HAPPY YEAR 2021

 I congratulate you on the occasion of the New Year, wishing you a year full of peace and kindness.

Reflecting on the past 12 months with all the challenges experienced and looking ahead to the challenges and opportunities of year 2021, I am optimistic that, this year will be a year of milestone significance for you.

Have a prosperous Year 2021

 

thought provoking words

Business tycoon, an entrepreneur, 2007 Presidential candidate and political reformer, Prof. Pat. Okedinachi Utomi has accused the educated middle-class in Nigeria of playing the ostrich while the country is steadily decaying. He made this statement in a dinner organized by his friends to celebrate his contributions towards nation building at Golden Gate Restaurant, Ikoyi on July 10, 2009.

He further stated that the present situation of things in the country has made Nigeria the worst place to live compare to how it was in the 70s, whereas in most societies, the natural trend is an improvement to the development of the society.

On account of these, he called for an alliance for progress where people from private sectors, civil societies and nation-builder politicians to come together for the purpose of sustaining progress in our beloved country no matter who is in control of political power. The effort is of necessity non – partisan, he said.

Prof. Utomi outlined four vehicles around which the alliance for progress should work in order to build institutions which will sustain democratic ethos, wealth creation, security, law and order. The first is LIFFE, which is lawyers interested in free and fair elections presently coordinated by Ruddy Ezeani, a member of the Lagos Bar. LIFFE has a working council which includes senior advocates like Wole Olanipekun, Olisa Agbakoba, OCJ Okocha as well as the incumbent NBA President, Rotimi Akeredolu while other Senior lawyers like General I.B.M. Haruna are also considering the invitation to serve on the council alongside Ahmadu Abubakar. The goal of LIFFE is to have about 5,000 lawyers dedicating their time to monitor from voters registration to post-election petition resolution, as well as to assign at least two lawyers to every ward in the country.

The second vehicle is Citizens United to resist ballot box rigging. This requires recruiting thousands of people to realize that their future depends on the fairness of the vote and they are to defend with their might or where necessary, their blood, the ballot box. This group must have the orientation of freedom fighters passionately interested in liberating their people from bad governance. The third vehicle is the committee on voter’s education which recruits its membership mainly from the academia, the Clergy and Civil Society organizations. It is designed to run programmes to get voters to focus on issues, the characters of the candidates, their competence and their antecedents, and to bring the contents of Nigeria’s electioneering progress into line with what obtains in decent societies where candidates talk in town hall meetings and answer to queries from voters instead of the caricature that obtains in Nigeria.

The fourth vehicle which is the council for recruiters of middle – class persons into politics has a primary objective of educating Nigeria’s middle-class about the dangers of the current practice where politics is relegated to people who have nothing to lose. The far extreme of the spectrum which excludes the majority of people was significantly the reason for leaders’ discrimination from the people. He noted that politicians failed to focus on issues of everyday well being for the things that affects everybody which is why in most developed countries, the politicians are neither the very rich nor the very poor but the educated people.

Prof. Utomi also paid tribute to the founding fathers of the present Nigeria who he said did not amass wealth but exemplified the true meaning of leadership just as he condemned the current dispensation where a few thousands suck up the country’s resources.

Lagbaja free MP3, song download, lyrics, music videos

Lagbaja free MP3, song download, lyrics, music videos

The tale of a faceless musician in Nigeria

Lagbaja has become a household name in the forefront of comtemporary African music, rich in the traditions of the continent while cosmopolitan in attitude

Lagbaja is a Yoruba word that means somebody, nobody, anybody or everybody. The name perfectly depicts the anonymity of the so called "common man". The first question people asked when Lagbaja is encountered is "Why the mask?" Basically, his mask is used as an icon of man's faceless.

It symbolize the faceless, voiceless in the society, particularly in Africa. Once you see Lagbaja's mask you are reminded of your own faceless.

His music continues to fascinate with the unique focus on the core of African drums. It is the product of various influences ranging from traditional Yoruba music to Jazz. Often the music is purely instrumental,an interplay between tradtional Yoruba percussions, drums, chants, the western instruments, especially the Saxophone. His lyrics are primarily sung in Yoruba, English or a blend of the two as is colloquially spoken in Yoruba cities.

However,many of Lagbaja's song dwells on serious social issues, while others simply entertain.some are dance inducing while others pass serious messages in humourous ways.

One thing that links all his songs together is the use of traditional African drums. Traditional Yoruba drums are the most prominent in his music, that is as a result of his state of origin and the philosophy of which his music is focused on.

Bisade Ologunde a native of Lagos Nigeria, a singer-songwriter, instrumentalist, popularly known as Lagbaja employes four families of drums in creating different grooves and moods in his music.

The dundun / gangan family is the most prominent and at times up to five drumers combined all the various components to create the polyrhythms.The bata ensembles is led two musicians who alternate between soft high toned driving rhythms with their Omele bata, and thunderous loud talk with their mum drum-iya ilu.

Lagbaja's groovy fusion has been refered to as afrojazz, afrobeat, higherlife and afropop until now that he himself has christened the music AFRICANO, alluring mostly to the central role of African drums and grooves in his music.

His second album "C'est un African Thing" won him the most prestigious National music awards in Nigerian Album of the year, Cross Over music of the year and the Best Afro Beat Artiste.

Book Review> Speech Making and English Pronunciation by Dele Omojuigbe

Speech Making and English pronunciation by Dele Omojuigbe is a must read for everyone who want learn proper way of speech making and English pronunciation.

The book attempted to simplify English pronunciation for students and at the same time, teach them the processes of effective public speaking.

Speech making and English Pronunciation is a resource material topics which students, and other users should be able to understand easily and thereafter put into practice.

Chapter five of this book described the understanding of the English Vowel chart which help the reader to understand easily the pure vowels of English. The pure vowels is been described from three perspectives. The tongue height. frontness or backness of the tongue, and the shape of the lips. Having those cateria in mind, an attempt was made to describe the pure vowels, using Daniel Jones description as a guide.

Speech Making and English pronunciation is quite voluminous with enough information that will glue your eyes to the book until you finish it without realising how much time you have spent reading the book.

The author wise choice for the cover page is the first attraction to the book. The two colours that was used for cover page is ox blood and cream colour attract the eyes in a very special way,before an individual get to the title which is quite captivating, it is a must read for everyone both young and old, there is whole lot of information to learn from the book.

Be inspired by Tu-Face creativity

Have you ever wondered why Tu-face (Innocent Idibia) is so internationally acclaimed? Have you ever stopped to reason and brain-storm on why, against all obstacles, storms and controversies, he was unstoppable?

Well, in case you don't know, Tu-face is so etra-ordinary talented in music and he is a perfect example of a creative mind!

Tu-face who was born some three decades ago is some who has exploite his creativity to the extent of acquring money and fame (locally and internationally) with it. He is at a stage of his life right now that if he sneezes into a compact disc, people will buy it just for the love of Tu-face. But, he didn't just acheieve this recognition over-night, he worked and fought hard for for his destiny.

In 1997, Tony tetuilla, a member of a group that held us spell-bound with beautiful musical renditions, "Omode meta". The song came spoke about his percieved maltreatment in his musical group and the song featured another group which was just entering the entertainment world. This grroup, which had Tu-face, Faze and black-face as members, was called "the plantashun boys"

The plantashun boys, who were appearing on air for the first time with that song, further went ahead to release more songs that endeared them to the hearts of millions of people world-wide. Their fan-base included: the young, the young at heart, the old and the old at heart. Songs like: Plantashun boys, baby don't you, tell me why and others, became anthems to the listening ears of the public until 2002.

In 2002, the group split up and every member of the group went solo and this gave Tu-face an opportunity to do his thing, in his own way.

Kennis Music, a leading music record label in Nigeria nay Africa, saw the talent in Tu-face and without delay, they signed him on. This new partnership between Kennis and Tu-face only helped in elevating Tu-face to the height where his creativity was suppoed to get him to as he churned out tracks after tracks, singles after singles and albums after albums.

With adequate publicity, songs like: Ifeni bawa, Get the vibes, African queen, Odiya, enjoyed enough air-time and like a man whose work speaks for him, his songs started earning him the wages that was due to him.

From the Kora awards for African talent of the year 2004, to A.M.E.N awards, Tu-face won them all. He was and is still a king to other musiciand of except P-Square (Another Creative minded duo to be reviewed another).

Tu-face has won a lot of local and international awards, he has performed in virtually every part of the world and he has fame and money in abundance simply because he allowed his creativity to work for him.

People of this world, please give it up for this multi-talented and creative art, Tu-face Idibia!!!

Meditation

A stage in my life brought forth moment of imagination and thoughts whereas unknown but came to be deep thoughts and dreams gave insight of little wonder, big wonder, my heart open forth my mind and dreams of an endless journey which looks so uncertain with fears of failure and hardship and here came voices all over the four walls of my rooms echoing "You have failed! You have failed!! You have failed!!!". And swiftly, I look around my small room and the only thing that captured my attention was my reading table with heaps of books as I calculate my gradepoints because I was a graduating student.

I found out that I was still struggling to maintain upper credit not to talk of distinction which has always been my wish becuase my environment made me to understand that it is only when I graduate with distinction that I can have a good touch of happiness of my life. I began to cry, I cried and cried until I almost lost my breathe. I wish the hands of the clock would move backward to when I gained admission into the school in order for me to toil like the great souls with great zeal of accomplishment who pays no attention to the burning candles of the night in order to attain accademic excellence.

And again, another voice came in a voice just above a whisper and said, life is an endless struggle where only the strongest survive and the strongest of the strong rules. "You have not failed yet" the voice said. "You are on your way to greatness if only you can visualize your thoughts, imagination and dreams". And for you to visualize your thoughts, imaginations and dreams, you have to be creative. Think of an idea that does not exist and bring it into existence.

Creativity is using your imagination to produce new ideas that no one has ever produced. You must not be an artist, fashion designers or make-up artist to be creative. No matter the field you find yourself, add value to that environment. Don't waste your time beacuse no body might have that same dream as you have.

You don't need to have all the qualification in life before you can make an impact in the society and this brings to the fact which says "whatever you find yourself doing, give the best you can to it". A very good example is william Eugene smith, an american photojournalist who was known for his refusal to compromise professional standard. He began his career at the age of 18, he had a passion to be the best and not merely to be the best but to be recognised as the best. Not merely to be recognised but to be recognised over and over and over again.

The most influential person in Eugene's life was himself. He recorded human condition. No one could really succeed at such a job yet Eugene did with his creativity, recording human condition with his photographs. He created at least 50 images so powerful that they have altered the perception of photojournalism.

Creativity takes process to grow but when it has grown, it explores and dominate the world. Success takes a gradual process because success does not come at a platter of gold. And success can never replace failure over night. It takes a process and the process is for you to plan your life. It is never too late...there is always a new begining!!!

Take a step and join the creative minds!