Decade Blogs - Chikere Ezeh - Exhuming Blogs of Old

Decade Blogs

I should avoid repeating the history that Chikere has nicely documented in his contribution to my Decade Blogs Series, one that reminds us of the many blogs that thrived like active volcanoes that have now gone dormant or extinct.

I have exhumed all of the blogs by putting in their URLs, and I must not forget Nkem Ifejika’s activity on Twitter and Facebook at the expense of his African Shirts blog too.

Blog - To Celebrate My Decade of Blogging

Chikere also had another blog that majored in the music of the 80s, Old School, they call it, this was music of our youth, when we were footloose and fancy free. Sadly, my powers of persuasion have not worked their trick on getting him to return to blogging, until I asked for this favour, which he graciously granted. Thank you.

On Twitter, his handle is @chykere, this does take us down memory lane, then a dash of current affairs as he lays into the man at the rock, how I wish they all return to their first love. Enjoy this piece.

I promised to get something in to Akin before the weekend. It’s Thursday night, and I know time is never your friend when you need it. So if this turns out to be a ramble (and I have always rambled), forgive Akin, I will buy all the drinks when we meet.

Akin, A decade of blogging.

What hasn’t been said, what is left to say? The man inspires, the man educates, the man is witty the man speaks ‘big grammar’, the man can’t be bullied (some have tried and still have their tails between their legs), the man … I can go on and on to describe this fine gentleman - an esteemed member of the 9ja bloggers ‘family’ of the noughts. (*9ja is a corruption of Naija, which is a corruption of Nigeria - 9ja & Naija are colloquialisms.)

I remember those years fondly. Bloggers like ObiFromSouthLondon (Dormant), Black Looks (Active), AlooFar (Sporadic), Chxta (By Invitation Only), Waffarian (Active), 9jamommy (Sporadic), SOLOMONSYDELLE (Sporadic), BellaNaija (Active), Ugo Daniels (Twitter), Nneka's World (?), Jaja (By Invitation Only), Linda Ikeji (Active), Ijebuman (Dormant), Vera Ezimora (Active), Monef (?), Temite (Now only on Twitter as Temite), Mandy Ojugbana (Dormant) etc made it feel like family. Our mission….ha-ha, I can’t remember. We just did our thing and still managed to stay out of prison or get ruffled by 9ja immigration. Most of us were part of the diaspora mob.

Blogging on a daily/weekly basis requires some discipline and dedication. I’ll speak for myself when I say I didn’t quite have the latter. I dropped out, as did a few of us. We had discovered the joys of Facebook and Twitter; we took our ‘vile’ along with us. Folks like Akin carried on. They had the staying power, the imperturbability and endurance required. I couldn’t ‘guest blog’ on Akin’s page and not use big grammar! However, I’ll try not to disgrace myself.

So…

Forgive me; I am a bit ‘rusty’! I haven’t done this since I hung up my ‘pen’ in 2010. The true date was actually December 22^nd 2008. I was persuaded by (guess who) to ‘drop’ a few more posts before making a final exit so I made a comeback in September 2010. It didn’t last.

I did two things on my blog – I called myself Aba Boy (Dormant). I was a ‘boy’ then, and I had spent my best years in Aba (Ngwa) – Nigeria. A charming town that is being methodically dismantled by absolute incompetence. That is a post for another day.

As I was saying, I did two main things on my blog - if I wasn’t talking about my love for funk/soul music of the 80s, I was discussing and ‘dissing’ the state of our nation, Nigeria. I also never spared Nigerian ‘God of men’, that is a pet hate (project) of mine. So here I sit thinking of what I would be ‘blogging’ about – today - if I still was at it. No brainer: I couldn’t and wouldn’t have avoided (Olusegun Obasanjo) OBJ’s ‘traitorous’ letter to President (Goodluck Ebele Jonathan) GEJ. How unbecoming, mischievous and provocative, to borrow (Reuben Abati) Abati’s words.

By the way, I think he will soon jump ship. He is just waiting for the right mo. Dude is a bit nifty! I might even join the queue of those who think we should knock the messenger and ignore the message. Who cares if it evidently shows that we are losing the argument? The ‘anyhowness’ (borrowing again, this time from @DoubleEph) of the average Nigerian is to ignore the message. The messenger has to be God before we can even begin to consider the content.

I read OBJ’s letter a couple of times. Akin advised us to - "...Read dispassionately and more than once." he tweeted, I did. Hate OBJ (and I am not his biggest fan) or nor do I love him (and there are still a few out there who do) you can’t knock any of the points he raised. Ok, most of them we already know. Anyone who tells you that we are not witnessing unparalleled levels of corruption in Nigeria is disingenuous. A few I am left mystified about. How can a man agree to serve one term and no one thought of extracting a written agreement from him!

A killer squad, that left me stumped, not only did I not know that OBJ was a cricket fan; I never thought GEJ had it in him. Then again, if you hang out with the esteemed men like the (Mujahid Asari-Dokubo) Mujahid who knows what can become of a good choir boy. Overall, OBJ was mostly on the money.

My take from day dot – and this time I am having a slight pop at the messenger - was that GEJ was not ready for this job; this is a typical example of being miles out of your depth. He may be a nice man, I don’t know him but being incompetent and pleasant can still be used in a single sentence. Let us look at his modest beginnings, not the lack of shoes.

It is common knowledge that back in the day, gubernatorial candidates picked the ‘shoddiest’ as running mates. They were called spare tyres, a position that just needed to be filled. Many of us cannot name our deputy governors. They were so ‘unemployed’ some even had to beg to be given ministries to supervise. When the governor of the state went on leave, he handed over to the Speaker of the State’s house of assembly, not his ‘deputy’.

So ‘quarterback’ this situation. When a man of 'merit' like (Diepreye Solomon Peter Alamieyeseigha) Alamieyeseigha is asked to pick his running mate, what manner of person will he select? Anyway one thing led to another, to another… and we are where we are. I had to make a slight case for those who attack the messenger on this point J.

Happy 10^th anniversary my friend and mentor. It is an honour to ramble on your blog I promise to do a better job on your 20^th. It’s 12 minutes past 12 (midnight). Well done big Bro, you inspire a lot of us every day.