Every pretension to Africa for Africa Day

Africa Day in Manchester

I had planned nothing for the past Bank Holiday weekend except to catch up on some much-needed rest and sleep when I was offered a ticket to attend the Echoes of Africa event at Aviva Studios/Factory International on Saturday the 24^th.

This was in commemoration of Africa Day, previously known as African Freedom Day or African Liberation Day, initiated by the Organisation of African Unity on the 25^th of May 1963.

Looking at the agenda of events running from 11:00 AM to 6:00 PM, I was unsure if I had the stamina for 7 hours of potential revelry and entertainment, but I was determined to show up, if only out of gratitude for the invitation.

Please, I’m not fooled.

The Live Painting Workshop, which had begun in the early afternoon, was already underway when I arrived. I took a seat on one of the long sofas at the back, and I tempered my cynicism regarding the artistry of the participants, who were pretending to represent some essence of Africa. It easily resembled a messy children’s paint class, yet people of all generations were engaged in it.

We have been led to believe that a certain combination of vibrant colours and abstract shapes is representative of Africa in context or origin; it reflected everything Toto’s Africa was, but not the reality of what Africa is. The inspiration for the song originated from a late-night documentary about Africa and likely the recollections of missionaries to Africa who became teachers for American schoolchildren.

An unrelatable discussion

The next item on the agenda, beyond the over-representation of Nigerians on the discussion panel, focused on a topic likely more suited for those seeking a career in Afrobeats or some contemporary genre of African music. Having first met a lady of Portuguese and Guinea-Bissau descent who knew the lyrics to everything the female disc jockey played; I spent more time with a grandmother of Caribbean heritage tending to her noticeably Caucasian grandson.

Indeed, what is now deemed the music of Africa is quite pervasive; it has a global audience, and collaborations are extending its reach into places one would never have expected such music to resonate.

Yet, in my conversation with the grandmother, I thought a more relevant topic would be how we preserve the significance of our African heritage in the diaspora and provide younger generations a sense of belonging in the various spheres that influence education, experience, and identity.

Music and fashion to the world

Perhaps this was not the forum for such a cerebral debate, and thus far, it had only intensified my scepticism regarding the purpose of this gathering. Each time we were urged to make more noise like Africans, there was a feeling that English reserve had crept upon us unawares.

The live music performances were interesting, but I knew none of the artists or their music, and I was barely connecting until one performer took the stage like the Bobby Caldwell of Afrobeats.

If there were no visuals, one would imagine the performer hailed from a large city in Africa; he had mastered everything and could pass for being as good as the popular Afrobeats artists.

Then came the fashion show; the mispronounced words by the compere regarding atelier to Aso oke were quickly forgiven when it became clear that the distinction between African designer and African fashion meant the latter garnered less attention compared to the former. Some of the items showcased on the catwalk were comical at best, but I am not the target audience for this kind of attire.

Before I knew it, it was almost 6:00 PM—a delightful day out and a reminder that the Echoes of Africa were just that; an echo is a reflection of the original sound and should not be mistaken for the real thing.

Edinburgh: MaDeb African Shop

Out on a discovery

I stepped out of my hotel this evening to go for a meal and thought I’ll walk to a group of restaurants around London Road and Leith Walk in Edinburgh. However, instead of walking up London Road, I had a sense of adventure to go down Easter Road where I had noted from Google Maps that an Italian Restaurant might be open.

Half a mile down Easter Road, the restaurant was closed and I am beginning to realise that some restaurants and takeaways are closed on Mondays.

Unsure of what else to do, I decided to take a side road that I thought would get me to Leith Walk even if my bearings thought I was on the wrong path, I did end up on Leith Walk, one of the longest stretches of road in Edinburgh that seems to have so many names, you better not look at the road signs.

A homely wonderland

I crossed the road and walked upwards into town as my eyes caught the sign of an African goods shop, my curiosity got the better of me as the two ladies in the shop beckoned to me, and so I yielded and walked into the shop. All indications were they thought I was from Eastern Nigeria, but I introduced myself differently as my eyes darted around the stocked shelves to see familiar goods and wares that excite the West African palate.

I could not decide what I wanted when I was informed they had frozen jollof rice and stew, and if I had access to a microwave oven, that would do just fine.

MaDeb African Shop had only been open two months and whilst for me it was a chance discovery, it might well be the only purveyor of goods and wares the West Africans would only be too familiar with. The African Flavour Restaurant that I wrote about over a month ago had closed, it was a bad business that failed to take advantage of the monopoly it had to serve a particular clientele and that is just a shame.

More and more

The list of things to get from Madeb African Shop is almost inexhaustible, the shop uses three areas, the main shop, the back where perishable goods are kept and refrigerated and the basement with cosmetics and hair products.

In the main shop, there are spices, flours, canned foods, dried and smoked fish, Agege bread, ingredients to various stews as Egusi, Ogbono, bitter leaf, fermented peas (iru), mint leaves (efinrin), palm oil, kola nuts, plantain bananas, tubers like yams, sweet potatoes, suya packs, Nigerian drinks and beverages. Ointments like Robb and Aboniki, this is your perfect nostalgic corner shop.

For those who prefer their West African dishes ready-made, the shop provides a cooking service as well as preparing meals for events. I have the feeling this outfit would be a better replacement for that lackadaisically useless restaurant.

Get there and shop

The ladies were humorous, pleasant and nice, on getting back to my hotel, I defrosted my jollof rice, added some stew and downed it with a can of Afrimalt, I must be tipping the scales on the wrong side of zero.

MaDeb African Shop,
5 Croall Place,
EH7 4LT
Edinburgh

Photos

Customer Complaint II: Spices African Restaurant, Manchester, your spice is shit

Silly me

Smarting from my encounter with Currys PC World, as a glutton for more punishment I went online shopping again for food through Hungry House.

I typed in my postcode and I clicked on African cuisine and a list of 5 restaurants showed up, most of which serve Nigerian fare but only one of them was online, it was Spices African Restaurant and so I placed an order of various meals totalling £51 including delivery and I received a confirmation that my order was acknowledged and pending.

My order and confirmation

 

A few minutes later at 19:18, I received an email confirmation that my order would arrive anytime between 19:40 and 20:25, at which point, I began to salivate with Pavlovian expectation.

My hunger angered

At 20:18, an hour after my order was placed, I received a phone call; I almost jumped out of my seat to get my order from the door when the caller asked who he was calling. Quite strange since he would have had the order and that was where he got my phone number from.

I gave him my name as he asked if I have put an order to his restaurant through Hungry House, I replied in the affirmative and at that point he told me my order was to be cancelled because there was no one to deliver it. I was stunned.

I remonstrated that having confirmed my order, it meant they had what I ordered and were able to deliver it, but he was having none of it as he told me to call Hungry House to cancel my order and seek a refund.

Pissing me off

At which point I asked if that was how he did business, but he was nonchalant. Angered and frustrated, I offered that Spices African Restaurant would not get a good review for this, to which he replied something to the effect that I could go and do my worst.

I called Hungry House to complain since they are acting as the portal and escrow service to Spices African Restaurant and they were none too pleased. I was given a £5 voucher towards y next Hungry House order and my money would be refunded within the next 3 working days – a rotten inconvenience, but I am not finished with Spices African Restaurant yet.

Closed for business

For the moment their account has been suspended on Hungry House like the other African Restaurants that might have been involved in sharp business practices as Spices African Restaurant, except for Tae’s Tavern which is currently undergoing refurbishment.

Why are they all offline? Spices African Restaurant was put offline after my complaint

Suffice it to say that Spices African Restaurant has probably gotten away with such rotten service without consequence or repercussion because no one pursues the matter beyond the exchanges on the phone, but I am having none of it.

Bad business mien

It saddens me that many ethnic businesses take a lax attitude to customer service and handle the importance of first impressions with levity, almost oblivious and unconcerned of the damage it can cause the reputation of their business and the loss of custom.

As the business begins to fail, they attribute their difficulties to external factors when the problem is principally their attitude to cultivating respectful and considerate customer relationships. This is the stuff vendettas are made of, especially one that leaves a hungry man too angry to think of food until the blog is completed.

Spices African Restaurant, you crossed the wrong man and you have not begun to pay dearly for this. Your spices are rotten, your Africanness is suspect and your service as a restaurant is a disgrace.

Opinion: To Be A Homosexual in Africa Today

The freedoms I have

Sometimes I forget that privileges and conveniences I have by reason of birth and location, taking many things for granted that many others desire to see, if they can beyond, the next hour.

The life I have today I cherish, the health I have has been a constant blessing - each day I desire the world is a better place for all people, sadly, for some, each day is a worse hell than the day before.

I have no answers to many of these problems, but I hope for the few I meet, I can seed a word of hope, some encouragement and maybe more to brighten them up towards the things they face.

Justified to do justice

Yet, I have watched as people secure in the sense of who they think they are from their religion, their status, their morality, their identity or their beliefs of superiority bray like an irate mob to consume those who are different.

They have found an easy outlet of convenience, justified in their words and deeds to act in the stead of God and culture to remove from their communities those that do not conform.

The hatred dripping from their fangs like vampires after a feast of bloody abandon, they have whipped up a frenzy of hysteria; we must protect our values from corruption, but the corruption they perceive has always been part of our humanity, from the time there was the opportunity between people to find affection and express that affection as intimately as they dare to care.

Difference and diversity

Before the law that instructs about whether things we right or wrong, we existed almost oblivious of each other yet enjoyed the brotherhood and neighbourliness of our humanity until knowledge came of how different we were.

Some celebrated and embraced our diversity, others exploited and exacerbated our differences, the former was the selfless act of love in the mould of the Good Samaritan, and the latter was the selfish act of hatred giving scope for unimaginable evil.

Yet, we are allowed the courage of our convictions to take the easy path of convenience and follow the crowd of thoughts that would ostracise the other to belong to the many.

We have schooled ourselves to not acquiesce, groomed ourselves never to tolerate, and decided we cannot accommodate those that are to our thinking different, bad, dangerous, evil, degenerate, repulsive, hell-bound and condemned.

A fellow human being

Such is the homosexual to many of us, a fellow human being, who should if we had our way never be fellow, nor dare to be human for their being does not deserve to walk the streets we walk.

But think on this matter; in any population on the face of the earth and the diversity that each unit when compartmentalised might contain, anything from 1% to 10% or more would be so radically different from us – shall we treat them like dogs for their status, their race, their tribe, their handicap, their sexuality, their speech, their beliefs, their views, their culture, their lifestyles, their origin, their mix, their loves, their hates and much else?

Then think on this, if you belonged to any minority where the tyranny of the majority reigned supreme to blackmail, to persecute, to bully, to prosecute, to excoriate, to condemn, to lynch and to put to death.

That is the unbearable existence of the gay African (a fellow human being) in their hostile communities; anything up to and possible more than 80 million* Africans who have always lived in Africa and hardly been exposed to influences outside Africa are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual or intersexual, they have nowhere to go but to live in Africa, where they belong, by birth and by right.

*[The 80 million figure is an estimate of possibly 8% of the total population not being heterosexual. More references appear below the blog.]

Worst examples of leadership

The purpose of leadership in the face of vulnerable minorities is not to accentuate the differences amongst the people they lead that would persecute the few, but to demonstrate the magnanimous virtues of maturity, to offer all the protections of the law possible and to moderate all their expressed views and actions to minorities amongst them.

This is the failure of leadership we have witnessed in politics and governance being demonstrated in pandering to populist demagoguery, for the truth is that homosexuals have always been amongst us in Africa until someone found some political gain in pointing fingers at them.

The almost 80 million African homosexuals are not going to disappear overnight because some law has been promulgated to the glee and satisfaction of the majority.

What are you doing?

The lynching of homosexuals in streets near you, where you have given your support to depriving your own fellow citizen and countryman of life by your words, your actions or your silence would not eliminate them.

By God, if sexuality were a matter of choice like one could change clothes, homosexuals would definitely wear different clothes from what they wear now to conform and be assimilated into your norm.

For all those that debate and contend that homosexuality is a choice and a lifestyle, if you walked a long hard mile in the shoes of a homosexual, your choice and lifestyle would be that of a heterosexual but we have enough science to prove that homosexuality is as set as the colour of your skin – you can tone or tan your skin, but you cannot change your race.

Address your humanity

As we acquiesce to the 21^st Century extermination of the African homosexual, each one of almost 80 million of them, the lives lost in World War I which we celebrate the centenary of this year and those lost in World War II combined, along with the gruesome evil of the Holocaust, would not begin to number close to the task of ridding ourselves of this homosexual menace.

This is not about the West, this is about our own, our own people, fellow human beings, their lives, their livelihoods, their existence, their pursuit of happiness, all quietly seeking to fulfil their potential in their own countries, provinces, states and communities, like any other person born into this world desires, given the opportunity.

If you for a moment were homosexual, what would you do?

Address your humanity and with that see the humanity in others.

Thank you.

Other readings

Blog - Human Rights Day 2011: Gay Rights are Human Rights

Blog - Nigeria: Arrest Him! He's Homosexual!

LGBT rights in Africa - Wikipedia

Gay Men in Africa & HIV/AIDS – AVERT

What Percentage of the Population Is Gay? - Gallup

Populations of Africa - Wikipedia

Opinion: How Zwarte Piet is a Subject of Culture, History, but Rarely Race

Some quaint traditions

A number of exchanges on Facebook regarding the Sinterklaas tradition which is the Low Countries' equivalent though contrived of Santa Claus had me rummaging through the memories of my almost 13 year sojourn in the Netherlands.

The topic concerned the helpers of Sinterklaas called Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). These are usually Caucasians with blackened faces in clothes of flamboyant contrasting colours somewhat modelled on the Moors as Sinterklaas is said to visit the Netherlands from Spain.

Much as I understand that the blackening of faces might present a culture shock to foreigners observing this tradition for the first time, it does not remotely pertain to outright racism apart from the general idea of a master-servant relationship between Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet.

Know your history

What bothers me is the tendency for certain people to arrogate to themselves either real or imagined histories of figures and traditions they have no affinity with and in the process they begin to personify the victim complex of those cultures.

On the broader issue of our humanity, we do recognise that we all have a responsibility to seek the institution and enforcement of broad human rights for freedoms and the pursuit of happiness.

However, it is also important that we recognise our core identities such that we do not appear to race ahead of the discussion that pertains to the rights of others in groups that we do not essentially belong due to many factors beyond race and residence.

Too diverse for colour to matter

My view of the black race is that it is just as diverse as any other race. Though we might have shared histories of oppression and indignities suffered through centuries, it is important that we recognise the differences in our history within the compendium of many histories in Africa, in the Caribbean, in North America, in South America and now recently in Europe.

Whilst centuries ago, Africans might have shared in the broader cruel history of slavery towards either the Middle East or the Americas, each destination developed a divergent history where the commonality of race is the only affinity between us after which we are all very different people.

In Africa, Blacks might people the Anglophone, Francophone, and Lusophone parts of Africa, but within those countries that make up these groupings, we are radically different in culture, tribe, tradition and histories that the artificially cobbled-together nations we belong to are mostly geographical expressions that we have learnt to live with.

How to join a struggle

We can identify with and join a struggle for the liberation of other oppressed members of our race, but we must be careful that in our identifying with a cause we do not lose our identity and history to complete assimilation, uprooted from the ancestry and moorings of who we are.

Other Africans joined together to fight Apartheid, but we fought as free people seeking the freedom of our brothers and sisters; we did not become South African and put ourselves under the influence of Apartheid to stand in the face of the shootings in Soweto.

Quite heterogeneous

In Britain, the tendency to see the black race as homogenous is dangerous. The majority Caucasian indigenous and growing foreign population though white, rarely identify that strongly along racial lines as Africans, African Americans, Caribbean or similar people of colour do.

They have their languages, culture, histories and strong identities linked to regions, customs, traditions and many other common traits that sets each grouping out as unique.

I sometimes fear that we coalesce and school together like fish on issues where we are essentially birds of a completely different feather.

Zwarte Piet is hardly the problem

It is why I could not countenance the apparent righteous indignation bordering on apoplectic rage, of African residents of England to Zwarte Piet. The debate is ongoing in the Netherlands about cultural and politically correct elements of retaining that aspect of the Sinterklaas culture.

It is healthy, interesting and robust, but it is nowhere near the zest for insurrection demonstrated by racial impostors from abroad, who might have found another roller coaster bandwagon to hitch a ride on.

We indeed must have debates about racism, racial equality, race relations, race history and probably revisit history for understanding, appreciation, recognition and reparation of wrongs of the past and present – I do not think that debate can be had with wrestling Zwarte Piet to the ground in either horseplay or mortal combat.

The fight for dignity is paramount beyond race, but we lose focus when we decide to take more offence on issues where our affinity with the people we presume are not liberated is tenuous at best.

Opinion: Tackling the Culture of Blacks Handling Disease

The taboos we must break

I found myself nodding in agreement to literally every line I read in this article published in The Body magazine – The Complete HIV/AIDS Resource – titled Breaking Through: HIV and African Americans.

If we removed HIV and replaced it with cancer, diabetes, hypertension, or misfortune, we would have subconsciously listed a sliding scale in terms in growing confidence to talk about how certain issues affect us.

Someone dying of the complications of HIV might only be able to accept that they are dying of cancer, the visible signs and sometimes along with diabetes means, we never attempt to ask more probing questions.

Our false stories

As I read the article, the writer informed that he had lost three relations, presumably African American to AIDS; two women, including his aunt and a man who insisted he was a heroin user when it was quite possible he was gay.

We have never been able to approach the reality of our diseases for the so many factors raised in that article. It is not just an African American thing; it is particularly African and probably broadly affects all non-Western cultures.

When I write blogs like this, I am wont to excerpting generous portions of the source material to make my points. However, I have decided we need to get the courage to begin to face the many issues that plague our communities as we suffer in silence, perpetuate the stigma and look at disease as the otherness that will never approach our steads.

We shock to numbness

We cannot deny that HIV/AIDS and cancer cuts a swathe through our communities like a wild forest fire that we treat as if it is insignificant, as our silence becomes a coping mechanism of convenience.

This means we fail to access health options and healthcare early enough for radical and timely intervention until it becomes an emergency exceeding effective medical treatment leaving us with just one option of palliative end-of-life care.

The story then becomes one of hospital visits, close family in shock at the apparently sudden deterioration in health of their relation as life slowly ebbs away no one the wiser about the truth until a nurse pulls one of the most affected relatives aside to say exactly what the diagnosis was. AIDS? Cancer? Usually not enemies scheming in the backyard, held at bay with Psalm 35.

There and then, the world collapses around every loved one and the questions start to flood the mind with prefixed inquisitive phrases of how long, how bad, how did, what can, how much – we have experienced this many times and yet we willingly hop on the vicious cycle of the culture of blacks handling disease badly.

The signs we ignore

We ignore the warning signs in the cause of the worry about the loss of our livelihood and the economic distress that accompanies a disease. Then visit our temples hoping and wishing for miracles with mountain-moving faith that had moves nothing more than the air that comes out of our mouths in fervent prayer, because we are in the mortal grip of fear; we rapidly approach an avoidable expiry date.

We listen to stories and conspiracies, we search for Shamanist cures in grottos that have defied the onslaught of civilisation and logic, imbibing awful concoctions too rotten for a recipe list and yet the temporary relief presages a catastrophic relapse before it is passed off in an obituary as a brief illness or a sudden death.

No fairy tale

These are the facts, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, the “Nigerian multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, pioneer of Afrobeat music, human rights activist, and political maverick” died of Karposi’s sarcoma, and it is a form of skin cancer usually brought on by AIDS.

His brother, a prominent AIDS activist and former minister of Health could only talk about AIDS affecting his family after the man had died. Nelson Mandela’s son also died of AIDS, but we only learnt of that after the fact.

As a cancer survivor, I know how much I have revealed about my condition and the secrets that I still keep for the fears, the shame, the stigma and many other attendant issues that dog our cultural outlook to disease.

Yet, as the article states, and this I will excerpt, “Magic Johnson has not been cured by some medicine being kept from us.”

Ignoring our possibility

We can expect better medical outcomes if we talk, if we act or react immediately and seek professional advice when things are changing in our bodies that we cannot account for in our daily routine.

Karposi’s sarcoma as a result of HIV/AIDS complications was already treatable in the 1990s, and anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs manage HIV to the extent that people living with HIV can live very productive lives.

We cannot ignore our way round reality, nor can we bargain away disease with the false comfort of vows and the sudden laying on of hands; we need to accept first by understanding what we have* and that will inform the kinds of interventions that medicine or therapy can help us with, in a timely fashion.

[*This includes, HIV/AIDS, cancer, diabetes, hypertension, depression, mental illness, misfortune – tag anything you want to the list.]

Medicine is not evil and churches are not hospitals, but the beginning of dealing with the problem that plagues our community with the poison of silence is to read an article in a HIV/AIDS magazine about respected black women in the family dying of AIDS in today's America.

Finally, go for that test, it is about your life and keeping it.

Click on the link and read - The Body - Breaking Through: HIV and African Americans

Thought Picnic: Our Jungle Colonies of Mob Justice

Our jungle colonies

We need to reassess what we have become as a people. That has been the opinion of many with regards to events that happened in Nigeria over the last week.

For me, the news broke on Twitter that 4 students suspected of theft were lynched by a mob comprised of the people from a community that harbours a university – the same university that produced our President.

If the news was not harrowing enough, the fact that someone stood by to record the event on video and post it online should elicit much more debate about the victims, the lynchers, the community, our country at large and the impunity that allows for such acts without restraint.

A people devoid of culture

Sadly, what it suggests is that we have lost the sense of community that allows us to live peaceably with each other in civilised settings enabling law enforcement to take the lead in terms of dealing with suspects, crimes and criminality.

When we speak of our culture or value systems, we honestly must begin to wonder if we have any left that we can identify as our own.

The commonality of traditions we have once shared in respect for authority, accepting diversity without accentuating the differences, the respect for elders and the voice of reason have departed for something rather bizarre.

We are not civilised

When we attempt to compare ourselves with other supposedly civilised societies that we imagine have no culture or traditions, some things are evident in those societies that we struggle to exhibit.

Their communities have over time developed rights and freedoms that are protected by the force of law and yet they have not stagnated but have progressively found new causes to espouse and confer rights and freedoms on. From our somewhat sanctimonious perspective we agree amongst ourselves that those societies are decadent and that their values are un-African. Yet human rights should not be defined by anything but our humanity.

However, every person born into those societies is treated with dignity, respected and protected; they can seek and obtain justice and fairness from the cradle to the grave and where there is abuse, society acts decisively to seek redress, punishment and compensation.

Our detrimental cohesions

There is separation of religion from the state, everyone has the freedom to have a faith or have none at all and yet respect the fact that difference does not mean we cannot be agreeable. That is the fundamental of civilisation.

We have used our diversity to accentuate our differences, we coalesce into tribal Bantustans ready to be called into mob action than be inspired by reason and reasonableness. The ends of religion we adhere to border on the fundamentalist feeding a seething intolerance of blood-letting bigotry – No, that is not civilisation, it is language of the primitive and the expression of the savage.

Even in the most conservative interpretation of the foreign religions that have swept away the core elements of our value systems and mythologies, none recommend death as a sentence for death; yet, the call to mete violence out to fellow human beings is heard and responded to without flinching, we participate explicitly or voyeuristically through justifying those acts and pretend to a civilisation we do not possess.

Where we must go

It is empathy borne of civilising ourselves that will usher in the rights and freedoms we so desire for ourselves but rarely defer to others in our prejudices and judgements. Starting with the right to life, the right to justice, right to fairness, the freedom to pursue happiness individually and communally, the freedom to practice the faith of one’s choosing and the absence of fear because the government stands up to its responsibility to secure life, livelihood and property whilst enforcing extant laws.

We have to ask ourselves that question whether the union that is our nationhood is united in our minds and we must learn that our safety, freedom and security can only be assured if we attempt to walk in the shoes of the victim and strive above all else to be one another’s keeper.

The legacy of Homophobia overtaking a ministry and the gospel

Court in controversy

In February, I watched an edition of CNN’s Open Court programme that deals with the sport of tennis covering events and personalities.

[This blog has a very religious tone to it for detail and context.]

One feature of the programme was titled “Where are they now?” and this time Margaret Court [1] was featured who is the most celebrated winner of grand slams with 62 to her name, a record that is most unlikely to be broken in the foreseeable future.

She now resides in Perth, Australia, a minister of the gospel with a Pentecostal leaning as the video showed a church service where she was presiding, ministering and preaching.

So, I decided to do a search for her full biography and was lead to her Wikipedia entry [2] where apart from the general historical background and the records she had broken there were main topics about her faith and her views about homosexuality with stridently fundamentalist views that span at least a 12-year period.

Whilst to members of her congregation she might be respected, honoured and revered, this seemingly inconsequential issue might well have closed the doors of her chapel to people who in terms of the purposes of the gospel one would think she should be ministering to.

A vile gospel

The sad issue here is people have a religious ministry and inadvertently when engaged in social discourse lack savvy that they end up preaching what essentially is a Gospel of Condemnation.

It then begs the question as to what ministers of the gospel want to be known for; controversy that thrives on wedge issues and moralises to galvanise those already in the tent or that gospel most representative of the ministry of Jesus Christ that opened doors to those who would normally not fit in the moral framework of the “holier than thou.”

The erstwhile Anglican Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Peter Akinola [3] would be at pains to get the truth of the gospel to the hearing of others because the last years of his blessed ministry were overtaken by a virulent and vicious homophobic message that accelerated schism within the church alienating many.

The Archbishop obviously and honestly thought he was on the right path but between the causes of homosexuality and homophobia in Africa, one can aver that the latter is more unAfrican than the former.

Slamming the doors

The new Anglican Primate of Nigeria, the Most Revd N.D. Okoh was on pastoral visit to the UK and when confronted with this matter seemed to have taken on the mantle of his predecessor with a double portion of that poisonous anointing.

These were his words [4], “Let me say this; the Anglican Church in Nigeria, emphatically does not accept gay people. Our bible is against it, the word of God is against it. Gay or lesbianism or whatever… it is like saying we condone drug users. What we offer them is repentance and deliverance from that evil spirit. Do not come here to tell me about grace; what grace? We will never accept it.”

This view is interesting because if gay people will not be accepted, they will not have access to the gospel that offers them the supposed condition the archbishop wants them to attain.

The question then is what gospel he professes to preach because it offers no peace, no light, no hope, no encouragement and really no Christ.

I can understand that the most difficult gospel vocation is loving one’s enemies and if homophobia were defined in terms of a type of enmity, wherefore is the love?

No respect for others

The archbishop newly in this role has already painted himself out of the corner of glad tidings to the declaration of war on a section of those his gospel if it were good and wholesome, imitating the gospel of the word of God who need to hear better than all this vitriol.

A new low in African homophobia [5] fuelled and fostered by “so-called” preachers of the gospel was displayed in January at the funeral of David Kato, the Ugandan LGBT activist who was bludgeoned to death at his home.

In what was supposed to be a solemn, sad and reflective occasion allowing for people to bury the unfortunate man with some dignity and respect, a pastor seized the microphone and began an unseemly homophobic and hateful attack on the dead and the audience.

Whilst the situation was retrieved eventually to commit the departed to the ground, very few religious leaders condemned this affront to everything good and wholesome even if it were not a religious setting – this barbarity of the gospel needs to stop.

Return to the examples you so profess

Going back to the Nigerian Archbishop; if he were to live in the historical times of the bible he would condemn the fact that the Israelite spies allowed themselves to consult and be hidden by Rahab the harlot [6] when they visited Jericho.

King David [7] would have had no recourse than to be a convicted murderer sent to the gallows for committing adultery with Bathsheba and scheming the inadvertent death of her husband in battle, depriving us of Psalm 51.

Surely, no matter how thirsty he was, Jesus should not in the 4^th chapter of John have been talking to the Samaritan woman [8] in the first place, then to learn that she had had 5 husbands does not bear thinking of, but this same woman was that one who announced the coming of the prophet to her townsfolk.

As for the woman caught [9] in the act of adultery, the archbishop would have thrown the first stone and repented long after she was dead. It is unlikely he would have had the Christ-like compassion to say to her, “Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more.”

The Church in Corinth was as sexually depraved [10] as you could get a congregation and it was to them that Apostle Paul wrote the epistle about love in 1^st Corinthians 13 [11] and gave information about the miraculous workings of the gifts of the Holy Spirit in 1^st Corinthians 14 [12].

The gospel and this other gospel

I think grace was at work, compassion mattered and love allowed for God in his dealings with man to overlook a lot to draw them close to the message of the gospel He had for them.

The legacy people have of their ministry would endure long after they are gone, some ministers would have to look at how their message which may not be ministering to the needs of a wider society with attitudes and views so diametrically opposed to the church, because it is to those same people that the gospel really needs to be preached and they will not hear a word of it if the reputation that precedes the preacher is that of condemnation.

I dare say as in the epistle to the Galatians, they preach another gospel [13].

Sources

[1] YouTube - Margaret Court, record holder in tennis

[2] Margaret Court - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[3] Peter Akinola - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[4] New Archbishop of Nigeria Anglican Church declares support for homophobia « Justice for Gay Africans Society

[5] Violence Erupts at Kato Funeral | News | The Advocate

[6] Bible Story about Rahab Helping the Spies

[7] Story of David and Bathsheba for Kids

[8] Jesus and Samaritan Woman

[9] Jesus and the Woman Taken in Adultery

[10] 1 Corinthians 5:1 It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father's wife.

[11] I Corinthians 13 - Passage Lookup - New International Version, ©2011 - BibleGateway.com

[12] 1 Corinthians 14 - Passage Lookup - New International Version, ©2011 - BibleGateway.com

[13] Galatians 1:8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!

40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students

An unexpected commendation

Out of the blue on the 7^th anniversary of my launching this blog I receive an email citing my blog again as one of the 40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students [1].

I am almost embarrassed by the commendation offered which in their words reads “Akin: Highly eloquent, insightful and provocative, Akin is essential reading for any undergraduates or graduates with a particular affinity for Nigeria — though topics from other nations (and the continent as a whole) do frequently crop up as well.”

Coming from the AccreditedOnlineColleges website I can only suppose that as academia is moving online more of their reference material will be sourced from opinions of people who have ideas to share about different issues.

I remember almost 2 years ago my blog was cited by BachelorsDegreeOnline.com as one 100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa their commendation drew a different perspective of my writings and it has evolved over time.

I am most grateful for this acknowledgement. In closing, I must not fail to mention that NigerianTalks.Org and NaijaBlog were cited too.

Sources

[1] 40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students | Accredited Online Colleges.com

[2] 100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa | Bachelors Degree Online

100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa [akin.blog-city.com]

Maison Tropicale - Grand Projects

The context of grand projects

The most recent grand project in Africa was the 2010 FIFA World Cup and that had its detractors. Many who thought the billions spent on hosting the jamboree could have been better spent on development and poverty alleviation projects.

In some ways, there is feeling that grand projects should be sited anywhere else but Africa until it develops to a certain standard of living before it gratifies itself with something big.

Apart from a major art commission in Senegal, the issue of the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro [1] in Cote d’Ivoire was discussed, this was at one time in the Guinness World Records the world’s largest church.

In context, the Catholics of Cote d’Ivoire are quite proud of this church as theirs in Africa and it was consecrated by Pope John Paul II in 1990.

For the masses and for excellence

As we discussed this, it reminded me of Oprah Winfrey Lady’s Academy for Girls [2] (OWLAG) in South Africa where the American media mogul had sunk $40 million of her own money to create an institution of educational excellence.

Many thought it would have been better for her to create 40 $1m schools instead but I offered the argument that it the job of governments to build schools for the populace and if Ms Winfrey were to spread resources thin in this manner, she would who have to rely on already failing governments to manage and run those schools.

OWLAG as a beacon of educational excellence can serve as a standard of what is achievable just as grand projects that foster pockets of development and create aspirations to raising the standards of living and quality all around Africa.

The springboard of grand projects

Whilst sadly the Maison Tropicale prototypes did not get rolled out to the 10,000 units originally planned they could have provided an upward review of traditional architectural practices and the ease of dismantling the structures could have made for easier provision of housing.

Unfortunately, those were lessons we failed to learn but 33 years after the event in the Nigeria, the villages built [3] for the 2^nd Black Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC ‘77) represent one of the largest housing projects ever embarked upon in Africa.

Sources

[1] Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[2] Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls [akin.blog-city.com]

[3] Festac Town - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

La Maison Tropicale Series

Maison Tropicale film in Amsterdam

Deconstructing Maison Tropicale - Introduction

Maison Tropicale - Ownership

Maison Tropicale - Heritage

Maison Tropicale - Corrupt enterprise

Maison Tropicale - Grand Projects

Maison Tropicale - Corrupt enterprise

Corrupt enterprise

The audience might have worn a wry smile when the camera focused on an interview with one of the top government officials in Congo Brazzaville.

He completely denied knowledge of the removal of the Maison Tropicale prototypes and offered that he only really learnt of their disappearance and the circumstance around the situation at the interview.

It was not convincing, silver had definitely crossed palms for the removal of that structure beyond the payment that was made to the landlady who used the paltry sum she made compared to current market value of the prototype to become a powerful slum landlord developing all the land surrounding the original prototype foundations.

In Niamey, the people seemed to have a lesser claim to the prototype and simply felt powerless in preventing their monument from being dismantled and carried away.

Powerless people

In the words of that neighbor, she said, “Poor people have no power”. This again represents the helplessness of the ordinary African in exacting their rights and getting justice.

In age-old colonial-speak, they gave us the Bible and took our land; in this case, they offered a few bronze coins for the prototypes and sold them for truckloads of gold.

The money they paid would have smoothed the bureaucratic hurdles that would have impeded the opportunities to take the prototypes out of the countries with the blessing of government officials who were supposed to hold African treasures in trust for the people and ensure they are not pilfered for personal profit of as it were art thieves.

The need for reeducation

However, without a strong sense of ownership and an appreciation of heritage very little can be done to generate the activism that would militate against African treasures being stolen out of African for the business enterprise of thieves.

There is a reeducation context to this which should include embracing our colonialist past and what came with it with the greater prospects of proud African history open to tourism and the recognition of our culture in situ.

La Maison Tropicale Series

Maison Tropicale film in Amsterdam

Deconstructing Maison Tropicale - Introduction

Maison Tropicale - Ownership

Maison Tropicale - Heritage

Maison Tropicale - Corrupt enterprise

Maison Tropicale - Grand Projects