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.

Sunday, March 4, 2018

NIGERIAN HATE SPEECH BILL: AN ATTACK ON FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION

ICHEOKU says apparently freedom is indeed not free; not even when it is guaranteed and provided for in the constitution. The oppressors, as usual, will always try and find a way to take it away. This is the reason freedom is always fought for and defended by the people for whose benefit it is enshrined in the constitution and meant to serve. Freedom, when not defended, is easily trampled upon and eventually taken away from the people by their oppressors or budding oppressors. 

Over the years, Nigerians have been complacent in defending their rights and freedoms, leading up to all the maltreatment the citizens have been getting from their governments and uniformed personnel, the police, the army, paramilitary etc, who abuse them daily and without recompense. Feeling much emboldened, the current leaders in Nigeria have now taken the notch up, yanking the peoples rights and freedoms and finally resulting in their pursuit of a Hate Speech law with a death sentence attacked to it.  ICHEOKU says Nigerians are witnessing the early stages of a full blown dictatorship and if they do not rise up to fight to stop it now, they will wake up someday to find out that they are totally and completely shackled down inside a gulag of no mean proportion. 

Nigerians are beginning to experience life under a dictatorship as the despotic regime of President Muhammad Buhari is incrementally taking Nigerians' freedom away, one freedom at a time. First to go was the right to a peaceful assembly when innocent placards carrying IPOB protesters and Shiites Muslims were indiscriminately massacred by the government. Now comes the latest Hate Speech bill making its way through the completely emasculated and National Congress; another one of this rapid encroachment on the peoples freedoms including their right to freely express themselves. 

ICHEOKU says why Nigerians are not yet up in arms protesting and protecting their freedom to speak freely is the most surprising thing in the whole unfolding scenario. You speak the truth you die, you don't speak, you die; so why not die speaking truthfully? Why not for the future of our children's tomorrow, we sacrifice our today, building a society that is indeed truly free and not subjugated to just one man's wish. The first thing any emerging dictatorship takes is the people's freedom of speech and if successful, it will go after other rights, knowing fully well that the people have been emasculated and can no  longer complain, are both vulnerable and conquerable. 

Hate speech as defined "is a communication that carries no meaning other than the expression of hatred for some group, especially in circumstances in which the communication may provoke violence. It is an incitement to hatred primarily against a group of persons defined in terms of race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and the like. Hate speech can be any form of expression regarded as offensive to racial, ethnic and religious groups and other discrete minorities or to women." 

ICHEOKU says with this as a backdrop, is it then such an egregious offense as would elicit death by hanging, as the Nigerian authorities are planning to institute, when the probability of violence is the outcome? Why would an ordinary speech, what was said by somebody, now become punishable with death. This is the sixty four thousand dollar question which the government of President Muhammadu Buhari is not answering; and this is the same question which 190 million Nigerians are not asking nor reacting to. Very soon, it will be too late to do something about it and the country will live to regret their inaction when their action would have helped avert the disastrous bad intention of the government.  

First of, the law as intended is generally too broad as the speech which will qualify as "Hate Speech" is not specifically defined nor discernible; but will be left at the subjective whims and discretion of whoever or whatever commission that is put in charge of determining what constitutes and qualifies as Hate Speech. ICHEOKU is emphatic that the constitutionality of this bill could be successfully challenged in court for being over broad; as courts have been known to not take so kindly to such not thought through legislation, especially one attracting the death penalty. It was the same mindset that once made drug trafficking a death penalty offense and retroactively carried it out on some four innocent Nigerians. ICHEOKU says how any sane country, in this 21st century, could be legislating speech out of fashion is simply beyond pale. If these mongrels take the Nigerians peoples right to freely express themselves now, what else would they also take next. 

What other rights or freedoms would they come after following a successful yanking of free speech? What other rights of Nigerians would come into their purview and which they would want to take as they continue to become more and more autocratic; yet Nigeria is a democracy. What democracy is it when the people cannot freely express themselves and say what they are actually thinking; and these are the same people who said all manner of things prelude to their taking over the leadership of Nigeria; castigating and criticizing, as well as accusing the former President Jonathan Goodluck and his government of everything under the sun, including blue murder. But suddenly, what was okay then has now become an abomination for which offenders lives must be taken and this is in this 21st century? 

ICHEOKU says and calls on all Nigerians to rise up and defend their right to free speech as such fundamental right cannot be taken away just because some despots in agabada feel insecure being called out for their sins of mis-governance. How then is Nigeria different from Vladimir Putin's Russia, Kim Jong Un's North Korea, Xi Jinping's China, Saudi Arabia, Erdogan's Turkey, Iran and such other despotic enclaves where the people are living in a country wide prison called a society under the thumb of a ruthless dictator. It is a fight that need to be fought now and by all Nigerians, in order to prevent Nigeria from descending into a Stone Age regulation era where expression is completely emasculated. ICHEOKU says Nigerians must demand of their representatives to kill the Hate Speech bill now or forever lose their country, as well as their freedom to say what they think. Who amongst Nigerians wants to live in a prison called a muzzled Nigeria. Away with the Hate Speech bill; kill the Hate Speech bill NOW!

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