly used. Because you can’t incite those who know and understand condition(s). Again, some section said the president is not at fault but the people working for him or working with him and as such what he need from us is prayers and fasting. Based on this, I’m going to reply fully to those who think what the president need is not criticism (either constructive or venomous), but our prayers and fasting. Fellow comrade and “defenders”, follow me as I explain myself again…

On our refineries, it’s either I’m wrongly informed or I’m not in this country, this is the sixth years in office of Mr. President, please tell me, how many refinery(ies) has/have been constructed in the last six years? All we hear everyday are “rehabilitating”, “repairing”, “renewing” etc of the old ones. Are there no land again in Nigeria to build more? How many months does it take to build a refinery? How can our country be buying what we have in abundant? How can the children of a great hunter be eating legs of chickens? Where are we on refinery please? If our president cannot add more refinery(ies) in six years, how can he add in the next four years? Since the “defenders” have taken his case upon themselves, I wish they can constructively convince me on this.

On the recently concluded National Conference, the delegates (485 in number) were paid a weekly “remuneration” of N1.4 million each. This money were paid directly into each delegate’s personal account. And guess what, the money was paid like that until they finished the conference. N1.4 Million weekly! And when asked, the president said; “Its just a pastry gift in appreciation of their dedication and seriousness to move the country forward”. I’m not jealous of the money, far from it, but the promptness and dexterity in which our president handled the case is encouraging, despite the fact that most of them are either sleeping or paying scrabbles. If the same seriousness is given to all our sectors, we could have gone far than this.

I will encourage the defenders of our President to read about Taiwan. ‘Why Taiwan?’ you may ask, well, Taiwan is a barren rock-laden country with virtually no mineral resources in commercial quantity, in fact, Taiwan need to export sand from China for their constructions, but guess what? Taiwan is the fourth richest country in term of GDP. What did their reasonable leaders did? Instead of their president giving gifts to less than 500 “brilliant and outstanding” delegates, he shared the gifts to all his less than 30 million citizens; he gave substantial educational gift to his fellow citizens, he gave reasonable electricity gift to his people, he gave appreciable medical and health care gifts to his country, he gave considerable transportation, employment, security and good governance gifts to his people. That is why Taiwan is where they are today. I want the defenders of our President to swear if they have never used Taiwan products before? That is the outcome of the rigorous work their president embarked on, that is what I call real good luck.

The N1.8 million daily “feeding” money of the president is enough proof that he does not need my fasting. How can I fast for someone who uses over One Billion Naira to feed in a year? With 30 million naira budgeted for the feeding of just 2 lions in Aso Rock, I want those who say I should be praying for the President daily to give me one reason why he need my prayer and the prayers of others who he has betrayed. Are you saying that the lives of Two animals are worth more than ours? The N1.6 Billion spent on “repairing” one out of the 7 aircrafts can change the lives of many graduates. To the defenders, should I continue?

On corruption, hmmmmmmmn. EOD. ICPC has become a ghost and the eagle logo of EFCC has been stylishly changed to parrot. During the period of OBJ, even if people are accusing Obasanjo then that he’s using these anti-corruption agencies to witch-hunt his enemies, at least we are seeing results. Even his fellow people are not spared; Police Heads, Politicians, Legislators, Governors etc were also exposed and many prosecuted. To the defenders, lets assume fighting corruption is “witch-hunting”, how many people has our president been able to “Witch-hunt” in the last six years?

The defenders should realise that we are in this together, so its either we do it right or we get it right. If nothing is being done by us now, if we still continue in sentiments, if we still engage in regional sympathy, our unborn children will not forgive us, the coming generations will not be impressed by us.

Hope is a feeling that better things lie ahead. But hope only makes sense where it can be converted to reality. I hope our wishfulness will be converted to reality. Because we were not suppose to know and understand the meaning of poverty in this great country. Pessimism should not be the best way to express our emotional feelings towards this country. We all deserve better than what we are getting. We were not suppose to be brought up this way. But if the defenders think we can all be bought, coerced or sweet-talked, then they should expect the unexpected. I want you (the defenders) and Mr. President to know that there is a limit to hope! Reasonable people, good morning.”

Williams J.K. Fortune