Let's Talk (Feb. 14, 2015): Gender Relations Among African Men and Women

NIGERIA, MAKE YOUR VOTE COUNT IN 2015 - PAUL INYANG

Paul Inyang

I have resisted writing on this subject for the fear of being accused of pilling on. Words have meaning and in some cases many interpretations. Lawyers are known especially for their ability to craft words to give it a legality—giving those words some credibility especially in the courts of law. This realm is far from my reality, so I cannot tell you much about its construct and purpose. I do however know that we need these things (laws) to give us some order or at the very least provide us with something to harangue, haggle and argue about. The bottom line is that laws determines how we operate and at times gives us clear boundaries as to what is right and wrong.

Philosophers have engaged in the art of giving meaning to social constructs but have left us with a lot of ambiguity because we essentially can have as many perspectives as we want on issues,especially when it requires some sort of moral interpretation. Religion immerses itself in this area also because of the claim to possession of the clearest guides not only to morality but in the view of many the purest determinant of right and wrong. For some, the interpretations are literal and for others it involves allegories—woven as stories that guide us in making moral interpretations as well as guiding us to right and wrong. Whatever book one subscribes to, whether it is the Bible, Koran, Hindu, they all provide guidance to belief, morality, and basic rules of life—defining and naming God and His expectations. If we can stay a bit away from our beliefs for a minute and just look at them as inspirational books, then it is easy to understand why depending on interpretation people can be misled quite easily.

Politicians or so called leaders have joined the fray, unfortunately there are no guiding principles other than what we have been taught as the mainline political practices—democracy, communism and socialism to name a few. Politicians are given to parsing, invectives and vituperations—in an attempt to confuse us and validate what by any definition is immoral, contemptuous and totally unacceptable. Lest I digress, this is about words, meaning and interpretations. When is a “thief a thief" and when is corruption what it is said to be. Which law or good book justifies either? Can one tell me which one is the lesser of two evils. It is as if we can distinguish between both it then provides us justification and an explanation of its existence. Why would one in authority try to explain the difference between both—what is their motive? Please disabuse me if I am wrong—have things changed so much that everything is grey and there is nothing like “black and white” anymore? In my opinion, it is asinine to suggest that there is a difference between the two, even if true. Both are embedded in each other—stealing after all is a corrupt practice. Does it really matter if the legal definition suggests a difference and are they not birds of the same feather? I would like to know which of the aforementioned books (Law, Bible, Koran) suggests that both are right/legal. Unless we have become so morally decrepit that we cannot distinguish between right and wrong, then we can buy into such. Again, life cannot be built on philosophical constructs—in that realm, one can make arguments on both sides and has a free hand in choosing his or her point. This is real life. I may be wrong and philosophers can take issue with this but let us call a spade a spade and we will be guiding young minds in the right direction. Just my opinion—that of an overactive mind.

Paul Inyang - 2/12/2015

Let's Talk (Feb. 8, 2015) - Daughters of Africans in Diaspora

NIGERIA VS FRANCE: WHEN ALL DEATHS BY TERRORISM ARE NOT EQUAL

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, which tracks security issues in Nigeria, over 16,000 people have been killed by Boko Haram since 2011.  The most memorable murderous rampage so far by this terrorist group began in the town of Baga in Nigeria's North East on January 3, 2015 and, by the time it ended on January 7, 2015, over 2,000 of the town's residents had been slaughtered.  In other words, Boko Haram assaulted the unarmed citizens of Baga for five straight days unchallenged by Nigeria's military or security forces.  On the same day that this murderous spree ended, that is on January 7, 2015, two French religious zealots vexed by years of the ridiculing of their religion by Charlie Hebdo, a little known satirical publication, went into the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris and killed 12 people.  On the next day, with the help of another terrorist, 5 more people were killed, bringing the total number of victims to 17.  The world was instantly outraged about the attacks in Paris, including Nigeria's President who had yet to act on, publicly mention or even as much as acknowledge the extensive massacre in his own country.  Just days later, national leaders and over a million people from around the world were in Paris marching in support of France and in opposition to terrorism.  Rightly so.

Especially since the first attacks in Paris were occurring at the same time, on the same day, that Boko Haram was killing thousands in Baga, Nigeria, many have wondered why 17 French victims received the world's attention while over 2,000 victims in Nigeria were ignored.  Some have suggested that this happened
because that was France's first experience with terrorism at such large scale.  After all, Boko Haram's attacks have become a normal existence in Northern Nigeria.  For years now, they have frequently murdered thousands and taken control of several cities and villages in Northern Nigeria without any credible effort by the government of Nigeria to stop them.  As a result, tens of thousands of Nigerian citizens have fled their country while an uncountable number of children have been rendered orphans by Boko Haram. Some others have argued that the attention that France received was due to the fact that the attacks in France were a direct assault on freedom of speech, which Charlie Hebdo's attacks on religion supposedly represented. 
That this argument should be taken with a grain of salt is exactly the point that the Financial Times made when, following the Paris attacks, its Europe Editor described Charlie Hebdo as "stupid" and accused the publication of Muslim-baiting.  It is also the point that David Brooks, conservative columnist at the New York Times, made when he wrote in his January 8, 2015 column that the celebration of Charlie Hebdo journalists as martyrs of free expression was misplaced.

To be clear, neither of these men was arguing in support of the acts of terrorism that occurred in Paris but the point was not lost on either man, nor should it be lost on any of us: that the 2,000 or more people that were murdered by Boko Haram on the same day had done nothing to offend Boko Haram; yet they were slaughtered and the world ignored them.  One reason why the argument about freedom of speech lacks credibility is because most of the people who advance the argument are the same people working hard to suppress the votes of minorities in the United States and other countries; the same people who attack academics over their expressions at university campuses and the same people that would not accept the legitimacy of duly elected public officials that they dislike. They are the same people who would jump all over the President of the United States for not flying to France to be part of a public spectacle that would have had had him linking hands with dictators ruling over countries where journalists are routinely jailed and even killed for writing or saying something that these hypocritical leaders consider offensive.

Some have argued that the world displayed no outrage about the murderous attacks in Nigeria because those victims were black.  If one follows this line of reasoning, race would then also be the reason why most of the world's big media outlets did not report on the massacre in Nigeria.  This argument seems logical but only to the extent that one chooses to suspend insight. Of course Nigerians are black and, of course we live in a world where black people almost always get the short end of the stick.  But it is also true that the plague of incompetence that has a firm grip on the internal politics and leadership of most African countries is not always the product of covinous racists hatching plots in covens.  To understand why international attention and media reporting may have been lacking, it is necessary to examine some of the facts.

The day after the Baga massacres ended (that is, on January 8, 2015), President Jonathan of Nigeria launched his re-election campaign.  That was the same day that the terrorist attacks ended in Paris. At no point in his re-election campaign speech did he bother to mention the fact that thousands of his fellow Nigerians, whose President he was, had just been slaughtered on his watch by Boko Haram.  However, he issued a statement of support for France while condemning the attacks in Paris.  In fact, for some time to come, his government contested the facts of the Baga massacre.  Between claims that it never occurred to claims that "only" a hundred and fifty people were killed, to claims that news reports about it contained exaggerations, one thing was clear: that  Dr. Jonathan was presiding over a government that had no interest in protecting the citizens that elected him to office as President.  At least this was the impression that they succeeded in presenting to the world.  Against that background, it is a hard sell to expect the rest of the world to be outraged about crises in Nigeria when the country's leaders were neither outraged nor seemingly concerned.  In every human culture known to exist, it is always weird optics for anyone to cry more than the bereaved.

Secondly, the world is not outraged for the same reason that much of Nigeria's wealthy class isn't.  Boko Haram is operating in Northern Nigeria, which is very far from the quiet and peaceful Southern Nigeria where Nigeria's oil fields and economic powerhouse are.  One does not need to be a rocket scientist to know that Boko Haram would be long crushed if their attacks were directed against Nigeria's oil wells.  An attack on any of those places would have been considered as an attack against the world that is so dependent on Nigeria's oil.  Besides, so many of Nigeria's wealthy politicians and business class now own pieces of Nigeria's oil production.  They would most definitely make the government protect their financial interests.

There is also the fact that, by operating in the Islamic North, most of Boko Haram's victims are fellow Muslims.  There is a sizable number of people who are satisfied to think of Boko Haram as being contained for as long as they remain in Northern Nigeria and kill "their own".  This is not a fact that many people in Nigeria's leadership would readily admit in public but they know, as does anyone who is interested in the truth, that this is indeed the reality.  Yet, one should expect that the current Nigerian government that has let the crises fester for 6 years would begin to attack and destroy Boko Haram militarily just before the next presidential elections because the President very badly needs to look good to the electorate now more than ever if he must win re-election.

Finally, if Africans are interested in how their stories are told and when the stories should be told, they must begin to write their own stories.  One of the lessons that we must take from this experience is that to always depend on other people to write one's story is foolhardy because, when the story is not written, it does not get out and when it does not get out, injustice reigns.  In the absence of literary advocates on behalf of those who live at the mercy of Boko Haram in Nigeria, Jon Stewart of the United States and a few media outlets around the world are left to write and speak about injustice and the nightmare of Boko Haram in Nigeria while Nigerians and other Africans watch and read reports about their kidnapped daughters and their murdered brothers and sisters without as much as a serious attempt to hold their leadership to account.  The thousands that were killed in Baga are forever silenced.  For those of us who remain alive, Wole Soyinka's message in his classic The Man Died ought always to resonate - that "The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny".

Let's Talk (Feb. 1, 2015) - Prof. Godwin Ohiwerei - Chair, Sociology, Je...