Beyond cancer threat to stories of health

Winded by the speed

The speed at which things have moved presented a cause for concern much in the need of allaying any anxiety. As you pay attention to your health and seek the best outcomes, some processes and procedures become a medical requirement for ensuring things are nipped in the bud at the earliest opportunity.

A few blood tests, a conversation with my GP and a visit to the surgery for a preliminary assessment have set me on the path to a date with some of the best urologists in the field and what my GP casually suggested would be a scan, might well be a bit more uncomfortable at this studio that offers a one-stop shop of tests superficial and intrusive, aided by a local anaesthetic.

The scheduled duration of 30 minutes could last up to 4 hours and all that is in an appointment letter that landed before I picked up the post proposing an analysis of my GP’s request.

Checking off cancer prospects

Before one is a potential cancer diagnosis or just the discovery of the cause of symptoms that could not be explained from being felt up in a funny place. Having dealt with cancer before, I can safely suggest it does not entirely prepare you for the prospect that you might be checking for it and unsure until you are given the all-clear.

Health stability in managing long-term conditions can lull one into complacency and a renewed sense of invincibility. Life is fleeting, each day is a gift and a blessing for which we should be thankful and grateful.

Beyond every looming threat

What you find in certain issues of life, is you need to cultivate your support network of significant persons that would buoy you through tough times. People with whom to share burdens and talk about things, partners, friends, and others, depending on how comfortable you feel about things.

My faith is also a critical source of succour and strength, feeding on the encouragement of the Word of God in the Bible and in the sermons of anointed preachers to confidently call those things that be not as though they were.

The times I have faced life-threatening diagnoses and conditions with the hope and assurance that I have the grace of a better story and a testimony seeking to be told; whether the threat or reality of cancer, it would not be the last you’ll hear of me.

Other reading

Blog - Cancer is a human experience, not a battle won or lost

Blog - When I had the murderous cancer of denial

Blog - Thought Picnic: I share hoping it can help

Blog - Cancer: No journey is the same

The Terrestrial Church of Cacophony

Out of sight, but an earful

I first learnt of the Celestial Church of Christ, an African initiated church in the 1970s when I spend short school breaks at my cousin’s in Sagamu.

The church was situated at the end of the road with a stream running by the church into a dense forest, they could have been unnoticeably ensconced there without disturbance.

Yet, it was impossible to ignore them, at almost half a mile away, their daily rumpus or dare I say worship was loud, agitated and quite a public nuisance.

Embrace silence

It came to a head one morning when the head of the house sent a cease and desist notice to the church to maintain a sense of considerate neighbourliness in their activities by lowering the volume of their orgies. God, we must appreciate is not hard of hearing.

Now, that was courageous, daring and bold, for anyone to challenge a religious establishment in that manner. It worked, they were quite amenable to the idea, probably under duress and with the knowledge that the aggrieved was a lawyer.

Mind the fine

Later, towards the end of the 1980s, I was a ward of some senior members of the Celestial Church of Christ, they were quite obliging to allow me attend the church of my choice rather than force me to align to their tenets, for that, I am exceedingly grateful.

However, the reason why we have this recollection of events past is because this morning I read in the newspaper that the pastor of a Celestial Church of Christ branch in Grays, Essex had been fined a total of £1,241.50 including costs for conducting unbearably loud services four times a week well into the early hours of the morning; 4:00AM that is. [Metro]

The neighbours had endured this public nuisance for months and one really wonders why any religious activity needs to be broadcast beyond the confines of the walls of the meeting place except for the need to use the sound to keep the members alert throughout the interminably long services.

Just unacceptable

More pertinently, what this suggests is a lack of understanding that what is tolerable and allowed in the hyper-religious Nigerian society borne of Lord Lugard’s suggestion that we have a vague dread of the supernatural, is hardly acceptable in many Western societies.

People are not as religiously imbued and those who have any sort of religious affiliation tend to go about their devotion with consideration and moderation, too high a bar of expectation required of an almost fanatical claque.

If this sanction does not serve as a deterrent, the council has suggested that the church might have to lose its sound equipment. Knowing that I have lived in a part of Essex where there was at least 6 non-establishment churches within 500 yards of our apartment, I was fully persuaded to veto an application to site another church nearby just because the existing ones had already exercised our tolerance to the point of intolerable.

For all the celestial aims of the church, there are terrestrial norms expected of any gathering for any purpose they might be persuaded to pursue. This one like many that have yet to be called to order around the UK has become a congregation of the Terrestrial Church of Cacophony.

Thought Picnic: What am I supposed to do?

What for?

I woke up to an astonishingly atrociously unwarranted vicious message in my mailbox this morning. Much as I have received threats, abuse and worse before, I have usually consigned the message to the bin and marked it as spam.

Over time, I have learnt not to allow things like this is perturb or upset me, these are messages from generally inconsequential people with whom I have no contact or relationship, that it should never matter.

Fight this

However, on this occasion, I decided not to overlook the situation. Too many times, people have sat behind their keyboards with a deluded sense of anonymity to lay invective and vitriolic abuse on strangers without consequence.

For instance, if you were abused without cause on the street or a public space, you can either have other members of the public intervene or even have the police deal with the issue.

Consequences abound

The fundamental especially in the free world I have the privilege to live, is that we all have the freedom of expression but the licence to threaten and abuse crosses the line into menace, illegality and possible criminality. That licence, if anyone deigns to use it is not protected speech and should be sanctioned.

Whilst there might be many reasons why I was abused in the mind of the perpetrator and I cannot care to imagine what they might be. My acting now might well ensure no one else gets attacked like I was and also make clear that the full force of the law is just round the corner as a result of acting in a reprehensible manner.

I won’t hurt a fly

The person oblivious of what I can do, I traced the particulars and indicators of message and forwarded the information to the administrator of the hosting facility he used along with a complaint. I probably will not get more than an acknowledgement, but it was a necessary action.

It reminds of someone who in the process of trying to defraud me left me with a number of his bank account details, it was not long before I obtained his home address, birth certificate and a few other private pieces of data that I forwarded to the authorities. He, at the end of the day, was responsible for his misfortune.

I am as docile as a sleeping dog, kick me and you’ll wake a rabid dog with a vicious bite. But then, some people just have to scratch their itchy noses with the gaping fangs of a viper. What am I supposed to do?

Nigeria: The powerful taking the law into their hands

The third part of that programme

If we are to go by the respect for the rule of law as the core intent of President Yar’Adua’s programme in Nigeria, I have noted we also have to have that go in tandem with equality before the law.

Reading another news story today leaves me very aware of the fact that the President does have a mammoth task before him and I can only wish him Godspeed.

Obviously, it appears many of my insights seem to revolve around the family of the ex-President, I would have you know that their cases are not unique and almost always representative of people who can wield power and peddle influence by reason of their association rather than personal achievement.

Daughter bothers mother

This time the matter concerns of the mother of Senator Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello – Mrs Remi Obasanjo; considering the tribulations her daughter has been going through and they the parents would quite have us believe their daughter is being persecuted and victimized as a means of getting at her father.

That is a matter for some other debaters; however, it is nice to see that families do close ranks when met with some sort of adversity.

It would appear the mother had been in Abuja to offer moral support to her daughter and only just returned to Lagos after her daughter had fulfilled her bail conditions.

Since the daughter until recently had been as elusive as the Scarlet Pimpernel the press decided to seek a sound bite off her mother in Lagos about the travails of her daughter.

Within the law your privacy

Now, anyone anywhere should be at liberty to exercise the right to privacy and be able to seek relieve from intrusion of the press. Generally, that should be a polite message to visitors that one is not interested in their entreaties and inquiries, failing that one can seek the help of law enforcement or go as far as seeking an injunction from a court of law.

A journalist from the Punch newspaper - the powerful have a seething contempt for professional, journalists, most especially - visited the premises of Mrs Remi Obasanjo in Lagos seeking an interview and presented his business card to the security guard; soon afterwards an aide of the madam came to the gate and this allegedly is the conversation that took place between them.

The threatening conversation

Aide: Are you the owner of this card?

Reporter: Yes.

Aide: Madam is not in the mood to see anybody now and I will advise you strongly that you leave this place at once.

Reporter: Did Madam actually send you to deliver this message?

Aide: Yes, and I will advise you in your own interest to leave and never to come around this place again.

Reporter: Why?

Aide: Well, I have just told you, if you love yourself, don’t come here again. Or why do you want to risk your life?

Reporter: But this is not my first visit here.

Aide: And since you have been coming, how many times have you seen her? So, in your own interest don’t come here again.

Reporter: But make sure you give my card to her.

Aide: She has seen your card, and will call you when she is in the mood to talk. Bye

Reporter: All right.

My pique

I have a serious problem with this conversation, the first clause of the second sentence of the Aide is fine enough – Madam is not in the mood to see anybody now – fair enough she has had a rough few weeks on account of her daughter.

Is there any reason to then try to menace the journalist with – I will advise you strongly that you leave this place at once – it is very much like chasing away a stray dog; there might be cases for treating journalists as dogs, but I do not think the conversation warranted this level of hostility.

The reporter then tries to ascertain if the threat was a direct order from the madam or the aide being supercilious and working beyond her brief.

Incriminating her mistress she affirms that she was told to threaten the journalist – fine enough.

She then threatens the well-being of the journalist saying he should in his own interest leave and never come back again – well, where there is a public interest issue that would be a difficult order to follow – we can agree that the case of the daughter does not automatically make the mother a public interest subject.

The threats and menace continue with this statement – I have just told you, if you love yourself, don’t come here again. Or why do you want to risk your life? – She does appeal to his sense of self-preservation but a threat to his life?

Is Nigeria this lawless?

This is just not on, is Nigeria such a lawless society?

Is she implying that an enquiry made of the ex-wife of a former president can lead to a homicide in trying to escape or avoid media scrutiny?

That I would say is completely lawless, no one should have their lives cheapened in such a way in order to convey a message that they are being inconvenienced, it is really taking the law into their hands and there are places where such a threat would be prosecuted to the limits of the law exacting apologies and compensation.

But this is turning into a train of ideals that need to be part of the President’s grand scheme – respect for the rule of law, equality before the law and not taking the law into ones hands.

The aide either exceeded her lawful remit or her madam was wielding influence and power that primarily should belong to law enforcement and legal process – you can refuse to see a journalist, you can beseech the journalist not to visit or pursue you but you have crossed the line of legality when you threaten a journalist with menace.

In the end, I am glad she did not send out her security guards to beat the journalist to a pulp, I would not put it beyond their ilk to commit such a heinous act and get away with it.

I think can now really announce that I am officially exiled from Nigeria – I cannot countenance this kind of attitude, it is just not on.

Boats, Threats & Videotape

A voice out of somewhere

“I am coming to you”, Could this be a father saying to his daughter who is distressed at school as a voice of assurance or is it a voice carried in the un-calm winds of the Persian Gulf in the Strait of Hormuz, threatening the existence of a coalition vessel convoy?

No one can say, just as the United States military command in the Gulf cannot now confirm that the video of seemingly or allegedly Iranian speedboats in aggressive posturing to their fleet is the source of that cool but eerily sinister voice.

We have seen boats, threats and videotape – you can make what you want out of both.

Far away war a day

The United States, very far away from home causing enough trouble in the Middle East was in international waters close to the territorial extent of Iran – this was no doubt a recipe for close encounters with their enemy.

The US then released a video of seemingly reckless speedboat riders playing chicken with a belligerent world power – they were at the point of being blown to smithereens when a voice was recorded with this chilling threat.

Iran then released their own video and the storyline takes a completely different course – a calm and collected officer asking about the coalition vessel, definitely not the voice we heard of the US video threat.

The curse of propaganda

If anything, it shows why we need multiple perspectives of any story, because each side had a propaganda element to portray and we are at risk of being persuading of what might be entirely false.

Had Iran not released a video view of their perspective of the incident the US reported, we would have satisfied ourselves with the usual staple of Iran being a lawless, ill-disciplined, faction-ridden theocracy that needs to be blown up to instigate regime change.

The Iranian version of events, though edited for consumption just as the US version was, gives us another pause for thought that Iran might not as horrible as we get told they are – it also shows that we would try to get away with anything, if other parties are not smart enough to take a record of their engagements with the West.

The UFO threat

I find this whole thing utterly reprehensible, I would hate to think that people are manufacturing videos to reflect a situation that does not represent the truth – between the US notion of provocative and Iran notion of routine, there must be something that is closer to the truth.

As the US backtracks about the coincidence of the voice with the appearance of these speedboats which one could almost say are probably Unidentified Floating Objects (UFO) – mirages of the sea – recorded from the fatigued lenses of a battle-weary cameraman and edited by excitable agents for more blood and gore of war.

As this story unravels, I do not think the entire truth would be revealed – however, for the sake of truth, fairness and justice, it is incumbent of all these aspiring Hollywood film-makers to release the entirety of their recordings of the event.

The news wires and channels should also keep out the analysts – at least, give us viewers the opportunity to decide for ourselves who is closer to the truth of the event.

A new premise for war

Beyond this is the opportunity for the US to contend that they have been provoked into attacking Iran having lost the impetus from the recent report that states that Iran has suspended any nuclear weapons development programme for years.

With an admiral suggesting that Iran risks a Gulf conflict, one fears that some activity very similar to the Iraq Dossier on the presence of Weapons of Mass Destruction on which the war in Iraq was based but found to be groundless is being orchestrated to justify an unjustifiable attack on Iran – someone is fanning the embers of discord and one wonders who.

More so, having failed to execute the war in Iraq with finesse, or handle the issues in Afghanistan with a conclusion in sight; it is contemptible that a new set of planners are probably trying to see if another war in Iran can be a lessons-learnt success to redeem the supremacy and credibility of the United States.

Perish the thought, but let it pass your mind for a second!

Both pieces of footage