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SAN

Classic Alert: 1991 560 SEC

1991 Mercedes Benz 560 SEC

This is the W126 series 560 SEC. This car was built from 1985 to 1991. A flagship wide body icon, with a 5.5L V8 engine. This one shown is with the AMG body kit. This car was originally priced at $145, 000, but can now be had for anything from $5,000 all the way to $30,000 depending on the condition and if it's an original AMG model. I would buy this car, even in 2015, if just to have it sit in my driveway and constantly take me back to the late 80s / mid 90s, when all I could do was watch it drive past on 'A' list locations like Allen Avenue and Opebi. How we would tell ourselves that it had to belong to a drug dealer, even if we did not know that for a fact.

My cousins had a very neat 500 SEL that I drove a couple of times, circa 95/96 (actual pic below). While you would find the old money crowd and foreign missions use the SEL, the SEC was for the young cats. We saw Bobby Brown pull up in this, with a loud screech, in the "My Prerogative" video and we were sold. This car was for the dude who would not wait until tomorrow. The one who just made good from his latest deal. The long throat new money rich boy who would eat his future today. The one who did not want to delay gratification. So many times I wish I was that one, just so I could drive the 560 SEC.

500 SEL, Campbell street, Lagos Island. (Eid al Fitr, 1995)

Watch this video from another passionate enthusiast and understand what this car meant to us.

SAN

Photo credit: ebay.com
Video credit: Youtube.com/Electricfederal

Kollington, Akala or who?

Source: @aganamike on twitter

Whoever he is, he should be making a video to a song called Kasabubu or Ijo Yoyo.

That's a lot of "shains" and multicoloured epiderms...

Tackling Suicide Bombings - The 25 year Plan

Let us first establish that there is a difference between insurgency and terrorism, even as related as both are in some cases. I have written about this before. While insurgency can be tackled by a good military strategy, terrorism is more difficult to combat through physical means. Terrorism is characterized by instilling fear from mass killings, especially through "random" bombings and targeted assassinations. This is mostly executed by small cells of individuals who are well trained in the art of disguise and melting into a crowd. A chief tool of terrorism is suicide bombings or martyrdom through gun attacks in the open populated centers. It is very difficult to combat this element of terrorism. The battle is one of hearts and minds.

The real question is “what is it that makes an individual kill themselves in the quest to kill several other strangers who have done nothing wrong to this individual?” What is the motivation? What allows for the lack of remorse? What removes humane considerations?

Guys, it is false religious doctrines. Whether we agree or not, there is more than sufficient information out there that shows how people are brainwashed into wanting to go to heaven even at the nearest opportunity and in a manner that guarantees certain rewards. I will not be posting any videos here, but I'm sure you've seen some currently trending on social media. I saw one on 72 virgins just today and I also saw the one from Al Jazeera, shot in an Afghan elementary (Taliban) school. It is a well-established fact, so, let’s get real. 

While one might read this and assume this is an attack or indictment on any religion, I would caution that what I propose are just pragmatic steps towards reorientation and mindset correction. Whilst religion is not the root cause, it does certainly act as a catalyst. There are those who will be used to achieve political ends using violence when they're brainwashed to believe they're doing it for God. Where the real failure lies is in the system that allows some preachers and authorities of religion to preach doctrines which provide shelter and comfort for those who will be coerced into performing inhumane acts against others with the encouragement of reward in the hereafter. 

So in response to a commentator on my previous post who asked for an outline of the plan that I had called a 25 year plan, here are a few steps in what would be a deliberate program of state instituted and supported activities with appropriate collaboration from relevant civil society groups or stakeholders.

1. Review the UBE act to do the following:

                                                       I.            Extend the tenure to 12 years – full primary and secondary education

                                                    II.            Uniform “basic” curriculum across the country – it should be relevant to national integration, current direction of the economy and promote self-sustenance after school. 

                                                 III.            The sections which deal with punitive actions for parents that refuse to send their children to “proper” schools should be reinforced with stronger sanctions and well communicated. Kaduna and Sokoto states are already leading in this direction.

2. Religious teachings must be regulated and monitored by government, working with the different religious councils. Extreme doctrines that preach hate, isolationism, disdain for the structures of state and our laws and false martyrdom based on carrying out heinous acts with a promise of a hereafter of comfort, should be criminalized. 

It must be made sufficiently clear that when a religious injunction says it is a sin to kill the innocent, that this includes all human beings. Not just believers. No one has a right to take life under any guise and there is no reward in heaven for killing for God.

3. The real religious leaders should come up with a program for preaching the counter narrative (Javed Ahmad Ghamidi: 2015). There must be a deliberate, disciplined and sustained effort to tell the truth about what true religion is and discredit the false doctrine that is so prevalent and easy to believe. This needs to have leadership support right up to the recognized heads of religion in Nigeria. 

The reason this is a 25 year plan is that we have already lost one generation and the demographic that is most affected is in the age gap of 15 - 27.

So even if you solve the politics, poverty and non-inclusion in society and leave out the aspects mentioned above, it will continue to be a tool to be used whenever the need arises. Remember that so far as humans and nations exist, there will be conflicts, disagreements and political manipulations. 

The real achievement will be that they are able to employ other means of resolving these conflicts that do not use humans as willing tools for committing mindless terror through suicide bombings. Life here on earth needs to be seen as having value. Expectations of the hereafter and what will merit one getting there need to be in line with the “real message” in “the religious book” and not one sold by devious puppeteers.

SAN

The Ignorant Electorate: A Danger to Democracy

A population with low intellect may not be capable of making beneficial decisions. They argue that the lack of rationality or even education is being taken advantage of by politicians, who compete more in the way of public relations and tactics, than in ideology. While arguments against democracy are often taken by advocates of democracy as an attempt to maintain or revive traditional hierarchy in order to justify autocratic rule...

- Keith Richburg, Head to Head, African democracy, 2008.

_____________________________________________________________________________

When a people are presented with more than a dozen candidates from diverse backgrounds, track records and political party affiliation and yet make the election one between the devil and the deep blue sea, then they have only themselves to blame. This is not just about Wada/Audu (Kogi 2015). Several others voted drug barons and failed governors to represent them in the senate, past and present.

Until the electorate is enlightened and made to understand the real reasons for voting and what politicians are supposed to do for them, they shall continue to vote in the most benevolent thieves and incompetents and not necessarily the ones with either proven (good) track records or with noble intentions.

The voter must be made aware that by that singular act of selecting a candidate via the ballot, they have been offered a chance to determine the positive or negative outcome of the next four years of government intervention in their lives. They must also be mature enough to live with the consequences while basing their next voting attempt on the lessons learned from the last one.

To grow our democracy to where the impact will be felt in governance and national development, agencies charged with national orientation must make voter education an utmost priority.

An ignorant electorate is the Achilles heel of democracy.

SAN

It is Well

Synopsis of a Nigerian Hospital Visit

[Visitor 1]: Sorry o brother. You're looking really weak. What are the doctors saying?
[Patient]: (coughing) the doctor says my enemy has bronchitis
[Visitor 2]: (with stern expression) I reject this diagnosis and rebuke the tongue of that Doctor!

SAN

The Constitution on Nigerian Citizenship

Image Credit Okechukwu Ofili of www.ofilispeaks.com

A Citizen as defined by the Oxford Dictionary is a person who has full rights in a country. A citizen could also be a person who is recognised by a country as being her citizen because such person possesses some characteristics (e.g. To be born in that country) which entitles him or her to some rights in that country. Under the Nigerian 1999 constitution, one may be a citizen either by birth, registration or by naturalisation  ( see Section 25 - 32 of 1999 Constitution). 

Citizenship by birth.

 A citizen by birth in Nigeria is a person who was born in Nigeria before or after independence and whose parents or grandparents belonged to a community indigenous to Nigeria or any person born outside Nigeria either of whose parents is a citizen of Nigeria.

Citizenship by Registration. 

The President may register any person as a citizen of Nigeria if he is satisfied that such person is of good character; he has shown a clear intention to be domiciled in Nigeria and has taken the Oath of Allegiance. Such persons are usually women who are married to Nigerians or people born outside Nigeria who are of full age capacity and either of  whose grandparents are Nigerians.   

Citizenship by Naturalization.

 Any person may also apply to the President of Nigeria to be granted a certificate of naturalisation. However such person must satisfy the following conditions:

-  He must be a person of full age and capacity;

- He is a person of good character;

- He has shown a clear intention to be domiciled in Nigeria;

- He is in the opinion of the Governor where he plans to reside to be acceptable to the local community as has assimilated the way of life of Nigerians;

- He has made or is capable of making contributions to the advancement; progress and well - being of Nigeria;

- He has taken the Oath of Allegiance;

- He has resided in Nigeria for a period of fifteen (15) year;

- He has resided in Nigeria for a period of 12 months and preceding that has stayed in Nigeria for periods amounting in aggregate to not less than fifteen years.   

Persons who are citizens by registration or by naturalization may forfeit their Nigerian citizenship if he retains or acquires the citizenship of another country where he is not a citizen by birth and any person who is of full age capacity may renounce his Nigerian citizenship by declaration and the President shall cause the declaration to be registered. Such declaration will however not be accepted if made during any war in which Nigeria is physically involved or is contraty to public policy in the opinion of the President. 

Any citizen of Nigeria by registration or naturalization may be deprived of his citizenship if within 7 years after becoming a citizen such person is sentenced to imprisonment of not less than 3 years or if he has conducted himself in ways that shows disloyalty towards the Federal Republic of Nigeria. 

- See more at: http://legalnaija.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/citizenship-under-nigerian-law.html#sthash.YzsH2ihj.dpuf