Nigeria News
A Book To Crow About
By Kole Omotoso
This is a book to crow about. There are many reasons why anyone familiar with the vexed issue of European languages in African lives would crow about this book. European languages came to Africa and stayed on, as a result of colonisation. They have not only stayed on in Africa, but have also virtually replaced African indigenous languages. These African languages have been reduced to vernaculars, whatever that is supposed to mean! These European languages as well as a few other non-European ones, such as Arabic, harbour in their systems, blatant concepts, ideas, expressions and words which are anti-black and so racist against Africans and people of African descent. Of Black Servitude Without Slavery: The Unspoken Politics of Language deals specifically with English. The pre-eminent position of the United States of America in the world today, ably supported by Britain, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada English is any measurement the global language of the human race. It is the first language of millions across the globe and the second language of billions more.
It is simply unacceptable that such a world-wide means of communication should be the carrier of racist sentiments, consciously and unconsciously, on a daily basis, around the globe. That an African should take on the crusade of ridding the English language, as well as the other European and non-European languages, of this blemish is something to crow about.
The author of this book, Agwu Ukiwe Okali, is the Founder-Chairman of the Okali Seminar Ideas Foundation for Africa, OSIFA, a non-profit foundation dedicated to fostering and facilitating a more effective participation of Africa in the world of ideas. Born in Nigeria, Okali holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science, as well as a Master of Laws and Doctor of Juridical Science degrees from Harvard Law School. Okali had a distinguished career at the United Nations, last serving as Registrar of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, with the rank of United Nations Assistant Secretary-General. His victims-oriented restitutive/restorative justice idea influence key aspects of the set-up of the permanent International Criminal Court in 1998.
Dr. Okali is not the first African to be so concerned about the nature of racism in European languages generally and English specifically to raise the issue in a book form. In the 1960s the octogenarian Sierra Leonean scholar, Professor Eldred Durosimi Jones, had written about the issue in his study of the image of Africans in the England of Shakespeare’s age. African writers, especially Ngugi wa Thiong’O of Kenya, have cried foul against the English language and its persistent racism against the black person. Invariably, these writers have either simply continued to use the language or else, like Ngugi, have suggested abandoning the use of the language in favour of African languages. It is as if they are saying that the problem is that of the European languages, and as long as we can find something else to speak, we do not need to worry.
But, is there any other language to speak today other than English? Even Ngugi, our most vehement critic of the English language, writes in Gikuyu but translates his books into English. Dr. Okali, unlike these speakers of English, has concluded that if we are going to continue to speak this language, we must do something to help purify it so that it does not abuse us, we African speakers of the language. This is the reason for the suggestion that we must crow about this book.
The book divides into three sections of the beginning, the middle and the end, like a classical narrative. The beginning, contained in the first three chapters, deals with the system of thought and mind set in European languages generally and in English specifically. The persistence of these systemic racist thoughts in the English language is commented upon against the recognizably massive achievement of the world in the struggle against racism. After all, Barack Obama was voted president of the United States of America in 2008. Almost a decade earlier the world had fought and defeated the apartheid system in South Africa.
The middle of the narrative deals, in the next three chapters on what can be called “the blackness of bad/badness of black” syndrome. Here, Dr. Okali does not simply present the black person’s unease in the presence of these racist aspects of English but also deals with the unease a white person feels in the ambiance of the opposite when everything white is good and the opposite of everything bad. This is the first inclusion of the white unease in the discussion of the black unease as a result of the racism of aspects of the English language. Of particular interest in the middle narrative of this book is the chapter five that deals with the Blackness of Bad/The Whiteness of Good: Is the English Language “Unconstitutional”? Here, like a good advocate that Dr. Okali is, the English language is hauled before the highest court in the United States of America to decide, given the 13th and 14th amendments to the constitution, if it can continue to bandy around words such as ‘blackheart’, ‘black market’, ‘blackmail’, ‘black sheep’ etc as well as ‘white hope’, ‘white magic’, ‘white knight’ etc. Although, Dr. Okali presents enough evidence to win his case, he is a thoughtful lawyer enough to know that this idea is almost not justiceable.
As the narrative moves to the end, there is suspense, as if the reader is anxious to know what happens next, what will this bright writer of English recommend to rescue his much loved English from its blemish of racism? Chapters seven and eight bring the book to an end but not the discussion. There is the need for the formation of an organisation to fight the fight against racism in languages to be known as Society For The Elimination Of Racism In All Languages, SERIAL for short. For the purposes of the work of this organisation, it would be necessary to reduce chapter seven to a pamphlet to be distributed worldwide. I can only end this presentation of Of Black Servitude Without Slavery: The Unspoken Politics of Language by asking that the redemptive action begin!
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Posted in Nigeria News. A DisNaija.Com network.
Source: PM News
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The Kano State Government on Saturday said it has transferred 1,098 ‘almajiris’ to different states of the country.
The commissioner for local government, Murtala Garo, disclosed this while presenting a report before the state’s task force on COVID-19 at the government house, Kano.
Almajiris are children who are supposed to be learning Islamic studies while living with their Islamic teachers. Majority of them, however, end up begging on the streets of Northern Nigeria. They constitute a large number of Nigeria’s over 10 million out-of-school children.
Mr Garo said the Kano government transported 419 almajiris to Katsina, 524 to Jigawa and 155 to Kaduna. He said all of them tested negative for coronavirus before leaving the Kano State.
Despite the coronavirus test done in Kano for the almajiris, the Jigawa government earlier said it would quarantine for two weeks all the almajiris that recently arrived from Kano.
Mr Garo said another 100 almajiris scheduled to be taken to Bauchi State also tested negative to COVID-19.
In a remark, Governor Abdullahi Ganduje said the COVID-19 situation in Kano was getting worse. He appealed for a collaborative effort to curtail the spread of the virus in the state.
Mr Ganduje, who commended residents for complying with the lockdown imposed in the state, said the decision was taken to halt the spread of the virus.
Kano State, as of Saturday night, has 77 coronavirus cases, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The decision to transfer the Kano almajiris is part of the agreement reached between Northern governors that almajiris in each state be transferred to their states of origin.
However, even before the latest agreement by the governors, the Kano government had been transferring almajiris to other states and neighbouring countries after it banned street begging in the state, most populous in Northern Nigeria.
Despite the transfers, however, no concrete step has been taken to ensure such children do not return to Kano streets as there is freedom of movement across Nigeria although interstate travel was recently banned to check the spread of the coronavirus.
Sourced From: Premium Times Nigeria
By Ugochukwu Alaribe
Operatives of the Abia State Vigilante Service, AVS, popularly known as ‘Bakassi Boys’ have arrested 24 market women hidden in a container truck, at Ekwereazu Ngwa, the boundary community between Abia and Akwa Ibom states.
The market women, said to be from Akwa Ibom State, were on their way to Aba, when they were arrested with the truck driver and two of his conductors for violating the lockdown order by the state government.
Driver of the truck, Moses Asuquo, claimed he was going to Aba to purchase stock fish, but decided to assist the market women, because they were stranded.
A vigilante source told Sunday Vanguard that the vehicle was impounded while the market women were sent back to Akwa Ibom State.
Commissioner for Home Land Security, Prince Dan Okoli, who confirmed the incident, said that smuggling of people into the state poses great threat to the state government’s efforts to contain the spread of COVID- 19.
Sourced From: Vanguard News
Operatives of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Yaba of the Lagos State police command have arrested one Mrs Nene Steve for allegedly killing her maid, Joy Adole
The maid was allegedly beaten to death by Nene for requesting for her salary at their residence located at 18, Ogundola Street, Bariga area in Lagos.
Narrating the incident, Philips Ejeh, an elder brother to the deceased said that he was sad when they informed him that his sister was beaten to death.
He explained that the deceased was an indigene of Benue State brought to Lagos through an agent and started working with her as a maid in January 2020.
‘’She reported that her boss refused to pay her and anytime she asked for her salary she will start beating her.
She was making an attempt to leave the place but due to the total lockdown she remained there until Sunday when her boss said she caught her stealing noodles and this led to her serious beating and death,’’ Ejeh said.
He called on Lagos State Government and well- meaning people in the country to help them in getting justice for the victim.
The police spokesman, Bala Elkana, stated that the woman and her husband came to Bariga Police Station to a report that their house girl had committed suicide.
Detectives were said to have visited the house and suspected foul play with the position of the rope and bruises all over the body which confirmed that the girl had been tortured to death and the boss decided to hang up the girl to make it look like suicide.
He said: “The police moved on with their investigation and found a lot of sign of violence on her body that she has been tortured before a rope was put on her neck.’’
He added that the police removed the corpse and deposited it in the mortuary for autopsy to further ascertain the cause of the death.
Elkana said the matter has been transferred from Bariga police station to Panti for further investigation while the couple have been arrested and will be charged to court.
Ostensibly alarmed by the latest killings of dozens of soldiers by Boko Haram insurgents, President Muhammadu Buhari has summoned an urgent meeting of Service Chiefs to find ways to stop the trend.
He has also dispatched the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, to the neighbouring Republic of Chad for an urgent meeting with President Idris Deby and his defence counterpart.
Knowledgeable sources said in Abuja on Friday that the president is worried by on the deterioration of security situation on the Nigeria – Chad Border that has led to the recently increased Boko Haram terrorism in the area.
The sources which did not want to be named in Abuja said: “Nigeria has a Chad problem in the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF) put together to secure the Lake Chad basin areas and repeal the Boko Haram terrorist attacks against all the countries neighbouring the Lake.”
The sources noted that Chad is believed to be having their own internal security challenges and this has reportedly led to their pulling away their own troops manning their own border around Lake Chad, saying: “That lacuna is being exploited by the Boko Haram terrorists, who go in and out of Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon to launch terrorist acts. This is a clear illustration of the fact that terrorism is beyond national borders.”
When contacted, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, confirmed that the Defence Minister is going to Chad but said he is unaware of the purpose.
Meanwhile, the military authorities are said to be in the process of identifying the families of the latest victims with a view to making contact with them.
Credible sources revealed that it is the reason the president is yet to make any pronouncement on the matter.
“The President has called an urgent meeting with the Service Chiefs, as well as the fact that families of the latest victims of the Boko Haram are being identified and contacts made before a government pronouncement on the tragic attacks. This, it is understood, is the reason for the silence of the government over the incident,” the source said.
Sourced From: Tribune
Nigeria records 55 new COVID-19 infections, total now 165,110
Military, Police Ring Abuja to Forestall Boko Haram Attack
UFC: Usman gets N584m after beating Masvidal
Insecurity: Lagos bans occupation of abandoned buildings
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