Signs of Stressful Times

“If you would like to respond to this notification, please place your response above the dotted line. Hello Homeowners, With it being election time, we understand the want to display political signs. However, according to the HOA documents, signs of any kind are not permitted. Error! Filename not specified. (Article XI section 11.20) We kindly ask that you remove any signs that have been placed. Thank you for your cooperation.” 

     I got this notice from my home owners association regarding my yard signs. Is this legitimate? “I don't know the background or details, but it sounds legitimate. Many HOAs have restrictive covenants--and they apparently are citing a specific one that pertains to yard signs. “People often run into problems with their HOAs. Sometimes it is possible to mount a campaign to get a provision removed or modified, but it takes a lot of time and effort!”

     Is the Home Owners Association Constitution in line with this Virginia Law?:

https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title15.2/chapter1/section15.2-109/ § 15.2-109. Regulations on political campaign signs. "No locality shall have the authority to prohibit the display of political campaign signs on private property if the signs are in compliance with zoning and right-of-way restrictions applicable to temporary nonpolitical signs, if the signs have been posted with the permission of the owner. The provisions of this section shall supersede the provisions of any local ordinance or regulation in conflict with this section. This section shall have no effect upon the regulations of the Virginia Department of Transportation."

    Still waiting for a response from the Home Owners’ Association. Election stress is real. Be kind to your neighbors, friends and family, no matter which candidate they voted for.

Soyinka Is Right

Soyinka Is Right In a Sense 

By Onwubiko Agozino 

Do you agree with anything or everything that Wole Soyinka said about the embarrassingly disorganized and badly marred 2023 elections in Nigeria in which he singled out one party for apparently undeserved harsh words? Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie expressed her disagreement with the ‘strong words’ that Soyinka used in describing one of the candidates, but Adichie did not point out if there is any area of agreement with Soyinka. 

Baba Sho done old now. But no matter what he says, he will remain a hero for many; and whatever he says matters to most. We may not always agree with him; but even when we disagree, there may be areas of agreement with his views that must be pointed out in recognition of his complex narratives that are open to interpretation at different levels of analysis. 

 Personally, I agree with Soyinka that the slogan, Obidient, is inappropriate for a democratic society or for a party seeking to be taken seriously by the people. Obedience is more correlated with fascist regimes than with democratic societies prone to debates and freedom of expression without fear. Perhaps, M-Obi-lized could have been more grammatical to Soyinka but he is entitled to say that he is not Obidient to anyone. He could have added that he was not Batified nor Atikulated either. He should have said it better but what he said has progressive implications. 

 The Obidient movement is wider than the Labour Party and it is not an ethnic movement of the Igbo, contrary to comments that wrongly suggest so, perhaps to incite Igbophobia. The Igbo voted more for Obasanjo than some Yoruba did. They voted more for Yar’adua than some Hausa and Fulani did. They voted for Jonathan more than some Ijaw did. Even when they voted against Buhari, some of them voted for him too. They did so even when there were Igbo candidates contesting against the candidates they voted for. The Igbo were not the only ones who voted for Peter Obi for president across the country. All parties should commit to offer apologies to the Igbo for the hatred and violence against them and offer them reparative justice. 

 The task of the Labour Party is to mobilize the masses of workers, farmers, traders and youth through a closer link with the organized labour that has offices already across the country. Peter Obi can commit his significant shishi towards building the party up by, for example, helping to hire full time staff, funding training and workshops for party workers, and helping to open offices across the country. The party can build beyond the organized labour and the Obidients and should mobilize to defend its mandate and be ready to contest every seat in every election going forward. Obi cannot always be on the ballot paper. Labour Party should organize beyond the colonial boundaries of Nigeria and mobilize across Africa for Union Government.

 About 26% of the electorate were reported as coming out to vote. Perhaps this figure would have been higher if there was no voter intimidation, ballot box snatching, and violence. To raise this poor turn-out percentage, I have suggested elsewhere that there should be an INEC lottery at every general election. The voters whose numbers are electronically selected would win the prizes in their own senatorial zones. For example, if INEC budgets one billion naira per senatorial zone to be awarded to 1000 voters at the rate of one million each, I bet that the turn-out will be almost 100%. 

Such an incentive to vote is small compared to the reported nearly one trillion naira budget of INEC. It is a small price to pay for increased voter awareness and against vote buying. Nigeria should consider abolishing INEC and allowing the state electoral commissions to run all elections, including the presidency and national legislatures elections. Just add the state governor and state assembly elections to the ballot for the federal elections on the same day. Allow voters to be identified with any government-issued ID and not just with the PVC. Allow early and absentee voting. Allow the Diaspora to vote. Allow a citizen like Nnamdi Kanu to campaign for referenda of his choice without being locked up even after the courts freed him. 

 Nigeria should move away from the divisive imperial presidency model and adapt the presidential committee of Switzerland. Each geo-political region should elect one candidate to the presidential council. Each of them will get a chance to chair the council for one year while serving on the committee, then there is another general election every six years. Any region that elects a male president to the presidential committee will automatically elect a female vice president from the region to the committee of vice presidents and vice versa. Proportional representation will allow smaller parties to be represented in parliament, as in South Africa. 

 Collective leadership may help to reduce the heat over which region produces the president and focus our attention on what matters. No matter where the president comes from, no region enjoys 100% literacy, poverty eradication, security, electricity, water supply, sewage service, garbage collection, healthcare, motorable roads, employment, gender equity, agricultural subsidies, etc. 

 Dr. Agozino is a Professor of Sociology and Africana Studies, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA. To follow similar debates on USAfricaDialogue Series on Google Groups, see: Ode to Soyinka at 86 91 views Subscribe Biko Agozino's profile photo Biko Agozino Jul 13, 2020, 5:27:28 PM to Dialogue From ten years ago, this Oriki still dey fresh: Ode to Soyinka @ 76 Ode to Soyinka @ 76 ODE TO BABA SHO AT 76 By Biko Agozino ‘Unlike societies right next to the Igbo for instance – more famously the... Gloria Emeagwali's profile photo Gloria Emeagwali Jul 13, 2020, 6:32:16 PM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Biko, This is Illuminating but you seem to be throwing out the Igbo Kingdom of Nri, out of your discussion of Igbo history. Why so? Igbo society was also hierarchical with the Osu and Ohu being at the lower rung of society. Title holders were not on the same rung as those without titles. Athenian democracy was shallow and over hyped in the textbooks since half of the population were enslaved and had no voice to participate. Another white lie. Igbo society may have been better but by no means a perfect model. As for Soyinka I wish him happy birthday although I still hope to ask him one day why he was so lukewarm about supporting the civil rights movement in the US? Correct me if I am wrong on this. A tiger does not show its tigritude , he said. Well you can say the same about the BLM movement - but Black Power symbolism was crucial for the movement to energize and inspire, and that it did. Yesterday the great Formula One racer Lewis Hamilton the only Black racer in the sport at a high level, did just that: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/sport/2020/jul/12/lewis-hamilton-vows-to-spend-life-fighting-racism-after-black-power-salute Sent from my iPhone On Jul 13, 2020, at 5:27 PM, 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series wrote:  -- Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/1041738840.1477311.1594655395274%40mail.yahoo.com. Biko Agozino's profile photo Biko Agozino Jul 13, 2020, 8:27:13 PM to 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series Sista Glo, On the Igbo not being perfect, no one ever said that they are perfect for they name their children, Uwaezuoke, the world is never enough. Yet, with all their very human imperfections, the Igbo do not deserve the hatred that the rest of Nigerians reserve for them. That is what Soyinka keeps reminding us, we have things to learn from the Igbo just as we have things to learn from other cultures. Threatening the Igbo with genocide is a form of phobia that is unjustifiable given their actual and potential contributions to the reconstruction of democratic praxis in Africa. Democracy itself is not perfect, it is the worst system of government, except for all the other alternatives, said Churchill. He would know because he preferred to impose colonial dictatorship in line with the philosophy of Plato - The Philosopher King - and Aristotle - the Aristocracy - as better models compared to democracy or what they called mob rule. Eze Nri was not a king but a chief priest whose authority never extended beyond the hamlets of Nri. It is true that chiefs were emerging in some parts of Igboland as documented by Nzimiro but Uchendu identified them as 'intrusive traits' from our monarchical neighbors. Rather than scoff at the deeply democratic traditions in places like Igboland, Rodney invited us to study them and celebrate them as much as we celebrate the empires of Western Sudan. The fascination with the Igbo by Rodney is all over HEUA where he praised them for building their own schools when the colonizers pretended that there was not enough money for schools; he celebrated their resistance to the double squeeze of underpaying the peasants for their harvests and hiking up the prices of manufactures, leading to the Women's War of 1929; and he dismissed claims that the genocide against Biafra was as a result of tribal war since the nations of Nigeria are too big to be called tribes, and there was never a record of genocide by Nigerian nations against their neighbors before colonization, while there are no African tribes called the Labour Party government of Britain nor Shell BP that orchestrated the genocide with Soviet Union help. The Osu and Ohu institutions, in my humble opinion, were impositions resulting from the slave raids and they are not present in every Igbo community. The Ohu system of slavery came about as a result of the slave raids to capture people for sale but the Igbo resisted such raids as much as they could. The British claimed that they burnt down the Long Juju of Arochukwu in order to end the slave trade that they themselves imposed and ran for 4 hundreds years. Chinweizu dismissed such a claim as false because the British had long ended their slave trade by the time they organized the punitive expedition to Arochukwu over the struggle to dominate the lucrative trade in palm oil. Osu came about, in my own opinion, as a sacred order for people who ran into the shrines to dedicate themselves rather than join in the resistance against the slave raiders. The Igbo would say, O sukwa, or it is happening; and those who fled into the refuge of the shrines were feared for having made contact with supernatural forces and became ndi Osu. A goat that is dedicated to the shrines is never beaten and it can come into your house and eat your dinner without fear. The Osu were untouchable because no one could beat them or kill them. Azikiwe made it his priority to abolish the Osu system once he became Premiere of the Eastern Region in 1952. The problem remained a burden to the Igbo because anyone who married an Osu was regarded as an Osu too. Parents would still make enquiries to make sure that their children will be happy in their marriage rather than face discrimination. Other nations in Nigeria also discriminate in the choice of spouses for their children. The Osu system has already been dissolved by the Igbo who are dynamic and cosmopolitan more than any other nation in Nigeria. For instance, no parents would withdraw their child from school if the teacher was known to be Osu, no one would refuse to go to church if the priest is an Osu, and no one would refuse COVID-19 relief if the governor or senator sharing it is an Osu. With the Igbo excellence in modern education, their success in trading and widespread enthusiasm for travel to other lands, the distinction between Osu and Amala is almost completely erased as people make friends in school or at work or on the sports field or in a musical band without bothering to find out if there is still a caste system. It may still be a problem in local politics but it is fast dying out. The residues of Ohu and Osu among the Igbo could be additional points to make in a legal writ or negotiations for reparations for the slow healing wounds of slave raids and post-colonial genocide for which the Igbo suffered more than most. The Diaspora demand for reparative justice should be extended to Africa too. Baba Sho cannot be imagined to be a scholar-activist who never paid homage to the Civil Rights Movement. That is exactly the theme of his play, Bachae, a homage to the civil rights movement in the US. Much more than almost any other African writer, Soyinka has been fascinated by the survival of African cultures of struggles for freedom in the Diaspora. His joke about the tiger and the tigritude should be understood as a critique of Senghore who preached Negritude but relished being an evolved Frenchman, though Senghore understood the joke and retorted that Soyinka does not speak tigrese or he would know what the tiger professes. See a commentary on Soyinka and the Civil Rights Movement in the US: Postcolonial Identity in Wole Soyinka Postcolonial Identity in Wole Soyinka Soyinka's representation of postcolonial African identity is re-examined in the light of his major plays, novels... Biko Ibrahim Abdullah's profile photo Ibrahim Abdullah Jul 13, 2020, 9:07:34 PM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com There was no Igbo as we know it today in 1500; what Afigbo called "village republics" pre-dated Igbo identity in the same way kingship authority and monarchical institutions pre-dated Yoruba identity. At issue here is communalism---as a universal phase through which human society pass through. Communalism as a pre-capitalist socio-economic formation sans class would read like "democracy"---Afigbo's "village republic" but they're not. Comrade Ikenna's conclusions on this subject refers. Sent from my iPhone On 14 Jul 2020, at 12:27 AM, 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series wrote:  To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/843384819.1773442.1594686359560%40mail.yahoo.com. Biko Agozino's profile photo Biko Agozino Jul 13, 2020, 9:40:01 PM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Democracy is not a phase in the evolution of republics, democracy predated republics or nation states. Democracy is a system of government of the people by the people and for the people. It is ahistorical to say that there were no Igbo before 1500 based on what you know today as identity. There was no entry for identity in the Encyclopedia of Social Science until the 1960s, what they had was an entry for identification, according to Stuart Hall. The Igbo language was always there from the beginning of human evolution of languages in Africa. The name Ndi Igbo literally means Early People. Ancient or modern, they have exemplary contributions to democratic forms of governmentality, said Soyinka. You are welcome to dismiss it as village republics but they were wider than the villages, they saw democracy or self-ownership as spreading throughout the world of the Igbo or Uwa Ndi Igbo, not just the village or hamlet. Biko https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/8E3F1986-345A-4D85-9C38-D44BC4FD8189%40gmail.com . Emeagwali, Gloria (History)'s profile photo Emeagwali, Gloria (History) Jul 14, 2020, 5:58:01 AM to 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series Thanks for the clarification on Soyinka. You are right the statement was about negritude. I hope that the everybody -hates -the -Igbo sentiment is a figment of your imagination. The Biafra war is over but you seem to think that it is not, loyal soldier. Some historians link the Kingdom of Nri to the elaborate and exquisite 9th century artifacts at Igbo Ukwu. GE Professor Gloria Emeagwali Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU From: 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series Sent: Monday, July 13, 2020 8:25 PM To: 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Ode to Soyinka at 86 Please be cautious: **External Email** To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/843384819.1773442.1594686359560%40mail.yahoo.com. Ibrahim Abdullah's profile photo Ibrahim Abdullah Jul 14, 2020, 5:58:01 AM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Biko---you come across as a crass Igbo ideologue! So identity is new and democracy is old? Where is the evidence? Stuart Hall and Abe Lincoln? Is that what history teaches? And the Igbo language has always been there--unchanged and changeless. So the link between Igbo and Igala and the suggestion that they split from a parent language; and the findings linking kingship institutions to borrowings from Igala is all crap. And Wole is your authority re Igbo forms of what "democratic governmentality". Am sure you will agree with me that Foucault is from Aba---true or false? Sent from my iPhone On 14 Jul 2020, at 1:39 AM, 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series wrote:  To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/1732211526.1776323.1594690031699%40mail.yahoo.com. Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju's profile photo Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju Jul 14, 2020, 5:58:04 AM to usaafricadialogue Biko, well done on your beautiful summation on igbo achievement. But its vital we face the osu problem head on which you and other igbo scholars on this subject who insist its not a huge problem are not doing. a search for the term 'osu' in the igbo centered facebook group igborant hq brings up at least eight posts on the subject. the richest of these is this active post and thread linked below with 392 comments as of today, a post where young igbo are actively demonstrating the permeative force of usu caste discrimination in igbo society. they are doing this through first hand accounts of the agonies of victims and their own self declared allegiance to this evil ideology-even in the face of fellow igbo who are so discriminated agst, other so described 'second class igbo' who would also be on that group, victims watching in pain as their fellow igbo openly describe them as less than fully human. unless igbo elite address this horror forcefully, its going nowhere. and even when they do so, its depth of superstitious and classism- being a means of feeling superior to others- and the heavy investment in it by those who call themselves 'freeborn' or 'diala', if i get the name right, in contemporary igbo society, means it might take up to 100 years of active campaigning to bring this evil practice to an end. we should avoid ethnic gymnastics and semantic pyrotechnics in addressing this delicately painful culture of dehumanization within and by members of the same ethnic group agst their own kin. we should be wary, agst stark and overwhelming evidence to the contrary, of claims that non-igbo dont understand the reality of usu caste culture bcs non-igbos are outsiders to the culture or that those igbo who criticize it dont understand it. we should focus on the evidence. it is a mark of the greatest inhumanity that a people facing the double challenge of a struggle within their own country and as black people on the global stage could insist on continuing to be so evil to each other. we must rise above ethnic self defense and indifference to and mockery of ethnicities not ours and address this horror as the whole world is struggling for african-americans- Ifeanyi Valerie Nwadike shared his first post. New member · 10 July at 18:38 Akwaugo was supposed to be married tomorrow but a particular reoccurring Igbo Tradition tarnished that eternal bliss. Akwaugo met Kenneth in the University and they both fell hopelessly in love. Both from Imo State, they were novice to any Culture and Traditions. They were in love for 3 years and after giving her a promise ring 💍, it escalated into an Engagement 💍 ring and Boom!!! Marriage. Both parties introduced themselves to their various families but something happened. The Mum knew the place of the girl very well. She sent spies to investigate 'Nchoputa' and found out the girl was an Osu. Her world came tumbling down. Ken who has a First Class in Physics says "I won't marry you baby cos of the future of our kids!" Akwaugo weeps on. 😨😫 Footnotes: Honestly, I don't think your Bible, Church or Religion has taught you anything if you still believe in the 13th century barbaric custom of OSU CASTE SYSTEM. You cannot be shouting BLACK LIVES MATTER or complaining of discrimination by whites when you discriminate against your own brothers and sisters at home. Our extant Constitution condemned discrimination at all level but in IGBO LAND, the OSU CASTE SYSTEM is still prevalent. 🌚🌚 There are many customs that have been abolished because they're repugnant to natural justice, equity & good conscience. Customs like forbidding females from inheriting their parent's property, sleeping with the corpse of their husbands to prove their innocence, what's so difficult in abolishing the OSU CASTE SYSTEM? Like how do you tell a 2 years old boy that he's an OUTCAST simply because your forefathers married their forefathers to the gods over 1000 years ago? Your Bible said you should treat others the way you would want to be treated (golden rule). How would you feel if your fellow being discriminate against you? 🌚 CUSTOM is the people's way of life. Discrimination is not our way of life & shouldn't be one of our customs. 🌚🌚🌚 Or what do you think? 🤔 I'm a freeborn tho. Will I say I'm lucky or blessed? 🤷🏾‍♂️ I'm just not happy to see a friend treated like she has a plague. Happy Weekend! ❤️ Image may contain: 1 person, close-up 128You, Adeleke Adisaogun Ajiyobiojo and 126 others 392 comments 17 shares Wow Comment Share To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/843384819.1773442.1594686359560%40mail.yahoo.com. Ibrahim Abdullah's profile photo Ibrahim Abdullah Jul 14, 2020, 9:21:35 AM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Gloria: Biko is the last soldier standing with the last ogbonigwe that has refused to explode. He will never accept Jack's no victor no vanquish plea. But he is still my comrade. Recall the heated exchange between Comrade Ola Oni and Ikena at the Marx indaba in Zaria? Biko always reminds me of that encounter whenever he appears with his ogbonigwe. He appears trapped in a past sans closure! Sent from my iPhone On 14 Jul 2020, at 9:57 AM, Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju wrote:  To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CALUsqTSgODdSEnU7OXFEZ%2B2r30KNAg-ty5ievGOP-JDhZbVb6w%40mail.gmail.com. OLAYINKA AGBETUYI's profile photo OLAYINKA AGBETUYI Jul 14, 2020, 9:23:17 AM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Biko. I slways stand back when most of your arguments revolve around Igbo exceptionalism. Thank God you have not yet resorted to sneers and veiled insults at interlicutors in this particular thread as may be unbecoming of a professor on the eve of his sixtieth birthday. I dont know how anyone can be speaking of 'village republics' as synonyms for village democracy. The Igbo may indeed have practiced village democracies as many African communities ( and the Greek city states did) but that did not translate into republics with their unique political traits. A republic will pledge the various democracies to a central authority through representation which the Igbo village democracies did not. To this extent most of the Greek city states and Yoruba city states were not republics even though they tended in evolution in that direction. That is why the Yoruba city states remained at best constitutional monarchies ( they only sent military contingents in time of war as Greece did in the Delian League.) Full republicanism started with Rome with three centralised assemblies to which member communities sent representatives. To refer to emergence of chiefs in Igboland as intrusive traits is to suggest that the Igbo unlike other communities were incapable of political evolution, incapable from learning from others but were created perfect at the beginning of time. .Nothing could be further from the truth. And why do you always undercut all reasonable arguments with people hating all Igbo and still threatening genocide against them? Come on, you can do better than that. You are no longer in your 20s and 30s. OAA Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone. -------- Original message -------- From: 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series Date: 14/07/2020 02:50 (GMT+00:00) To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Ode to Soyinka at 86 Boxbe This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (usaafric...@googlegroups.com) Add cleanup rule | More info Democracy is not a phase in the evolution of republics, democracy predated republics or nation states. Democracy is a system of government of the people by the people and for the people. It is ahistorical to say that there were no Igbo before 1500 based on what you know today as identity. There was no entry for identity in the Encyclopedia of Social Science until the 1960s, what they had was an entry for identification, according to Stuart Hall. The Igbo language was always there from the beginning of human evolution of languages in Africa. The name Ndi Igbo literally means Early People. Ancient or modern, they have exemplary contributions to democratic forms of governmentality, said Soyinka. You are welcome to dismiss it as village republics but they were wider than the villages, they saw democracy or self-ownership as spreading throughout the world of the Igbo or Uwa Ndi Igbo, not just the village or hamlet. Biko On Monday, 13 July 2020, 21:07:31 GMT-4, Ibrahim Abdullah wrote: https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/8E3F1986-345A-4D85-9C38-D44BC4FD8189%40gmail.com . -- Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/1732211526.1776323.1594690031699%40mail.yahoo.com. Biko Agozino's profile photo Biko Agozino Jul 14, 2020, 10:39:40 AM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com 'No victor no vanquished' is a polite way for the genocidist army to say la luta continua. It is the triumphalist Igbophobes who are continuing to wage the genocidal war against Igbo survival with things like Python Dance I and II, quit notices, deportation, and threats of mass drowning of the Igbo in the lagoon. No Igbo group or individual is waging war against the haters orm against other innocent Nigerians in retaliation. No one among the Igbo is seeking to build and explode Ogbunigwe or to fight with small arms to kill fellow Nigerians and steal their land or to destroy their places of worship. Not I bird, said Soyinka in Death and the King's Horseman - a puzzle that literary theorists are yet to unravel as an allusion to the violence against the Igbo. Some Igbo are asking for a referendum on the reconstruction of Nigeria and the call for restructuration is heard all over the country, not only in the South East. Even if there is a referendum today, you may be surprised to find more Igbo voting to continue with the one Nigeria of Azikiwe due to their heavy investments in other parts of the country and their love of travel. Even if Nigeria is divided today as an Arewa group recently called for, I will not be surprised if the Igbo call for us to go beyond division and try multiplication of cultural diversity through migration and settlement, subtraction of hatred, discrimination, and phobia, and addition of tolerance, atonement, and reparations. The Igbo example to the world is that even in the face of phobic hatred, a people can thrive if they invest their energies in education of their young rather than invest in weapons of mass destruction. Countries like Germany, Japan, South Korea, and China that have avoided war in the past 50 years have taught the world that education is better than invasion and forceful occupation. In other words, if the Fulani cattle herders and the Boko Haram terrorists are willing to learn from the open secret of Igbo survival and success, for example, let them build modern schools to educate all their boys and girls to the highest level of their abilities. The brilliance of the few who are given access to education in the North shows what Africa is missing by neglecting the education of our youth while arming them with foreign weapons to make Africa ungovernable. Education, education, education is the key to success, according to CLR James, Nkrumah and the Ghana Revolution. There will always be discrimination and heartbreaks in the choice of spouses. All over the world, families are choosy when it comes to the marriage of their children but education ensures that some stones that some builders refused may become the head corner stones. The Osu caste system is a contradiction in the democratic Igbo tradition but the Igbo have dealt with the problem democratically without resorting to genocide, incarceration, expulsion, drowning, or the seizure of properties. To the Igbo, it is less important to know whether you are Osu or Diala today, what counts is your morality, your skills as a medical doctor, teacher, musician, footballer or lawyer, your faith as Cathlic, Protestant Muslim, or Odinani, your education as in formal or Imu Ahia apprenticeship, your support for the community, and your wisdom. To a great extent, the Igbo are proof that when you have contradictions in a democracy, the solution is not less democracy but more democracy. Yes, the Igbo learn a lot from their neighbors, but I hope that they will learn more democratic lessons than undemocratic feudalist ones, more scientific lessons than money medicine superstition, more humility than ethnic supremacy. The neighbors of the Igbo are free to learn also from the tail of the kite how to fashion the ogene metal gong if they want. Who is sick and beautiful, asked Oriental Brothers? Biko To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DB6PR04MB29827C1AADE9CB069C4A5E04A6610%40DB6PR04MB2982.eurprd04.prod.outlook.com. Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju's profile photo Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju Jul 16, 2020, 9:38:21 AM to usaafricadialogue Beautiful summation but this section is an effort to avoid the issue- ''There will always be discrimination and heartbreaks in the choice of spouses. All over the world, families are choosy when it comes to the marriage of their children... The Osu caste system is a contradiction in the democratic Igbo tradition but the Igbo have dealt with the problem democratically '''' Not true. It is dealt with through ongoing discrimination that is far from ''healthy discrimination and heartbreaks in the choice of spouses. All over the world, families are choosy when it comes to the marriage of their children''. Brother, please Igbo elite should address this scourge, not sweeten or whitewash it. On the way to repositioning Ndigbo, I wonder how you can do so without seriously addressing anti-Osu discrimination amongst Ndigbo. An Igbo writer went so far as to describe disaffection by Osu as critical to Biafra's defeat in the Nigerian Civil War. The more realistic response in self defense is 'we are sensitive to this problem, and are working on it'', not ''ít no longer exists'. Everyone knows the latter response is false, so no one is deceived, the speaker and those whom they are addressing. Taking this further, at the risk of being accused of ethnic essentialism, if I get the term right, ignoring the continued pervasiveness of the Osu phenomenon plays into the hands of perceived inadequacies in Igbo political organisation, this perception being centred in the question of unity of vision amd issues of leadership. People point to Ojukweu's poor showing when he returned from exile and went into politics. What has been the range of Igbo elite's response to IPOB, the modern, more refined version, though still in need of refinement, of the Biafra initiative? thanks toyin To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/1087066256.2278768.1594737459775%40mail.yahoo.com. Emeagwali, Gloria (History)'s profile photo Emeagwali, Gloria (History) Jul 16, 2020, 12:29:47 PM to Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju, usaafricadialogue Quote of the day “We are sensitive to this problem and are working on it “ not “it no longer exists.” Adepoju Professor Gloria Emeagwali Prof. of History/African Studies From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com on behalf of Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju Sent: Thursday, July 16, 2020 9:36 AM To: usaafricadialogue Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Ode to Soyinka at 86 Please be cautious: **External Email** Beautiful summation but this section is an effort to avoid the issue- To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CALUsqTS2DbeJe4CrrTznZLNJv6ysDkJpMY-i7zvjxZRToZjitQ%40mail.gmail.com. Biko Agozino's profile photo Biko Agozino Jul 16, 2020, 3:46:23 PM to usaafric...@googlegroups.com Adepeju, You are making things up in quotation marks that I never said - 'healthy discrimination'; 'no longer exists' - na you sabi that one. What I said is that Azikiwe abolished Osu on day one after the British tolerated it for 100 years. Unfortunately, Zik did not have enough daughters to marry off to all the fine Bobo who were Osu, it was joked by some. My observation is that no matter how handsome and attractive you are in your mirror, once you want to marry someone, there will be many critics to object that you are too short or too tall, too educated or too illiterate, some may even accuse you of being too sexy to be trusted with the opposite sex, or that you go to the wrong place of worship and must convert first, or that you are too poor to afford the bride price, or too rich to be humble. Abi na lie? Yes, I said that the Igbo are dealing with the Osu residues of the European slavery holocaust by relying on indigenous democratic modes of governmentality. There has never been massacres, genocide, expulsions, abandoned properties, sectarian suicide bombing, kidnapping of gwongworo loads of school girls for sex slavery, no ritual killing for money medicine, no internal deportations or threats of drowning in the Oshimili. Never! To the Igbo, a core principle of life is live and let live, life to water and life to fish, let the eagle perch and let the kite perch, when one thing stands another thing stands beside it to make the forest rich. You are right that the Igbo elites could do more by, for example, bringing a writ for reparative justice against the British who orchestrated the slave raids and later the genocide in Biafra against the Igbo who did not make good slaves and who led the struggle for the restoration of independence. The Igbo elites and masses have already done much by ignoring the caste system when it comes to the personal choices of spouses, friends, business associates, co-workers, congregations, play mates, schools, books, movies, songs, or political comrades. But when it comes to the retail politics of who should be crowned Igwe based on the imposition of 'natural rulers' by the Obasanjo dictatorship in 1976 in an attempt to pocket the indomitable Igbo; against the victory of the Women's War against colonialism and the praxis of Azikiwe that shunned traditional rulers in the Eastern Region under the Richards and the McPhersons Constitutions with a big Con, caste systems may be revived by rivals as fake news. The Igbo could end this by returning to their indigenous democratic system without chiefs and by relying on elected town mayors and city council members for fixed terms in office. I do not know where you got the prejudice that the Osu were to blame for the defeat of Biafra. Most rational scholars know that the blame goes to Christian Yoruba and Christian Middle Belt military commanders with the support of some Christian Niger Delta elites and with generous supplies of deadly weapons by the Christian Labor Party government of the UK, the Christian Soviet Union and Islamic Egyptian military pilots but blamed it all on the Muslim Housa-Fulani elites. The Christian and Indigenous Jewish Igbo did not discriminate when it came to allowing refugees to share their homes without charging rents, they did not discriminate when it came to joining the resistance forces without guns against the genocidist military, they still do not discriminate when it comes to the education of all the boys and girls for a greater tomorrow. Ojukwu did not lose his deposits because anyone accused him of being an Osu, you are making this stuff up. He simply committed the blunder of joining the NPN to contest against the party of Zik with the long-shot hope of displacing Ekwueme as the presidential candidate in the next election (see Ezechukwu, The Rebel that I served). Ikemba could have joined Achebe and S.G. Ikoku, Eskor Toyo and Soyinka in the Talakawa party of Aminu Kano, Balarabe Musa, Rimi and Bala Usman that was aligned with the NPP of Zik, Nwobodo, Mbakwe and Solomon Lar. Or he could have stayed away from partisan politics as an elder statesman or Eze ndi Igbo gburugburu (all round). Had he joined Zik's party, he would have been unopposed for any position that he wanted to contest and no way could he have lost a seat to an unknown medical doctor in his Nnewi home constituency. You cannot blame everything on the Osu because it is a dying institution without the juju power that you attribute to it. The opinion of the Igbo towards IPOB is very democratic. The masses of the Igbo believe that IPOB members should be allowed to have their say and to fly the Garveyist flag (which fine pass the Green-White-Green that Soyinka said must have been designed by a dyslexic colonial official, of all the colors in the world, they imposed green twice to suggest that we are bush people, hence ain't no black in the green-white-green, The Penkelmese Years), stay home once a year to eat nsala soup in honor of the dead, and should be given the right to demand for a referendum (as is done in Scotland, California and in Barcelona) without being declared a terrorist organization to be terrorized with Python Dance, mass killings, jails and proscriptions. However, no Igbo person will agree that IPOB speaks for every Igbo person because everyone has the right to self-ownership or freedom. Say your own and let me say my own, sang Osadebe. Many Igbo believe that the way forward is the Pan Africanism of Du Bois, Azikiwe, Nkrumah, Mandela, and Marley towards a United Republic of African States. There is no country in Africa where you will fail to find a significant Igbo presence and the task for us elites is to make all Africans feel at home across Africa. This is the promise of the democratic dispensation - to allow freedom of movement and freedom of association to all people of African descent. Unfortunately, some groups still fantasize about building colonies and empires, expulsion of others and the domination of the security forces in the world of the knowledge economy which is better built with book houses than with ammunition supplied by imperialists for the mass destruction of Africans to enable the theft of our resources. Biko To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/MN2PR01MB556869545B23A1068785C323DE7F0%40MN2PR01MB5568.prod.exchangelabs.com.

VIOLENCE AND LITERACY

By Biko Agozino

The political violence and geopolitical dichotomy that emerged with the results of the recent general elections in Nigeria compel me to recommend a program in scholar activism similar to the one led by Comrades Eskor Toyo and Bassey Ekpo Bassey in the late 1980s. The program was called the Directorate For Literacy and I was one of those involved in the organization of weekly literacy classes for workers and monthly public enlightenment lectures in Calabar municipality in addition to the National Literacy Conference with delegates from all over the country. We also published the free monthly cyclostyled newsletter, Mass Line, that was edited by Eskor Toyo with me as associate editor, following my appointment as the unpaid Director of Administration for the Directorate. Other leaders of the project included Comrades Akpan Ekpo, Edwin Madunagu, Bene Madunagu, Okonete Ekanem, Princewill Alozie, and leaders of trade union branches,   all working on voluntary bases without payment. We even had a Youth Corps Member assigned to the project and we eventually acquired an office building with a clerk and a messenger on the payroll.

I remember when we started, how we used to sit under a tree and listen to Eskor as he clarified one political economy principle or another for the workers, journalists and the university teachers alike during passionate debates. One lesson that Eskor taught us was that contrary to the assumption by the ruling class and the masses alike that ethnicity and religion were the most important principles in Nigerian politics, the dominant principle remained class consciousness. This was because, according to him, whatever your religion or ethnicity, you would have privileged access to the governor or the top traditional ruler in any state if you are rich whereas the indigenes would never have that if they are poor. Hence, the masses should transcend ethnicity and sectarianism and join their fellow sufferers to break the chains of suffering in the land because our people had suffered enough (the motto of Mass Line).

Working with the Calabar Municipal Government of the late Bassey Ekpo Bassey, the Directorate for Literacy supported the setting up of micro industries, the construction of new school buildings, the abolition of refuse-collection levies and the abolition of school fees in elementary schools even against the opposition of the military governor of the state. Imagine what could have been achieved if every university in the country embarked on similar outreach projects to combat literacy across the country in alliance with popular organizations, with every local government authority and with the additional support of every state government and the federal government. Corporate citizens and wealthy individuals could also endow funds to support such literacy campaigns.

Similar projects should be set up in partnership with popular organizations across the country to help us to address the shameful statistics that the National Population Council announced recently – that in some states of the country, more than 70% of the adults remain illiterate while the better states could only boast of about 70% literacy rates and many of the children are dropping out from school. With support from the federal, state and local government authorities, in addition to organized labour and other popular organizations, I am certain that we could launch a similar program nation-wide with a target of 100% literacy rate within four years. Cuba did something similar after the revolution of 1959 by mobilizing the literate youth and funding them to go across the country and emancipate the entire population from illiteracy. I believe that Nigerians are capable of achieving this feat even without waiting for a Cuba-type revolution if the political will is there to tackle illiteracy decisively.

The above assumption is based on the hypotheses that anyone who completes four years of schooling should be able to read and write. Thus, if we embark on an aggressive literacy campaign from now, by the time the Jonathan-Sambo presidency completes its term in four years, we would have a 100% literacy rate in the country. This would be a major achievement by Nigerians and the effects would be felt across the country given that illiteracy is correlated with higher infant mortality, higher maternal mortality, higher poverty rates, and higher rates of violence in the polity, as Festus Iyayi inferred in his novel, Violence.

Some commentators have suggested that the problems of illiteracy and political violence are mainly Northern problems to be addressed there only. I beg to disagree. Illiteracy is a problem for us all and we all should be concerned about it in every corner of the nation. Moreover, political violence took place in every part of the country during the elections and not exclusively in the north. If the results of the elections had been dichotomized as it was but with Buhari emerging as the winner, it is predictable that parts of the south could have exploded in violence the way the north did. I agree that the ones who orchestrate political violence are frequently the members of the elite who are themselves relatively well educated. However, if we educate all our people, it will be more difficult for politicians to mobilize educated youth and ask them to go and kill and die for them when they know that the corrupt politicians are not worth dying for.

It is true that literacy is not all that it takes to end a culture of violence given that the most literate societies are far from being violence–free. In that connection, we will need to plan to go beyond mass literacy towards higher learning for at least 10% of our population as WEB Du Bois once demanded for the former enslaved African Americans. Hence more scholarships should be made available for poor students with courses on study skills to help them to master the arts and science of higher learning, thereby improving their life chances but also making them more likely to resort to dialogue as the preferred solution to disagreements. On graduation from higher education institutions, those who complete the National Youth Service Corps should be invited to enter for business plan competitions and the ones with the best business plans should be given grants, not loans, to set up their businesses with support from business extension services to help them to succeed and thereby create more jobs for their fellow youth.

The cowardly killing of Youth Service Corps members during the violence comes from the mindset that sees them as educated people and so the only way for the illiterate to rise up was by pulling down those who had risen rather than rising with the brethren and sisteren. The allocation of payment to their families is commendable but I agree with those who say that the payment should be increased at least four times to twenty million naira per family. In addition, the innocent poor who were killed during the violence should also have at least one million naira paid to their families as compensation. Finally, the victims of similar political violence in our history should also be paid damages that would be token reminders to all that we value the lives of all our people and to discourage violent agitators from unleashing this brutal orgy of violence periodically.

Violence may be endemic because the country is yet to address the pogroms that led to the civil war in any meaningful way, suggesting that such mass violence is tolerated with impunity. Since we cannot punish every perpetrator of mass violence as Rwanda discovered after the genocide, we need a policy of reparative justice by allocating huge funds for the rehabilitation of our fellow citizens any time and every time ignorance leads to massacres. Perhaps, if Yakubu Gowon had announced billions of pounds with which to rehabilitate the survivors of the pogrom as Chukwuemeka Ojukwu and Nnamdi Azikiwe had called for at the time, and as Wole Soyinka advocates, we may never have experienced a genocidal war in which the lives of Nigerians were cheapened enough to be wasted every now and then as part of the national psyche. It is not yet too late to address that monumental injustice the way submissions at the Justice Oputa Panel recommended.

Dr. Biko Agozino is a Professor of Sociology and Director of Africana Studies Program, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061: agozino@vt.edu

Anambra as Litmus Test

ANAMBRA STATE AS LITMUS TEST

By Biko Agozino

"But my fear is that the furore that has grown around the Anambra voters register may become a battle ground, with the corpses that we did not see on February 6 showing up on the streets soon enough when the Obi administration chooses to organise the pending local government council elections in the state." This was the conclusion to Ruben Abati's 'Hope Deferred' assessment of the governorship election in Anambra State but where is Dr. Abati expecting those corpses to come from, his own village? 

Let me start with a confession of a personal momentary dilemma on December 11, 2009, after the Africana Studies Program at Brown University-hosted Achebe Colloquium on Africa. The event gave me the opportunity of shaking hands on the same day and in the same hall with some of the greatest heroes of Nigeria - Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Emeka Ojukwu, and Peter Obi. My dilemma was similar to that of one of the characters in Ngugi’s latest novel, The Wizard of the Crow. In the novel, a business man, Titus Tajrika, refused to wash his subsequently smelly and gloved hand after shaking hands with the corrupt head of state. Oh yes, I have been washing my hands since the hands that I shook were clean hands while Tajrika may have stopped washing his hand to retain the odour of contamination because he shook an unclean hand.

Anambra State of Nigeria was pronounced the litmus test for the wobbly Nigerian democracy at that first Achebe Colloquium at Brown University, Rhode Island and Anambra people have managed to pass the test to the delight of many Nigerians. The election of February 6, 2010, was not perfect but the results reflected the wishes of the majority of the voters to see Governor Peter Obi of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) continue in office for a second term. Based on his track records, this was a deserved victory for which I join many Nigerians in congratulating him.

During the Achebe Colloquium, I was surprised that no Nigerian present could challenge the views of presenters like the former US Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr Lyman (pronounced Lie-man) that Nigeria was becoming ‘worthless and irrelevant ‘to the outside world. Only after the moderator of that first panel, Professor Obiora Udechukwu, tried to prod the panel by asking if they could name any exemplary leader in present day Nigeria, did Professors Abiola Irele of Harvard and Richard Joseph of Northwestern suggest that Governor Tunde Fashola of Lagos State was their model leader.

I was surprised that no one mentioned Peter Obi, the governor whose state was the topic of the symposium, as an exemplary leader. So during question and comments, I told the colloquium that we should give credit to the people of Anambra state for producing some of the greatest achievers in Nigerian history. Without itemizing the giants that have emerged from that small geographical space called Anambra, I reminded the audience that the state has been offering a model of democratic leadership that the rest of the country should learn from.

Here was a state in which the mandate of the people was stolen and awarded to a medical doctor, Chris Ngige, mistaken for a stooge but who was later sabotaged when it turned out that he was out to satisfy such basic expectations as paying salaries on time and building roads rather than surrender the treasury to the self-styled godfather, Chris Ubah. He was kidnapped and the police withdrew security details from him but amazingly, he was not killed despite the destruction of government-owned properties valued at millions by those that Achebe called a clique formed for the destabilization of the state.

Meanwhile the actual winner of the 2003 election went to court rather than rent a crowd of thugs to kill and maim as is the practice in many parts of the country where elections are called do-or-die affairs and candidates are challenged to prove that they are ready to die for the positions that they seek. After one year of litigation, he won his mandate back through the rule of law and became the only minority party governor in the country with a State House of Assembly in which his party did not have a single member.

The question on many minds was how long he was going to last in office before the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) dominated house would impeach him. And right on cue, they impeached him and also tried to impeach his deputy apparently to make way for the PDP Speaker of the House to become the governor. They miscalculated because the deputy was not automatically impeached when a governor is impeached and so they inadvertently gave Nigerians our first ever female state governor in the person of Obi‘s deputy, Dame Virginia Etiaba. Once again, the elected governor Obi went back to court and once again won back his mandate without a single life being lost!

I told the colloquium that it did not end there. The PDP Federal Government was bent on taking over the state and so a former personal assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo was dispatched to contest the governorship of the state under the flag of the ruling PDP in 2007. The incumbent governor went to court to challenge the election because his term in office started when he won his first court battle to reclaim his mandate and so there was no vacancy at the time of the 2007 election. The Independent National Election Commission (INEC) ignored the injunctions and conducted a fake election in which the candidate of the ruling PDP, Andy Ubah, was declared winner despite complaints that no election took place. The declared winner was sworn in as governor but the legitimate governor avoided a campaign of violence and went back to court and again won back his mandate through the rule of law and without any loss of blood.

Before the February 2010 re-election of the highly achieving governor for a second term, the PDP candidate in the non-election of 2007 had gone to court to ask that he be declared governor in waiting and allowed to complete his term of office that was terminated when he was forced to hand over to the properly elected governor. The Supreme Court threw out the suit on the ground that governorship was not hereditary. By then he had lost the opportunity to contest the primaries of his party, PDP, for the 2010 election and true to character, PDP did not hold any primary elections but simply imposed a candidate on the party members. Two dozen other candidates who had bought primary elections nomination forms for millions of naira each but were denied an opportunity to contest the primaries went to court and won but a higher court over-ruled and said that the party had every right to select its candidate as it saw fit. Again, no one was killed even though the father of the imposed candidate was briefly kidnapped for ransom.

In the end, about two dozen candidates contested the 2010 governorship election with the PDP support split among the still relatively popular former governor (Ngige) who was rigged into office by godfathers but who chose to serve the people, the former governor who won a non-election (Andy Ubah) and the imposed party candidate (Soludo, a past governor of the Nigerian Central Bank) who won no primary election,  all representing three different parties, Action Congress, Labour Party and Peoples Democratic Party, respectively. I knew then that by splitting any support that PDP may have had that way, not to mention that the other two dozen candidates who had intended to contest the PDP primaries took their grievances into other parties and became their flag-bearers, the incumbent governor (Obi) was guaranteed a re-election on the platform of the APGA, despite a long-running split in the APGA party.

Once again, there was no loss of life, the election was said to have gone off peacefully, according to most observers. Some thugs were said to have snatched a few ballot boxes and many voters could not find their names on the inaccurate voters lists but the results reflected the wishes of the majority of the voters who cast votes. Governor Peter Obi gained over 90,000 votes for the APGA; Chris Ngige came second with over 60,000 votes for the AC and Charles Soludo came third with over 50,000 votes for the PDP. Andy Ubah, the Labour Party candidate, placed 4th with over 20,000 votes. If these three PDP candidates had combined their support, they could have defeated the incumbent governor but that is only a hypothetical if given that the PDP would probably not have received more votes no matter who their candidate was due to the scandals that have dogged the party at the national and the state levels.

Congratulations to the people of Anambra State for showing us a good example in which the votes of the people actually was made to count in an important election. Never mind that many of the over one million registered voters (with suspicious names like Nelson Mandela on some of the lists) did not get the chance to vote due to inaccurate voters lists. Those who did not win should do the honourable thing and congratulate the winner or go to court to challenge the results if they still want to waste the huge wealth that they were using to influence the results to no avail without accounting for the sources of the funds.

Dr. Ngige was later reported as intending to challenge the results in court due to failure to understand that when the constitution said that the winner must receive 25% of the votes cast in two-thirds of the local governments, the correct meaning is the valid votes since invalid votes are null and void and of no effects. But even if the invalid votes are included in the calculations, then all that was needed was to round up from 24.7% in one of the local governments to give Mr Obi the victory that he deserves.

For a people who are stereotyped as loving money more than anything, the people of Anambra state have demonstrated that as one of the best educated states in the country, democratic rights are not for sale to the highest bidder and that is good news for the whole of Africa - education, education, and more education! The embattled Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Maurice Iwu, may have redeemed himself partially (after a court ruled that his organization was incompetent to run elections in a different state) with his innovation to announce the results at the polling stations to avoid the tendency for results to be inflated at the collation centers by electoral officers who may not be able to resist the inducement of large sums of money or just due to human error of the sort that reportedly gave Ngige additional 10,000 votes that he did not have which would place him third if deducted from his total.

All they needed to do was add the figure one in front of or a couple of zeroes behind the total votes for the rigging candidate to bring the total closer to the number of registered voters who may have been deliberately frustrated from voting to allow room for rigging. But such a plan, if that is what it was, failed this time partly due to the vigilance of the monitors and the people, the transparent service of National Youth Service Corps members as electoral officers, and the uneven efforts of the heavy police presence. The method of announcing results at source should be maintained while the voters lists should be cleaned and made more accurate as we wait for the big one next year. Meanwhile, all hands should be on deck to support Governor Peter Obi to consolidate his success during his well deserved second term.