Ethnic profiling as Nigeria’s predicament – Newstrends
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Ethnic profiling as Nigeria’s predicament

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On January 9, 2021, operatives of Amotekun – the quasi-state police outfit of south-western Nigeria – went to Aiyete in Ibarapa LGA, Oyo state, on a mission to arrest suspected kidnappers based on “intelligence” from the local communities. At the end of the operation, Alhaji Usman Okebi and his two sons were killed and several houses burnt in Okebi settlement. There were reports of gunfire exchange. Now, I have tried to narrate this incident in the simplest form. However, what I have just written in one paragraph is very loaded. If I do not decode it, you may never understand the undercurrents and the implications. You would think it was a simple case of crime fighting.
Here we go. When the Aiyete incident was reported by the media, the pegs were noticeably different. A northern newspaper reported that “Amotekun has killed three Fulanis in Aiyete, Oyo state”. The Sarkin Fulani of Oyo state said: “Alhaji Usman has been living in that Fulani settlement for the past 45 years. He grew up there and I am surprised people said they were kidnappers.” But a southern newspaper reported that “Amotekun has combed the forests and killed three suspected kidnappers”. A local said: “The Amotekun corps burst the kidnappers’ cells today but the kidnappers resisted them. The kidnappers are Fulani.” Whom should we believe? Can you see our predicament?
In conflict situations, we usually take default positions, mostly in favour of our ethnic identities – no matter the facts. It is an emotional thing. Nothing is as simple as it appears. In the current Nigerian situation, if you are a typical northerner, you are likely to side with the Fulani herders. While you may readily blame certain crimes, such as drug-pushing and internet scams, on “southerners”, you would want kidnapping and rape attributed to “criminals” rather than “Fulani herders”. And if you are a typical southerner, you would want internet scams attributed to “criminals” and not “southerners” but want all kidnappings blamed on “Fulani herders”. Can you see our predicament?
Let me expand that. In the south, there is a deliberate narrative to pin all kidnappings and robberies on Fulani herders. In fact, it would appear no single southerner is involved in kidnapping. All kidnappers are Fulani herders. Or, to put it another way, kidnapping is only bad if it is done by Fulani herders. If it is by southerners, it is no news. Playing up the role of Fulani herders also helps the narrative that there is a Fulanisation and Islamisation agenda. In fact, there is a famous quote that Uthman Dan Fodio, the 19th century Islamic scholar and jihadi of the Fulani ethnic stock, said he would not rest until he had dipped the Quran in the Atlantic Ocean. Can you see our predicament?
Up north, of course, there is the tendency to be defensive over the activities of the herders. They are not kidnappers, many would say, but innocent pastoralists looking for pasture. They don’t carry guns. They don’t kidnap. They don’t rape. These are the regular defence lines. Gradually, some northerners are shifting ground and saying some of the herders may actually be criminals, but there is a new twist that they are not even Nigerians. Why then are we fighting each other over “foreigners”? Basically, we are dealing with ethnic profiling (which can lead to ethnic cleansing) and ethnic defensiveness (which can obfuscate the security issues). Can you see our predicament?
One popular proposal to curb the herders’ menace is to stop open grazing. I support this position. But my support wanes when the proponents say “with immediate effect”. Some states made laws to that effect. Unfortunately, you cannot stop open grazing immediately. The livestock will die. Just like humans, they need to eat and drink daily. If you stop open grazing “with immediate effect”, you are making a law that cannot be obeyed. And if you try to enforce it, there will be crisis. There will be pushbacks. The logical thing is to gradually transition to ranching. It will not happen overnight. Not even in one year. It will take time. It has to be planned. That is the intelligent way of doing things.
But there are issues with ranching as well, and I am not talking about the economic costs. The first is what I have already explained – the Fulanisation theory. While northerners predictably supported RUGA (the ranching initiative of the Buhari administration), southerners predictably said “God forbid”. Those are our default positions. The bigger problem, though, is the assumption that ranching can, or will, end kidnapping (and banditry). I’m sorry – these are two different things. There is the nuisance caused by cows and there is the criminality of kidnapping/banditry/rape. Ranching can tackle the cattle nuisance but only security can address the criminality. Let’s be clear about this.
If you ask me, I would say insecurity is the major driver of the current ethnic tensions in the land – but, sadly, things have been framed along sectional lines such that it has become practically impossible for us to have a meaningful conversation. The ethnic profiling – which, by the way, is not limited to only one side of the divide – has overshadowed the fact that the Nigerian security architecture is largely corrupt, inept and ill-equipped to cope with modern crimes. If our security ecosystem were professional, modern, proactive and apolitical, we would not be here arguing over the ethnic identities of criminals. We are certainly paying the price of this perennial inefficiency.
To be sure, we have been battling various manifestations of insecurity for decades. In the 1960s, our biggest issue was political violence as politicians tried to establish a hold on their domains in the post-colonial state. In 1970s, after the Civil War, armed robbery became our biggest challenge because of the influx of small arms. In the 1980s and 1990s, ethnic and religious conflicts provided the biggest challenge to the security forces, with frequent clashes and killings all over the country. The 2000s and 2010s witnessed the rise of violent religious extremism in the north and militancy in the south. That was the decade that birthed the devastating Boko Haram insurgency.
Today, we are dealing with our biggest security challenges ever. While political violence and armed robbery are still there, Boko Haram insurgency and terrorism as well as banditry and kidnapping have combined to expose the underbelly of the security architecture. The security agencies are overwhelmed – overwhelmed by chronic incompetence, overwhelmed by the fifth columnists in their ranks, overwhelmed by inadequate infrastructure, overwhelmed by the ethnic coloration of purely criminal activities. Political demagogues and ideologues are doing their best to set Nigeria on fire by politicising the insecurity and promoting ethnic cleansing. It gives them great joy.
Although, the current situation plays into the hands of ethnic champions who look for the slightest opportunity to milk our misfortunes and pursue their bitter balkanisation agenda, insecurity is not just in southern Nigeria. We are actually dealing with an aspect of state failure affecting hapless Nigerians – both north and south. I know for a fact that bandits, identified as Fulani, have been carrying out mass killing in Zamfara villages for years, dating back to not earlier than 2012. But it is Fulani killing Fulani, so it can’t be framed as Fulanisation, and it is, therefore, not sexy for the media. Yet, these are human beings like us being killed like rats. Politics has numbed our common humanity.
What is the solution? Insecurity in Nigeria is a multi-dimensional problem that can only be tackled with a multi-dimensional approach. The insecurity is the climax of many things that we have been discussing for years: poverty, unemployment and poor governance. We cannot address them “with immediate effect”. However, we must urgently secure lives. That is the irreducible minimum. We must concentrate on containing insecurity first while pursuing long-term measures. Those proposing state police should also know that some things cannot be implemented immediately: the constitution needs to change and police need to be trained and equipped. They need to be realistic.
Nigeria is clearly in a precarious predicament. We know insecurity affects everybody, but the only thing some people can see is “tribe and tongue”. We cannot solve our common problems by clinging to prejudices and biases – either through ethnic profiling or being defensive of our kith and kin. We need a middle road. We need solutions. Whether the kidnapping is in Sokoto or Saki, criminals are criminals and we need to drop our biases to confront the issues as dispassionately and as intelligently as possible. We need statesmen and women, problem solvers and peace builders, around the table. War mongers and ethnic champions should please give us a break.
Finally, while the Shasha killings – clearly a product of recent ethnic tensions in Oyo state – could have degenerated, we should be thankful that the real Nigerians still showed up. There were no reprisals in the north, which I can bet was the work of peace builders in the region. Reprisals are the easiest thing! Also, Premium Times, the online newspaper, reported how Yoruba protected Hausa and how Hausa protected Yoruba in the aftermath of the Shasha killings. I heard similar stories about the Nigerian Civil War. This is, indeed, who we are as Nigerians. It is only a few merchants of malice that are spreading hate. And they are doing it very well. That is exactly our predicament.
AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…
WELL DONE, WAZ
On Thursday, Mr Waziri Adio concluded his five-year, non-renewable tenure as the executive secretary of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI). He helped re-position NEITI, adding policy work to its portfolio, producing analytical publications and organising dialogues. I particularly was educated by the regular analytical insights into extractive revenues. NEITI used to be known only for yearly audit reports – which were not even regular. Under his watch, backlogs were cleared and reports are now faster at a reduced cost. Nigeria also got the highest ranking in validation by EITI, the global body. Above all, he served his country very well and left with his integrity intact. We’ve been friends for over 30 years and I am ever so proud of him. Excellence.
CARELESS WHISPERS
Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi state first sought to justify the bearing of arms by herders and quickly retreated, saying it was “a figure of speech” – as if we were all born yesterday. Governor Bello Mutawalle of Zamfara state also ran his mouth, saying not all bandits are criminals. He later retreated, saying he didn’t mean it that way. Whatever. The chief of them all should be Brig-Gen Bashir Magashi (rtd), the minister of defence, who asked defenceless people being attacked by bandits to stop “running from minor things like that”. He said: “Is it the responsibility of the military alone? We shouldn’t be cowards.” Is this the quality of thinking among Nigerian leaders? Disastrous.
PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
Apparently, the appointment of Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the DG of the World Trade Organization (WTO) – the first woman and first African in that position – did not go down well with the Swiss media. A number of them introduced her as “66-year-old Nigerian grandmother”. Linda Klare-Repnik of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, summarised it well: “If it had been a white man, the title would have been along the lines of ‘Harvard Economist, ex-World Bank Managing Director and ex-Minister of Finance’…” Well, we are also like that in Nigeria. The first thing we check is the ethnic and religious identities of appointees before we consider the résumé. Jaundiced.
HUMAN RIGHTS
The federal high court has scrapped all charges required to file cases on fundamental human rights. You are not likely to see that on the front page of newspapers, but it is a significant development. It is not enough for us to continue to demand a reform of the justice system. We must also seek to make things as simple as possible for the less privileged to engage with the system. Millions of people are shut out of getting justice because they do not have the means to seek redress in a court. Imagine how wonderful it would be if lawyers and journalists will work hand in hand, pro bono, to expose and combat the human rights abuses by the police and other government agencies. Progress.

Opinion

Zenith Bank’s new MD and the burden on successful women – Farooq Kperogi

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Adaora Umeoji Nwokoye

Zenith Bank’s new MD and the burden on successful women – Farooq Kperogi

It so often happens that whenever a Nigerian woman makes the news as having been appointed to a high position that is, has been or, in the minds of male chauvinists “should be,” the exclusive preserve of men, she becomes the object of (social) media slander, unconscionable belittlement, vile gossip, slut-shaming, and malicious smears.

That is the fate Zenith Bank’s Mrs. Adaora Umeoji Nwokoye has been suffering since her announcement as the first woman Group Managing Director and CEO of the bank. In what is supposed to be her moment of joy, she’s contending with an avalanche of mean, nasty remarks and misogynistic bullying from insecure men with fragile egos who, instead of being happy for her, choose to question her qualifications, obsess over her looks, and ascribe her rise to a reward for sexual favors.

The most egregious of this came from a widely shared Facebook post by one Azalike Nonso who wrote that Mrs. Umeoji-Nwokoye looked “like a hook up [sic] girl” and that he would “NEVER take [Zenith Bank] seriously again” for appointing her its boss.

When he was challenged, he doubled down on his evidence-free moral stigmatization of the woman by insisting that she “knack her way to the top,” a Nigerian Pidgin English expression for she slept her way to the top, a sentiment one  Okoye re-echoed in another widely shared Facebook post.

As the father of three girls, these dreadful patriarchal putdowns and vilifications of a successful, high-flying woman by some idle worthless scum of men hurt me on a personal level. Mrs. Nwokoye embodies what every responsible parent should want their daughter to grow up to be. She got the job because she was more qualified than anybody for the position.

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She has multiple degrees, including advanced ones, in sociology, accounting, business administration, and law—in addition to three decades of experience in banking. She was, in fact, the Deputy Managing Director of Zenith Bank in the last eight years that preceded her elevation to the status of GMD/CEO of the bank. In other words, she had functioned as the second in command of the bank.

What more does it take to merit her position? Plus, she achieved her career success while married to her husband, Emmanuel Nwokoye, said to be a medical doctor, with whom she has children. And that’s the more reason why the unprovoked besmirching of her moral integrity is in such bad taste. Nigeria is supposed to be a traditional society where the institution of marriage is supposed to shield women from these sorts of calumnies.

I honestly wanted to ignore the social media skunks who cast aspersions on her honor without a shred of evidence because, truth be told, the overwhelming majority of people, both male and female, exulted in Mrs. Nwokoye’s norm-bending, glass-ceiling-breaking elevation as the boss of Zenith Bank.

Nonetheless, when I read Chido Nwakanma’s article titled “Zenith Bank and Managing Dr Umeoji’s PR” on Thursday and sensed suppressed, even benign, but nonetheless significant signs of misogyny in the garb of professional public relations analysis, I felt compelled to intervene.

Nwakanma is a well-regarded journalist and public relations expert for whom I have a great deal of respect. But his article on Mrs. Nwokoye’s promotion to the top of the ladder was a letdown.

He deployed what we call “blame-the-other-technique” to channel and validate patriarchal and misogynistic views of successful women, which basically consists in fixation on women’s dress and appearance, using discriminatory standards to assess women’s performance, and paternalistic condescension.

He said, “An observer noted that Zenith probably needed to prepare for the communication and PR challenge of showcasing an overly beautiful and over-educated female as MD.” “Overly beautiful and over-educated female as MD”! That’s classic patriarchal phraseology.

No serious analyst would ever talk of the handsomeness of a male bank CEO or describe a man with three bachelor’s degrees (in sociology, accounting, and law), two master’s degrees (in business administration and law), and a doctorate in business administration from a for-profit online American university as “over-educated.”

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He would be described as “well-educated” instead. There is a tone of mild disapproval in the term “over-educated.” Over-education means having more education than is useful or needed. It’s as if she earned degrees above her gender station.

But it gets worse. He talked about concerns over her red dress, why she uses her maiden name as her middle name, and then had this gem: “She is beautiful, no doubt, and parades an exciting Figure 8. Unfortunately, Figure 8 is not corporate. She must sacrifice the vanity of Figure 8 for the corporate essence.”

That’s someone’s wife and some people’s mother, not to mention the CEO of one of Nigeria’s top banks, we are talking about. She’s being scrutinized for the shape of her body, not the content of her character (as Martin Luther King, Jr would say) or the quality of her ideas. Would any expert deserving of that name write about the sturdy, six-pack build of a newly appointed male CEO of a bank and then go ahead to dismiss it as “not corporate”?

Nwakanma mentioned “Figure 8” three times in three sentences. That’s extreme, unwarranted, and frankly, disappointing sexualization of a successful woman (not to mention someone’s wife!) who owes her rise in the corporate ladder to her brain, not her so-called Figure 8.

Nwakanma’s piece is merely a more intellectually sophisticated version of the crude misogynistic digs at Mrs. Nwokoye by bitter, no-good social media lowlifes.

Look, I have zero personal or professional familiarity with the woman, but I have a personal investment in how men handle the success of women because I am also raising three potentially successful women. My first daughter is studying engineering at a top-three engineering university in the United States.

I would be concerned if insecure men attribute her success in life to factors other than her brilliance, grit, and her hard work. I would lose it if middle-aged men were to fixate on her figure and choice of dress for analysis—things that are never done for men.

A similar scenario played out in 2017 when Mrs. Aisha Ahmad was appointed as one the deputy governors of the Central Bank of Nigeria. As I wrote in my October 14, 2017, column titled, “CBN’s Aisha Ahmad, Misogynistic Bullying, and Religious Hypocrisy,” two categories of (male) Nigerian social media users were disconcerted by her appointment.

“The first group,” I wrote, “said she is unqualified because her promotion as Executive Director by her bank was suspiciously co-extensive with her appointment as CBN’s deputy governor, suggesting that her promotion was done in anticipation— or as a direct consequence— of her appointment.”

I added: “The second group, made up of mostly northern Muslim men, said she was unworthy of her position—wait for it— because her formal western attire doesn’t conform to the Islamic dress code for Muslim women! One widely shared Facebook status update, in fact, defamed her as a ‘sex worker” on account of her dressing. That’s a prima facie case of libel.”

As is by now apparent, successful women—be they southerners or northerners, Muslims or Christians—can’t catch a break. They are always judged more harshly than men. This culture has to stop!

Zenith Bank’s new MD and the burden on successful women – Farooq Kperogi

Farooq Kperogi is popular Nigerian newspaper columnist and United States-based Professor of Journalism. 

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Names for pig and pig meat in English Muslims should know – Farooq Kperogi

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Farooq Kperogi

Names for pig and pig meat in English Muslims should know – Farooq Kperogi

In the spirit of Ramadan, I am republishing a revised version of an article I wrote in June 2017 in my defunct “Politics of Grammar” column about pig-based meats and foods that Muslims are forbidden from eating but which many of them who visit the West unwittingly eat on occasion because of their poly-appellativeness (my coinage for multiple names.)

The column was inspired by an encounter I had in 2015. A Muslim high court judge from Osun State nearly ate pepperoni pizza (pepperoni is a mixture of beef and pork) at a workshop for Nigerian judges that I facilitated here in the United States. I knew he was an observant Muslim because we’d prayed together, and he’d shared concerns about the ubiquity of pork in Western culinary choices.

During lunch break, I saw him with slices of pepperoni pizza amid several people. I beckoned to him to come immediately, but he was really hungry, so he said I should give him a few minutes to finish his food.

I know enough Yoruba to know that pig is called “alede” and eat is “je.” I combined the words to make a sentence that I didn’t think made much sense. He jumped out of his seat instinctively and asked me in English if what he was about to eat contained pork. I answered in the affirmative.

He went straight to the bathroom and vomited, even though he hadn’t eaten anything. I felt sorry for him. He refused to eat or drink anything thereafter.

Another inspiration for this column derives from the tales of distress and guilt I’ve heard from many Muslim visitors to the West who consumed pig meat or who were awfully close to doing so out of ignorance of the deceptive appellative trappings of many pork-based gastronomic products.

For instance, at least five Muslims have told me that they either ate or almost ate a pig-based meat product called “salami” because they were deceived by the lexical similarities between “salami” and “salam” (Arabic for “peace”) and were misled into thinking they were eating halal meat.

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What could be more halal, they thought, than a meat that shares lexical and phonological similarities with “salam,” the short form of the Muslim, Arabic-derived greeting, As-salamu alaykum, and the root word of Islam itself?

In fact, many African Muslims bear the name Salami as the short form of Abdulsalam or “Abdus Salam (which stands for servant of the Peaceful, “salam” being one of the 99 names of Allah.) (Africans typically add a terminal vowel to every word or name. Thus, “Salam” becomes “Salami.”)

So how did pig meat come to share lexical similarities with the name of Allah and/or the short form of the most common greeting among Muslims, especially given that pork is prohibited in Islam?

A northern Nigerian Muslim who ate salami in London in ignorance told me he was sure that the choice of the name was a deliberate “Zionist plot to make Muslims eat pork.” That’s not true. First, Jews, like Muslims, are forbidden from eating pork. Second, the phonemic similarity between “salami” to “salaam” is actually accidental.

Salami is salted Italian pork sausage (more about this later.) “Salami” is derived from the Latin name for salt, which is “sal.” The Italian suffix “ame” is used to form collective nouns. For example, foglia, which means “leaf,” ‎becomes ‎fogliame when used as a collective noun. So salame actually literally means “salts,” but specifically salted meats. (“Salami” is the plural form of salame). The association of salami with salted pork came later.

Interestingly, this pork-based meat is called “salam” in Romanian, Bulgarian, and Turkish!
Well, there are few animals in the English language that trump “pig” in abundance of alternative names for it.

This includes names that indicate gender (such as “boar” for male pig and “sow” and “gilt” for female pig) and names that indicate age (such as “piglet,” “farrow,” or “shoat/shote” for young pigs).

A pig is also called a “hog,” a “swine,” a “grunter,” a “squealer,” a “sus scrofa,” a “porker,” and a “cobb roller.”

Most people know “pork” as the culinary noun for meat from pig, but there are way more pig-based foods and meats than “pork” that several people, especially Muslims who are prohibited from eating pork, are not familiar with. I list 14 more below as a public service.

1. “Bacon”: This is usually served during breakfast at homes and in hotels—along with eggs and sausage. It’s thin, sliced, salted, fried and brownish pork. It’s one of the most traditional culinary treats in the West. It’s so central to the gastronomy of the West that it appears in idioms such as “bring home the bacon,” which means to be the breadwinner, to be responsible for one’s family’s material wellbeing.

Most people know that bacon is derived from pig, but I have met many Muslim visitors to America, especially from Nigeria, who don’t know this. It’s also less commonly called “flitch.”

2. “Banger”: This is chiefly British English. Banger is pork cut into tiny pieces, seasoned, and stuffed in casings. The usual name for this elsewhere is “sausage” (see 3 below). It appears in collocations such as “banger and beans,” “bangers and mash,” etc.

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3. “Bratwurst (or just brat)”: Just like “banger” is chiefly British, “bratwurst” is mostly German. It’s a popular German pork sausage, although it’s often mixed with beef. In America bratwursts are called “brats.” (Sausage is any type of minced meat, mostly pork, that is seasoned and stuffed in casings).

4. “Chitlings” or “chitlins” or “chitterlings”: It is the intestines of a pig, which American blacks ate as food during slavery because it was one of the few sources of protein available to them.

Several decades after slavery, chitlins (also spelled chitlings and chitterlings) are still an African-American delicacy. If you are a Muslim who wants to experience African-American culinary delights, often called “soul food,” be sure to avoid “chitlings.” It’s just a cute word for the intestines of pigs.

5. “Chops” or “pork chops”: I know “chop” means “eat” in West African Pidgin English. But in Standard English it can mean a small cut of meat. It usually, though, is a small cut of meat from cooked pig. That’s why the usual phrase is pork chops, but it is also frequently rendered as “chops,” and that’s where people unfamiliar with the culinary vocabularies of the West might be misled into thinking they are eating a small cut of beef or mutton, etc.

6. “Frank” or “Frankfurter”: This is a type of smooth, minced, smoked pork often served in a bread roll. It is sometimes made of beef or a mixture of beef and pork. It’s generally called “hot dog,” especially in American English, and it’s so named because some people suspected, without any proof, that in Germany, where it was invented in the city of Frankfurt, dog meat was surreptitiously inserted into the meat since Germans ate dogs up until the 20th century.

Other names for franks or Frankfurters are “dog,” “weenie,” “wiener,” “wienie,” and “wienerwurst.” Although hot dogs or Franks started in Germany, they have become a staple of American street cuisine.

Thankfully, there are now turkey hot dogs, beef hot dogs, and chicken hot dogs, but the most popular ones are the pork-based ones. It’s always good to ask before you buy.
7. “Gammon”: This is pork taken from the thighs of a pig. It’s derived from the Latin word “gamba,” which means leg. It’s also called jambon or, more commonly, ham.

8. “Kielbasa”: This is the Polish word for pork-based sausage, which has achieved widespread acceptance in American English, especially in northeastern United States. It’s also called “Polish sausage” because it’s originally from Poland.

9. “Liverwurst”: Sometimes people in the West grind the liver of pigs and stuff them in casings. Germans call it leberwurst, which has been Anglicized to liverwurst. It’s also called “liver pudding” or “liver sausage.” Wurst, as you’ve probably guessed, is German for sausage.

10. “Rasher”: This is another name for bacon. Note that because of increasing pressure from Muslims and Jews, there’s now bacon or rasher made entirely from beef, turkey, chicken, or goat. If in doubt, ask.

11. “Ribs (or baby back ribs)”: This is meat from the ribs of a pig. But the term can seem like a generic reference to the ribs of any animal. It is also called back ribs or loin ribs.

12. “Pancetta”: It is Italian pork, derived from the belly of the pig. It is dried, salted, and chemically processed.

13. “Prosciutto”: As you’ve probably guessed, it’s also an Italian word. It is ham (see number 7 above) that has been dried and salted.

14. “Sowbelly”: It is salted pork cut from the belly. Other obvious names are “pork bellies” and “pork slab.”

Names for pig and pig meat in English Muslims should know – Farooq Kperogi

Farooq Kperogi is a renowned Nigerian newspaper columnist and United States-based Professor of Media Studies.

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Mass kidnappings : The truth Nigerians do not want to hear – Femi Fani-Kayode

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Femi Fani-Kayode

Mass kidnappings : The truth Nigerians do not want to hear – Femi Fani-Kayode

Worst still, many of them, particularly in the younger generation, find it difficult to read more than three lines even though it is to their own shame and detriment.

For those that have the gravitas, insight, foresight, profundity and intellectual virility to read and comprehend the counsel I have offered in this write-up, I urge you to bookmark it and wait and see what unfolds unless and until we quickly identify and recognise the problem and address the issues raised.

There are two reasons for the mass abductions and kidnappings that we are witnessing in our country today.

Firstly to garner cash which is then sent abroad to buy more arms and fund terror and secondly to destabilise our country and to discredit and undermine the credibility of our President and the Federal Government.

I hope and pray that someone is listening because this is precisely what we witnessed when the Chibok girls and other children were abducted over the years and the motives are the same.

Those that think it is only about the acquisition of money are naive and ignorant.

There is far more to it than that and there are numerous shady and sinister characters, international criminal cartels, foreign Governments and intelligence agencies and local accomplices and facilitators that are involved in this great evil.

Targeted
Nigeria has been targeted for destruction, division and disintegration by those that see us as a threat to their regional hegemony, strategic national interests and imperialist aspirations but most of us still don’t get it and perhaps never will.

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They do not want a strong, united, prosperous and regionally dominant Nigeria but would rather turn us into a pathetic and pitiful shadow of our former selves, a cowardly and quivering caricature of what we once were and a weak, divided, incredulous and headless pawn and set us up for self-destructive economic and military annihilation.

They know that a strong Nigeria, like a strong South Africa, would stand up to them in the arena of world politics and international affairs and ensure that our collective interests as Nigerians and Africans would be protected and they do not want this.

As a matter of fact for us to achieve that enviable status is not just their greatest fear but their worse nightmare.

They ask themselves in their corporate boardrooms, presidential palaces, cabinet meetings and legislative chambers, who can stand up to a strong Nigeria?

They wonder where else they would get their free mineral resources and be in a position to manipulate and dictate to servile leaders if not Nigeria?

And if Nigeria were to fail, fall and go the way they want us to who would stand and speak for Africa and the black man in the comity of nations?

If the truth be told without a strong, flourishing and virile Nigeria Africa is nothing and the black man is nowhere and this is precisely why the powers that be, when it comes to world politics and the international community, do not want us to succeed.

As far as they are concerned we are too weak, corrupt, ignorant, primitive, backward, servile, self-hating and dumb to achieve anything meaningful and we are more than happy to spend the next 100 years as a nation and a people that seek nothing but validation, leadership and guidance from them.

Yet how wrong they are. They have no idea who and what we are and deep down they fear us and recognise the fact that an unbound and unfettered Nigeria with strong, bold, articulate, confident and fearless leaders that do not seek their approval or validation and that have no interest in remaining as their slaves would be their worse nightmare. Such leaders would be dangerous to their evil cause and their attempt to sow the seeds of civil war, hardship and economic paralysis in our country.

Fight back
It is time that we confront the matter with an iron hand and fight back to save Nigeria.

It is time for us to get off our knees, to throw away the begging bowl, to stop constantly seeking validation from those that do not wish us well, to stop blindly implementing their disastrous economic models which seek to impoverish and destroy our people, to uproot and reject their well-planted seeds of division and to stop tolerating their subversive activities.

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Ask yourself, who funds the terrorists and bandits and where do they get their weapons from?

They did it in Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger, Algeria, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, Syria and so many other countries over the years and decades and now they are doing it here.

Ask yourself who was behind the attack on a mosque in which worshippers were killed on Friday in Kaduna and what was the purpose of this abominable and condemnable act of terror if not to destabilise us and create panic and chaos in our nation?

Again how is it that just a few days after the mass abduction of women in Gamburu Ngala, Borno state and just one day after the kidnapping of 280 female students in Kuriga, Kaduna state yet another 15 students were abducted in Gidan Bakuso, Sokoto state just yesterday.

All this nonsense must stop and we must desist from refusing to acknowledge that we now have and indeed have always had a major problem which needs to be acknowledged and be solved.

None of these things happen by chance and what we are witnessing is a deep seated and long term conspiracy to literally end our nation as we know it and throw us into a state of fear, poverty, anomie, anarchy, fratricidal butchery and carnage.

Worst of all is the fact that our so called “best friends” and “allies” in the west and the international community are the ones behind it.

We need help and if we can get it from the Russians, the Chinese and even the Iranians in order to restore our peace, self respect, freedom, dignity and prosperity we should do so.

Asking the West for help either in intelligence gathering, advice or covert Military operations when it comes to the fight against the terrorists and insurgents in Nigeria is like asking the big bad wolf to save little Red Riding Hood.

It cannot work because ultimately they are the hidden hand behind our numerous travails and they are the enemy.

May God open our eyes and deliver our nation and may we cultivate the fortitude and courage to come together as a people, eschew our differences, resist the evil and save our nation.

•Fani-Kayode, the Sadaukin of Shinkafi and the Wakilin Doka Potiskum, is a lawyer, a former Minister of Aviation and a former Minister of Culture and Tourism.

Mass kidnappings : The truth Nigerians do not want to hear – Femi Fani-Kayode

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