When Acting President Goodluck Jonathan Visited Washington D.C.

I saw Acting President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday. And I am still reminiscing about meeting him. Yes, he sat just an arm stretch from where I sat taking photos. It was an exciting opportunity to experience first-hand the Acting President’s visit to D.C. He was well received at the international stage, among his peers and he was able to articulate his vision and plans for Nigeria to all who probed his agenda. Obviously, a lot of focus was on the forth-coming election- 2011. Everyone, well almost everyone, wanted to know what strategies he was putting in place to ensure a free and fair election when the time comes.



During the discussion forum hosted by Nancy Birdsall, President of Center for Global Development, Acting President of Nigeria Goodluck Jonathan offered his perspective on several of the key issues affecting Nigeria, including electoral reform, consolidation of the gains of the Niger Delta Amnesty, the fight against corruption, and improvement to the power and energy sectors. Birdsall who said the US was interested in helping Nigeria manage her oil said the world wants to see a more active and engaged Nigeria. She expressed how disappointing it has been that Nigeria missed several opportunities to serve on the global stage. “Despite Nigeria’s great wealth, too many Nigerians are still in poverty” she mused. What will it take to move Nigeria from its introverted and stalling progress towards the level it deserves? Africa needs a strong Nigeria, one that is focused on improving lives.



In response, Goodluck Jonathan said that he felt honored to have been invited to attend the Nuclear Security Summit. He noted that Nigeria has indeed enjoyed 11 years of uninterrupted democratic governance. He said that he hopes to strengthen the economic relationship between Nigeria and the United States in line with Private Sector Partnership- supply of crude oil and non-oil business relations and US support in improving power generation and supply. He also said that the Amnesty program is on course in Niger Delta, to help youths stop antagonizing their government through violence.



Acting President pointed out that one of Africa’s challenges is controlling the illicit transfer of weapons from West to Africa. “Why must Africa be a dumping ground for small arms and light weapons?” he asked. When these small arms are dumped in Africa, it gets into wrong hands thus threatening lives and disrupting security. “These are the real weapon of mass destruction” he said.



He was asked about his ambition in the non-oil States, especially on Agriculture. But to my dismay, the question was lost while attempting to elaborate on his plans to ensure an electoral reform before the next election. I wonder if Mr. Acting President step back sometimes to ponder on why the oil sector is becoming overrated. Whatever happened to Agriculture? Whatever happened to efforts by government leaders to make Public Service as sexy as other sectors?



In a later event, during the launch of the Michael S. Ansari Africa Center (Atlantic Council), the first question Goodluck Jonathan was asked was how he plans to engage the next generation during his administration. Acting President said there is room for the next generation who are ready to work hard. One of his strategies is to instill into every youth a value system that will allow us think more about the good of Nigeria instead of individual gain.



Goodluck did not falter in articulating his goals to Senator Chuck Hagel, Chariman of Atlantic Council; Mr. Fredrick Kempe, CEO of Atlantic Council; Dr. Nancy Walker, moderating the discussion and the rest of us, key stakeholders with or without vested interest in Nigeria’s development.



He explained his ambition to build infrastructures; create investment opportunities, put in place a solid base for education, employment and good governance. As for 2011 election, he said that he would ensure electoral justice and accountability.



“Nigeria is rising and our rise will be for the good of all…” he said. And to the US he chided, “As friends we must be honest with each other”. Why pat Nigeria on the back as a partner with one hand and put its name on terrorist watch list with the other?




Meanwhile, hope you understand why I am particularly pumped about all of this? My friend Chinyelu Odunze, a first generation Nigerian-American studying at American University, and I attended the two events. All we had to do was RSVP and there was no backlash on the list of attendance. During the Center for Global Development event, we sat beside the President'sSpeechwriter and listened to Acting President Goodluck Jonathan speak. I also saw the Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomole; The Vice President of the African Region of World Bank, Oby Ezekwesili; and other actors in the Nigerian political and economic sector.




The Acting President’s speechwriter asked us if the speech was good. We nodded in affirmative. Honestly, the speech was really thorough, punctuated with good humor. However, I realize we don't need impeccable Political speech from our government leaders. We need to see our leaders take positive action.


As if reading my mind, our Acting President emphasized the areas where he is hoping to take action. Again, he said that he would use his tenure to improve power generation and supply in Nigeria, sustain the amnesty program on course in Niger Delta and work to control the illicit transfer of small arms and light weapons from the West to Africa.



Yes, we got a good impression of the Acting President’s visit to Washington. To resonate what my friend, Professor John Kline of Georgetown University said in an email response to my enthusiasm, “I hope the elections will provide an opportunity for real leadership toward unity rather than factional division. (Perhaps it needs an inspired youth journalist to help guide it in that direction?)”



There was a rare traffic jam in the Capital city. Notice of parking restrictions for the 2010 Nuclear Security Summit was in effect until 12pm on Wednesday, April 14. Intermittent road closures in some areas of D.C. were expected and everyone was notified in advance. World leaders came to Washington D.C. and this time, Nigeria’s presence was not in oblivion, Acting President Goodluck Jonathan was neither in silence nor in derision. There is hope for Nigeria.

(As reported for the Nation newspaper)

A Conversation with Acting President Goodluck Jonathan

Speechwriting job is often underrated but I think it is very excitingly appealing to all who have a penchant for research and documentation. Working in the overrated oil-sector is definitely not as sexy as being the Speechwriter of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.



But before considering attempting such position, you need a good education to prepare you. At least that was what the President’s Speechwriter said. He got a Master’s degree in this field and a PhD in that field. The list of educational qualifications is so long that I would not mention them here to avoid misrepresentation.



My friend (Chichi) and I attended The Centre for Global Development event, organized to give the Acting President of Nigeriaan opportunity to give his perspective on several issues affecting Nigeria. We sat beside the President's Speechwriter and listened to Acting President Goodluck Jonathan speak. He (the writer) asked us if the speech was good. We nodded in affirmative. Honestly, the speech was really thorough, punctuated with good humor.



However, I realize we don't need impeccable Political speech from our government leaders. We need to see our leaders really take action.



As if reading my mind, our Acting President mentioned the areas where he is hoping to take action. He hopes to use his tenure to improve power generation and supply in Nigeria, sustain the amnesty program on course in Niger Delta and work to control the illicit transfer of small arms and light weapons from the West to Africa.


In a later event, during the launch of the Michael S. Ansari Africa Center (Atlantic Council), the first question Goodluck Jonathan was asked was how he plans to engage the next generation during his administration. Acting President said there is room for the next generation who are ready to work hard. One of his strategies is to instill into every youth a value system that will allow us think more about the good of Nigeria instead of individual gain.


He also committed to build infrastructures; create investment opportunities, put in place a solid base for education, employment and good governance. As for 2011 election, he said that he would ensure electoral justice and accountability.



“Nigeria is rising and our rise will be for the good of all…” he said. And to the US he chided, “As friends we must be honest with each other”. Why pat Nigeria on the back as a partner with one hand and put our name on terrorism hotlist with the other?



This is a jenniferized first-hand version of Acting President’s visit to Washington D.C during the Nuclear Summit. If you read the story differently elsewhere, that is someone else also telling his or her story.

Are we approaching a Cultural extinction? (2)

It is a popular notion that Tunde Kelani’s films are rooted in the Yoruba culture. I asked him once what culture means to him, he said, "Your total being is your culture…what we know in our culture was the importance of a good name and a good character, "Omo Oluwa bi", you have to bring honor to the family…why we are having so many problems today is because there is a cultural vacuum. People are cut off from their culture, therefore resulting to short of moral."

To elucidate further on the discourse, here is how our conversation went:

What is leading us to such cultural extinction?

Tunde Kelani: An open society, influence from other cultures. When I was growing up, there was only one TV station; this TV was the first in Africa. Today, Nigeria has over 100 TV stations, only God knows how many radio stations, and then we have Satellite TV, mobile phones, Youtube, etc. All these have devastating effect on our indigenous culture because some other cultures are so rich that they propagate their culture and seek to dominate other cultures. Unfortunately, in our society, we tend not to like our own, we seem to prefer those other culture to our own. This is a serious error because those other cultures that have preserved their own culture, like Asian countries, have developed while those accepting other cultures have remain undeveloped.

Any hope for redeeming our culture?

Tunde Kelani:That depends on the political will of our leaders… it depend on a conscious effort to start a process of re-orientation... On a personal level, I think families are compounding the problem…we are settling for self-colonization with the way the present generation of Yoruba people, especially women, are discouraging their children from speaking the Yoruba language. They are making them 2nd class citizens of other cultures…they are doing more harm than good. Without your culture, then you are nobody. That is why Yoruba define the culture of nation with the language. When Yoruba talk of a nation, they say "Orile ede". This means a place with its own language. If you remove the "ede", it becomes "Orile" which means nowhere. So without your language, you have no root, and without your root, you are nobody. Some people think it is civilized or fashionable by not allowing their children speak their language but this is the greatest level of ignorance, it is shameful, absolutely repulsive.

Now how do we start this process of reorientation to preserve culture which was earlier defined by young Sam Harvey as "a fallacy held by individuals who wish to upset the order of equality, creating superiority and making bold the differences in our global race."?

Are we approaching the extinction of “Culture”?

A young boy, Sam Murray, while defining culture once said that "culture is one’s historical, spiritual, and ethnic backgrounds in which encompasses language and traditions. Culture is heritage and is commonly associated with race and religious ideologies. Personally, I feel that culture is merely a word that only exist to label and divide people by their differences. How is my culture form yours? Because I speak a different dialect and eat food in which you are not accustomed, are we so different that we must labels ourselves in such a way that invokes war? Culture is a fallacy held by individuals who wish to upset the order of equality, creating superiority and making bold the differences in our global race. We are all kin and are all kin and therefore are from the same origins, our culture is unanimous, well at leas this is my belief."

What language do you speak? What type of food do you have for breakfast? How do the women in your country dress? Answering some of these questions above is very easy. But coming from a multi-ethnic country like Nigeria, I always find myself thinking critically to ensure whatever I say clearly explain that my response is either unique to me as an individual, the environment I grew up or my State.

The other day, some of my colleagues wanted to know how we dance in Nigeria. What a huge responsibility it was to define the Nigerian dance culture. Luckily for me, we found variety of videos of different traditional dance in Nigeria on Youtube website. We spent time analyzing how each tribe’s dance style was different yet similar to the other. "In Nigeria, there are over 250 languages" I said, trying to drive home the point that they should not define the Nigerian culture by only watching the cultural dance video of Yoruba,Igbo, Hausa and of course Edo people.

But why do we really define ourselves by Culture, especially when this culture is so diverse and ever evolving?

It is a popular notion that Tunde Kelani’s films are rooted in the Yoruba culture. I asked him once what culture means to him, he said, "Your total being is your culture. The Yoruba culture is essentially a moralistic one. You can apply this to any other culture but what we know in our culture was the importance of a good name and a good character, "Omo Oluwa bi", you have to bring honor to the family…why we are having so many problems today is because there is a cultural vacuum. People are cut off from their culture, therefore resulting to short of moral."

What anybody who has come of age should know

Nigeria should not just be seen as the most populous country in Africa. An increasing population without strong economy and a stable government has implications for the land and the people as a whole. One of the most common factors most people point at when analyzing the current situation in Nigeria is the bad leadership and somewhat passive attitude of Nigerians.

Sometimes it is easier to sit and whine about the inadequacies of our government leaders, to compare our society with others and hope that someday our economy will recover form its current squatting state. According to the CIA World Factbook Web site, seventy percent of Nigerians are under 35 years. This mean that if this age group actively participate in the coming election, we would have more grounds to hold our leaders accountable, stating with INEC who is expected to count the votes.

In a nutshell, if you are Nigerian and you have come of age then it is very imperative that you become more active in civic participation. Starting with the basics such as: registering to vote for the 2011 election and also encouraging your friends to do likewise.

The 2011 elections are only few months away. Considering the political trend in Nigeria, we know there is still a lot to be done. We live in a society where people can take unprintable measures to undermine the system in pursuit of self-interest. But it is left to us to decide if we want to act to change the system or be acted upon. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has promised to do better than they did in 2007 election but "No true Democracy manifests without a people's deliberate labour Register to vote, vote and defend your vote.”

As Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde recently said "A time will come when as a youth, you will no more be judged by how many ‘Lamboginis’ you cruised or the amount of Gold jewelry you paid installmentaly for, but how you affected your generation. My name is Omotola and I'm a cool voter...what's your C.V.?" Let us make hay while Sun shine. When it is time to register to vote, don’t be caught missing in action. It is not enough to wish for a better government leaders. We all have a role to elect them in. Don’t succumb to business as usual of moving with the Party with mouth-watering manifestos. Join the cool voters, make an effort not only to register but also to vote. By God's grace come 2011, let us rock that vote beyond election-malpractice.