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21  Forum / Family / CULTURAL CRINGE on: 5-11-2020 04:47 PM
During an internship I did in a research institute in Lagos, a colleague asked me what my nickname was, “Mazi Spartan” I replied, she thought it was too Igbotic. “Why don’t you just answer Spartan or Mr. Spartan, since Mazi from your explanation more or less means Mr,” she inquired.



At another time, looking for a writing job, a friend introduced me to her sister who I think is one of the best wordsmith I’ve ever met. I needed her help for both tutorship and to secure writing gigs.



After our conversation over the phone, my friend (her younger sister) calls me to share the good news, “XXXX thinks you are okay for small gigs for now and she has agreed to help you fine tune your writing too, but she pointed out that you have an Igbo tongue problem.”



Why do we call ours an Igbo, Yoruba or Calabar tongue but refer to the white race tongue as accents.Why do we identify and appreciate some who go out of their way to learn to speak like the whites and scorn others who speak in their local phonetic dialect.



Is this a racial disorder or is it just some sort of pseudo-elite practice that is endangering our identity and our language?



Trust me, I go through a rather rigorous process to learn to pronounce words correctly. If I choose to speak English, I might as well say the words correctly, but this should not in any way serve as any form of yardstick to measure my intelligence or exposure.



My accent is my identity, it is something that I should adorn like a robe.It distinguishes me from a thousand English speakers; if an Italian, French or even Texan and Scottish accent is appreciated, why will I let myself be convinced that mine is a problem?



My language is not inferior, my culture is not crude, and my traditions are not in any way barbaric. Admittedly,............


Editors Source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/11/cultural-cringe.html
22  Forum / Law and Crime / LEKKI SHOOTING AFTERMATH: Chizoba Francisca Agu has been buried on: 5-11-2020 11:58 AM
One of the peaceful protesters who did not survive the shooting in what many refer to as Lekki massacre on 20th of October, 2020 was laid to rest yesterday.

Chizoba Francisca Agu who was hit at the protest ground at Lekki toll gate was laid to rest in Nkpologwu, Ibenda Obollo Eke, Udenu Local Government Area Enugu State.

Check below for link to full story.

Editors source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/11/lekki-shooting-aftermath-chizoba.html
23  Forum / Jobs and careers / Secondary school at 32 years old? How mockery did not stop Neros Pharmaceuticals boss on: 4-11-2020 03:17 PM
It is not often you hear “from grass to grace” success stories like that of Dr. Poly Emenike, CEO of NEROS Pharmaceuticals. It is one of those stories you hear and you can’t hold it to yourself, in fact you jump to share it at every given opportunity. It is a tale of rising from nothing to owning one of the most enterprising indigenous pharmaceuticals in Nigeria, a man that defied intimidating odds with just a clear vision, strong character and a lot of belief.



Born to peasant parents in Nanka, Anambra State in 1955. Dr.  Emenike struggled to complete his primary education in 1971, due to obvious reasons of finances. Excelling in his Common Entrance Examinations did not help the uphill task of funding a secondary school education. On last resort, he was sent to live with his maternal uncle, Philip Umeadi, a lawyer in Onitsha. That didn’t help much either and after just three years, he left Onitsha and was taken to Benin city, Edo state. He attributed his leaving Onitsha after a short time to his strong desire to further his education, it didn’t help matters that sometimes his former classmates who were now in Christ the King College (CKC), Onitsha, visited him.



He left Benin City in 1974 and returned to Onitsha merely months after he went there, determined not to allow servitude or other humans need for house servant determine his future. As fate will have it, he had to abandon his academic pursuits to venture into small businesses.



In 1987, defying logic or the norm, Dr. Poly Emenike now with a wife and kids decided to enroll into Ansar-Ud-Deen Grammar School in Surulere, Lagos, and to the amusement of many he decided to wear uniforms like his much younger classmates, a move that would have attracted a lot of mockery but did not daunt his resolve to experience what he missed 13 years prior.


Full story at link provided below.
Editors source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/11/how-mockery-and-scorn-did-not-stop-dr.html
24  Forum / Family / Marrying an Igbo man? Six (6) things you must learn on: 2-11-2020 02:22 PM
In a rapid modernizing society which aims to share responsibilities and roles between genders equally, this piece is for non-Igbo wives or wives-to-be hoping to learn a few habits to make a modern Igbo man adore her and if need be, give his life for hers without hesitation (yes! Igbo men are that loving). It is also important to mention at this point that this piece is not solely from a patriarchy point of view but a general attempt at exposing the ‘Achilles heel’ of the modern Igbo man’s heart.



Marriages between Igbo men and women from other tribes around the world are becoming an every weekend occurrence. This could easily be attributed to urbanization and economic migration which the Igbo people of South-East Nigeria are known well for. So, in our quota of contribution to world peace, we’ve decided to help our sisters from other tribes with 6 important keys to an Igbo man’s heart.





Here are the big 6:

Fraternize with his friends There is no loss in this habit for you, fraternizing with his friends makes it easy for him to have them over or visit them with you, such visits strengthens your place as his best friend amongst his friends.
 

Fraternizing with his friends also endears you to them, Men advise themselves a lot especially when they like or admire their friend’s partner.

 

Finally, fraternizing with his friends puts you in a vantage point to sieve his friends. If he is already comfortable with his friends around you; you can easily discourage him from continuing a friendship that your intuition is telling you will be detrimental to your relationship with him (your hubby).

 





Love his Mom We know you didn’t sign up for all that, but if you want him to respect you and adore you, you will have to mirror those affections on his mother. Do not worry if she is not responding due to any strange reasons. Just try your best, you picked the man for some reason and in due time he will show you why it wasn’t a mistake.
 





Be Loyal This is not same as fidelity neither is it love, this is just plain loyalty. Be dependable, be predictable (yes! men are different from women).
 

The average Igbo man is hustler by nature, he is always thinking of opportunities to explore, he can’t multi task, he can’t be sharing his time between trying to provide or build his family and investigating what his wife is doing or why she is not being straight forward with him.

He is likely to forego the business or whatever engagement he was in to first figure your actions out, and God help the both of you if it’s just tantrums or something ‘unedifying’.

We do not support or encourage any form of infidelity in marriages but if you ever get caught up in any ‘situationship’, do the best you can to be always steadfast.

 

PS- Surprises are allowed to spice up relationships, even pranks are encouraged to create good memories, but do not make it a habit.





Learn to cook his favorite soup At this stage in life, you should have realized men (in general) are big babies, things like preparing his favorite food, playing his favorite music, or supporting his favorite team can earn you a good treat and a special date in the bedroom. You learning how to cook his favorite soup or meal is a huge bragging rights for them.
 



Show him off There is really no need to elucidate this; this is your second nature as a woman so just mirror it on him. Yes! Igbo men love that stuff too!
 



Always voice your opinion Actively engage him in conversations, not arguments o!

 Argue at your own discretion. What we are advising is active engagements in conversation especially when you have an opposing view to his; this makes him aware of your thought process. It will also contribute largely to his peace of mind because when you are relatively mute over an issue, he doesn’t have to worry about what you are thinking.


Editors Source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/11/marrying-igbo-man-six-6-things-you-must.html
25  Forum / The Buzz Central / Chief Emeka Morocco Maduka; 8 Things you didn't know about him on: 31-10-2020 07:03 PM
The death of High life music Maestro Chief Emeka Morocco Maduka, the king of Ekpili music is no longer news. The successful musician passed away on the 29th of October 2020, this was confirmed by Mr. Chukwudi Avoaja, a member of the Performing Musicians Association of Nigeria( PMAN), Anambra branch.

According to writer Tochi Onwubiko, the life and musical career of Chief Emeka Morocco is poorly documented and is not easily accessible even by surfing the internet, so we took it upon ourselves to dig for 8 things most people didn’t know about Chief Morocco.

Here they are:

 Smiley      According to an interview with the National Light Newspaper, amongst the many hit tracks released by Chief Emeka Morocco Maduka during his successful career, the song that brought him into limelight was ‘Mgboye and Dominic’.


 Smiley    This is the ‘second death’ of the music maestro, during a music tour in Northern Nigeria in 1998, there was a widespread rumor of his death from a motor accident, he learnt of the rumour while performing in Maiduguri and went ahead to finish the tour unperturbed. This rumor prompted his release of an album titled ‘Asili 98’ (Gossip) which was one of his bestselling albums.
 

 Smiley    Although regarded as the King of Ekpili music, Chief Morocco did not invent Ekpili Music but is said to have had the biggest influence on the modern day Ekpili music. He is recorded to be the first to introduce guitar, keyboard and usage of microphone in the genre, he was also the first export of Ekpili music as he disclosed in an interview with the Anambra State owned newspaper, National Light.
 

 Smiley     Chief Emeka Morocco Maduka got the name Morocco while in secondary school at Eastern Commercial Secondary School Aba, Abia State. While playing football, he often boasted of having the ability to dribble his playmates from Nigeria to Morocco and students stuck to calling him Morocco boy, he however, admitted that after he went into music he considered changing the name so he looked it up in the dictionary and found out that the meaning was similar to his story of success in music and decided to keep the name.
 

 

 Smiley     Chief Morocco’s father saw the music career his son embarked on as an irresponsible distraction and never fully supported it until his death.
 

 Smiley   Chief Morocco started music at the age of 12, released his first album Aya Nigeria (Nigerian War) in 1971 and has up to 120 albums to his name, wow! Before his death, he was the oldest living high life musician in the south east.
 

  Smiley    Before his death, Chief Morocco had at least one album in the making. According to an interview with Sun news online earlier this year, he stated that he will retire from music after his 80th birthday celebration.
 

 Smiley     A historic music concert to celebrate and mark ’60 Years of Chief Morocco Maduka on stage’ was  scheduled to hold on 7th of March this year in Onitsha Anambra State, but had to be postponed due to the Corona virus outbreak and was then rescheduled to 24th of October and did not hold unfortunately before his demise.


Editors Source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/10/chief-emeka-morocco-maduka-8-things-you.html
26  Forum / Law and Crime / Read The Truth About The Birth Of The Dreaded Bakassi Boys In Aba, Abia State on: 26-10-2020 10:25 PM

Did you know the incident that led to the formation of the brutal Aba Vigilante Group aka "Aba Bakkassi" was because some Criminals robbed and killed a Yoruba woman who came to Aba on a night bus to buy shoes from her customer in the Ariaria Shoe Factory?

The incident made the Shoemakers Association in Ariaria to rally up amongst themselves to hunt down and kill close to a dozen Criminals.

First, the arm robbers or thugs were all Igbo, and the shoemakers were all Igbo. The victim was a Yoruba contractor who got job to make NYSC boots and she subcontracted it to her customer/s in the Ariaria shoemaker village.

Those days there were no mobile phones, no ATM, or mobile banking, so people travelled those days with large sums of cash. The mode of transportation over long distances was usually through Luxurious buses on night journeys.

She got into Aba very early, it was still dark. She took a Taxi from Main Park to a hotel very close to Ariaria Market, she agreed with the Taxi man to come pick her up at daylight.

At daylight, people saw her corpse at one of the various heaps of rubbish along the road. Fortunately, the Taxi man came back to the hotel and they denied the woman lodged there. He saw people gathered along the road, on enquiry he saw the corpse and recognised his passenger, luckily she already told him she came to see her shoemaker at Ariaria.

The Taxi man went to the Market and told them, her customer was also expecting her. They put 1 and 2 together. They went to the hotel, it was the hotel attendant that gave information to the Criminals, they immediately mobbed the hotel attendant to death after he confessed and called names. The Criminals were notorious and most people knew them.

In the next couple of days, all of the culprits were apprehended and mobbed to death by the Ariaria people. This was how the Abia Vigilante Group aka "Aba Bakkassi" started.

I don't want to say much, but I doubt if an Igbo trader would have gotten justice elsewhere.

By Ngozi Ojukwu
27  Forum / Politics / EndSARS Protest; The Story Behind the protests on: 25-10-2020 05:12 PM
The Nigeria as we know it slept on Saturday 3rd of October, and very exasperated citizens woke up to reports of yet another alleged murder of a Nigerian youth by members of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) officers in Delta State. Although a normal headliner in Nigerian tabloids for years now, the public outcry that follows such reports doesn’t result to any prosecution or the least explanation by the now defunct F-SARS of the Nigerian Police force.

Even though the Police Force vehemently denied any hand in what happened to Joshua Ambrose the young man from Ugheli, Delta State; Nigerians did not buy it and this ushered what is said to be the most widespread, independent, non-partisan and voluntary protest in the nation’s 60 years history.
The anger being felt by the Nigerian youths who refused to celebrate the annual independence day four days prior due to perceived ineptitude and incompetency in the present administration was amplified by the news of the familiar monster the government created and wouldn’t keep on tight leash despite numerous complaints of abuse, murder, kidnaps, brutality, extortion and violation of human rights.

The protest began online on 4th of October with hashtag #ENDSARS and quickly blew into an inferno when musicians Douglas Jack Agu (Runtown) and Folarin Falana (Falz) announced a date (8th of October) for a peaceful protest after another of their spineless colleague chickened out due to alleged pressure from the Force hierarchy.

In spite of the protest against brutality from police officers, peaceful protesters were shot at and brutalized, resulting in the death of at least one young man, Jimoh Isiaq and injuries on more than ten others in the beginning days of the protest. The ill advised move of the government to stifle the protest with arrests and intimidation met hard resistance, alongside the threat of some weak Governors banning protests in their states and the alleged threat to shut down internet service with the intention of destabilizing the protest with communication breakdown.

The protest is increasingly demanding accountability and respect from armed forces in the country and is also requesting immediate review of the salary of the police force which is suspected to be the root of the decay in the system; its tentacles are also spreading to address other begging anomalies in the country. The widespread but surprisingly very coordinated protest by the youths is forcing the government to bend to the will of the masses.

This protest has seen Nigerians  both in the country and in Diaspora exert their power, expertise and influence in managing finances and donations to the cause of the protest, initiate immediate release of detained protesters, arrange conveniences, coordinate and mobilize offline and online patriots and most importantly lend one voice regardless of class, tribe, social status, occupation, gender or age!
It is one of its kinds in the history of this nation and no matter the outcome, it is now obvious to the average Nigerian youth that our problem is not tribe or religion but a failed system thriving on our hatred and blowing out of proportion our otherwise negligible differences.

Editors Source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/10/endsars-protest-story-behind-protests.html
28  Forum / Sports / Super Captain, Mikel Obi leads Stoke City to first home win on: 25-10-2020 04:57 PM
Super Captain, Mikel Obi has led Stoke City to their season’s first win at home in a goal thriller against fellow championship side, Brentford.
The former Super Eagles captain who took up the captain job on Saturday afternoon in the absence of Ryan Shawcross and Joe Allen put up a remarkable performance completing the match’s most interceptions and second highest tackle behind Tommy Smith.

This win places the Stoke city side at 8th with 12points on the championship table and stretches their unbeaten streak to seven games.
Goals from Steven Fletcher, James McClean and Tyrese Campbell were enough to see the potters through as Brentford almost pulled level with a brace from second-half substitute Marcus Forss.

This is the second consecutive game Mikel Obi has captained for the potters due to the injury problems of the first choice captain and his assistant, the first match was a ‘2-2’ draw vs
 Barnsley.
The 33 year old former Super Eagles Captain is proving he is still a force to reckon with in his second stint in a competitive English league.

Editors Source https://www.ojamedia.com/2020/10/super-captain-mikel-obi-leads-stoke.html
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