Attention Booksellers!

Booksellers, can you please help us

We talk about a decline in, or the crisis of a poor reading culture in Nigeria from time to time and if this is indeed true everything should be done to fix it. And while there are many things that we will continue to wish that the very many still-deaf governments in the land would do, this blogger has recently chanced on one thing that Nigerian booksellers can do: think more intently about reaping more over the long-haul when fixing those book prices.

Let me illustrate. There is a certain book published in Nigeria and sold in the country and several other territories that I know the publisher has fixed the shelf sales price in the Nigerian market for 1000 naira. Now not being a novice in the book sector in Nigeria, I am aware that about 20 percent of that amount is left with the bookseller under the mainstream sales on return system that is widely used in book-selling in these parts. Now imagine my consternation to walk into a bookshop in the Lagos mainland to see the book being advertised for close to N5,000! Now that truly is not fair and would clearly not help our overall goal of boosting the reading culture in this land where so many people live below the single dollar per day mark and recharge cards and throwing parties rank higher than books in the scale of preference of the potential reader!

Can we then help ourselves please by fixing prices that will not be yet another very clear dis-incentive to readers? And while we are about this, how about throwing in some well-thought out and of course, cost-effective marketing. Books have to be SOLD you know!! And you can inbox me for some tips here if you need them.

Political chit-chat

Political thoughts

I got up the other morning with a strong resolve to pen these political thoughts. Now let me share same with readers here.

Opposition in politics is not conceived to be a permanent state. It is a temporary position where you grow capacity to grow up into being the ruling power. The operative words then would e ‘growing capacity.’ And when you grow stuff, it invariably has to be seen. Bringing it down to the realities of the Nigerian political condition today, we would charge the mainstream Nigerian opposition parties today, and particularly too, the ACN and CPC. If they do not reform with a view to continuing to grow capacity even in these non-electoral times, they would still not see power federally when the die is cast in 2015 or so. As for the ruling PDP, someone high up within its own fold once used the metaphor of ‘dry fish that cannot be bent.’ We still dey laugh.

 A second thought is that Power at its base indeed, is a structure. While strong individuals may be important in pushing the required political goals from time to time, it is however more strategic to work on an even more enduring template that structures must continually be built, overhauled and re-examined.

Tinubu, Buhari, Ribadu and all of the prominent frontline players in the political class, today should watch it. There would be more revolts from the middle.

It s important today that we check out Labour’s metamorphosis as we go on. That party, like the APGA, has a story to tell. Among other things, top players within its system today must recognize the immediate baggage that comes with its name. Why not necessarily being a hostage of its naming, the truth however is that it can change it if it can no longer carry it! The recent body-speak of Gov. Olusegun Mimiko is not helping things. The Iroko and his platform must be seen to stand for something. Anything goes would clearly not work now. Let Labour speak clearly now or forever remain silent. A word is enough for the wise.

Fashola, Rochas, Al-Makura, Oshiomhole, Ogboru, we salute you. We are waiting to see how things would play out for and with you in the coming months. We dey greet o.

Professor Attahiru Jega, though you have done basically quite well this time around, but please we enjoin you to work harder even now as the new Nigeria that we are talking about looks like it is still ahead. In this, you may want to start looking at the troublesome issues of the last polls afresh and start preparing early for the next one.

Education and jobs, Mr. President will save you, and you can take it that this blogger who has been around for a long time surely knows what he is talking about. This is what those immediate post-election riots were all about if the truth is to be told in these more sober moments. And it is a very strong fuel in both the Niger Delta militancy as well as the Boko Haram inferno. Learn from Lula in Brazil who though elected a socialist sturdily crossed the ideological line to grow Brazil into being one of the most prosperous economies in the world at his exit from power last year. You also have the lesson to draw from the ubiquitous Communists in China who have also built a formidable economy for themselves even when the world continues to debate whether they are right, left or center-leaning. The answer, my dear Presido, is in the details. And while we are at it, what really is the game that we are playing with this new Single Tenure dribble. Is it as innocent as you are putting it? No shaking sha. Well done o.

There is hope for Nigeria

Sitting in Church on Wednesday night (27-07-11), and hearing Pastor Paul Adefarasin enunciate his heartfelt thoughts on the Nigerian condition brought back memories of that wise saying that it takes good men not standing up to be counted on the side of righteousness for evil to thrive in a country. How apt!

Let me attempt a summary of the message here.

Beginning with the new testament text from the Book of Matthew where Jesus teaches that the Church is expected to be the foundation of truth and positive influence in the earth as 'salt' that brings in the much needed flavour,' the man of God went on to state at the heart of the continuing failure of the Nigerian nation was the inability of very many Christians in the nation to properly appreciate the full text of 'the gospel of the kingdom' that Christ had preached and lived and bring that to bear on the different components of the country.

Not leaving his congregation hanging as to what exactly he meant, he equally drew upon two other Bible extracts to strongly cement his thesis. The first was the 1 Kings account of the visit of the Queen of Sheba to Israel's King Solomon where after seeing the joy, peace, development and calm within Solomon's Kingdom, she was to affirm that indeed all of these had only come about only because righteousness and justice were the governing values in the kingdom. The second text, from Psalm 89, corroborated the 1 Kings reference as it was one in which Solomon's father, King David was very significamtly, extolling the throne of God as having justice and righteousness for its foundations!

Bringing it down to the affairs of nations, Pastor Paul underscored that there was indeed a firm connection between the dominant values of a nation and how it consequently scored in regards to the critical issues of growth, prosperity, peace and development. Taking the congregation through the examples of nations as diverse as the Bahamas, France, England, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, Switzerland, Germany and Israel, he showed that nations which had strong and redolent values, ultimately met their objectives and shone on the world stage.  

For Nigeria unfortunately, he explained that at the heart of the crisis of the Nigerian federation was the anachronistic setting of its emergence as a nation, coupled with a continuing inability to replace the aberrant values that have now become the hallmark of the nation with more ennobling ones. To paraphrase him, this was all because there were a few people who got back power on behalf of the entire nation from the British at Independence and were intent on succeeding themselves with a few other people who also were intent on succeeding themselves also with a few other people to continue to milk the fat of the nation for themselves and the British and going on like that continually!

Adding meat to his narrative, he recalled that the initial process of the formation of Nigeria was not really done out of any altruistic design to weld together a nation in the best interests of its constituent peoples. Rather, it was done to provide a channel for the exploitation and transfer of the resources of the country to Great Britain.

Even when the campaigners for Independence fought for the nation to be freed, he averred that the only freedom that the colonizing British finally permitted and granted was a neo-colonial arrangement which saw the more feudal segments of the political elite in a dominating position to the detriment of more enlightened political functionaries that were canvassing a far more beneficial and wholesome liberty.

Affirming that there was indeed nothing patently wrong with leaders like the late Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello who he stated was indeed a good leader, he averred that what was rather problematic was the very complex and diverse pan-Nigerian canvas which they were now expected to operate but which they were ill-equipped to deliver upon.

'The Sardauna of Sokoto was a wonderful leader but his vision was for Northern Nigeria.'

Continuing, he stated that this scenario has continued in Nigeria today where there were good Hausas, good Igbos, good Yorubas, etc in the country but there were indeed very few good Nigerians imbued with a sense of mission and purpose to indeed build a great and strong nation on the firm foundations of righteousness, development, truth and justice.

He then concluded that the very strong challenge that the nation was faced with today lay in the need to fully appreciate this problem and thereon devise values that would correct this anomaly and help take the country further on the path of destiny, transformation and purpose. He listed some of these values that the nation and its leaders must cultivate and live by today as justice, honesty and development, saying that this, not anything violence, was going to be the definitive Nigerian revolution.