I am Angry…May Be Not!

I was at a Starbucks Coffee Shop on Georgia Avenue NW seeping my Arabian Mocha Sanani and at the same time perusing the Washington Post searching for a job when a perfunctory greeting with two strangers turned into a conversation which ultimately affected my mood for the entire afternoon. You see, an American couple, one with a bachelors degree in the sciences, and the other with a technical school education claims to be expatriates in the Nigerian oil industry. Both praised Nigeria to high heavens and gleefully showed me pictures of their mansions, chauffeurs, gardeners, housemaids, and security details in Port Harcourt and Lagos. Damn, thirty-five years in America and I still don’t have a mansion, chauffeurs, gardeners, housemaids, and security details.

No one respect Africans. At home and abroad, Whites and Purple people enjoy sticking it to Africans. They make fun of us in movies and literature. They call us names. Yet, no one has ever been sanctioned. But you see you cannot call a Japanese a “Jap,” or be seen mouthing anything bad against the Jews. The Jews are very good at policing the media for anyone who dares to utter disparaging words against them. You can’t even give them the finger without some sort of penalty. They call it anti-Semitism. Imagine what is happening to Mel Gibson. In a drunken state he made statements that are considered anti-Semitist. For goodness sake, the guy was drunk! And now he is going to loose millions of dollars, perform community service and then bow and kneel before Jewish organizations. Damn, it must be nice, pretty nice to be a Jew as opposed to being African. May be we should make up a supposed bad word and claim it is anti-African. Say…Blackie?

Until a few weeks ago I have been chatting with this Seychelles babe. Damn, she is beautiful, full of life and funny too. She is well-traveled and well-educated. She is not docile but knows how to run a home. Out of bed, she is every bit a lady; in bed she is better than Traci Lords. She is fiery and wickedly sinful. And so I was hooked. I was taken. Everything was going fine until she discovered I was a Nigerian. She hates Nigerians. In fact, she despises Nigerian men. Two Nigerian lads — one in undergraduate school and the other in law school — screwed her hard and screwed her bad. They messed with her body and her soul; and so she wasn’t about to go through another hellhole with another Nigerian. Why must she take her pain and annoyance out of me? Why me? Why visit the sins of my country men on me?

After several years of bashing President Olusegun Obasanjo, we are now faced with a grim reality: Abubakar Atiku or Ibrahim Babangida. Holy sh*t…that’s all we have! Take it or leave; either way, we’ve been had. My goodness, that’s not a choice. It is not a good choice. How did we get ourselves into this jam? We protested and nitpicked Obasanjo’s every move and pronouncements and complained about him so much so the man has not known peace and quiet in sixteen months. It was bad, so bad he has not had a good night rest in twelve months. In exasperation he gave up his Third Term Ambition. He knew what we didn’t know, or refused to acknowledge. Damn, to think I was part of the group that was hollering at the man? Atiku or Babangida…Babangida or Atiku? That’s a scary choice. Holy Moses, we thought OBJ was bad…IBB and Atiku scare the sh*t out of me.

Why don’t Nigerian newspapers maintain valid email addresses? Have you ever tried sending anything to ThisDay, Daily Trust and Punch? It is so sad to know that a paper like the Punch have three email addresses that are all invalid. And what’s the matter with ThisDay with all those dubious awards they give periodically. The silliest of the award is the “Best Governor” crap they give every year or so. Why? None of the awards they give makes sense. I mean who, for instance, in his sane mind would dole out abest-of-anything award to any governor, minister, commissioner or any other jackass position in that country? F*ck, what is ThisDay going to come up with next? The Best Vice-President Award? Hey ThisDay…sign me up for the Best-Praise-Singer award. Here is my $50k…is it enough?

Have you noticed that virtually all Nigerian Christians are born-again? Are there benefits to these claims? There was this rascal who, while demanding bribe from me from one part of his mouth, was telling me about Jehovah from the other side of his mouth. He is telling me he is born-again, asking God to bless me in abundance and at the same time letting me know that unless I “deliver,” things would be rough for me. I also use to have this neighbor who frequented the Redeem Church on Sundays and then go to the hilltop of Oshogbo every other weekend to fortify herself and her family. Her husband was the one who told me that unless I belong to some powerful spiritual society or extra-Christian groups like “the Lodge or Ogboni or Olumba Olumba,” I dare not enter the political fray. When I told him I was an agnostic who borders on atheism, he laughed at me.

I am flabbergasted by this: what’s the matter with all those modern day Ndiigbo-Muslims? When did our Igbo brethrens start forsaking their Catholism or Anglicanism for Islam? It doesn’t sound right. Igbo…Muslim…Muslim…Igbo. Haba, what’s going on? I remember the days when some Southerners adopted Northern name just so they could attend Northern universities for cheap. Well, that I can understand; but to forsake ones religions for whatever gain that might accrue? Does the Ndiigbo know things we don’t? By the way: are these Igbo-Muslims truly accepted by their Northern brothers? Oh well, may be there is really no difference between changing ones name for the sake of education and changing ones religion for other benefits. Chei, chei, chei…God dey oooo.

Why is Chief Diepreye Solomon Alamieyeseigha the only (former) governor in the slammer? Is the EFCC contending that Alams was/is the only crook among the thirty six state governors? Common, Mallam Ribadu, that possibly couldn’t be the case.There are thieves and rogues and jagudas in virtually all the government houses. For instance, whatever happened to Joshua Dariye, the Plateau State governor, who dared the EFCC and the Obasanjo government to come after him? He is still around, isn’t he? And whatever happened to Orji Kalu and a dozen other alleged rogues? Is there selective arrest and selective punishment going on in that country?