by Stanley Azuakola

Leadership newspaper in trouble again

Last week, the Polish Prime Minister, Donald Tusk, paid a working visit to Nigeria. Following the visit, the Leadership newspaper leaked yet another alleged presidential directive which has the potential to damage the cordial Nigeria-Poland relations. Already the management of Leadership newspaper has prepared its press statements of condemnation, as they await this week’s dose of arrest.

In the new ‘presidential directive’ which the paper published, the president reportedly wrote:

1. You know Poland currently occupies the position of 20^th largest economy in the world, the position which Nigeria desperately covets; hence all efforts during the visit must be geared towards cross-polishnation.
2. Cross-polishnation is the process whereby Nigeria crosses the Polish nation and overthrows them as the 20^th largest economy in the world.
3. To achieve this, the Polish prime minister must be placed under 24-hours surveillance throughout his stay in the country.
4. I will personally be in charge of extracting vital information from him while my wife would lead the charge on his wife, all for the love of country.
5. Note that I had to include “all for the love of country” in the last line so that in case this directive is leaked as usual, at least this time I have a defence

The spokesman of the president, Reuben Abati has debunked the Leadership newspaper report. According to him, “this desperate conspiracy between ‘Leakership’ newspaper and ‘Liar’ Mohammed would surely fail. The president respects the rule of law so he will not personally do anything about it; however we do not know if the police feel the same way. So they might receive a visit soon.”

Gov. Amaechi drives the conversation

A symposium for Young and Emerging leaders which held in Ekiti last weekend with the aim of driving the conversation, went exactly as planned, thanks to the intervention of Governor Chibuike Amaechi of Rivers state.

Amaechi, who was a speaker at the event, managed to make his talk all about himself and drove away the conversation altogether. When confronted about this, the governor said, “Isn’t the idea to drive conversation? They didn’t specify which direction so I chose to drive it away.”

Gov. Amaechi also used a powerful analogy to explain why revolution is impossible in Nigeria which made perfect sense to him. He said: “Let me explain this in a way you will understand. For some of you here even getting a small Volkswagen Beetle would be a revolution in your lives; but I and my arch-rival Godswill Akpabio went past that. We bought Bombardier jets, and what could you do about it? Nothing. So relate that to your Ojota protest. You wanted a revolution there, but we went and got our Bombers in army uniforms. Were you guys able to do anything?”

CROWNED CLOWN (CeeCee) OF THE WEEK

There must be something in the water being taken by the people in Abuja, the nation’s seat of power. A lot of those in a position of power there seem to have thrown sense into the bin.

It’s hard to understand why Fueling Poverty, the 30-minutes documentary by Ishaya Bako highlighting the massive poverty and wastage in the country was banned by the Nigeria Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB).

“The contents are highly provocative and likely to incite or encourage public disorder and undermine national security,” that was how the NFVCB put it in their letter communicating the ban, which they also communicated to the police and SSS. But these people are just silly. Their worthless ban has fuelled massive support for the documentary, and just 24 hours after the ban became public, the number of people who have viewed it has hit record numbers, thanks to You Tube.

It is absurd that the government board finds the movie reflecting the Nigerian situation provocative and do not reason that the docility and ineffectiveness of the government is itself a provocation on the masses. There really is something wrong with the water in Abuja.

The NFVCB and its acting director general, Patricia Bala, are certified clowns for misunderstanding the role of their board and for taking an action that the producer would probably be happy about, giving the movie free massive publicity. They take the CeeCee this week.

————————————

Follow A Pinch… on Twitter @stanleyazuakola

 

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.