JonnyWaka; first African traffic Mobile App

By Prince Osuagwu (Vanguard Newspaper)
Download; Google Play store | Blackberry App World

Necessity is the mother of invention. That could be a better way to describe new mobile developments in Nigeria today. Almost in quick successions, we have, for the past one year constantly featured Nigerians who invented innovative mobile applications, gadgets and devices out of the frustrations they have either experienced as Africans or observed being part of this continent.

From social media sites to mobile devices, apps and tabs, the list of Nigerians joining the history books seems to be unending.

Just as we were celebrating a bamboo tablet from a Nigerian inventor on this page last week, we were also awaken, almost immediately after, with the info of another Nigerian, Dele Oluwole who has made good use of the chaotic traffic situation in Africa,particularly Nigeria to create an app.

Why this app Although, Oluwole said he has not been parmanent in the country for the past ten years sourjouning Denmark, Great Britain and New Zealand, traffic reports bachome were however frustrating and immediately evoked the desire to think home. He created a mobile application called JonnyWaka 316, meant to help improve road user experience, safe, efficient road management and reduction of road hazards.

How it works

Developed for road users in Lagos, Port Harcourt, and Abuja in Nigeria, and also Accra roads in Ghana, Oluwole said JonnyWaka is a FREE mobile app to download. The app is specifically designed to help users avoid incidents like traffic jams, armed robbery, flood, among other road hazards.

Beneficiaries

available for download on Google Play Store and BB app world free

Apart from road users who can use this app to plan their day, it was also said to be designed to help authorities like Nigeria’s Federal Road Safety Corp, FRSC and the Nigerian police to monitor and report traffic situations, track road crimes and armed robberies.

The app also gives road users who have downloaded it the opportunity to help the administrators upload traffic incidents like accidents, flood and armed robberies on the site.

With this, the Traffic Report screen is then updated automatically in less than 60 seconds for everyone to see and the incidents are then marked on the road, route, and map showing the precise locations.

There is also a provision on the app site, for users to take a shot of accident scenes and upload immediately to help people avoid those roads/routes.

Source; Vanguard Nigerian Newspaper

New classified adverts website for the Nigerian and UK markets: ww.Whitedrum.com

October 27, 2010 by Albert Njoku

www.whitedrum.com is a new entrant to the highly competitive classified adverts market in Nigeria. There are already a few big players in this area as seen on this earlier post. Initially focused on the Nigerian and UK markets, Whitedrum.com is a product of Deltek Solutions UK and Deltek Solutions Nigeria (two different companies). The motivation for the launch could be summarised in this quote from an email I received from the CEO, Dele Oluwole:

Nigeria is highly populated and we think the good people of Nigeria deserve much more than the classified advert websites we are seeing around today, so we have put in the best of our resources to come out with whitedrum. There are still many more web applications for the Nigerian online market in the pipeline. Our plan for the future is to become a globally preferred classified website as we have long-term plans for countries like Ireland, Canada, Ghana, Australia, etc.

Users can either log on to the Nigerian or UK version of the website via a menu option at the top left corner of the site. Adverts are then filtered accordingly. The Nigerian version groups adverts by the States and it was easy to locate information. Advert posting is free and users can upload up to 4 photos. Youtube videos are also allowed. Users have a private dashboard from where they can manage their adverts. At the moment, there are not much adverts since the site just launched.

Did I find any major problems on the site? Not really. There was no functional error as I was able to register, search for and find adverts easily. The only problem facing Deltek Solutions is how to raise awareness about the existence of the website. To this end, I saw they have implemented sharing options for facebook, twitter etc. The site's focus on the UK market as well means contending against industry giants like Loot, Gumtree and a myriad other small sites occupying smaller percentages of the market.

I was a bit overwhelmed by the many colours and graphics though. I kept wondering how this would affect speed. Given that adverts already would contain pictures, additional graphics decoration could come at the expense of speed of execution. I thought this but the site seemed to run pretty fast. (Why does every Nigerian website have to have massive shades of green everywhere?)

Another impressive addition was a geo-location feature for each advert showing the ad poster's location on a map. I have not seen this on any other of the Nigerian advert websites. Additional reassurance for would be buyers of advertised goods maybe :)

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The Rogue National Assembly Members

Nigerian National Assembly Member earns N15 Million (£60,000) PER MONTH
British Member of Parliament earns a little over £60, 000 A YEAR

Federal lawmakers’ pay unjustifiable – Balarabe Musa
By Mudiaga Affe
Thursday, 21 Oct 2010
The Chairman of the Conference of Nigeria Political Parties, Alhaji Balarabe Musa, on Wednesday said the jumbo pay for the National Assembly members was unjustifiable.
Musa, who spoke on the telephone with our correspondent in Lagos, lamented the country’s mounting domestic debt and the depleting foreign reserve.
The CNPP chairman attributed the high domestic debt and the depleting foreign reserve to the jumbo pay of lawmakers and government’s mismanagement of public funds.
He said, “What members of the National Assembly collect is related to the misuse of the budget which has led to increase in domestic debts because what has been budgeted for the National Assembly is over spent.
“To keep the National Assembly under the control of the Executive, more money leading to increased domestic debt will have to be taken. Indirectly also, the foreign reserve could also be depleted to service some of these selfish agenda.
“It does not really make sense that a country which foreign reserve is depleting and local debt increasing will be servicing this kind of expensive National Assembly. The only reason they do this is because of the level of corruption in the system.”
Also, Chairman of the Osun State chapter of the Anti-Corruption Resolution, a volunteer group set up by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to monitor corruption in the grassroots, Chief Amitolu Shittu, said if the Federal Government remained insensitive to the high costs of maintaining the National Assembly, the country’s economy might collapse.
He said, “The problem is not unconnected with the amount we are using to service each member of the National Assembly that is too enormous. In the House of Representatives for instance, outside the principal officers whose allowances are bogus, each member gets at least N15m monthly. This system is bound to collapse the country’s economy.”
The Managing Director of the World Bank, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala had during the 2010 World Bank/International Monetary Fund annual meetings in Washington DC, said Nigeria must curb its domestic debt to prevent unfavourable consequences.
Okonjo-Iweala, a former finance minister in Nigeria, who played a major role in the country‘s 2005 Paris Club debt relief deal, noted that the country‘s external debt was low enough at its current level.
The Debt Management Office said recently that Nigeria‘s total public debt had risen by 21 per cent in 2009 to $25.8bn, which represented 13.8 per cent of the country‘s Gross Domestic Product.

http://www.punchng.com/Articl.aspx?theartic=Art201010211442485

Nigerian senators highest paid in the world, yet they want more

Salary U.S. President: $250,000/yr. GDP U.S. Economy: $13Trillion/ yr.Allowance

Nigerian Senator: $1,500,000/yr. GDP Nig. Economy: $45 Billion/yr.

Now this is what a Nigerian senator earns

Basic Salary - N2, 484, 245.50.

Hardship Allowance @ 50% of Basic Salary - N1, 242,122.70 (Hardship?)
Consistuency allowance @ 200% of BS - N4, 968,509.00
Furniture Allowance @ 300% of BS - N7, 452,736.50
Newspaper allowance @ 50% - N1, 242,122.70 (Over a million naira for newspaper????)
Wardrobe allowance @ 25% - N621, 061.37 -Should Nigeria be responsible for clothing senators?
Recess Allowance@ 10%: - N248, 424.55
Accommodation @ 200% - N4, 968,509.00.
Utilities @ 30% - N828, 081.83.
Domestic Staff @ 35% - N863, 184.12.
Entertainment @ 30% - N828, 081.83.
Personal Assistance @ 25% - N621, 061.37.
Vehicle Maintenance Allowance @ 75% - N1, 863,184.12. (about £8,000 to maintain new cars)
Leave Allowance @10% - N248, 424.55. One off payments (As advised by Sagamite Severance Gratuity) @ 300% - N7, 452,736.50 (Once they get fired.)

Motor Vehicle Allowance @ 400% of BS - N9, 936,982.00 -
Every Four Years Senators Salary per month. - N2, 456,647.70
Total = N29, 479, 749.00 * 109 Senators Grand Total = N 3,264,329,264. 10

A feeding frenzy!!! ENOUGH IS ENOUGH

And they want more. Doctors, teachers, civil servants can't boast of N1m a year and these guys want N30m every month

SAY NO TO THIS OPEN LOOTING OF NIGERIA !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Blogger Buzz: Blogger integrates with Amazon Associates

Blogger Buzz: Blogger integrates with Amazon Associates

God has permitted slavery for wise reasons

William Lloyd Garrison

We have power in our hands to save our generation and we do not use it. This is the supreme tragedy of our time. When I say that the apparently insoluble problems of today can be solved by religious faith, my conviction is based on no idle fancy or wishful hope, but upon the scientific fact that what has happened once can happen again. It has been done and therefore can be done. Consider an historical parallel.
In 1805 a man named William Lloyd Garrison was born. He grew to young manhood, and taking a straight look at human slavery said he did not like it. He said it was wrong and announced that he meant to destroy it. People laughed at such bumptiousness, and when they tired of laughing, they sneered and said Garrison was a fool.

They pointed out that slavery was a great mountain in human history, an ancient, firmly planted institution. It had existed from the dawn of civilization. The great empires of Egypt, Greece, and Rome had been built on slave labor. Single individuals owned as many as ten thousand slaves. The English uptaking world had long recognized slavery as a basic institution, blessed by religion. When the Peace of Utrecht was signed in 1713, which gave England a monopoly on the West African slave trade, the treaty was celebrated in Saint Paul's by the singing of a Te Deum written by the Christian composer Handel espe­cially for the occasion. In America slavery was likewise firmly established. In 1835 the governor of South Caro­lina declared: "Slavery is the cornerstone of our Re­publican edifice. Destroy slavery and you put a stop to all progress." The same principles were held in the North. A professor in Yale University said, "If Jesus Christ were now on earth, he would, under certain cir­cumstances, be a slave holder." In 1855 the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church declared, "God has permitted slavery for wise reasons." At the time of the Dred Scott decision most of the members of the Supreme Court were slaveholders. The law honored it, the Church blessed it, business profited by it, and the nation recognized and practiced it. It was a mountain, as granite is a mountain, and who could destroy it?

Garrison said he could. Garrison believed in God with the faith of a child. "I trust in God," he said, "that I may be his humble instrument of breaking at least one chain." He became the most hated man of his time. He was ostracized and burned in effigy, but he went up against the mountain. He was a man aflame. His biographer declares: "The continuousness of Garrison is appalling and fatigues even the retrospective imagination of posterity. He is like something let loose. I dread the din of him. I cover my head and fix my mind on other things; but there is Garrison, hammering away till he catches my eye and forces me to attend to him. If Garrison can do this to me, who am protected from dread of him by many years of intervening time, think how his lash must have fallen upon the thin skins of our ancestors. The source of Garrison's power," declares his biographer, "was the Bible. He read it constantly. It was with this fire that he started his conflagration."

So, armed with faith that nothing could daunt, Gar­rison rolled up his sleeves, took his little hammer of mustard-seed faith, and approached the great moun­tain of human slavery. He brought down his little hammer and a faint tingle was heard. The people laughed and booed and sneered. But Garrison brought it down again and again. Blow after blow fell until his little hammer became a great sledge, the reverberations of which could be heard throughout the land. As he beat with his faith upon the mountain, a crack began to show. It widened until the people shouted with a mighty voice, "Look, the mountain is breaking!"
The glorious, thrilling fact is that just fifty-eight years after Garrison was born, human slavery was out­lawed forever in the United States of America. It is an illustration of the shining truth that any mountain can be broken down by faith when men are completely surrendered to God. We can end war, depression, moral decadence, social injustice, and restore declining democracy if enough of us, like Garrison, will take seriously these words, "If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed . . . nothing shall be impossible unto you."

There is still another area where Christianity must give power to win in life if it is to measure up to the place we have assigned to it. It must help you and me as individuals to overcome ourselves. We have been discussing the method for solving the intensely per­plexing problems of society. It would perhaps be easier to accomplish that feat than to solve the intri­cate and complex personality of one man's own self. If you are like most of us, you are yourself the most difficult person with whom you will ever be forced to deal. Every man somehow must come to terms with himself. That is not easy of accomplishment. There is a perverse element in each of us, and in some it constitutes a real problem. Every right-thinking and normal person wishes his better nature to prevail. No man consciously wants to live life on a low or inferior spiritual level, but there is something in us that pre­vents us from being what we want to be. It is the fact that our whole nature has not been brought under God's control. There are still pagan areas within us. These unspiritualized elements of our lives get us into trouble.
- Norman Vincent Peale

....... the story of my country

Let us go into this issue

By Sanusi Lamido Sanus, the Central Bank Governor

The Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, surprised guests present at the Muson Centre for the launching of the book of Sir Olaniwun Ajayi at the Muson Centre in Lagos.
The book titled: “Nigeria, Africa’s failed asset?” attracted many important dignitaries, intellectuals and some governors. The argument by discussants centred on whether or not the colonial masters laid the foundation for the problems Nigeria is currently facing.

Many argued that the British loved the North and that was why it gave more than 50 percent of the National Assembly seats to the North at independence.


Sanusi, however, stole the show when he spoke. His speech was anchored on the plank that the British and Nigerian rulers are responsible for the state of the situation Nigeria finds itself today.

Below is his unedited speech.

“Let me start by saying that I am Fulani (laughter). My grandfather was an Emir and therefore I represent all that has been talked about this afternoon. Sir Ajayi has written a book. And like all Nigerians of his generation, he has written in the language of his generation. “My grandfather was a Northerner, I am a Nigerian. The problem with this country is that in 2009, we speak in the language of 1953. Sir Olaniwun can be forgiven for the way he spoke, but I can not forgive people of my generation speaking in that language.

“Let us go into this issue because there are so many myths that are being bandied around. Before colonialism, there was nothing like Northern Nigeria. Before the Sokoto Jihad, there was nothing like the Sokoto caliphate. The man from Kano regard himself as bakane. The man from Zaria was bazazzage.The man from Katsina was bakatsine. The kingdoms were at war with each other. They were Hausas, they were Muslims, they were killing each other.

“The Yoruba were Ijebu, Owo, Ijesha, Akoko, Egba. When did they become one? When did the North become one? You have the Sokoto Caliphate that brought every person from Adamawa to Sokoto and said it is one kingdom. They now said it was a Muslim North.
“The Colonialists came, put that together and said it is now called the Northern Nigeria. Do you know what happened? Our grand fathers were able to transform to being Northerners. We have not been able to transform to being Nigerians. The fault is ours. Tell me, how many governors has South West produced after Awolowo that are role models of leadership? How many governors has the East produced like Nnamdi Azikiwe that can be role models of leadership? How Many governors in the Niger Delta are role models of leadership? Tell me. There is no evidence statistically that any past of this country has produced good leaders.

You talk about Babangida and the economy. Who were the people in charge of the economy during Babangida era? Olu Falae, Kalu Idika Kalu. What state are they from in the North?

“We started the banking reform; the first thing I heard was that in Urobo land, that there will be a curse of the ancestors. I said they (ancestors) would not answer. They said why? I said how many factories did Ibru build in Urobo land? So, why will the ancestors of the Urobo people support her?

“We talk ethnicity when it pleases us. It is hypocrisy. You said elections were rigged in 1959, Obasanjo and Maurice Iwu rigged election in 2007. Was it a Southern thing? It was not. “The problem is: everywhere in this country, there is one Hausa, Ibo, Yoruba and Itshekiri man whose concern is how to get his hands on the pie and how much he can steal.
Whether it is in the military or in the civilian government, they sit down, they eat together. In fact, the constitution says there must be a minister from every state.

“So, anybody that is still preaching that the problem of Nigeria is Yoruba or Hausa or Fulani, he does not love Nigeria. The problem with Nigeria is that a group of people from each and every ethnic tribe is very selfish. The poverty that is found in Maiduguri is even worse than any poverty that you find in any part of the South. The British came for 60 years and Sir Ajayi talked about few numbers of graduates in the North (two at independence). What he did not say was that there was a documented policy of the British when they came that the Northerner should not be educated. It was documented. It was British colonial policy. I have the document. I have published articles on it. That if you educate the Northerner you will produce progressive Muslim intellectuals of the type we have in Egypt and India. So, do not educate them. It was documented. And you say they love us (North).

“I have spent the better part of my life to fight and Dr. (Reuben) Abati knows me. Yes, my grandfather was an Emir. Why was I in the pro-democracy movement fighting for June 12? Is (Moshood) Abiola from Kano? Why am I a founding director of the Kudirat Initiative for Nigerian Development (KIND)? “There are good Yoruba people, good Igbo people, good Fulani people, good Nigerians and there are bad people everywhere. That is the truth. “Stop talking about dividing Nigeria because we are not the most populous country in the world. We have all the resources that make it easy to make one united great Nigeria. It is better if we are united than to divide it.

“Every time you talk about division, when you restructure, do you know what will happen? In Delta, Area, the people in Warri will say Agbor, you don’t have oil. When was the Niger Delta constructed as a political enlity? Ten years ago, the Itshekiris were fighting the Urobos. Isn’t that what was happening? Now they have become Niger Delta because they have found oil. After, it will be, if you do not have oil in your village then you can not share our resources..

“There is no country in the world where resources are found in everybody’s hamlet. But people have leaders and they said if you have this geography and if we are one state, then we have a responsibility for making sure that the people who belong to this country have a good nature. “So, why don’t you talk about; we don’t have infrastructure, we don’t have education, we don’t have health. We are still talking about Fulani.. Is it the Fulani cattle rearer or is anybody saying there is no poverty among the Fulani?”, he said.

Before 2010; the sinking ship

By Dele Oluwole MBCS

I have so much hope for my country that no sceptic can comprehend, but I have just a little ray of hope left as the ship sinks.

When Barack Obama won the elections we were so ecstatic, you probably would have thought he had won the Nigerian Presidential Elections. Thinking aloud now, before the Obama elections victory one would have though that Nigeians have probably lost the sense of positive reception.

No, I say No, Nigerians have not lost their senses but are prisoners of their own conscience. Racing against time Nigerians still think Nigeria will move forward …….. can a sinking ship move forward?

# Can Nigeria really move forward when a woman (former speaker of the Nigerian house of representative) who was accused of spending N820M ($5,494,137) on her official residence still walk free.

# Can Nigeria really move forward when former governors that embezzled millions of dollars and who are wanted by the British government for prosecution are given refuge by the Nigerian attorney general?

# Can Nigeria really move forward when former Head of states / presidents accused of amassing untold wealth from the national treasury still walk free men?

# Can Nigeria really move forward if accident victims will not be attended to at most federal general hospitals until bribe is given?

# Can Nigeria move forward when no credible, free, or fair election can ever be guaranteed

Not untill the ship is salvaged can Nigeria move forward; first thing first, Nigeria must avoid quick fix and begin to address the lasting solution by demanding that her corrupt leaders are accountable to her otherwise past, present, and future political leaders will continue to embezzle the public funds knowing that they will never be accountable to anyone ........... and the ship will not just continue to sink but disappear eventually.

Oga to pack dog poop?

By Dele Oluwole

G - Oga, good morning sir! (Oga walked to his car without responding)
K - (Whispering) did he not hear you say good morning?
G - Please just leave me alone this morning; are you just noticing that oga doesn’t respond to greeting from us?
K - I know but why is it that it is only you and I that he doesn’t respond to?
G - Don’t tell me you are not aware that he doesn’t also responds to salute and greetings from the Zombies guarding him.

K – But I saw Barack Obama recently on TV responding to a salute from a guard before disappearing into the Airfore one jet
G – That one na real human being

K – Are you saying your Oga is not a human being?
G – Na you talk am oooo

K – The last time Obama was in the UK Gordon Brown took after him and responded to greetings from the police officer guarding No. 10 Downing street main door for the first time

G – So, Brown has been ignoring his guard all this while?
K – Let him ask the late Kabila how important a presidential guard could be


G – Did you not see the picture of Lord Mandelson on the pages of news papers recently walking his dog?

K – You mean the British Business Secretary?
G - Yes

K – Are you referring to when he was spotted walking his dog Jack outside his north London home?
G – Did you notice that in his left hand he clutched a plastic bag containing that which all dogs, when given fresh air and a clean patch of pavement, inevitably do?

K – Yes, the man used his own hands and not the hands of a poor gateman like you to remove the waste from his dog while walking it.
G – So, Britain has a law that forces people to remove their dog’s shiit when walking it? Can that happen here? A minister to remove dog’s shiit? The PA of our Oga will not even do a thing like that let alone our Oga Himself?

K – Abomination! Oga to pack dog shiit? You are talking nonsense; Oga’s PA will employ a dog keeper instead, even the keeper will not remove the dog’s shiit on the street of Abuja
G – (Laughs with head hanging) … but Oga will remove the dog’s shiit if British pounds are lined in it (laughs louder)

K – Is Lord Mandelson not a minister like our Oga?
G – But Minister pass minister ooooo.

K - Senator here na MP for there and Minister here na Secretary for there ….. so what’s the difference?

G – Na lie, I hear say them dey practice parliamentary while we dey follow presidential and how come Mandelson is a Lord or abi is Honorable equal to Lord?
K – I have always told you that your half education will do you more harm than good

G- Don’t digress, Lord Mandelson did what he did because there are CCTVs everywhere in the UK, moreover there were journalists everywhere and he simply wanted to be leading by example ….. to be exemplary, finito.

K – You will be lucky not to die of ignorance …… tell me, which country in the world needs more exemplary leaders than us?
G – Come on, this people can pretend a lot you know

K – If pretence can change our country and reverse the abysmal destruction I think our leaders should start pretending.

G – But Oga is already pretending
K – What do you mean?

G – I heard oga cut down his ministry’s budget sent to the presidency for approval from N35.6 billion to N35.5 billion
K – Yes, your block head got something right for once, yet the approval to refurbish is official residence came faster from the presidency than the entire ministry’s budget anyway.

G – The most important thing is that the budget was approved.
K – Yes, but my friend Kasali who is an office messenger in the ministry told me their salary was delayed for 4 months before it was finally approved. His daughter who passed her JAMB exams therefore couldn’t register in the University because there was no money while Oga’s daughter studies in Cambridge.

G – Where is Cambridge University? I have heard so about it
K – It is in America

G – Are you sure
K – Just gu-gul it

G – How?
K – Look for it in yahoo and the machine will tell you where Cambridge University is

G – ehen …. You mean I can gu-gul Ladoke Akintola University, Ogbomosho where my cousin attended and I will get all the information about it
K – You dey craze, I beg I dey go (walked away)

G – wetin I talk wey you don dey ves now ….. ok cu next time

Bury me anywhere but not in Nigeria

By Dele Oluwole

“A country where death traps are called roads, incessant armed robbery/police attacks on hardworking individuals have become a way of life, and where constant power supply can not be guaranteed for 4 hours a day is not worth returning to…… not many citizens leaving abroad would proudly call a country with so much evil credentials home” – Chukwuemeka O.O

Before asking for the heads of Nigerians working abroad that dread returning home please take the courage to inculcate some decorum in the Nigerian police force, repair the death traps called roads, and advise the rogues called politicians to grow up. Nigerians leaving abroad wouldn’t ask for too much, they are not even asking for 24 hours power supply.

Helping to build ones county is a civic responsibility but not when you know that your life could be snuffed out by a trigger happy half educated police officer for a paltry 20 naira note or simply for driving an expensive car, and definitely not when you nurse the fear that an illiterate lorry driver who can not identify a stop road sign can run into you on the motorway and leave you paralysed.

Chukwuemeka left the shore of the country for greener pasture in Finland some 18 years a go; he worked hard, became successful, and married a finish woman. He never minced words about how much love he had for Nigeria his country of birth; he was always quick to tell everyone how he cherished returning home. He believed strongly that life abroad can never be compared to the freedom and wonderful relationships enjoyed back home.

He told his children several times how wonderful it will be for them to finally return to the country where their father came from. He told them about the natural Owu waterfalls, the Yankari game reserve and he didn’t also forget to tell them how unified the people are in diversity. His wife was fascinated with the fact that over 200 languages are spoken in one country.

Chukwuemeka’s experience on one of the Finish motorways was the last straw needed for him to finally return to Nigeria; he had been humiliated by a Finish transport police officer who did not only delay him to the extent that he missed picking his sons from school but dehumanised him in the name of routine stop and search. Just two weeks after the unimaginable motorway experience he received a mail that his two sons will be taken away from him by the social security department because he arrived two hours late at their school and for leaving them unattended for two hours, they therefore do not think he is capable of taking good care of the boys. The social department also wrote in their letter “on this occasion you will not be prosecuted because we have had no previous records of you abandoning your children”.

He thought there couldn’t be a better time to return to his beloved country, he therefore proudly decided to start planning his final return to Nigeria. It would be an understatement if one says his wife and children were in high spirits when he broke the news to them; they were so delighted and thought the relocation would be the best thing to have happened to the family at that time.

The news of their return soon got to his neighbours as his children announced it proudly at school. Before long, he put up his house for sale and because of the location the house was gone in just two weeks. The quick sale of the house exhilarated the family as delay in selling the house could have probably been the only setback to their dream of returning home and would have spelt doom for them.

His wife shopped for light clothing for the family while Chukwuemeka spent most of his time on the phone sealing the deal of a temporary duplex accommodation in the GRA area of Ikeja. Three days later they were received at the MM international airport by family and friends. The warm reception at the airport was a moment that will for long be treasured by the children and his wife. Chukwuemeka couldn’t be happier as he was proud to have his family warmly received by his people.

The wife was eager to explore Lagos, the populous city of aquatic splendour, so neither the obscenity of the rickety Molue buses nor the maddening scenes that characterise places like CMS, Ojuelegba, and Oshodi during peak hours come as a surprise to her and the children as Chukwuemeka had already prepared their minds well in advance. Two weeks after arriving in Nigeria their experience in the country was full of fun as everything was moving on well like the script from a movie until one Saturday night.

They had gone out to attend the birthday party of one of Chukwuemeka’s friends from university days, when they got back home they immediately retired to the bedroom while the children got busy with the Nintendo game in the living room. The bedroom door suddenly opened unusually and instantly without turning, with a tone heralding authority Chukwuemeka’s wife reminded the children the need to go to bed immediately when out of the blue a thunderous slap with deafening sound like thunder landed on her left cheek.

Chukwuemeka who was half asleep woke up terrified to find his two Sons escorted into the room with their wrists tied behind their back, behind them were three gun totting robbers who now ordered everyone in the room to go flat on the floor. The robbers took away all they had; money, clothes, and jewelleries. The armed robbers asked for their Finish passports, that was just the clue they needed to conclude that the robbery operation was an inside job with first hand information about them, but fortunately for the Finish returnees their passports where at the Malaysian embassy where they had applied for tourist Visas a day before.

The encounter with the armed robbers was so traumatic for the children that they remained awake for many nights; the children’s agony coupled with his wife’s pressure to return to Finland made Chukwuemeka’s decide it was time to go back to Finland with his family. On the night of departure, the children’s joy had no bound and as they travelled through Ikeja to the MM international airport their car was flagged down at a police check point just three miles away from the airport. They were immediately ordered out of the car to be identified. The leader of the uniformed men took Chukwuemeka into the police vehicle, showed him locally made short guns, and said “cooperate otherwise my boys will spray you all and brand you as escaping armed robbers”. Their four luggages which had their passports were taken away and never recovered.

The next day, they were at the Finish embassy for the travel documents that would enable them return to Helsinki. The visa officer told Chukwuemeka to go and retrieve the passports from whoever he sold them to. She said she had lost count of the number of Nigerians with the finish indefinite leave to remain who falsely declared their travel documents missing in recent times, but his wife was assured 24 hours safe return to Finland. She was also offered hotel accommodation pending when her Finish travel documents will be ready. She did not only turn down the offers but promised not to leave the premises of the embassy until her husband and two children are issued Finish travel documents.

The good news is that the four members of the family have since returned to Helsinki in one piece but not after the knife hedge battle with the finish embassy that lasted for 6 weeks. Chukwuemeka may have returned into the pain of an adopted country but it’s far better than the incessant pandemonium of his country of birth. His two children were so traumatised by the armed robbery experience that they had to undergo psychiatric treatment for two years.

Chukwuemeka has since given up on Nigeria and did strongly warned his wife and children who are now 16 and 19 not to bury him in Nigeria when he dies, he once jokingly said he would rise if his body is buried anywhere called Nigeria. He kept telling his friends that his body can be buried anywhere in the world but not in Nigeria - not even in the Nigerian waters.

That’s what I call the fury of a man whose country lost forever.