Editorial: Fifteenth of May 2011

Fences and foxes

If you intend to save your chickens from foxes you will build good strong fences and if you tended your chickens well by also ensuring where they have free range to roam was not weedy, bushy or overgrown, it is unlikely when you go picking the eggs you’ll end up with a snake bite.

One is at pains to say that if Pakistan were cast as a farmer, her chickens would have been safe or she would not have come to harm during the morning egg-run.

This is an apt analogical characterisation of the supposed sovereignty of Pakistan and their embarrassment at having the United States of America breach their borders in pursuit of Osama bin Laden that make their protestations and dishonesty hypocrisy at best and an exercise of bare-faced denial of realities and truths they are still failing to address. Things are just not all that right with others than the government besides the US having writ large around Pakistan.

Might of the fox

There is no doubt that in an ideal world the United States should not have entered Pakistani territory to take out Osama bin Laden but it is not the duty of the fox to mend fences or the nature of the snake to resist opportunistic assess to eggs – that is just the way of the world and nature, might almost always determines right rather than the cosy liberal notion of knowing the boundaries of right and wrong.

Then again we profess the upholding of human rights as the basis of our values and as much as can be done is done to project that across the world.

In an ideal setting Osama bin Laden would have best been captured and made to follow the due process of law and justice – he however never presented the means by which anyone could objectively suggest that when cornered he could be captured without his assailants meeting a gruesome end.

In the heat of the raid

He might not have been armed but he might have been wearing a suicide vest as his type of ideology has persuaded others to just as we were informed that he had 500 Euros sewn into his clothes.

The house might well have been booby-trapped needing a trigger which could proximity-based or otherwise, but there is some confidence that allowed him to maintain such a conspicuous house with just the basic security of high walls and strong gates.

In the end, the easiest way to ensure no one else came to serious harm was to shoot him in the head before he thought up something as diabolical as other daring terrorist acts that are attributed to him and his acolytes.

The despatch

For the havoc this particular person had wreaked on the world, the innocent, his fellow Muslims, life, property, economies, security and much more; Osama bin Laden had in terms excluded himself from any reasonable quest that should have sought to protect of his rights and was hardly deserving of the dignities, respect or honour that people would like to arrogate to him.

Osama bin Laden was a singularly special case and should never be conflated with other issues of policy, politics, values, justice or sovereignty; he had to be summarily dealt with on apprehension and promptly disposed of on expiry.

Much as one could be given the opportunity to dance on his grave, it is one offer that should be declined; I cannot swim.

Editorial: Ninth of May 2011

The hills heard the jive of Osama’s footsteps

Long ago, the hills were alive with the sound of bombing but all that carnage never once got near him, he escaped from that hideout as a large bounty was placed on his head.

Time and again we heard as a refrain, how shall we solve a problem like Osama we cannot say what it took to climb every mountain, search high and low, follow every highway and every path you know.

We imagined he was high on a hill in a lonely goatherd but when he was found every single brand name of interest showed up in a room. Cola, the inadvertent pastime of Spanish pajero, wild oats, Vaseline, milk, conjugated posteriors of popular football and ganja make up a list that was bordering on unlawful and criminal.

The realisation dawning when the slug hit, when the head split and when we were feeling had, we simply remembered his favourite things and then we don’t feel so mad.

Dreams and things all up on a tight rope

I have not been to a circus in a long time and when I’ve had the opportunity to I have avoided the secluded kiosk of Madam Safira who was a compendium of futures you will believe if you crossed her palm with a coin that once had huge value.

Close to the hedge, the well-oiled castors just made you wish she was close to a steep incline that brought her bets on your life to a terminal end.

It would appear Clive Capital, the largest commodity hedge fund closed their palms to Madam Safira as her abode careered precipitously down to the rocks and between palms $400 million fell through the cracks because the oil price went south.

One has never been sure if the one-armed banditry of hedge funds who are no good at making things but are geniuses at making things up are better than Madam Safira at making dreams up, in all cases, one is well advised.

Impossible dreams of extreme privacy

As dreams go, the holy book tells a story of an albeit strange dream had by a king who knew he had this recurrent nightmare but refused to tell his dream and expected someone to both remember the dream and interpret it too.

Enter Daniel a gifted seer whose ability just transcended anything possible it was out of this realm at least that is what we thought when the judges in the UK put super-injunctions on the press.

The analogy is however apt, imagine having to interpret a dream you have not been told and compare that to someone taking an injunction out on the publication of a story and then an injunction on preventing information of that injunction being made public.

One can only wonder to what purpose as the same persons would willingly make public their saintly acts but seek the cloak of extreme privacy in terms of their sinful deeds.

We are only entitled to a single story of good behaviour and amazing role models, people without fault or blemish that they be demigods at worst and because they can pay for it we are none the wiser that they are also flesh and blood doing the unspeakable, the unmentionable, the reprehensible and the atrocious – but we cannot judge until Twitter tosses up the whole travesty and the law is left looking like an ass, once again.

Acknowledgements

Inspirations for this editorial are drawn from the lyrics of the Sound of Music in expressing a view about Osama bin Laden’s favourite brands courtesy of the Rogers and Hammerstein Organisation that owns the rights, from news that a commodity hedge fund lost $400m as reported by the Financial Times and the revelation that a Twitter user had revealed the murky details of super-injunctions as reported by the BBC.

The second chapter of the book of Daniel tells of the dream of king Nebuchadenezzar.

Editorial: Eighth of May 2011

An editorial for blogs

This blog is not a newspaper but the writer does have opinions that sometimes do not fit in the normal strictures of a blog; I suppose those are rules I have set for myself rather than ones that are hard and fast by reason of concept or custom.

I have noticed that my blogs are somewhat fully fledged, long, topical and organising of a particular series of thoughts and opinions, I can only recall writing a blog that was just a paragraph and that was years ago.

What I intend with what I will henceforth label editorial is to offer short views on news, events and observations covering a whole range of topics as I am minded to express without reservation and most definitely at all times, without prejudice.

Basically, Twitter will not suffice and Facebook hides the conversation from those who still harbour fright of its menacing tentacles.

The best president gone west

The events of the past week have been world-changing in many ways from my perspective as the Nigerian election season that started in April closed on Friday with the supplemental election that held to deal with irregularities that occurred two Thursdays ago.

The election petitioning process has begun in earnest with the second largest party in the presidential elections going to the tribunal to contest the results and seek redress.

The presidential aspirant of that party had promised not to seek redress but his party which in some terms was the vehicle for his ego and obstinacy is flailing with legal abandon such that it would be interesting to see how the reluctant leader will step forward to take the prize if his party does win their cause which will not happen by a long shot.

However, being baseless optimists, the prospect of a President with 4.5% of the Senate, 7.2% of the House of Representatives and 2.7% of the governors might well be the best President Nigeria ever had with an impossible congress to get his agenda through the system not forgetting the President cannot rule by executive fiat.

Meanwhile Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs) the UK equivalent of Queen’s Counsel (QC) will have a largesse of billable hours and usually plaintiffs acquire justice by SAN intimidation, it is not unusual to have a fistful of SANs to knock the justices off their benches, I hope to get a ringside seat to watch the utility of futility.

Between martyrdom and mermaids

When the United States decided to bury Osama bin Laden having given him a hole in the head, they definitely seem to have been conversant with Islamic burial practices as the difference of opinion was expressed in washing him before sending him to his 72 mermaids at the bottom of the sea.

The wash basically stripped him of the martyrdom that his acolytes would have wanted to confer on him and I would suppose the clothes in which he died would not be afforded the mystique of the Turin Shroud.

Everyone seems to be claiming journalistic privilege in wanting to see pictures of the deconstructed terrorist in order to convince themselves that they have mediaeval and macabre appetites for blood and gore rather than incontrovertible proof of the execution of the culprit.

My candid advice to those who need to see pictures is that they trawl the Internet and they can be enthralled with as much savage pornography as they need for a lifetime. I am quite satisfied with the changing versions of stories of how he met his demise, because there is one inalienable fact that others have to provide; an Osama bin Laden without gills, breathing air and telling us once again – Catch me if you can.

Russian roulette democracy

The UK had a series of elections last week and the one that I felt mattered was the referendum on Alternative Voting which simply allowed voters to rate candidates in order of preference until one of them passed the 50% threshold to claim the election.

Nominally, it would have forced candidates to work harder at being recognised to become one of the preferences but the people rejected the idea of their representatives working to earn recognition thereby leaving them less accountable to their electorate.

We get the government we deserve and so one can safely say all you have to do as in one case where the votes were tied is to cast lots or have one draw the long straw to win – who would have thought a classic case of short-straw democracy will occur just when people were given the chance to make a radical change to the system?

Democracy is definitely contending for the best from a selection of the worst options in most cases.

Obama sees the end of Osama

Osama in my slumber

Just before I fell asleep my Twitter time-line revealed Barack Obama was about to make an unusual Sunday statement and so my dreams were invaded by content broadcast by Al Jazeera concerning Osama bin Laden.

I eventually stirred up and the alertness that came was hit with the comprehension of my dreams, Osama bin Laden is dead.

A very evil man

It is a welcome development but it needs to be taken in context. This man was a very evil man whose Midas touch was death and destruction under the guise of an extreme form of religion that took its strains from Islam.

He found brotherhood amongst fellow religionists, usually sexually ascetic and repressed who were cajoled into giving up their lives for a paradise of debauched harems of virgins. With these bedazzled foot-soldiers he waged Jihad with impunity and unspeakable atrocity.

East Africa, Yemen, New York, Washington and spin-offs in Bali, Madrid and London, it was carnage like Armageddon and the man behind it every few months released videos to taunt and tease that he was still around – Catch me if you can.

The cost in life and property cannot be quantified in Afghanistan and Iraq, in some circles he could have been the precursor to the Anti-Christ, if a mere mortal can make destruction a global business you can only wonder about those who are destined to wreak biblical proportions of havoc untrammelled.

Justice is not served, revenge is

Amazingly, whilst he launched 9/11 from Afghanistan and was almost smoked out in Tora Bora he was found in a monumental edifice just North-East of the capital of Pakistan a classic case of hiding in plain sight.

I am not convinced justice is served, his actions changed our world that the rights, freedoms and liberties that many gave their lives for in the wars of the 20^th Century have systematically been rolled back in the blanket interests of safety and security, the world will never be the same again.

However, revenge has been taken, vengeance exacted and it is important that our celebration of his death especially amongst democratic nations should see this as the removal of a leader, a figurehead and an international nuisance, it would have been nigh on impossible to take him alive to face our courts and answer for the crimes he committed – we need to maintain that view of justice being served in that kind of structure.

Managing the fallout

An embarrassed Pakistan should have something to say about the unwanted guest that took residence in their country, as for the body that is in the custody of the United States in Afghanistan, he was shot in the head, he deserves no burial rites derived from the religion he professed to follow but besmirched with his actions and philosophy – there is a whole lot of rebuilding of systems, creeds, beliefs and reputations to be done.

He should never become a martyr and those who seek inspiration from his causes should begin to diminish and let our hope and future begin to take shape into a world that is safe, free, secure and less threatened by terror not forgetting the conflicts that allow for these extreme activities to take hold.

Palestine needs resolution, repressive regimes in the Arab world need to come to an end, some accommodation needs to be found for Iran, the Muslims should not find persuasion in the view that they are under siege.

The news today and the paralysis of analysis will for the moment be; Obama sees the end of Osama.

O'Bama - Osama - Oh Bummer - Obama

Where’s Obama?

Sometimes, one has to resist the temptation to keep an open mind about an issue and nowhere is this most pertinent when innocuous spelling errors convey a radically different meaning from the main import.

This comes about in the light of the apology that CNN has issued during a programme hosted by Wolf Blitzer where a caption "Where's Obama?" appeared with Osama bin Laden being pictured.

Courtesy of Crooks and Liars.com

Obama happens to be the surname of the photogenic Afro-American senator who seems to be a promising prospect for US presidency probably 8 to 12 years from now, in my reckoning. His name is Barack Hussein Obama.

It smacks of rank sloppiness to have had a typographical error on names so prominent especially one that seems juxtapose “America’s most wanted man” with “America’s most promising future president”.

We are continually told that Osama bin Laden is the “World’s most wanted man”, I think not. China, India, Nigeria, Brazil and Russia have significant populations and there is no reason to desire the man for anything, America was the most affected by his atrocities, we should put that in context.

Names of the immigrants

However, for a country that was built and exists as land of immigrants, the time has passed when immigrants who moved to the US anglicised their names to appear conformed and integrated.

Time and again, we see names like Milorad Blagojevich, the governor of the state of Illinois or the popular California governor, Arnold Schwarzeneggar, a former president Eisenhower and even the culprit Wolf Blitzer where Wolf is probably a contraction of Wolfgang – all hardly native American – but no one exerts pressure on them to recode their names for simplification.

Oh Lordy, O’Bama

Senator Barrack Obama has however suffered much for his name, I remember the Economist suggesting before he was elected that he might be more electable as O'Bama – balderdash!

Our names are our identities, no matter how tongue-twistingly impossible they might be to others, there is no valid reason to adopt some alien pseudonym in craving acceptance, if your personality and quality of character shines through, people would endeavour to get your name as correct as they dare to.

From a more sinister perspective, this slip might have been a deliberate effort to denigrate Senator Obama, having created an image that exemplifies the revulsion of terror when America was almost brought to its knees – there should be much that CNN should be sorry for – this is the kind of thing as one commentator said would be seen on FOX News, well, we have just reached a new low point in reckless journalism.

The errors of our constitution

This reminds me of an episode in 1984 when I was the student representative of the EE II constituency in the Yaba College of Technology. I had obtained a copy of the Students Union constitution just at the time that the newly elected president, Kola Oladoja offered to make copies of the constitution for the members of the House.

When that constitution arrived, it contained 47 major errors which made it look like a rewrite of the constitution without following due process.

I was livid with rage that an elected official who had sworn to protect the constitution now seemed to have created his own constitution and I moved a motion to first pulp the material and then discipline the president, unfortunately, the officials of the house did not seem to realise the gravity of this offence.

Negating the context

In the 28 spelling errors, there were sentences like, “The official shall resent …” when it should be “The official shall present …”, the use of may when it should be must, perceive for receive – very much negating context, such that officers could not be brought to account on many pertinent issues.

This failure to deal with the breach of trust and confidence because of the unusual popularity of the President of the Students Union lead to a situation many months after when leading a student protest on the campus, the crowd lost discipline and grew riotous damaging campus property that the college was closed for months.

Our lesson

The fallout included many of us vocal political voices repeating years study which for me came to nought, the president himself was rusticated and it was rumoured that he probably came to an untimely end.

This, all because we did not have the guts to challenge the errors in our constitution, which should have lead to the instant impeachment of the president.

No, I do not take these errors lightly, and the one against Senator Obama is a slight almost unforgivable.

Ahmedinejad-Bush coming to your television

Looking at a rather smart Iran

I can only wonder who is making brisk business selling seats for the debate of the Century, two presidents of states that are arch-enemies squaring up against each other to discuss world affairs.

Having now proved to all that precision weapons are not that smart enough to disarm a guerrilla movement through their proxy in Lebanon and commissioned a heavy water reactor plant for Uranium enrichment, Iran is playing a rather deft diplomatic hand that is leaving the United States rather flat-footed.

I can pointedly note that Condoleezza Rice has not been able to set foot in the Middle East having brought forth through the serious birth pangs of a New Middle East a baby that would spit out milk that comes from America.

In fact, it is now left to Kofi Annan and the UN to clean up the debacle of that inconclusive 34-day war.

Let us talk to the world together

So, as we await Iran’s response to proposals of hypocrisy that aim to preclude Iran from the enrichment of Uranium on suspicion of dual-use intentions that could lead to a nuclear bomb; Dr Ahmedinejad who only the day before in a released statement about a letter to Angela Merkel sent in July about the Holocaust being a debilitating hoax to hamstring Germany, has now challenged Mr George Bush to a live television debate.

This challenge would obviously be dismissed as expected by the White House as a diversion from global concerns about Iran’s nuclear weapons.

But then I ask whose concerns exactly? Apart from those of the privileged nuclear world whose main actors surround Iran on all sides with wars and unrest whilst sponsoring opportunities for insurrection within Iran.

I think both presidents do have something to say and it is time that those presidents met and thrashed things out rather that employing megaphone diplomacy and railroading the UN into precarious resolutions that bring more trouble into an already troubled world.

It is also poignant to note that Laura Bush took the podium in New Orleans at the first anniversary of Hurricane Katrina; Mr Bush’s ratings do not put him in any reckoning apart from accepting more faults and responsibility for the poor management of the Katrina aftermath.

New ideas needed

North Korea however is probably busy planning another sabre-rattling missile fly-past over Japan as they beat their chests over having nuclear weapons and getting away with it all, the whole concept of nuclear deterrence has failed and new ideas with safeguards that even-handedly address global issues for security, energy and military might need to be debated on an equality and partnership forum.

It is now not enough for some countries to hijack the debate to meet ulterior ends whilst purporting to act on behalf of the world, those arguments which have been played back a broken vinyl record no more excite the resonance of ground-breaking, inspired or worthwhile points – rather they all look like ways of getting at that axis-of-evil.

A high wooden horse

It is now time for America to climb down from their high horse and begin to do the anathema, address the causes of terrorism, address the problems in the Middle East from the occupied lands to the support of tyrannical regimes and worst of all, maybe it is time to talk to Osama bin Laden, because this mad war on terror is doing nothing for peace on earth and goodwill to all men.

On a final note, would this war on our liberties, freedoms and privacy masquerading as the war on terror have any bite if we all knew that Osama bin Laden were dead?

All before noon and not after

Bolton Bolts

The least celebrated and most controversial appointment in George W. Bush’s tenure has handed in his resignation having not been able to persuade the UN Security Council of the need impose sanctions on Iran.

As it transpired, Iran already has its nuclear weapons and in what might seems like a sick joke; Iran not having a Bikini Atoll or some remote Nevada desert has been conducting nuclear tests underground resulting in the increased seismic activity of earth movement and collateral damage.

It begins to make sense why Americans have been allowed to participate in relief efforts that might reveal a lot more than the suffering of the people.

Osama lives in Omaha

Another development sees Osama bin Laden who has acquired both a new identity and is under Interpol witness protection about to blow his cover.

This is because whilst we have been informed that he is a frail man needing dialysis in the mountains of Tora Bora, he is in fact hale and hearty in America enjoying the pleasures of the good life of a multi-millionaire, well especially if you have shares in Beckshire Hathaway.

This is because he was instrumental in creating a presidency of seriously big government from a conservative party which has through the events of September the eleventh been able to pre-occupy us with a war on terror and abrogate every liberty, freedom and right we fought for over the Twentieth Century subsuming it to the need for national security and enforcing it through patriotism.

The new powwow

It would have been impossible to imagine that a president of George W. Bush’s calibre in 2000 would have been able to pull off a feat of untrammelled executive power without the concerted liaison with Osama bin Laden.

It is no wonder now, that more people than lost their lives or got injured in the twin towers have been recorded in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Blowing his cover now would completely upset the balance of power, history and the New World Order. However, who would not acquiesce to this temptation just as Iraq seeks a new leader in Osama bin Laden, whilst the Washington Post and Fox TV have linked up with two Deep Throats with evidence to make the markets go up in a frenzy of agitated abandon.

Euro Bureau rejects cheap dollar

This is not helped by the fact that the great budget deficit is beginning to impact on the balance of trade such that Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Iran and Venezuela has decided to trade their oil in Euros, abandoning the dollar in such a way that China now has to devalue the Yuan to maintain global competitiveness.

The Congress is apoplectic with rage but powerless to act as a few senior senators and representatives were caught on camera protecting the Southern border from invading Mexicans by shooting them in the river as they crossed.

After noon, it is all over

Well, if we really did have a new world order, it would be over by noon.

However, beyond noon, in another life, I would have been a godfather and my goddaughter would be four today.

Happy Birthday dear and to others – It is only April Fool’s day.

Hello Hamid, it's George - see you in 5 minutes

Welcoming surprises

Easy communications serve a purpose of informing and arranging for visits and events.

Many a time when I was in Nigeria, we had guests arrive out of the blue; we joyously exchanged greetings and feted them with food and drinks as they stayed on for hours on end – that however, is the community spirit of friendship and camaraderie.

As for the more professional Nigerian, arrangements were made a foretime usually through the office communications network because mass telecommunications never thrived until mobile telephony pervaded the market in the last few years.

All different in London

However, moving from Nigeria to the UK, one’s time is pre-occupied with goals, purpose and the arduous rigour of survival, that unplanned and unannounced visits are just not on.

This comes as a surprise to people who have just arrived from Nigeria who retain the convivial and miscellany; but the re-education is brutal and swift – we all learn how to live in the West. What a life!

Hamid, it’s George

Then, just imagine the shock Hamid Karzai had yesterday when a very important guest dropped in on him out of the blue.

At least, we all knew that he told the world that he was off to India and then to Pakistan; I suppose Afghani soothsayers might have prognosticated that Hamid should expect a surprise on the First of March.

Afghanistan is now Bush Democracy – the people voted and elected who the American expected to be elected – as opposed to a real democracy – the Palestinians electing who they want, albeit Hamas who the American considers terrorists.

Afghanis pulled it off

Seeing the elaborate preparations that go into planning state visits, the Afghanis must have had to cobble together a good few of their scarce resources to welcome the liberator.

I could not help but notice the quality of the red carpet that lead up to the news conference lecterns. That might sound frivolous, with all protocol thrown away; low-flying helicopters and security so tight that the visit had to be unannounced – this democracy has a long road to travel.

One can wager that Afghanistan is only second to Iraq in everyday violence and carnage, even though they are both occupied with superpower troops.

Alas! Guns and overwhelming firepower can only do so much. The Nemesis - Osama bin Laden is probably hiding in the West wing, because they cannot seem to find him anywhere else and nobody is looking back home.

Unannounced inspection

I can remember when I was in boarding school; every once in a while there was a surprise inspection which included a complete search of all the premises as we were gathered in some other location answering the roll call.

Fear, terror, anxiety written on our faces as hearts pounded like a new Tora-bora event; just in case the house master discovered something seriously out-of-order or rule-breaking.

Then, I think of the protectors of the President as he arrives secretly in Afghanistan, then the Afghani president is told; multiply that with the embarrassment of having guests arrive in Nigeria when you have completely run out of drinks – I think the Afghanis handled it well.

The one question that remains is when any important political figure would be able to announce well ahead of time that they are visiting Afghanistan of even Iraq; that concern is however, moot; the people who live there suffer a lot more.

Afghanistan is what it has become, but Iraq is what we made it.