Community and The Neighbours We Never Knew

The Vanishing Neighbours

It was only a few weeks ago that I had a conversation in the office kitchen, near the coffee machine. I was curious as to why a company on our floor seemed to keep a three-day week. They were in on neither Monday nor Friday.

The lady I spoke to said that they worked from home on Mondays and had Fridays off. As usual, this week I did not expect them in on Monday, but by Tuesday it became apparent that they had gone. The hive of activity that sat between my office and the kitchen became a scene of eerie calm and emptiness. A part of my office community had gone without notice.

Communion and Loss

Earlier in the week, during Communion at church, people lined up for the gifts. My place in the seating arrangement means that I am one of the first congregants to go forward, ahead of others.

After returning to my seat for contemplation and to listen to the choir sing, I could also watch the other congregants go forward for the breaking of bread. A male couple usually sits to the side, on the right as one looks towards the altar, but only the taller of the two went forward.

It seemed peculiar, as they were never apart, and the shorter of them still carried his age well, being a nonagenarian, though I cannot say why we had never exchanged pleasantries in all the time I had seen them.

Comforting the Bereaved

After the Sung Eucharist, I saw other church members go to chat with the one who was present, and it caught my eye that they were shaking his hand and patting his knee. Everything pointed to the premise that something might have happened to his partner, and from these interactions, I had drawn my own conclusions before I enquired of another person.

The old man had passed away during the week, and they were comforting his partner. I had not made his acquaintance well enough to be familiar, yet I felt that we had, even from the distance I maintained, lost a dear member of our community. May his soul rest in peace.

A Summer Barbecue

Our village, which comprises five apartment blocks with shared facilities and a rather cantankerous WhatsApp group of restless people who have not yet found the natural circadian rhythm of silence and peace at a certain time of day, gathered in the communal garden for a summer barbecue.

I was not sure I would attend, as I am not good with crowds, but when my neighbour, one of the organisers, saw me a few hours before the event, I could not excuse myself from the fête. I paid for my ticket and took a bottle of South African shiraz and a bottle of orange juice to the gathering.

Gathering in the Garden

Dressed in traditional and colourful apparel, I was easily the centre of attention, while at the same time hoping to be inconspicuous. This was the first time something like this had been arranged in our decades-long residency of the village, and over forty people came.

From someone who had moved in only a fortnight ago to others who have lived here for over thirty years, I gleaned enough from the conversations I had. I was better off sitting in one place, with people interacting with me, than moving around networking extrovertly, which is a total drain on my mental reserves.

Proximity Without Intimacy

It struck me then how strange it was that so many of us should live so close and yet know one another so little. That WhatsApp group is the perfect emblem of it; we are near enough to disturb each other's peace, yet not close enough to know the names behind the complaints.

We had shared walls, stairwells, and a garden for years, and it took a barbecue for some of us to exchange a first word. Proximity, I realised, is not the same as intimacy, and living side by side is not the same as living together.

What Community Means

What it revealed to me was that we do not do neighbourliness and community enough, at least for those with an interest in others. I once had a neighbour whom I never met and who kept to themselves in the eighteen months they lived next door. Whether a recluse or simply indifferent, one could only be glad they were gone when I learnt of the situation.

I only want neighbours I can check on and who check on me; people who, when we meet in the corridor, would stop to have a chat; people ready to help one another in the ordinary and the more so. They become a kind of family, and that too is what community is all about.

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

Borstal Wednesdays on Teams

The Wednesday Dread

Wednesday mornings do not deliver the kind of impetus and encouragement needed to see the day through with a sense of purpose and an aim for achievement.

One is reminded of being in a secondary school morning assembly with all the trappings of a borstal; the headmaster traipsing across the platform, slapping the birch into his hand, and speaking in a booming voice of quarrelsome displeasure and pique.

Diktat Over Dialogue

For a gathering of professionals, where the distinction is more one of corporate hierarchy than any other gift or ability, the patriarchal and patronising tone of diktat over conversation rubs everyone up the wrong way.

One might want to consider that this manager is perhaps oblivious to the fact that those who report to him are indeed professionals. Besides, whilst there may be a case for certain colleagues needing some hand-holding, guidance, direction, or instruction, the broad-brush approach to generalisation over the particular and specific creates a rather toxic environment.

Morale and the Pulpit

It can be said that a majority do not leave the Wednesday powwow thinking they have been edified; it is moral-sapping, pulpit-thumping vituperation that easily slips into uncouth language, betraying both discourtesy and disrespect.

In the same vein, I appreciate that the higher-ups are under pressure to deliver results, but ruling by fear, deeming us stupid, or questioning our intelligence will get you nowhere.

We are here to do a job, not to be corralled like sheep or donkeys into some subservient role, subject to constant and unwarranted opprobrium. The borstal comparison becomes all the more telling when you wonder whether they once presided over some regimented setting and held sway over unskilled labour.

The Reckoning Ahead

In other words, in my decades-long experience of dealing with management, this one ranks, in every sense of the word, as the least commendable and capable when it comes to managing talent, and would be far better suited to commandeering a chain gang.

Heck, some of us are way past slithering up a greasy pole of obsequiousness for favours; we have had roles of greater responsibility and remuneration, and are here for nothing other than the joy of doing and giving back.

If there is room for improvement, I cannot say, because this appears to be learned behaviour from a former leader who barely earned my respect, their brusqueness unbecoming of anyone cultured. The headiness of office is becoming an aggrandisement of self, not far removed from bullying. Many will tolerate this for just long enough before the blowback makes heads roll.

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

Insomnia, Libraries, and Loose Ends

Last Workday Feelings

As yesterday marked my final day at work in 2025, my Out-of-Office notice simply stated that I would be returning in 2026, without specifying a date. It made yesterday feel like the start of a weekend, which it wasn't, but your mind tends to play tricks on you. Then, I’ll be channelling Brian.

That feeling had one benefit: I wasn't too bothered by the nighttime insomnia that affected me more than expected. By the afternoon, I was barely able to concentrate or stay awake. I had to ask to leave early, and it still took another 90 minutes to exit the office.

The Mandatory Training Dilemma

At home, I enjoyed a good lie-in, but I couldn't shake the thought of the mandatory training I had to complete before the year ended. I needed to get it done quickly before genuine holiday feelings set in. However, I must admit, I have commitments to certain social events that prevent me from leaving Manchester soon.

I planned to finish the mandatory training at the central library, which has a large reading room. The downside was that if you don't arrive early, you might not find a socket for your laptop. When I finally found a socket, it wasn't working.

Back to the Office

Soon, I was struggling, but I got halfway through the course before deciding that heading to the office would provide everything I needed to complete my tasks for the year: connectivity, lighting, comfort, familiarity, and ambience.

Colleagues were surprised to see me back, especially since I had already said goodbye most of the day before. Brian guessed I might be the last to leave, as I had arrived just before 3:00 PM. I didn’t pursue that conversation, since he could easily have asked me to leave the office before I finished.

Mission Accomplished

I completed the mandatory training on Agentic AI and scored top marks in the assessment, then did another Health and Safety course that wouldn't be due for another month. I seized the opportunity to do it now, and it was best to get it out of the way.

I can now effectively close for the year. Any activity or study from this point onward can be undertaken at leisure, without the pressure of deadlines. As Brian prognosticated, I am the last one in the office. It also means I won’t have to return until 2026. What a wonderful year it has been.

Now, give the cat some milk

A backroom Rottweiler

Nothing can be as irksome as interlopers encroaching on the areas of expertise of others to usurp a situation. A 33-year career in Information Technology leaves you too aware of many things that you find yourself restraining yourself from stating the bleeding obvious short of lacing your apparent vitriol with expletives.

In my profession, whilst I am engaged as subject matter expert, I prefer to stay in the background and feed my line management with the information and arguments they need to make to the business or entities for what we want to do. Where I do attend meetings, I am conscious of the fact that where the comfortable are being comforted the more and the afflicted suffer even more grievous affliction, I come to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted.

Don’t project your failure

That is why a project manager who thinks they can bend everyone to their will would hate an encounter with me because I do not mince words, I say things others might never find the phraseology to express.

Like when one said we have to work weekends if need be and I retorted, we all have lives outside of the work, that weekends could not be seized on without due consideration. I might have gone on to say it was a failure of core project management not to have properly assessed the time, resources, and cost to complete a project because no one talked to the people who mattered.

They really work you up

Teams are engaged to solve problems or create solutions as a daily activity, yet someone somewhere in the organisation rather than come round to discuss the scenario they need a solution for, they craft elaborate and pointless solutions not properly understanding the problem in the first place and put our backs up creating unnecessary angst.

If I had any hairs to pull out, I would be pulling clumps out daily. You wonder why they fancy themselves in our roles just to have the satisfaction of activity without achievement. If I were to direct my ire at them, I go on an exploration of the English putdown that acts like slow poison. Do I recall when someone was giving me grief and my one-line response was, “This situation has moved on from personalities to providing a solution.” Now, give the cat some milk. 

The UK: Scoring low on the good skirt test

Help!

Anyone who reads my blog will more or less conclude that I am a liberal. I am probably a liberal, I do have certain conservative views, but I would hope that I practice a sort of pragmatism tempered with a broad accepting reasonableness.

My last blog addressed the issue of the regulation of women’s as a fascination and a mode of gauging the level of morality in certain societies. One can easily sententiously subscribe to the view that a certain mode of dress as accepted in certain places is the level of tolerance of permissiveness and an exacerbation of the lascivious, but I refuse to entertain that as embracing of the freedom of responsible expression by adults.

However, I was met with a serious challenge to my generally liberal views of dress as I arrived at work and in the process of disembarking from my taxicab, the passenger in the taxicab in front stepped out, blazing red Christian Louboutin shoes, black blouse, and jacket, over a black skirt. In tow, a trolley bag and a catwalk gait to the office block.

The good skirt test

I dare say, from basic observation, the good seamstress test was suffering in extremis, the skirt appeared to be not long enough to cover the detail, and it was short enough to maintain too much of a lingering interest as to forget that there was someone wearing the clothes. The good seamstress or tailoress as I found was the archaic term for dressmaker at the Leeds Industrial Museum over a week ago suggests, ‘a skirt must be long enough to cover the detail, whilst short enough for keep the interest.’ Not a lingering and lewd interest, though.

The skirt struggled to pass the basic test on both accounts for the occasion when it probably would have wowed the fashion watchers on a celebrity red carpet. Then I cannot comment on the appropriateness of the attire if the wearer is comfortable in what they choose to wear, but I would be surprised if it did not draw some commentary anywhere she went around the campus on Monday.

My companion did quip as we got out of the taxicab, inquiring if I did see what she thought she had seen. I guess a lot more people had their heads turning for the want of some understanding.

It’s summer, but at the office

Then I was intimated of an event some summers ago, when the mercury put the UK in Mediterranean bliss and with that, the business sense in dress was discarded for a laissez-faire beach casual look. This compelled the management to remonstrate about presentation and manner of dress with regards to the appropriateness for the office, however, without listing the prescriptive items of clothing that appeared to suggest contempt for comportment and decency.

I still feel adults should behave responsibly on matters of presentation and appearance at work without having to be told how. Then again, some sometimes forget and need to be reminded of where they are, so that they can make adjustments where necessary.

However, what could happen is if management is too timid to be particular with individuals, the scattergun approach of a circular might also come with certain put-upon staff constituting a vigilante fashion police mob acting beyond their areas of core expertise.

Nobody should have to be told how to dress, but somebody needs to intervene when the manner of dress draws attention away from the wearer, especially when the wearer is not on a catwalk.

The karma of the vending machine

Enzymes on the run

Every once in a while, I get peckish, a feeling of wanting something, maybe anything to eat just to sate a craving or a hunger.

I am not one given to snacking, nor am I a vulture that eats between its meals. A workday would be a breakfast of oats, a few biscuits and lots of tea until when I get back home for a proper meal that almost always puts me to bed before I have to get up at 11:00 PM for my pills.

Working it out

On Friday, I had sworn to spend the weekend at home, but a thorny problem as I left work meant I spent my time swotting into the witching hours trying to understand the whys and wherefores of the conundrum at work. When I seemed to make some headway, I decided I would be at work the next morning to try out the possible solutions and catch up on a number of elements I felt I could close out.

Arriving at work, an uppity security guard reclining in his seat tried to put officious obstacles in my way, only courteousness held me back from delivering a needed putdown, though as I signed in, I measured him by asking if he was the chief security personnel for the weekend, he replied in the affirmation and that invariably put him in his place.

A chocolate jackpot

The day brought heavy rain and great results, at least, I achieved most of what I came in to do before a taxi cab came to take me to the station. At the station, I decided to get a bar of chocolate from the vending machine. I put in a pound coin and once I got my chocolate I was given some change of £1.70. My luck, I thought, so I told the station master and pocketed my jackpot.

Monday came and I was leaving late, so a colleague offered me a lift to a major station where trains are more frequent than the local station in the town where I work. The newsagents had close because it was already after 06:00 PM.

Stuck against a fall

I bought a ticket and walked up to the platform which was a good walk away from the station master’s office. Feeling peckish again, I decided to get a packet of crisps from the vending machine at the station. Again, I inserted a pound coin and made my choice. The dispenser whirled and the packet of crisps got stuck at the lip of the dispenser where it should have obeyed the law of gravity and fallen into the chute where I could have retrieved it.

There was nothing I could do to retrieve my quarry and a notice on the vending machine indicated none of the station staff would be able to help if I had problems, the only option left was to call a number and give a machine reference.

The karma of the machine

The number being a premium rate number would suggest if I called I might well end up spending well over a pound in calls to determine whether I would get a refund or a service engineer would be sent out to fix the problem. On balance, the trouble wasn’t worth more than the pound I had apparently lost. Since that packet of crisps was the last in that row, there was no point putting more money in to get the next packet of crisps to push off the earlier packet of crisps.

I made do until my train arrived well aware of the fact that I had just been a victim of the karma of vending machines. Winning big and losing some.

C’est la vie.

Opinion: Our low threshold for standards

Our sense of judgement

Some events of the last few days have now opened my eyes to why Nigeria would languish at the bottom of corruption rating indices.

The Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Ranking places Nigeria at 144 out of 177 countries with a score of 25 out of a hundred countries.

I observed in a number of tweets that the corruption measurement parameters are skewed to a Western perception of transparency to which we have very little sensitivity.

The poisoning of openness

For instance, there are too many areas where "conflicts of interest" have no particular meaning as pertains to public office.

People or organisations might have multiple interests which could affect their motives or cloud their judgements on issues where independence are critical for a transaction to be above board.

Neopatrimonalism is the order of the day where officials dole out without accounting or accountability to obtain favours and allegiance.

Here, especially people in power buy access, influence, allegiance, obeisance or votes by using the commonwealth of public funds.

Transparency is more a dictionary word rather than one of civil engagement required in all transactions.

Few talent pools

Whilst we are aware of nepotism, influence peddling and malfeasance, they all seem to be instruments of acquiescent brokerage.

We acquiesce to the abuse of power, privilege and office; as much as we can rail against this when it is not in our favour, we are accepting of the gains that this brings us without quibble, concern or even conscience.

The extension of this is the tribal and clannish tendency to want people like us in power rather than the best people we could find do things for the good of all.

The number of states in Nigeria is evidence of the many pools we have to fulfil positions to represent federal character but these many pools do not constitute adequate talent pools to tackle the challenges that face Nigeria.

Low thresholds for standards

For instance, we have a Freedom of Information Act that appears to be a tool of courageous engagement than an everyday call to accountability.

In the almost 30 months of the signing of the Freedom of Information Act, we have not seen its common usage in unravelling the obscurantist tendencies of the government, this especially in determining the cost of our democracy, how much oil we produce, how it gets spent and the real cost of the fuel subsidy.

The fundamental ethical demands of honesty, openness, integrity and so on, have a much lower threshold of fulfilment.

Normalised abuse

We have low expectations of ethical conduct, this accompanied with a very low emotional intelligence of the leadership that they are not discerning of issues enough to adapt or adjust until shamed, blamed, defamed embarrassed into taking appropriate action.

Rather than address the issue upfront, we seek moral equivalences and comparative scenarios to excuse reprehensible conduct or justify positions we have taken.

Consequently we are almost inured to the abuse of power and office, whilst those in power cannot be made fully accountable because the pursuit of truth, fairness and justice is neither with determination nor resolute.

Objectivity and honesty

I reflected on this as I read comments on certain blogs that partly inspired the blog I wrote yesterday - Opinion: The Salvation of Full Disclosure from Hypocrisy

The bigger lesson I want us to take away from that blog remains – With Full Disclosure, whilst people might question your objectivity, they cannot question your honesty, when you juxtapose that statement with another - Without Full Disclosure, whilst people might not question your objectivity, they will question your honesty.

You have a trade-off between objectivity and honesty predicated on full disclosure, that subtle distinction is what had me in the middle of the absurdity of apologising for manifest hypocrisy.

I have to admit and accept that my cultural influences are probably too diametrically opposed to my greater engagement that we all probably have a long and hard job of re-education and reorientation to appreciate that we need to raise the bar for ethical conduct.

Thought Picnic: Political regain from office pain

Wants and needs

It was like entering a bazaar of the bizarre. My engagement extended just a few weeks ago had someone asking if I still required the privileges I had to do what I was brought in to do.

Immediately, I replied ensuring my manager was copied in that the privileges are essential to fulfilling my role – that should have been the end of the story.

Apparently, that was not the case, as the week began, I noticed that certain ordinary things I was once able to do, I could do no more.

Lose to lost

Sometimes you ignore the little issues because at the time, the situation is not as significant as to warrant further investigation, some other things I needed to do, I could do all because I was still registered with the environment.

However, yesterday, I decided to check why exactly a restriction came into place only to find out that literally all my privileges had been revoked without notification.

This is the sort of unnecessary frustration of activity and productivity that one sometimes encounters in the workplace that it borders on an atrocity.

Find the wind

Usually, on occasions like this, you settle into forensic mode, obtain earlier requests, approved implementations and compare those with the current state of play before the matter gets escalated up the chain for a speedy resolution.

Speedy it had to be, but not before the email church of scores of meaningless power plays that fail to grasp what needs to get done until someone up there bellows and suddenly there is someone to assume responsibility to resolve the issue with alacrity.

Just two hours later, things seemed to return to normal but it would tempting fate to want to determine the how and why of the loss of my privileges apart from the apparent lack of processes to ensure that such events do not happen willy-nilly.

Room to bloom

Where you find you are about to fume and fulminate, you take 10 sharp breaths, type with consideration without letting go of the piece of your mind you desperately want to express and allow the system to adjust itself as the responsibility chain that depends on your services sorts out the politics to get the technical issues resolved.

As you drum the desk with your fingers, don’t forget that you are still charging for the time you have been made idle by forces within the organisation that should have been facilitating your greater productivity.

A fire drill to nil

They’re out we’re in

The day at the office was not supposed to be as eventful as this. My main system at home had a major hiccup such that what I used to be able to do at home now had to be done at the office.

The hours of the mid-afternoon, I looked out from the window of my fifth floor office to see people trooping out of the building as if for a fire drill.

It had me wondering why people from one wing were being ushered out and the rest of us being left to burn, in fact I did surmise to colleagues about their testing the firewalls just to ascertain that they were fire-proof.

Beckoning our charred remains

A few minutes afterwards the alarm did sound at our end of the building and an announcement was made in Dutch for us to vacate the building with the instruction not to use the lift.

I picked up my hat and cane and made for the stairwell walking down at pace in order not to hold anyone up; on the ground floor we were held back by the automated pass-entry system which each of us had to use to step out to the reception where another crowd waited to get out.

Once we were out we were herded like sheep, no instructions, no guidance just taking the cue from those who had gone one before.

After we crossed the road to the other side we noticed a fire engine, a fireman disembarked with a portable fire-extinguisher and entered the building we none the wiser about why we had to leave the building.

No (E)mergency in this Respons

Soon afterwards a Quick Respons Team vehicle arrived, it made me wonder whether the sign-painter was trying Dutch, English or a Dutchified version of Response without the “e” and there was no space for the “e” in case you thought the “e” had fallen off.

The fireman came out of the building a few minutes after and we were ushered back into the building in what might well have been a fire drill but not by any standards brilliant.

Why it failed

The questions I had in mind were many:

Why the alarm had been going on at in one wing of the building without notifying the other parts of the office block.

Why the announcements were only made in Dutch when it is clear that most functionaries in the building work in a bilingual situation with the possibility that a good few did not speak Dutch but at least manage English.

Why the exit gates were monitored when they should have been open especially if the exit process involved panic or a stampede.

And what for?

Why no one bothered to explain what the reason was for evacuating the building – even if it was a fire-drill, it would have been to simulate the process to managing emergancies that could be fires, bombs, leakages or any dangers that would have necessitated conducting the exercise.

In my view, for all the people in high-visibility vests appearing to know what they were doing and probably returning to some debriefing to pat themselves on the back for a job well done; this was a farce at best and I really do not pray I am in this building when something really serious happens because I honestly cannot trust the “Quick Respons Team” to get me out quickly, safely and securely.

Fire drill assessment – Fail.

The almost curse of being particularly particular

Penthouse office views

We moved into a brand new office block this week and it was wonderful to move from a cellar to a top floor office.

I have however wondered how we ended up in the 5^th floor and the big-wigs on the 2^nd, hopefully, it not suggesting anything as Machiavellian as being so close to the airport.

In any event, we have the view of the airport, runway and hangars on the one side and a major road sided by a canal and a typical drawbridge for canal traffic on the other side.

It means after getting to Schiphol Airport by train, I have to board another bus; free of charge because an arrangement between the company and the bus company allows for free travel in the environs of the airport.

That seat is reserved – for us

I had kept my peace and even endured the journey standing once, but I decided not to do that again – the buses have upholstered seats with visible repeated signs of the pregnant, the nursing mother and supposedly the infirm – depicted as someone with a cane.

Now, I use a cane and not for the reasons of re-enacting Edwardian England, my back has been a bit troublesome though not as bad as it used to be – as I got on the bus, the able, the young and overly active made for these priority seats; I was having none of it as I pointed out to them – these are priority seats not reserved for you.

None looked pregnant, with suckling infants or with anything to aid their mobility, so before I got to the point of being forceful, a seat was yielded and I had the basic comfort of getting to work.

I do not normally rush for those seats if other seats are available but when every seat is occupied, well those who need them have priority over those who usurp them.

The bane of being particularly particular

What should not happen is the tendency to become particularly particular with an eye out for those who ignore the obvious – one trait in need of amelioration is that feeling of irksomeness when one sees these things.

Bags on seats, rushing in at entry points, bicycles beyond traffic signs, bicycles on footways, people standing in the way ignoring the fact that they are in the way – what a fuss-pot I’ve become.

Loathing and primed to correct, but without horn-rimmed spectacles and shrill voice to boot – I probably need therapy or have to live in a different world – but for now, we’ll just manage as much as possible not to be too aggravated by it all – we can’t all be so proper.

Nigeria: A motion to pray is rejected

Motion to pray rejected

It is with utter amusement that I read the proceedings yesterday regarding a motion in the Nigerian Senate called to pray for the President [1] who supposedly is recuperating from acute pericarditis in hospital in Saudi Arabia after having apparently performed Hajj last week.

Now, I do not take the matter of prayer lightly, I believe in prayer, I am a man of faith, I would even say, I believe in the efficacy of prayer and the ability to bring that efficacy to bear on our everyday issues.

I believe in prayer

As a Christian, Jesus Christ provides a general template for prayer in the Lord’s prayer [Public Domain] which basically involves acknowledging God, submitting to His will, seeing Him as your provider, recognising the need to act justly, compassionately and considerately with your fellowman, knowing your fallibility and recognising His power to uphold you and finally recognising the eternal “God-ship” of God. Other religions might have their own examples.

However, with that template, just as we have with courts, there are procedures, processes, rules and orders, prayers cannot be frivolous for starters and generally the Christian purpose expects prayers to be aligned with the will of God generally outlined in the Bible, lest we pray amiss and in praying as one apostle proffered, we pray to consume it upon our lusts – by implication, there is a selfish intention to have prayers answered without acknowledging the how, why and who of the answered prayer.

Confusion of process

In general, it is not so much complex but confused, we have complicated the simplicity of that template into ritual evocating dramatic action without essential power and defaulted on the uncertainty of whether our prayers would even get the hearing of God.

Now, when it comes to health, anyone would indeed pray from good health and when you are sick you do need much more help in being sustained through the ordeal to the time when there is a full recovery which might be natural, sometimes with the help of medicine and that recovery can also be speeded up and result in what is a miracle – you do not have to believe in that, but the person affected does know what has happened to them and that is their fact and their truth, no matter how unbelievable it is to others.

Preponderance of God without virtue

However, the motion to pray for the President was rejected twice with a voice vote, the preamble to the motion was considered superfluous and really the President of the Senate had only 24 hours before called for nine days of prayer regarding the health of the President of the nation.

At the risk of being flippant and irreverent, Nigeria probably has more churches and mosques per capita than any other place in the world. We portend to be religious; it permeates every facet of life but the religiosity itself does not necessarily equate to any form of godly virtue, rather, it has become a facade to deploy and ward off issues of personal character and responsibility, the antagonist at the mention of God must immediately acquiesce regardless of the facts at hand.

Lifting up our voice as a nation should make much power for change available if we were doing things properly, rightly, justly, honestly, responsibly and meticulously in faith – I would not cast doubt but one wonders if those boxes are ticked when prayer is made.

Get good health but resign still

It is my hope and wish that the President recover from his condition and be nursed back to full health, however, I am not sure that the same President is equipped even if he gains his full strength to continue to operate in the office that he has held for almost 3 years.

In all honesty, the President should and must consider the good option to resign and allow other possibly capable Nigerians to steer this great ship of state, his resignation should not deflect the fact that our prayers are still out there for his full recovery.

The dearth of healthcare infrastructure in Nigeria

One interesting thing to note which was not really voiced is the fact that the Nigerian Senate does not constitute an assembly of faith healers, rejecting the motion at least helps stress that as an acknowledgement of the limit of their powers to effect that kind of change.

What is however damning of our houses of representative assembly is that our President is not in Nigeria receiving adequate treatment; implying Nigeria with all its medical doctors, teaching hospitals, hospitals, clinics and medical centres there is no expertise to attend to the critical needs of keeping our leadership well and able to do their jobs. It is unlikely you will find the leader of any Western nation seeking medical attention in a hospital outside their country, why can we in Nigeria not aspire to that kind of national pride, self-reliance and confidence?

Whilst they were debating on the budget, this might have been an opportunity to lament the fact that in a country as ours where resources abound but opportunity is restricted to the apathetic elite; people of privilege who still think having their health matters managed by foreign doctors in faraway hospitals is better than having fully equipped hospitals at home.

Give public service the determination of public office

One would think with the way people fight for public office for great personal gain some of that fervour would spill into the public service of creating institutions of excellence at home manned by nepotistic but qualified or sometimes unqualified countrymen, which is what we condone and promote for everything to do with public office but never demand for public service.

The shame is really ours and one wonders if the prayers when prayed should include that for real wisdom as to how the ship of state of Nigeria should be steered, who should be in charge, what should be their priorities and well, that they might be fully capable to despatch their duties diligently, efficiently, properly and honestly.

Whilst we contemplate, let us once again, pray.

Source

Next | Senate rejects motion seeking prayers for Yar’Adua

Pursuing a cause greater than self

A voice lost to human frailty

One really important and possibly powerful voice was missing when the elections in Zimbabwe turned into a seething farce and outrageous charade, the voice of Pius Ncube.

Pius Ncube was until September 11^th 2007 the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo for just under 10 years and one of the fiercest critics of Robert Mugabe and his policies.

As a religious man with the force and authority of the Roman Catholic Church behind him, he was almost untouchable; as a man amongst his people he had a role of leadership to be the voice of the voiceless and the conscience of the people to shame the government into aligning itself with less suppressive activities and policies.

A cause greater than self

Pius Ncube had to resign his commission because an aspect of human frailty or ill-discipline beclouded the greater office he held as he was caught in adulterous liaisons which were recorded and documented by state security personnel.

For that alone, he lost the ability to project authority and hence the cause and mission was lost – succumbing to the wiles of the flesh in the midst of a greater calling, lost him his dignity, his office and a notable voice for the oppressed of Zimbabwe.

Obviously, we all know that we are fallible, but the position of leadership and authority carries great responsibilities especially where integrity and honour count for much that morality forms part of the bedrock that defines that personality.

Are you what you are?

It goes without saying that you cannot be a man of God and be caught in morally questionable situations, then expect to retain the gravitas that comes with your office even if your flock is willing to forgive and forget.

Also, as a politician, you might get away with all sorts of things, but if you stand on a platform of honesty, strong family values and rectitude, the last thing you want to be caught in is a lapse of judgement that brings your great house of cards crashing down upon you.

Another man gives in

Such is the case of Senator John Edwards, the failed running mate of Senator John Kerry in the 2004 US Presidential elections and former Democratic US presidential hopeful.

After many denials, it has transpired that he had an affair in 2006 [1] whilst preparing his bid for nomination and when his wife’s cancer was apparently in remission.

It really does beggar belief that Senator Edwards would have thought this liaison would not get out – there was not only a grave error of judgement in allowing himself to be caught in an unfortunate moment of weakness, it is amazing that the goal for high office did not slap him in the face that his flesh should submit to a greater purpose.

Lacking a view of consequence

One cannot bear thinking of the consequences of that situation where if Senator Edwards had won the Democratic nomination and the breaking news as that dastardly Olympic spectacle pervades our screens was that the Democratic convention would implode over a reprobate and lying nominee in hardly another 3 weeks.

The nation would have gone into mourning for the next four years whilst many would have yearned for another possible Clinton grab at the mantle of the presidency.

Such is the measure of men who do not have the backbone to vie for office with moral rectitude and a commitment to a cause greater than self.

Bury your bodies

One should not, however, kick a man when he is down, but the fact is if you should vie for leadership or office, your skeletons must not be in a cupboard where others might open the closet and be embraced with skeletal kisses, but the bodies should have been buried deep down in the ground where the bones and fossil remains would lead archaeologists and palaeontologists down the wrong path.

Better still, walk alone, walk like a man with a cause and mission that far exceeds the demands of the flesh that if tempted you will not fall – there are very few men who can walk that walk and those are the few men who are worthy of office, leadership, respect, adulation and the great prize.

If you can fall short, do not aspire or be really, really smart – I cannot say that Senator John Edwards despite his brilliance, success, advocacy and message has been smart.

One slip can lose everything

He has become such damaged goods that the mundane act of sweeping up the bread crumbs behind Barack Obama by campaigning, raising funds or having a platform at the Democratic convention cannot be done.

As for his excuses that aim to justify his position, we need to give it time and time can be an eternity – what a loss to many and what a shame indeed, my heart goes out to Senator John Edwards’ family and in some way to the man himself – how are the mighty fallen, they might yet rise again.

We who speak so loudly probably have skeletons roaming the streets and that is why the little smart thing in our heads prevents us from doing something stupid, like vying for office or seeking authority that brings great scrutiny and expectation of being super-human.

[1] BBC NEWS | Americas | Ex-senator Edwards admits affair