Today

Today is not the day to talk about the new Nigeria of tribal and religious unity.

Today is the day to talk to the teacher in Gombe that was burnt alive for desecrating the Koran.

Today is not the day to talk about the privatization of the ports and the riches that it will bring into the country.

Today is the day to talk to the pensioner that died because his severance was not paid.

Today is not the day to talk about the fourth mainland bridge and the new lekki connector.

Today is the day to talk to all the people who plied the apongbon junction in fear of their lives.

Today is dedicated to the project manager that was going home to her husband.

Today is not the day to talk about the mega bank profits and its effects on the small business sector.

Today is the day to talk to the small business that cannot run because it cannot afford any more disel to power its generator.

Today is not the day to talk about the oil services industry and the millionaires and billionaires- in- waiting from local content.

Today is the day to talk to the widow that discovers what ground water pollution really means.

Today is not the day to talk about mobile task forces and sophisticated security investments.

Today is the day to talk to the policeman that cannot afford to buy his own uniform.

Today is not the day to talk about the promise of the nation.

Today is the day to talk to the people waiting for the promise.

Today is not the day to talk about the “English speaking” people.

Today is the day to talk to the rest of Nigeria.

Today is not the day to talk about statistics.

Today is the day to talk to the human face of the statistics.

Today is not the day to talk ABOUT NIGERIA

Today is the day to talk TO NIGERIA

Global Gist
Aiight so one of the things I heard about recently was the push by some idiots in America to try and ban preaching on Television. Not just public television, which doesn’t show preaching anyway, but private television. Meaning that they were trying to say that a Christian cannot watch TD Jakes on TV even if s/he is willing to pay for it. They are trying to justify it by the whole establishment clause in the US constitution about Church and State. I don’t see how me watching a private station means that the US is supporting religion, but hey these guys must be geniuses since they see something everyone else is missing. It’s funny, you cannot even float something like this in Europe because people would lock you up in a psychiatrist ward cos you are clearly insane, and Europe is perceived as being more hostile to Christianity than America. Porn is protected due to freedom of speech and so we can’t touch Penthouse TV, but some genius is trying tell me that TBN should be shut down. Some times I wonder what happened to common sense.

Nigeria Gist
Aiight so I was going to do my NDS on this but, I decided that it wouldn’t be long enough for a full post but I wanted to holla about it. In keeping with Nilla’s positivity thing, I am going to big up the one arm of government that by and large is actually doing its duty; the judiciary. From the Supreme Court down, the courts have actually done what they are supposed to do, their judgments are based on interpretations of the law and are not biased. It is actually to the credit of the courts that they overturned the impeachment of Dariye, the Governor of Plateau. The guy is crooked, but 6 legislators cannot impeach a governor no matter what he did. The courts are managing the budding constitutional crisis with Atiku and Obasanjo as well as it can be expected It will be interesting to see how they deal with the Peter Obi case (he won the election in 2003, but due to rigging was only sworn in in 2006 and constitution says 4 years from swearing in). I would like to see someone challenge the constitutionality of sharia law in the courts, but I don’t think we are ready for that. Maybe Gani, our leading human rights activist, should take a break from campaigning for his Islamist Nationalist candidate, Gen Buhari.

Lagos Gist
Aiight so the big thing in Lagos recently, well amongst what one of my co-workers calls “English speaking” people, was the recent gubernatorial debate on Channels television. The station decided to ignore all claims of unfairness and place the four front runners on the first day, and the also-rans on the next day. I think it is slightly hypocritical to abuse Channels for setting the debates in the manner in which people wanted anyway. Anyway so the biggest disappointment of the entire debate was Jimi Agbage (sorry mona). He tried to slander Femi Pedro for apparently no reason (and Pedor finished him) and for someone whose whole campaign is the strenght of his ideas, you didn't come away thinking about any of his. Fashola seemed to confirm his status as Tinubu’s man and nothing more. Femi Pedro was the best of the lot in terms of answers, and he (unlike Atiku) was actually proud of some of the accomplishments of the Tinubu administration as he was his deputy. The biggest surprise of the night was Senator Obanikoro, this was mainly because the expectations people had about him were so low. It was like people thought he could not string two sentences together. He was articulate and he more than held his own.

Personal Gist
Aiight I don't normally do personal but the format I chose to do almost requires it. So here is something kinda funny/ironic. I discovered late last week that I was now attracted to someone that I threw into the friend zone myself six months ago cos physically she wasn’t my type but she was cool to hang out with (yes I’m superficial what’s your point?). I think it is one of those “we click & therefore…” things, and I am expecting it to pass. If she were staying, I might do the whole “by the way…” thing (which is never fun), but she is leaving and I don’t do long distance so there is no point to even finding out whether it was something she would be interested in (sorry about the last phrase I just watched Entourage season 3 and it stuck). Oh and anybody saying I am wrong will be ignored. Aiight I'm done.

Intro
So I got quite a bit of gist for you, but it will have to wait until later in the week cos as always Corper comes first. I am getting certain comments about Corper that made me decide to clarify what I assumed was obvious. I am not currently in camp, I did camp in September and am now sharing what I wrote then. The second thing is that I decided to do this on Sunday, which gives you the name, but it was too much of a hassle to put it up on Sunday and so I shifted the date to Monday but kept the name. On to todays post which is mainly about football, enjoy.

We in the Finals baby (Day 15)
Today was one of the more exciting days. A nice break from the dulling before and the dulling to come. This being naij, the most important inter platoon competition is the football and my team pretty much cruised into the semis. In the semis with rabid corpers on both sides our team proceeded to get our arses handed to us up and down the field. Only the heroics of our keeper and some pretty inept finishing kept us in the game. We then get to penalties and sneak the win and proceed to go crazy. We tried to party into the night but the ten 'o' clock curfew got in the way. Of course between the partying and the match we had to get disturbed by our platoon inspector to fill in some evaluation crap. Since it was seven I was a little confused as to why she wanted it so urgently. One part of it was for our comments in the camp and from reading them you could see why some say Nigerians are born liars. Judging by the number of people who said that they had a wonderful experience I won't be surprised if they asked us to come back for another three weeks later in the year. As for me I barely lied. I said I had a satisfactory experience which is true as far as it goes but it is all the other things I didn't say that made it a lie.

Unnecessary Qualification
This is kinda self explanatory, and definitely not as pissed off as the last one. I think I had come to terms with the last week of camp going to be very uninteresting after one day of venting. Even in a roundabout way, this is the last time I moan about the dulling. That day watching the football was really fun, cos we were the favorites for the game and it turned into a "smash and grab" on our part. I don't mention it but that was the first time I took a picture in camp. I was that excited. Anyway, until next week

First Thing



After the debacle that was Head of State, I vowed never to see a Chris Rock movie in which he wrote, directed and was the main star. I have changed my mind, and will now see "I Think I Love My Wife." Not because the New York Times reviewer actually liked the movie, but because Kerry Washington is in it. I will stongly support any movie that allows Kerry Washington to play the hot temptress, babe is just too mad. Below is a still from the movie.


Second Thing

I read zai's post on science vs. religion, and I wanted to talk about it without rambling all over her comment page. What annoys me about the whole thing is that it is not an argument that religion can win, especially in the way most people have it. I look at it this way if science can prove something is a FACT and it contradicts what is in the Bible then either what is in the Bible is wrong, or there has to be a different interpretation of what the Bible is saying. The fact that people look at it the other way in that there has to be something wrong with the facts drives me mad. Here are a few that typically drive me insane.

A literal counting from Genesis gives the age of the earth at around 10,000 years. A geologist finds a rock that is 6 million years, and you say that he has to be wrong because the bible says the earth is 10, 000 years old.

A city was said to be destroyed in Joshua, and archeologists found no destruction in the possible time frames for Joshua's rampage through Canaan. The archeologists are wrong clearly, because the bible says that Joshua destroyed the city.

My favorite one though is not about a fact, though it explains my issue in a nutshell. "There can't be life on other planets because the bible said that God only created life on earth"

Examples like this drive me mad cos I have never heard a defensible position that explains stuff like this. Everything that does is self-refferential.

"The Bible is the infallible word of God, so everything in it is true."

Who says that?

"The Bible."

For me, they show why you don't want religious policy driving science policy. A science policy that was drawn up by Christians will not only stop evolutionary biology, it will curtail certain areas of physics, math, chemistry, geology, archeology all because they may contradict what Christians know to be truth. Science starts from the premise that we don't know the answer, and so in any area that science touches on a Christian sphere of influence there is going to be conflict even if Christianity's answer is right because it presupposes that the Christian belief could be wrong.

It's hard enough trying to be a Christian in today's world, you don't need people telling you to disbelieve what you see in front of you. In the immortal words that Gallileo may or may not have said, "It moves"

Aiight, when I did the Lagos Gist post more people were interested in the prozzie radar issue, than were interested in the people getting maimed in Ajah issue. Well since I am unashamedly a crowd pleaser, I will now describe in detail what I meant by a prozzie radar.

A prozzie radar is the ability all guys of bar and club going age need to develop in order not to be quoted a price. Nothing makes a guy feel more like a fool than blocking a babe all night only for her to quote you a price. So a prozzie radar makes it less likely that you will be quoted a price.

So this is how I realized that a prozzie radar was needed. After camp, a bunch of us corpers hit Bacchus like sailors into port or prisoners on parole. One of my friends lit on this slim but curvy chick of medium height of above average cuteness. They basically grooved for the entire night, and then when we were leaving she rocks outside with a suddenly materialized friend. First I knew something was up was when the babe asked me what car she was going in. I was like "in the car with the guy that is taking you." When the guy that was on her case drove away I called him and was like you left your babe behind. He said and I quote "Can you imagine, Bitch quoted me price!"

Alright a prozzie radar is not really a set of rules per say, cos it is more intuitive than anything else. It is easier to spot prozzies when they are with other people. Things like age disconnect, especially when added to multiracial, are a dead giveaway. Some people include outfit, but that is only for the double hanky deal. Generally girls and not guys can tell the difference between two girls in skinny jeans, pumps and a halter top where one is a prozzie. Another thing to spot is the whole girls chilling at a bar and not really drinking anything (this is naij so you got to remember context)

Some guys used to use one of these two rules of thumb for their prozzie radar.

1) Every girl not known by either me or a friend is a prozzie and I shall not block

2) Girls who are chilling by themselves at certain bars are prozzies cos non-prozzies would know better.

Those with low self-esteem use:

Every girl that shows interest in me is a prozzie.

Some guys generally only block babes with business cards but even that is not fullproof, cos i've heard tell that moonlighting is rampant in naij.

Now that I think about it, a prozzie radar just limits the number of people you block. So it should be called a prozzie screener cos some are going to be able to get through. I suppose the more important thing is to know what you would do if you do get quoted a price. Furthermore, I recommend blocking babes at places other than bars and clubs and no I don't mean church. That way this becomes not so much of an issue. Aiight I'm done.

Oh and I have finally realized why people who know me in real life and read my blog don't think I have two brain cells to rub together, and are constantly surprised that I can put a sentence together. Here is a text I got today from one of my idiot friends:

Today is the day of the disabled. Plz send an encouraging msg to a retarded friend, just as I did. You hang in there sunshine. You are f**kin special.:)

Can you imagine. Bloody arsehole. Aiight I'm really done.

Married naija men are chasing, and young naija women are letting themselves be caught. The variety of women who are getting caught are undermining the traditional stereotypes of the condition driven poor girl, and the greedy middle class / rich girl. The variety of men doing the chasing has also broadened. The stereotypical old man with a pot belly is probably not the primary culprit in the infidelity game anymore. It’s getting so bad in Naij that if divorce was done the way it was done in America, Nigerian men would only go to bars run by priests (or lawyers).

I can’t really speak about motivations cos I haven’t had in depth conversations with mistresses about why they are mistresses. However what I do know is that people end up in relationships with people who hit on them. Why does the captain of the football team normally end up dating the cheerleader? Even when the cheerleader is not the kind of person that would shoot him down for not being a football player, the class clown doesn’t think he has a chance and so he doesn’t make a move.

It’s the same with single and married men when it comes to hitting on girls. Married guys, at least the ones we are talking about, are less likely to think anyone is out of their league. Single guys not so much. Married guys on average have more money than single guys, and so they get more of those ladies who are looking for money. Most married guys are willing to settle for those who are looking for money cos they are a lot of ‘em and it is a low hanging fruit. However the few(er) married guys who are interested in non-money hungry women actually don’t have a better chance than single guys who are interested in the same girls, though the cheerleader effect could cause them to get a higher percentage of this group of girls than they should.

From a strictly logical perspective it actually makes sense to be with a married guy rather than a single guy if you are 100% certain that you don’t want to be in a serious relationship. Married guys on average actually carry less baggage than single guys. Married guys that chase girls generally worry about one thing “what if my wife finds out” and usually they don’t even worry about that. Single guys on the other hand tend not to travel as light. The only problem is that what you know going in does not mean anything and that extra-marital affairs where the guy isn’t leaving his wife, means that if the girl starts getting serious and catching feelings, she ends up in a worse position than when she started. Cos a good rule of thumb to apply is that naija guys on average do not leave their wives.

I suppose I am trying to say that single guys are not handling their business, or maybe that not enough single guys can handle their business(the out of the league thing). The first is the fault of the guys themselves, the second is the fault of the economy (BTW really feeling Mode 9’s “fellow Nigerians”). Either way married men win, cos as my previous post said, girls are horny too. Oh and cham, I know, I know, I will do the prozzie radar thing tomorrow (the kicked out of camp Sunday Corper post happens five weeks from now but I'll dedicate it to you if you like). It’s just that I read 36’s most recent post and I felt moved to ramble a bit.

Imagine a girl that is just starting a new secondary school. She has fought and won the right to enter school unaccompanied, leaving the possible embarrassment factories known as parents behind. She gets registered with minimum fuss and then finds her way to her English class asking for directions only once. She enters the door and the entire class turns around to stare. The teacher looks up at the girl questioningly. “I’m a new student,” the girl says, “I was placed in this class.” The teacher nods and then says, “Sit next to the boy you find the cutest.” The girl thinks to herself, “maybe I should have brought my parents after all,” as she surveys the room trying to make her decision.

In the interests of full disclosure, this is a scene from Donnie Darko with jara. I am actually curious to know how many girls would actually sit next to their cutest boy. Conventional wisdom seems to say that girls are wary of letting their interest be known without some indication from the guy first, which implies that most girls would not like to be in that situation whatever they finally decide.

However whether girls want to be instigators or not life has a way of throwing up situations where it is the girl’s decision “to be or not to be.” So take a horny girl who is not really interested in anyone that is on her case (I promised elle and I always keep my promises). She has two options; grin and bear it, or do something (to broaden the subject pool, “do something” includes leading guys to know where their interest lies and then letting the guys do the heavy lifting). Apparently most girls would decide to grin and bear it, while complaining about the dearth of suitable guys. Now the ones who choose to act have the same choices guys do when they make moves on people; go for the meaningful or the not so meaningful. From my experience, these women tend to choose one or the other in the same ratio that guys do though with higher success rates (funny that, since guys are pigs and everything). I think the reason for that is effort of selection. Meaningful takes more initial effort than non-meaningful and since horny people aren’t big on effort to begin with, they tend to base their decisions on initial effort.

Clearly more men than women act when in this situation (though maybe not so clearly if you throw in hinting), but there is debate about whether the major factor responsible for female reticence is that women have more self-control than men, or that the societal ramifications are worse for women than they are for men. Most guys I know lean towards women have more self-control than men, but the women seem to be split on this one.

So leaving aside those troopers who actually do something let us address the needs of those belles who just couldn’t make the first move. Here are three things to help you get through.

Number 3
Listening to really misogynistic rap music like “Whoop That Trick” that proves guys are pigs that aren’t really worth your time.

Number 2
Wandering through a fraternity house at twelve noon on a Sunday after a Saturday party, or at the very least a bachelor pad, will leave you shocked that you were ever attracted to members of the opposite sex

Number 1
Walking through a night club in Lagos and asking the guys how many of them live with their parents is guaranteed to have the same effect as taking a shower with icy cold water.

Intro
Sunday Corper is back, and I am not impressed with my not being impressed about camp. I think that staying in camp was beginning to wear on me by the time I wrote this and it came out in the post. Well one can't be happy clappy all the time. Still it's good writing, though. Enjoy.

Dog Day Afternoon (Day14)
It seems that camp has assumed a routine that is likely to obtain until the end. You get woken up at 5 or 4 depending, go down to the parade ground, sing the anthems, pray, do drills listen to announcements, take attendance get done by 8:30, 9 and are basically free for the rest of the day. So if you are not social and you don't sleep easily you basically have nothing to do until bedtime at 10 at night. Well that is if you weren't dumb enough to sign up for march past. That is one of the cardinal rules; never volunteer for march past. If they pick you tough luck but never volunteer. Anyway we basically wandered around mammy, watched the karate kids, the girls volleyball and such, basically the most dulling day in camp. Even Guinness was crap tonight. The only bright spot was the toastie I had on my way back to the hostel. Today was so effed that even blocking babes felt like work. The thing is the camp is actually very small you are either in the hostel, the parade ground in the front, the dining hall in the back, the mammy market next to the dining hall or on the road that links the mammy market to the main gate. So wandering around quickly turns into a circuit and by this time money is running low so people don't give them guinness stand all day every day.

Unnecessary Qualification
Now wasn't that a barrel of laughs. Reading this I can actually see why people kept telling me to please go home for a few days. The description of the layout of camp makes sense to me, but I don't know if it would make sense to anyone else. As far as the title of the piece goes, if you know what it means you either have a large vocabulary or have seen almost as many random movies as I have. Peace.

First a brief update on the Lagos Political Scene

The first rumor: Obanikoro (PDP candiate for Lagos state Governor) and his boys were shooting guns in the air at a PDP rally.

The second rumor: AC cronies were hired to shoot guns into the air to distrupt the PDP rally.

The cynical Lagosians who heard the story over the weekend (it happened on Friday) were predisposed to believe the first story rather than the second. The funny thing was that this story got very little coverage.

Fast forward to Monday. There is an AC rally around Ajah and a bunch of protesters (area boys) invade the area carrying machetes and guns. I heard a few people were hurt but none were killed.

Tuesday Morning. The AC is hinting that it is the work of hired thugs by another political party. The State Commisioner of Police who plays for Arsenal in his spare time has vowed to bring the criminals to justice.

In completely unrelated news, the AC is the current ruling party in Lagos State.

Now back to the first set of rumors. Which one do you believe now that Monday happened?

In other news there are now pretty obvious depressions in the joints between the sections of Third Mainland Bridge. You feel like you are driving on rolling hills when you are on the bridge. I think the Apongbon area boys planned it, so they have more people to rob during rush hour when Third Mainland becomes unpassable.

Finally for the partying crowd, News Cafe at the Palms has carried away a lot of the Churrascos customers. Being the former hottest thing is probably not a lot of fun. If my prozzie radar is still in working condition, I have to say that as bad as Bacchus is, it does not hold a candle to Eko Hotel & Suites.

Intro
Here's another day I thought was the best day in camp. Though it is actually not about anything that happened that day.

Open day (Day 13)
Sunday is definitely the best day so far in camp. Woke up on our own time not to a bloody bugle. Also Arsenal kicked Man U's arse, yes did I mention that we have satelite in camp. Since nothing much happend today I suppose I should explain about the mammy market that I've been talking about. So a bunch of vendors pay the NYSC money to set up shop in camp and then proceed to charge the corpers exorbitant amounts of money for the things they need. It's also the most popular place to chill on camp with all the eateries and of course the one and only Guiness Stand. Basically you can come to camp with only the clothes on your back and still have everything you need once you get there. The thing 'bout mammy is that people find a joint they like and stick to it. So I've been going to the same indomie joint for days now. I can't wait to get out of camp to never eat indomie again or for at least a year. Also the DMT toilets are in mammy. These holes in the ground are the one reason why noodles are my main food. You only want to go as little as possible. So the really tasty things in camp are treated like luxuries for those who aren't foolhardy souls or day corpers. The one thing I should mention 'bout sunday is that for all intents and purposes camp is open on sunday and you don't need me to tell you the nature of most visits. Yep not like prison at all is this NYSC camp.

Unnecessary Qualification
So in answer to your burning question, yes I did eat indomie again after I left camp. Yes to any man u suppporters that may stumble across this blog, we kicked your arse while I was in camp.

Here are some lagos camp updates:

The mammy has been moved from where it was when I was in camp. For those of you that have been in Lagos camp, it is now where the "new" buildings were by the football field. Also for those of you who had fond memories of running through the bush to leave camp, they have erected a fence to stop the newbies from emulating you badly behaved people. Aiight I'm done.

The power situation in Nigeria is so bad now, that diesel is running out cos people are powering their generators pretty much constantly. We are told that the sorry state of affairs will persist for a while as the gas lines are fixed, and the newly commissioned power plants start contributing their share to the national grid.

The only good think about this power crisis is that the whole nation is going to jump with two feet on the electrical workers union if they open their mouth against the upcoming privatization. They have been trying it small small, floating articles in the papers about how the privatization is not the way to go. This is not the ports where only the “stakeholders” care what happens so they could make noise. From top to bottom the entire industry has extorted money from Nigerians and if they think it is going to be business as usual, they’ve been smoking crack for fun.

Since I am already semi-ranting, I have got to say that I hope I am still living in Nigeria when the Civic Centre gets blown up. Someone should be arrested for giving Jim Ovia planning permission. How can you build something that size on Ozumba Mbadiwe, one of the busiest streets in Lagos if not the entire country, and not provide anything close to adequate parking? So anytime anyone decides to have an event there, you get gridlock cos everyone is parking on the street.

Continuing on the traffic thing, I am beginning to agree with the guy at work that says that we should be like Kenya and ban the political use of sirens except in emergencies. When they have to sit in traffic for an hour and a half to get from Osborne to Akin Adesola the politicians will finally see that they have to do something about Lagos traffic. Or better yet when they are at Apongbon worrying for their lives they will know that we a’int playing and fix the damn roads.

On a happier note, Nigeria is possibly a couple of years away from real broadband. Globacom signed a deal with Lucent Alcatel to lay an underwater cable from Nigeria to London. If this is not just talk, then we should see similar internet speeds to those that they are seeing in other parts of the world.

Lastly, I really wish I could put up You Tube stuff, cos the live conversation between OBJ and Yar’Adua is the stuff that comedy magic is made of.

Peace

The rumor in Lagos right now is that Yar'adua is dead

Yep that is what i said

YAR'ADUA IS DEAD

No one knows if this is true or not, but I've heard things that make it likely.

There are so many conspiracy theories about this, about IBB, PDP and Atiku, and even about Northern power elites worried about Yar'adua's health, that people are going to be pointing fingers for decades to come if the rumor is true. I'm worried cos the North has no credible candidate in PDP at the moment, and if they are serious about their power sharing the have to find one. That could see the re-emergence of IBB as a possible PDP flag bearer or of his erstwhile deputy Gusau. As someone at my work said, "no devils please, either the one we know or the one we don't know"

Some are saying that this clears the way for Atiku, but from the way OBJ is talking, to me this clears the way for Buhari. As far as I am concerned, I have no wish to live in a country governed by a sharia loving ex-dictator. I don't care how many Christian groups he meets with Buhari is a fundamentalist moslem. Just like moslems don't want a fundamentalist Christian, I don't want a fundamentalist moslem.

I didn't even think I would want to vote for Yar'adua until I realized that the alternatives with him not running are not even worth contemplating. Damn this sucks.

Intro
Today's corper gives some more insight into the inner workings of camp.

Who Will Secure The Security (Day 12)
Based on your number when you get into camp you're placed in one of ten platoons. Each platoon has one day when they're on duty. On that day you provide security at the red line; the last place a corper can stand on the causeway leading up to the main gate which is also secured. The mammy market and hostel are the last two points manned. You also provide sanitation and kitchen i.e. cook all three meals. I was last security shif on main gate from 5:30 'til 10. We got kicked off duty at like 8 cos the camp director thought (wrongly) that one of us collected a bribe. Leaving early was cool with me. Though it pissed the hell out of our military instructor. The best thing about being on duty is that u can sleep in.; something I took full advantage of. First time I got up to six hours of sleep. From what I heard about our food, we sucked or so my roommates from other platoon told me. Most were satisfied with the evening rice and stew though. The only thing that sucks 'bout security is that we're the only ones not on parade and thus were stuck doing any corper odd jobs. For instance I had to carry heavy pots of yam tubers for an hour. All in all the day you are on duty is def the most relaxing day on camp except of course you're dumb enough to volunteer for kitchen duty.

Unnecessary Qualification
I found out later that everyone is supposed to be on sanitation duty, which meant that I was supposed to be up at five picking rubbish up throughout camp and not sleeping in my rooms. The guy honestly did not take a bribe, though he did take a tip that was not worth the trouble it caused in the long run. And yes those pots of tubers were heavy.

Nigeria – The Land of Opportunity?

Enter any discussion about Nigeria and you are generally going to talk about two things; Nigeria’s oil wealth, and Nigeria’s problems. If you live overseas then the generally becomes almost certainly. This is not to say that Nigeria does not have problems, but what a lot of people tend to forget is that one person’s problem is another person’s opportunity. The Nigerian opportunity set is larger than most people would believe, and this post attempts to give a cursory glance of some of the non-oil related opportunities in the Nigerian environment.

Based on the numbers, Nigeria is booming. The country has averaged real GDP growth of around 6% a year in the last five years. To put that in perspective, Nigeria’s growth is comparable to China’s in the same period and everyone is worried that China is overheating.

Nigeria is the last great untapped market. Nigeria has over a 140 million people, which means that it has one of the largest mass markets in the world. People stay up late at night trying to think of ways to tap into that market. Here are two examples of what tapping into that market can do for a company’s bottom line.

Telecommunications is now the dominant industry in Nigeria. It is the major success story of the current administration. Telecoms showed that if you could tap into the mass market in Nigeria you could make ridiculous money. Some are even saying that the Nigeria part of MTN is the most valuable member of the group.

Nollywood is the second industry that showcased the power of the Nigerian mass market. Quality of the movies non-withstanding, the industry is a triumph of the private sector in Nigeria. I have seen estimates of the industry’s value that are well over a billion dollars. To our pride, or shame, Nollywood is the most popular art form on the African continent and so what is has done is nothing compared to what it will do.

In addition to past successes, there are more than a few industries whose success could be dependent on reaching the mass market. Two of the most promising of these are Real Estate/Construction and Financial Services. People are making so much money off providing high-end real estate that it is ridiculous. However these same people will tell you that what they are making is nothing compared to what one could make if one could do mass housing in Nigeria. If you think that Real Estate is not going to be king in the next few years, take a look at the stock prices of the listed cement companies. As far as Financial Services go, so much money is flowing into the system (mostly pension money) that it is a real problem to figure out how to invest the money. So finding things for people to invest in is the next frontier, and there is a lot of money to be made.

Now before people start booking flights and rushing back to Naij, there is a 100 ton gorilla that I have not mentioned yet: implementation. Anyone with an IQ of above ten can see the opportunities in Nigeria, but realizing them is another thing entirely. Nigeria is where good ideas go to die. However this is less true than it was five years ago. Just as the rewards of doing business are high in this country, so are the costs. Michelin was running out of the country, just as Dunlop was raising money on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. All in all there is opportunity in Nigeria, but if you don’t want to work to realize it then you better go into the business of getting money from government, but then again if you are that type of person this is not for you anyway.

So tomorrow is my turn on Nilla’s nigeria discussion series. I’m angling to get a monthly slot, so y’all better read and comment so she will have no choice but to ask me back.

Anyway so I was trying to decide whether to do a serious or a frivolous post just before I went all Nigeria on y’all. There were two options that presented based on stuff that had been going on recently.

The first was going to be something on how absolutes generally devolve from relative conditions. So people who say “it’s all relative” and people who say “there are absolutes” are both right. Luckily I came to my senses and decided not to blog on that.

The second thing I was thinking about doing was the “unreliable narrator” (think Kevin Spacey in Usual Suspects) and how that affects the way people read blogs. Now as most people are not planning on becoming English majors this is not really interesting to them. I almost fell asleep thinking of the ways to develop it.

Now after reading olawunmi’s comment on my blog about my beloved Arsenal I decided I was going to rip in to him and the disgusting mank u. Then I realized that most of my readers were women whose only concern about a bomb going off in the Emirates would be that a bunch of cute guys died.

Then I talked to mona and let her know that the last post was supposed to be dedicated to her on her blog day cos she pretty much dragged me kicking and screaming into the blog community thing. So I was going to talk about that but as you can see it would be a two sentence thing and it’s done.

Then I read daddy’s girl’s comment on my grown up post and I was actually moved. Me who has never used the word in his life was actually moved. I was going to write something about her and I realized that I did not have the time to do it justice. Don’t worry babe it’s definitely coming (Now mona I know I said I don’t do tributes but remember she was the first person that I don’t know who actually commented on my blog. Fine I’ll do you one too; maybe).

Moving on, confused naija girl who is trying, and actually succeeding, to worm her way into my affections (there goes my pimp hand) tried to tell me that I deleted her comment. So trying to return strength to my pimp hand I went to her blog with the plans to tell her what’s what. I get to the comment page and there she was saying that what I said earlier was the nicest thing I ever said to her.

Cursing myself for a soft touch I returned to my blog. I remembered that I promised that I was going to drop a banger everyday this week and so thinking about what to write about, I decided to do some free association writing. It turned into this narrative that basically is pointless, and probably may give some insight into the way I think.

Reading through, I have to admit that it is kinda scary that I think with brackets. I haven’t figured out what to call this post. I was thinking “reflections” but Uzo would probably sue me or something. Insight into me or something of that nature is too corny for me (Damn, I think someone has a name like that: my bad). Anyway there are a bunch of names dropped in this so I think I’m going to go with O wan be. Yeah, aiight I’m done.