GUN VIOLENCE IN AMERICA: FOR WHO THE BELL TOLLS NEXT.

Just five people shy of Sandy Hook elementary school mass shooting incident that claimed 26 lives, the Uvalde Texas Robb elementary school mass shooting at 21 victims, now ranks among the highest grossing gun carnage in America. It is sad that such frequent blood spilling has tragically become part of our culture as a society. May the souls of the killed now rest.

25th AMENDMENT: ITS NOW ALL CRICKET.

Madam Speaker Nancy Pelosi once questioned former President Donald John Trump's fitness to remain in office due to what she claimed was his declining mental capacity. Does anyone know what Madam Speaker presently thinks about the incontrovertible case which America is now saddled with? Just curious!

WHO WILL REBUILD UKRAINE?

The West should convert frozen Russian assets, both state's and oligarchs' owned, into a full seizure and set them aside for the future rebuilding of Ukraine. Like the Marshal Plan, call it the Putin Plan.

A HERO IS BORN.

I am staying put. I will not run away and abandon my people. The fight is here in Ukraine. What I need are weapons and ammunitions, not a ride out of town like former Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani - President Volodymyr Zelensky.

IT IS WHAT IT IS.

"There is too much hate in America because there is too much anger in America." - Trevor Noah.

WORD!

A life without challenges is not a life lived at all. A life lived is a life that has problems, confronts problems, solves problems and then learns from problems. - Tunde Fashola.

NOW, YOU KNOW.

When fishing for love, bait with your heart and not your brain, because you cannot rationalize love. - Mark Twain.

JUST THE FACT.

In our country, you can shoot and kill a nigger, but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings - Dave Chappelle

DO YOU?.

“What you believe in can only be defined by what you’re willing to risk for it." - Stuart Scheller.

HEDGE YOUR CRISIS.

Never get in bed with a woman whose problems are worse than yours. - Chicago PD.

PROBLEM SOLVED.

'The best way to keep peace is to be ready to destroy evil. If you Pearl Harbor me, I Nagasaki you.' - Ted Nugent.

OUR SHARED HUMANITY.

Empathy is at the heart of who we are as human beings. - Cardinal Matthew Kukah.

WORDS ON MARBLE.

"Birth is agony. Life is hard. Death is cruel." - Japanese pithy.

REPENT OR PERISH - POPE.

Homosexuality is a sin. It is not ordained by God, therefore same sex marriage cannot be blessed by the church - Pope Francis.

CANCEL CULTURE IS CORROSIVE.


FOR SAKE OF COUNTRY.


MAGA LIVES ON: NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER!

TWITTER IS BORING WITHOUT HIS TWEETS. #RestorePresidentTrump'sTwitterHandle.


WORD.

"If you cannot speak the truth when it matters, then nothing else you says matters.” - Tucker Carlson.

#MeToo MOVEMENT: A BAD NEWS GONE CRAZY.

"To all the women who testified, we may have different truth, but I have a great remorse for all of you. I have great remorse for all of the men and women going through this crisis right now in our country. You know, the movement started basically with me, and I think what happened, you know, I was the first example, and now there are thousands of men who are being accused and a regeneration of things that I think none of us understood. I’m not going to say these aren’t great people. I had wonderful times with these people. I’m just genuinely confused. Men are confused about this issue. We are going through this #MeToo movement crisis right now in this country." - Harvey Weinstein.


RON DELLUMS: UNAPOLOGETICALLY RADICAL.

"If it’s radical to oppose the insanity and cruelty of the Vietnam War, if it’s radical to oppose racism and sexism and all other forms of oppression, if it’s radical to want to alleviate poverty, hunger, disease, homelessness, and other forms of human misery, then I’m proud to be called a radical.” - Ron Vernie Dellums.


WHAT REALLY MATTERS IN LIFE - STEVE JOBS

“I reached the pinnacle of success in the business world. In others’ eyes, my life is an epitome of success. However, aside from work, I have little joy. Non-stop pursuing of wealth will only turn a person into a twisted being, just like me. God gave us the senses to let us feel the love in everyone’s heart, not the illusions brought about by wealth. Memories precipitated by love is the only true riches which will follow you, accompany you, giving you strength and light to go on. The most expensive bed in the world is the sick bed. You can employ someone to drive the car for you, make money for you but you cannot have someone to bear sickness for you. Material things lost can be found. But there is one thing that can never be found when it is lost – Life. Treasure Love for your family, love for your spouse, love for your friends. Treat yourself well. Cherish others.” - SJ

EVIL CANNOT BE TRULY DESTROYED.

"The threat of evil is ever present. We can contain it as long as we stay vigilant, but it can never truly be destroyed. - Lorraine Warren (Annabelle, the movie)


ONLY THE POOR WISH THEY HAD STUFF?

“I’m not that interested in material things. As long as I find a good bed that I can sleep in, that’s enough.” - Nicolas Berggruem, the homeless billionaire.

Monday, July 19, 2010

IKE EKWEREMADU AND KIDNAPPING IN SOUTH EAST NIGERIA?

Icheoku read with shock reports implicating and/or associating Nigeria's deputy senate president Ike Ekweremadu with kidnapping in Enugu State? Icheoku also read another report of a denial of the alleged by the deputy senate president through his spokesperson. Whether Ike Ekweremadu is an innocent victim in the kidnapping saga or a godfather/benefactor of those kidnappers, providing them with necessary cover from his Abuja high office as deputy senate president, no one really knows; but sure, smoke usually follows a fire!
Some Nigerian politicians are so brutally selfish and self-centered that they are capable of just anything and everything under the sun including as in this case, kidnapping? For them as long as there is some political gain to be made and provided there is no adversarial impact on them and their families, the harmattan wind wild fire might as well assume a blaze of Hades velocity for all they care.
In this case of alleged Ekweremadu's involvement with kidnappers, there are so many 'known unknowns' and many things we think we know which we don't know; but the only certainty that presently exist is that there was an allegation and then a subsequent denial. As always, between the allegation and the denial lies the shed of grey, which usually houses the nest of the real story or put in another way, where the whole truth and nothing but the truth lies. Icheoku will however not second-guess anything at this time nor without any convincing evidence, wantonly brand anyone a suspect. We would air on the side of side of reasonable doubt and hope there is no smoking gun anywhere and elsewhere. But the scourge of kidnapping in the South East has become a terminal cancer and everyone with any Igbo blood flowing in his/her veins should see it as not deserving any flicker of life whatsoever. It is about time something drastic is collectively done to put these kidnappers out of business and for good! Enough of these ongoing blackmails and wanton shedding of blood of innocents in the South East and turning Igboland into inhabitable desolate 'wasteland?'
Now the question remains, what is the South East doing to curb and peter out the banditry of kidnapping which is turning the once proud land of our fathers into the new 'old Lebanon' of Nigeria? Where are the Igbo supposed leaders at this hour of great need to call these maga-dogs to order and at worst order their eradication from the land through self-help vigilantism, if that is what it takes to wrest our communities back from these band of marauding thugs. Icheoku asks, what is Ikemba Nnewi Odumegwu Ojukwu's position on this and whether he has spoken out condemning this malaise and ordering these beasts to beat it from his South East? What has Alex Ekwueme done or said about this hooliganism and has he reminded these animals the quantum of damage they are doing to the Igbo nation?
Where is Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu on this or is he waiting for another pitiful Vincent Ogbulafor's corruption scandal to erupt eliciting his removal from office for him to start running around and pontificating about a non existent "Igbo-ness"? Is Ebitu Ukiwe, Uche Chukwumerije, Jim Nwobodo, Ndubuisi Kalu, Allison Madueke, Ike Nwachukwu etc keeping silence and waiting for who to bell the cat? Why are all these Emperors Nero of Igbo-land singing, playing the fiddle and making merry while Rome of Igboland burns in an inferno of unprecedented ferocity? A time for providing real leadership in and for Igboland never called until this moment, and any supposed Igbo leader who fails to answer the call of fatherland should forever hold his peace and never once again, so parade him/herself. How could mother-hen be watching while the hawks continue to make a mince meat of her chicks, with unabashed sky-bombardments?
Recently, Edo (Benin) Kingdom got tired of such too many incidents of armed robbery and kidnapping and took the matter into their hands to solve it. They invoked a traditional panacea over their land, putting a diabolical curse on anyone directly or indirectly connected with the social malady. Low and behold, Benin Kingdom have enjoyed relative peace ever since and it was at the instance of their King, Omo N'Oba Erediuwa 1 that the Chief Priest Nosakhare Isekhure administered the curse. This forces Icheoku to ask, are there still 'Kings and/or Chiefs' left in Igbo land and what are they doing to help their subjects who are under an enveloping siege by a band of kidnappers? If Icheoku remembers correctly, there is this one all-over-the-place supposed Igbo Royal Highness and chairman/leader of all Igbo traditional rulers, HRH Eze Cletus Ikechukwu Ilomuanya, who sometime ago was engaged in a visceral battle with all the "Ezes of Ndi Igbo" of this world? It was then his self-assumed battle to stop anyone anywhere from assuming the ceremonious title of "Eze Igbo" be it in the north, west, south and even in the Diaspora?
This particular ruler was travelling to every kingdom, emirate and chiefdoms in Nigeria from the Emir of Kano to the Sultan of Sokoto to the Oba of Lagos to the Oba of Benin, practically begging them not to recognize any 'Eze Igbo' in their domain and to withdraw any such existing recognition from any Igbo man residing therein. Icheoku wrote an oped then, denouncing his effort as a waste of time and an evidence of a man with so much selfish ego and a desire to be the one and only 'Eze Igbo' in Nigeria? It is also important to point out that it did not matter then to this chief that these other 'Eze Igbo' in foreign lands have no real nexus to the Igbo South East and are not in any competition with him and his ilks; or in any other way a threat to their respective stools and/or kingdoms. But now that a real task militating against 'Ndi Igbo' has arisen, needing a real Igbo ruler/chief to rise up and go to war as in good old days, no one has seen the brake-lights of this traditional ruler nor heard his comment. Icheoku asks Chief Ilomuanya where are you and what is going on in Igboland; or are you afraid of also being kidnapped?
What use are these Igbo rulers/leaders when their women and children are living in bondage of the fear of kidnappers in their homeland if they cannot provide necessary leadership needed to run these bastards out of town? Where are the Igbo governors of the five South East states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo or are they like Ike Ekweremadu, also sleeping with the enemy and sympathetic to their cause; in order to later use them to scare away any possible opposition come 2011?
Icheoku is ashamed that these urchins have been allowed for too long to turn Igboland, the once proud home of such greats as Zik, KO Mbadiwe, Dee Sam Mbakwe, Pius Okigbo etc into a practically no go area or at best a 'visit at your own risk' enclave and with such a great trepidation. When will this fog of darkness ever lift from dear motherland.
It is about time this menace is put to an end and we hereby unequivocally condemn kidnappings in the South East as it is not only criminal but also giving all Igbo man and woman one heck of a bad name. These imbeciles who have turned Igbo nation into an unlivable hell-hole should really be ashamed of themselves for being the lilly-livered cowards they are, who are only strong at home. What happened to the standard test of bravado of the yore when real men go to foreign lands to plunder and bring home their loot? What happened to taking bravery abroad to go wrest back from the 'Whiteman' what they took from the continent centuries ago and are still taking? What happened to taking mercenary jobs in Afghanistan, Iraq and other such hot-spots of the world where brave men go to prove their mettle? Why become mere frustrated 'kitchen-brave' scumbags throwing their birds-muscles at motherland, robbing and kidnapping hapless Igbo men and women who still hold forte and call Igboland home; when many with means have simply deserted the region, fled to other regions for safety. But who are these faceless urchins that cannot be stopped or is there no willingness on the part of the Igbo people to have this come to an end?
Finally, talking directly to these bandits, Icheoku says please for God's sake call off this madness before you cost IGP Ogbonna Onovo, the first Igbo Inspector General of Police, his job. As you may be aware, Nigerians are becoming very restive and are questioning if IGP Onovo is up to the task of policing Nigeria since he cannot even police his own South East region by getting rid of these kidnappers. So South East kidnappers, if you have any common sense, you should help IGP Onovo to succeed in his job and enable him serve out his term before he is prematurely removed for perceived 'incompetence' in failing to reign in kidnapping, a problem wrought by you, his kinsmen and women. Icheoku is also calling on every Igbo man and woman to rise up against this army of invaders and fight them off the land and with their last blood if necessary.
This metastasised cancer of kidnapping in the South East demands that all Igbo hands be turned into surgical-hands, united to excise it; with the governors providing the leadership effort before marshal law is declared, replacing them with milads, who could then take these states back from those lowlife kidnappers. Worst case scenario, give the Bakassi boys back their machetes and cutlasses and let the real brave man be left standing. Also whatever is left of the fractured MASSOB should consider this kidnapping as an affront on their fledgling 'statehood' or how else can they assure Igbo people that they will be capable of providing good governance when they cannot rout out these shitless kidnappers from their territory? The governors of the South East are hereby warned and put on notice, either they urgently lead the effort at purging the South East of these kidnappers or President Jonathan should declare a state of emergency and let military administrators put a stop to these arrant nonsense and give the Igbo people back their homeland, freed of kidnappers!

2 comments:

  1. Kidnapping: South East rulers scandalised - HRH Orji, Anambra traditional ruler
    ….Blames it on loss of family value
    By PETER ANOSIKE
    Wednesday, July 21, 2010


    A member of the South-East Council of Traditional Rulers, Igwe Chukwuma Bob-Vincent Orji, has said that his colleagues are highly scandalized by the spate of kidnapping in the zone. Orji, who is the Eze Ugo 11 of Ezinifite in Aguata Local Government Area of Anambra State, blamed loss of family values for the main cause of abduction.
    He said that traditional rulers in the zone have been putting heads together to find a way out of the embarrassing situation.

    According to him, though the traditional rulers have been meeting, government has a lot to do in the matter as all the apparatus of security is in its hands.He also traced lack of obedience to traditional institutions in Igboland to the experiences of the war which turned some of the people of the region to desperadoes.
    The traditional ruler also spoke on other national issues.
    Exerpts:

    Spate of kidnapping in the South East
    I want to say that we traditional rulers in Igboland are highly scandalized by the spate of kidnappings in the region. Sincerely speaking, it is a very big embarrassment to us and we have been meeting to find ways out of it. The Igbo are noted for their enterprise. We are hardworking people. There is no part of the world you can compare their entrepreneurial spirit with that of the Igbo. We literally know how to squeeze water from stone to make a legitimate living and that is why we feel highly disturbed when kidnapping came into our region and want to gain ground because we know that it is very strange to us.Personally, I feel that two things are responsible for this.

    They are loss of family value and unemployment. I want to say that a lot of our youths have lost sense of family value. They have forgotten what their grandfathers stood for or represented. We never believed in riches at all cost. If you read some of Chinua Achebe’s books like Things Fall Apart and the Arrow of God, you will see the philosophy of an average Igbo man. We don’t condone evil and we don’t worship people that their riches are not legitimate. It is this loss of the Igbo world’s view that has given birth to all the bad things that are happening in the region at the moment. The other one is graduate unemployment. You know that most Igbo students pay their way from primary school to the university.

    We are not as fortunate as the Yoruba where free education had been part of their educational programme. Some people who went to school in the East do sell lands and other things to go to school and after graduation, there would be no employment. They have sold their lands or borrowed money to go to school with the intention that when they graduate, things would be better. When they graduate and wait for three to four years without employment, frustration would set in and that can lead anybody to any thing. However, that does not justify crime of any sort. In this situation, the government of the day has a role to play to ensure that employment is made available to youths after graduation as this would lead to the reduction of insecurity in the land.

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  2. What are the traditional rulers doing?
    Well, we have decided that every traditional ruler should investigate his subjects and report those that they are suspecting of being involved in crimes to the law enforcement agencies. As I said earlier, we are embarrassed by the situation and we are ready to play our role as the keepers of culture and tradition to ensure that it stops. We want to get the Igbo world is view before the civil war because we feel that the war, put a lot of panic on Ndi-Igbo as a race. Now, the excuse that everybody is giving is that Igbo are republicans by nature, but after the civil war that we began to hear this. Before the war we know that Igbo show respect to their leaders. We don’t even call our elders by their names. But after the war, survival of the fittest became the only way to remain on earth and everybody was struggling to survive after losing everything to the war.

    That was partly how we lost our world view and that was how the saying that an Igbo man can do anything for money even selling his own mother.So, we traditional rulers have decided to embark on cultural and world view revival. We want revive our world view so that our children who were born after the civil war would know that it is not true that we measure everything with money.Afterall,the motto of the Igbo is thou shalt not leave thy brother because strength is might. If truly we are republican we would not have this motto.So, we traditional rulers are not happy about the situation and we are determine to play our own part to ensure that it stops. Parents in the same vein should also help in inculcating values to their children. They should begin to tech their children the Igbo world view. We are not materialistic. We believe in our good given industry. Armed robbery, kidnapping and other vices are alien to us. It is never part of our history. It is not even in our folklore so why is it now prevalent in our soil? This is the question that we should be asking ourselves and the answer lies in what I have told you earlier.

    Should kidnappers face death penalty?
    Well, I am a traditional ruler. We are the custodians of customs and tradition and in the Igbo culture, there is nothing like death sentence. In Igbo tradition, whoever, commits heinous offence is banished and that is what was handed down to us by our ancestors .Therefore, I cannot prescribe death sentence. But government has the right to decide what to do with whoever that is convicted of kidnapping and whatever, government thinks is the best, will be acceptable by we traditional rulers. As I have said we are not happy with the embarrassment it is causing the people of the south East and we will be in support of whatever that would bring it to an end

    South-East governors
    I feel that they have a lot to do in this regard and want to give it to them that they are not sleeping. I am aware that it is giving them sleepless nights. Since they are the Chief Security Officers of their states, they should also think of other security measures that should be put in place. If the police are not well equipped, they could provide more equipment and also try to motivate them so that they would bring out their best. They could also try to involve the masses because those committing these heinous crimes don’t live in mars. They don’t in the desert. They live in houses and have neighbours.Government can encourage those who want to give information that would lead to the arrest of the kidnappers to come and that their information would be treated with utmost secrecy. This can help in wiping away those that are committing these crimes

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