Afghan officials say a NATO helicopter strike Saturday killed at least one child near the capital of Ghazni province.
Other reports said two children had died. Officials said the helicopter strike also killed at least nine Taliban fighters. The NATO-led force in Afghanistan said it was aware of the reported civilian casualties and was assessing the incident.
Civilian casualties have been one of the most sensitive issues in relations between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and international forces.
Due to another sensitive issue, the U.S. military Saturday pulled out of a strategic district of eastern Afghanistan, handing security responsibility over to Afghan forces. The troops' withdrawal from the district of Nerkh in Wardak province was part of a deal with President Karzai following allegations that Afghan forces had committed human rights abuses there under U.S. orders. The charges involved the torture and murder of militant suspects in the area — charges U.S. officials denied.
In a statement on the U.S. troop withdrawal from Nerkh, General Joseph Dunford, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, said the rest of Wardak province will "continue to transition over time."
Afghan forces are scheduled to take over full security responsibility in Afghanistan by the end of 2014, when most coalition forces are set to be out of the country.
Separately Saturday, President Karzai traveled to Qatar to discuss the potential for future peace talks with the Taliban
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
POLICE at Orerokpe, Delta State, have arrested a suspected cultist, simply called Monday, for allegedly raping and impregnating a seven-year-old girl (names withheld).
We learnt that the girl was living with her 27-year-old aunt, Destiny, in Ometa village, where Monday allegedly had carnal knowledge of her.
It was gathered that the victim fell sick after the incident but Destiny did not suspect it was as result of pregnancy until she alerted the child’s mother, a widow, who said she should be taken to the hospital.
The young child was taken to a clinic where a pelvic scan conducted on her confirmed she was pregnant.
A family source said: “The suspect was subsequently, arraigned in court yesterday, and remanded in prisons custody.”
As police rescue kidnapped principal, vice principal.
Meantime, police in Delta State have rescued the Principal and Vice Principal of Okuname High School, Agharho, Mr. Michael. Akpoduma and Mrs. Gerah Edith respectively, kidnapped by three gunmen, March 25.
Police officers and members of a vigilance group in the area stormed the kidnappers’ den in Okuname forest to rescue the victims, yesterday.
Delta State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Ikechukwu Aduba, who confirmed the the rescue of the victims said the kidnappers initially demanded N10 million and later reduced it to N5 million to free the victims, adding: “No ransom was paid.”
The principal and vice principal were driving home in the principal’s Camry car, March 25, when they were ambushed at a bad spot and seized.
They took them away in another snatched Camry, which they later abandoned.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
A man in his late 40s, who refused to utter a word despite the hysteria his presence generated, was almost lynched by a mob but for the intervention of police and other security agents.
The man, whose name could not be ascertained as of press time, was discovered to possess a full grown pair of breasts, which dangled from his chest, just like those of a young woman.
An angry mob was going for the kill when security operatives were quickly drafted to the scene. Their (mob) grouse was that it was strange and unacceptable that a man would possess dual sex organs.
Young men near a filling station at the Sapele-Warri/New Road junction tore the man’s clothes, and revealed a very small male organ, allegedly with no scrotum – which to them suggested that he was a hermaphrodite.
Saturday Tribune gathered from some onlookers who claimed to know the man that he had been seeking spiritual solutions to his problem by moving from one church to another.
It was further learnt that at one of the churches, he started manifesting some strange behaviours while for some time he hid his male and female sexual organs from church officials who later found out his status as a hermaphrodite.
The voice and face of the man were masculine even as he was said to also have female reproductive organs.
Men of the Nigeria Police in Sapele, and the other security operatives who were drafted to scene, quickly dislodged the irate mob, who were taking turns to fiddle with the man’s sex organs, ostensibly to further confirm their suspicions that the man was really a freak.
He was thereafter spirited away by the police to the Sapele Police Station for protective custody and investigations. A first look at the man's face, one can tell that he was saddened and pained by the injustice melted on him as he didn't commit any punishable offence against mortals.
It rips my heart that despite having lots of institutions of learning in every nook and cranny in the country, the vast majority are still ignoramus as they don't even need to be informed that the man has nothing to do with the subject-matter in the very first instance. (No offence intended)
Yes he has dual private organs of both male and female but since when did that become an offence to mortals? What is our business? Even if the man had committed any punishable offence, don't we have people whose duty is to arrest and prosecute such a person? What is the essence of having security officers if they can't be allowed to take care of such issues?
I beg us in the name of God/Allah to quit the abysmal idea of always taking the law into our own hands, this man is innocent, anyone can be in his shoes, that you don't have both male and female organs is to the credit of God, those who were mocking and humiliating him have offended God. I'm not happy with this show of shame.
At this juncture, our lawmakers should see if they can come up with a law to prohibit people from taking the law into their own hands and enforce such, it should also be an offence to watch a fellow Nigerian being treated unjustly, if not for the sudden intervention of the security officers, they would have murdered him. It is no news that such an act has become the order of the day, thus something has to be done to nip this menace in the bud.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
A Gweru man recently went berserk, bashed his wife and even threatened to stab her with a knife after she reportedly refused to teach him how to open and use a Facebook account. The man, Benjamin Chanyau of 1242 Mkoba Village 18, appeared before Gweru magistrate Ms Sithandekile Ncube facing charges of domestic violence. He was found guilty of assaulting his wife, Ms Fadzai Muchavhaira and fined US$200 or in default one month imprisonment.
The State's case as presented by Mr Bonwell Balamanja is that on 21 February, the complainant, Ms Muchavhaira was taught how to open and operate a Facebook account by her brother at the couple's house in Mkoba Village 18 in the presence of the accused.
After the departure of Ms Muchavhaira's brother, Chanyau asked his beloved wife to open her Facebook account and teach him how to operate the social network website. Chanyau also demanded to see what his wife was posting on her Facebook account alleging that Facebook was bad for married couples.
The wife refused to comply leading to a misunderstanding between the two. Chinyau got furious and kicked the complainant in the stomach once with a booted foot. He reportedly went on the threaten to stab his wife with a knife is she failed to show him what was on her Facebook wall and teach him how to use Facebook.
The complainant reported the matter to the police leading to the wife-basher's arrest.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Emotion ran high, Wednesday, at the Oduduwa office of the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Ikeja, following a startling revelation by a seven-year-old girl of how her father had been having carnal knowledge of her since she was six.
Aside this, her 49-year-old father, Sylvester Ehijire, who was paraded before newsmen, was also alleged to have had carnal knowledge of his one-year, three month-old grand daughter, in their one-room apartment, 13, Kolawole Street, Ejigbo.
The seven-year-old girl (names withheld) told a bewildered crowd that her father usually committed the sacrilege whenever her mother was away.
According to the primary three pupil, “every time my mother was not at home, my father will call me, dip his finger into my anus and his manhood inside my virgina. He would then promise to buy me biscuit and toy cars if I did not tell anybody. There is no Sunday that he did not do it.”
He threatened to blind me if I tell my mother
Asked why she did not tell her mother, she replied: “Anytime I wanted to tell my mother, he would hold my mouth and remind me of the things he promised me. But I would challenge him that he had never bought any of the things for me. At times when he finished and I threatened to tell my mother, he would tell me he would pluck out my eyes if I told anyone.
“Sometimes, he would even beat me whenever I attempted to open my mouth and also beat my mother with cane.”
Her 45-year-old mother, Mrs Ehijire, who hails from Iseleuku, Delta State, corroborated her daughter’s claim, disclosing that the abominable act became known in 2006 when her first child, (now married) informed her that her father had been having carnal knowledge of her.
“I travelled to Abuja for a catering job because I am a caterer. At about 1 a.m that fateful day, my daughter called me to say she had just been raped by her father. Then, she was 17 years old. I had to leave the job and travel back to Lagos the next day. I informed my husband’s parents but all of a sudden my in-laws turned against me, saying I was lying.
“This continued until I could no longer bear it. I had to leave the house with my children in 2007. But I came back in 2011, after entreaties by my in-laws.
“Since then, I did not know he was still doing it until my seven-year-old daughter told me, saying he even threatened to blind her if she opened up to anyone.
“When I confronted him, he started beating me. I went to his family members at Okota to report again but they did not do anything.
“The height of the abominable act happened last Wednesday after when I returned home to meet my one-year three-month-old grand-daughter crying.
“In a bid to pacify the baby, I took her to the backyard for a bath only to discover that her pampers were stained with blood and semen.
“At that point, I screamed and alerted my co- tenants. That was the last straw. I quickly rushed to the Ejigbo police station to report the case.”
Asked why she did not make an effort to protect her female children against such abuse, she explained that after reconciling with her husband in 2007, she usually left her daughter and grand-daughter in a creche until her return at about 6 p.m.
She said: “I gave a clear instruction to the proprietress never to allow anyone pick the children but me. But last Wednesday, I was told my husband went there and requested to pick them. Even when they resisted, he picked quarrel with them, asking if he had no right to pick his children.
“When I asked my seven-year-old daughter what happened thereafter, she told me that on reaching home, the father sent her and her elder brother who is nine to go and buy bread. She said when they returned, they met the net-door locked.
“While they were waiting for their father to open the door, the baby was yelling inside. Neighbours at this point became suspicious because they were aware of his antecedents. They started banging on the door.
“When my husband opened the door, they said he was sweating. One of them asked him to bring the baby and he did. They tried to pacify her to no avail. Can you imagine that my baby started crying from 3 p.m until 6 p.m when I returned.”
Medical test
To ascertain the claim, policemen at Ejigbo reportedly took both children to the hospital where the medical result made available to journalists showed that both of them had their hymen broken.
While the report of the seven-year-old read: “normal virginal and vulva, broken hymen (dis-virgined), that of the one-year three month-old baby read: “ bruised perineum, hymen broken, absent.”
My wife is lying – Accused
But when approached, Ehijire who hails from Uhumwonde area of EdoState, denied the claim, saying it was a mere ploy by his wife to ruin him.
He said: “She is only doing this because I am jobless. I used to be a truck driver. But when the truck engine had problem, I started staying at home. This was exactly what happened to our first daughter who is now married. My wife told the children to lie against me. I did not do it.
“What happened was that last Wednesday, I was at home when my two children came back from school. I told them to show me the creche where the baby was kept and I went to bring her, with the hope that I was helping my wife.”
He, however, told Vanguard in confidence that “I swear I did not know what is wrong with me. I believe this is not real. I believe something above the natural is using me to achieve its devilish purpose.”
A mild drama, however, ensued when all of a sudden his wife started pleading on his behalf, after she over-heard the command’s spokesperson, Ngozi Braide, briefing journalists on the legal implication of the man’s act if he is found culpable.
At that point, Mrs Ehijire said she did not want her husband dead. “If he dies it will affect me as well. I want him to be dealt with and not be killed,” she said.
But Braide hinted that the suspect would be charged to court soon.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
A middle-aged man has been caught selling human parts in the Oke-Opo area of Ilesha in Osun State. The man was caught by the Osun state police command after a tip off by residents of the area.
He was actually caught while dismembering an unknown man. What he has refused to say is if he finds people, kill them, butcher them then sell their parts or if he digs graves for dead bodies and sell their parts.
OMG what a wicked world we live in… This man needs live sentence. Gosh! See the shocking picture after the cut… viewer discretion seriously advised!
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
As part of activities marking the International Women’s Day, hundreds of women took to the streets in Lagos, weekend, to walk against rape in the society.
The women, whose protest walk came under the aegis of a non governmental organisation, Women Empowerment and Legal Aid WELA, marched to Lagos State House of Assembly, among other places, to vent their anger against the phenomenon.
Speaking during the walk, leader of the NGO, Mrs Funmi Falana, said violence against women in public and domestic life had continued to increase, as cases of rape and spousal murder had also become very rampant in the society.
She noted that a recent visit to Kirikiri prison showed that about 70 per cent of men awaiting trial for alleged murder of their spouses during violence in the home had been on the increase in recent years.
She said apart from the fact that men outnumbered women in public offices, there was no improvement on the complaint about violence against women in public and domestic settings.
She urged the speaker, Lagos State House of Assembly, Adeyemi Ikuforiji, who was represented by Mrs Funmi Tejuosho, Chairman, House Committee on Finance, to propagate some of the nation’s laws to assist in the proper prosecution.
Meanwhile Tejuosho, who welcomed the NGO, said the House was working tirelessly towards making the issue of rape and violence against women a thing of the past.
She said they had been able to sensitise market women and that they were going to take the law to the nooks and crannies of the country.
According to her, the laws, which had been written in English language would be translated to Igbo and Yoruba.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
France will start withdrawing troops from Mali next month, President Francois Hollande said on Wednesday, confirming that “terrorist leaders’’ had been killed in the north of the country.
Speaking during a visit to Warsaw, Hollande said France would start repatriating some of its 4,000 troops in Mali “from April.’’
Meanwhile, the onslaught by French and Chadian forces against Islamist militants in the mountains of north-east Mali was showing “success, which will be shown in the coming days, including terrorist leaders who have been killed,’’ he said.
Chad reported last week that Abdelhamid Abou Zeid and Mokhtar Belmokhtar, two terrorist leaders, had been killed. France has yet to confirm their deaths.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
OGAGA IFOWODO delivered this lecture at Oleh, Delta State, under the auspices of the Solomon Ogba Peace Group in Collaboration with Flomat Books
OUR subject is grim, a cause of one of our deepest anxieties – bordering on the nervous kind – about the present and future of this headache country called Nigeria.
If education is both the nursery and bedrock of the future, the place where the intellect and character of the men and women to lead a society, shape its political vision, and engage in its productive work are trained, then there is good cause for the nervous anxiety we all feel with literally every report that comes these days from the schools, in particular – and only because of our topic today – the universities and other tertiary institutions.
And, no, I am not now thinking of the national embarrassment of so-called university students who cannot spell their names – okay, if that is putting it too bluntly – who cannot tell a noun from a verb or finish three sentences without an embarrassing grammatical or semantic error.
There are, indeed, “the miracles,” the desert flowers, that astonish us through sheer improbability. But they exist in spite, and not because, of the current state of our tertiary institutions. To return to the point, I am, rather, thinking of what has been dubbed “the menace” or “scourge of secret cults.”
Confraternities and secret cults: Separating the dream from the nightmare: Let us begin with an attempt to clarify what secret cults are by first going to the origin of confraternities in Nigeria. For, today, the terms “confraternities” and “secret cults” do not mean separate things in the mind of the public: the one immediately suggests the other.
The word confraternity, according Webster’s dictionary, means “a lay brotherhood devoted to some religious or charitable service; a society, especially of men, united for some purpose or in some profession.” The root word is the Latinate “frater” which means brother. The first fraternity, Phi Beta Kappa, was formed on December 5, 1776 in the United States of America. It was founded at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, in the colony of Virginia; a college second only to Harvard as the oldest institution of higher learning in America.
Even that long ago, it had all the features associated with the fraternities that are a part and parcel of American universities today, such as lofty principles, a motto, an insignia, rituals, a code of friendship and camaraderie.
Phi Beta Kappa held regular meetings during which its members discussed literary and social questions of the day, including such hot political topics as taxation and representative democracy. Because it was formed during the period of revolution, it could only hold its meetings in secret.
Three years after it was formed, chapters were established at Yale and Harvard. This became the model for all subsequent fraternities and sororities (the sisterhoods) as well.
The manifestoes of nearly, if not all, of the “secret cults” known to operate within but also outside the campuses profess adherence to these characteristics. At least, that is what you will find with respect to the five oldest and better known ones. It is undoubtedly what anyone who cares to look will find in the manifesto of the Pyrates Confraternity, or the Seadogs, the oldest.
It was founded, according to the history published on its website, to combat class privilege or elitism, affectations or the blind aping of British colonial culture and social mannerisms, tribalism, discrimination, convention or stasis, and social injustice of any kind.
Its members also sought to live by the code of chivalry – to defer to and protect the weaker sex (presumably from gender discrimination as well, although this is not explicitly stated). In other words, its primary concern was to do whatever it could to ensure that the first university college in Nigeria would produce thinkers and visionaries and not yes-men and women dying to cast themselves in the image of the coloniser.
Ethnic chauvinism
Today, the pernicious mix of class and ethnic chauvinism that served as its impetus might sound strange, but here is how the Pyrates Confraternity described the context of its emergence, a view corroborated by objective studies, as in the essay “Violence in the Citadel: The Menace of Secret Cults in the Nigerian Universities” by AdewaleRotimi, published in a 2005 issue of the Nordic Journal of African Studies, and to which I will make further reference below. Meanwhile, here is how the Pyrates Confraternity describes the context of their emergence:
“In the early days of the University College of Ibadan … higher education was a near exclusive preserve of children from wealthy homes. The product of this middle [sic] upbringing, scions of business tycoons and colonial aristocracy, brought into the UniversityCollege all their notions of class privilege and indifference to the social realities of the nation.
The handful of students from poorer backgrounds either stuck doggedly to their books, looking forward to the day when the prize of an academic degree would compensate their present indignities, or strove assiduously to be admitted to the sophisticated circle of their flashier peers.
Ashamed of their peasant or worker background, some played on the ignorance of their parents who made prodigious sacrifices to enable their children join the aristocratic sets, in appearance and acquisitions at least.
So thoroughly did they absorb the habits and ethics of the class to which they desperately aspired that they, in effect, even outdid the “natural” elite of the university campus. Not surprisingly, student clubs were a reflection of these ambitions; so also was the orientation of the Student’ Representative Council, which often made demands on the rest of the Nigerian community as if it was a body of exotic strangers from outer space.
“In the 1950s, Nigeria was in a nationalist ferment and along with the heightened agitation for independence came the sad and predictable appeal to tribal sentiments as the motley array of ethnic nationalities, not previously under one national government, jockeyed for position and power.
This tendency was absorbed by the University College, Ibadan, which “became a breeding ground for the worst kind of tribal thinking clubs,” such that the Students’ Representative Council “and all forms of student activity, including sports, became mere expressions of tribal pettiness.”
Formed in 1952, the Pyrates remained for a long time the only confraternity in Nigeria and confined itself to harmless, if defiant and showy, activities meant to highlight their difference in thought and action from fellow students and other members of the university college community. The only possible cause for apprehension about their activities, which were carried out in the open, was, perhaps, their frightening insignia of skull-and-bones.
This spelled danger to “the ordinary undiscerning observer,” as they acknowledge, but it was meant to symbolize a lofty idea: “a constant reminder” that all mortals will, in the final analysis, be reduced to bones. And, that while still in body, flesh and spirit, they are enjoined to “do whatever you can now for the sake of humanity.” The logo was, in addition, a symbol of the Pyrates’ radical egalitarian humanism: after death, when all has been turned into dust and ashes, skulls and bones will not be differentiated and we would be remembered only by our deeds while alive. As far as manifestoes and rationales go, theirs has to be one of the most admirable.
When we turn to the Buccaneers, founded in 1972 at the University of Ibadan, we find similarly stirring sentiments. Again, in its own words, the Buccaneers are a confraternity of “men who seek (sic) very high morals and a vision to contribute meaningfully to society … [and] to provide exemplary leadership for the larger community.”
Non-progressive conventions
Its objectives include the denunciation of “oppression, corruption, tyranny, human rights violations and all forms of societal abuse” and an abhorrence of “non-progressive conventions that are detrimental to the societies we live in.” By using the plural “societies,” Buccaneers imply that this is an aim that extends beyond Nigeria to any society anywhere in the world in which a member might live at any point in time. Like the Pyrates, Buccaneers claim to maintain a strict and selective admission process, the better to ensure the integrity of its principles and goals. “We believe in the promotion of societal values, the upliftment of the oppressed,” they say, and “enjoin our membership (who are fortunate to be selected after a thorough and rigorous set of interviews) to uphold the values that are in accordance with the demands of leadership and good citizenry.”
Buccaneers also espouse an egalitarian philosophy. “In our eyes,” they continue, “everyone is equal and deserves equal opportunities, devoid of fear or favour. We embrace a philosophy of “BRODA DELIVER BRODA” which expresses our belief in teamwork and communal progress through selflessness, sharing, and protecting others in their time of weakness or vulnerability.
Implicitly, every Buccaneer is challenged to give and to support his broda and to expect the same in return” (original spelling and phrasing). At the risk of repetition, let me again quote the Buccaneers on their philosophy: We stand for love, orderliness, honesty, transparency, togetherness, championing and sharing each other’s problems and positively seeking to solve them, promoting each other’s welfare and well-being, creating a sample society for the world to copy from, promoting objectivity, fairness and social justice generally.
You might say the Buccaneers take themselves too seriously, but no matter. The Supreme Eiye Confraternity was founded on the idea of Afrocentricism; that is, a focus on Africa as the primary source of its beliefs and practices. Indeed, it states the claim very boldly thus: “an ORIGINAL African Confraternity” (original emphasis), as if the only other confraternity in existence then, the Pyrates, lacked originality as an organization of African students in the first Nigerian university.
This, perhaps, signalled the coming turf wars that would degenerate, once the enabling circumstances arose, into the evil phenomenon we are here to examine and to which I will come presently. The Eiye Confraternity was founded in 1965 at the University of Ibadan by students described as “patriotic and visionary,” according to its own history, “with a commitment to excellence, desire to make positive impact on the socio-political psyche of the student populace and Nation at large.”
At its inception, it went by the name Eiye Group but became the Eiye Confraternity four years later. The founders of the Eiye Confraternity, we are informed, “believed strongly in the espousal of the traditional African teachings towards human and spiritual excellence against the backdrop of colonial subversion of the African mind.”
The confraternity claims to believe “in the traditional teachings of the ancient African oratorical practices and not Voodoo” (original emphasis). It avers a continual striving “for human excellence through our initiatory traditions” and disavows any form of parochialism. It is not, it says, “an ethnic society” but one that “cuts across all barriers of the ethno-social, political, religious and economic divides in Nigeria through fraternization and the pursuit of a more just society for all via the ‘Brotherhood of man and the Fatherhood of God.’”
If the Eiye Confraternity was founded on an Afrocentric world-view, the Neo-Black Movement, more popularly known as Black Axe, merely expressed the same idea in the more overtly political concept of Pan-Africanism, an ideology of race-wide, and so trans-continental, liberation of mind, body and territory. It was formed at the University of Benin in 1977, according to the objectives stated in its organ (accessed online), The Arena, to “promote activities that will encourage Black people towards the full exercise of the human spirit, the re-awakening of all its Inventive, Creative and Moral Capacities”; “stand against all acts of racial contempt and conflict, exclusion, discrimination and intolerance”; “engage in researches on African traditions and culture;” “internalize and evolve realistic approach (sic) towards providing solutions for Africa’s problems;” and “enhance and promote the image of Black people all over the world.”
Not surprisingly, the Confraternity was formed in the heat of the euphoria surrounding the 2nd Festival of Black Arts and Culture in Nigeria, more popularly known as FESTAC ’77. The anti-colonial struggle for the total emancipation of the continent was still raging then in the southern African nations of Namibia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Angola.
Lastly, I will outline the history and objectives of De Norsemen Kclub, otherwise known as Vikings. According to the official website of the Vikings, its objectives are to direct the energy of its members towards economic development in all spheres of national and international life; wipe out unemployment, unproductiveness, and poverty, “first on board our ship, then the nation at large”; establish respect for human dignity and sanctity of human life; encourage labour and intellectual industry; preserve the environment from degradation and the promotion of national and international peace; uphold “God as the Foundation of our ship” and abhor in its totality all ethnic, religious, racial and status discrimination.
They also struggle to protect the oppressed and the weak of the society by promoting “corrective measures for defence of the masses against all social vices militating against its progress,” such vices as deprivation, corruption, injustice, victimization, and undemocratic measures.
As if these goals were not clear enough, the Vikings reiterate their “main objective” as the “fight against sacrilege, vandalism, smuggling, hoarding, trespass, touting, conspiracy, pilfering, terrorism, and insubordination, extortion, impropriety, kidnapping, piracy, intrusion, hijacking, quackery, bunkering, banditry, political extremism, false alarm, and guerrilla warfare.”
I have focussed on these five confraternities as representative of the numerous groups existing in the country today. As in all generalisations, however, I am bound to have glossed over a few, but I hope not significant, differences among not only these five but also, and even more, among the many other groups that have proliferated in the secret cult hot-houses known as our university campuses.
Furthermore, I have not focussed on the female groups, what would be a weak parallel to sororities in American university life, even though several of them are known to exist and operate under such suggestive names as Daughters of Jezebel, Temple of Eden, Black Braziers (Bra Bra), White Pants, Barracudas, Viqueens, Mermaids, the Amazons and the Damsels.
Relatively new to the terrain, having all been formed in the 1990s, not very much is known about them but it seems that sex (including the running of call-girl services) and competition for suitable boyfriends as well as the attentions and deep wallets of high
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
The two toddlers in Ketu, Lagos State, who were declared missing on January 25, 2013 have been found dead in an abandoned vehicle on the premises of a building next to theirs on Taike Street.
Codewit.com had on January 30, 2013, reported story of the kids – Toheeb Adedokun (three) and Tajudeen Falilu ( three).
The family as well as the police had suspected that they were kidnapped before the discovery of their remains on Monday.
The vehicle in which the children were found was a Honda Pilot Sports Utility Vehicle, which was used as collateral.
According to a police theory, the children went into the vehicle but were trapped inside, causing them to suffocate.
The tragic news, however, did not go down well with residents of the street as they alleged foul play.
The occupants of the house where the corpses were found had fled for fear of being attacked.
Some residents told Codewit that the occupants of the building had a case to answer.
One of them , who identified herself as Iya Basira said, “How could two corpses be in a compound for over a month and no one smelt any odour?
“We looked for these children for weeks and even the occupants of that building were aware that the children were missing.”
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
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