Skip to main content

Thomas Crooks, The Trump Shooter, Is A Nigerian!

  Thomas Crooks Thomas Crooks was just an ordinary guy until he listened to his overtaxed brain.  Brain: Do you know you can be famous? Crooks: How? Brain: By attempting the infamous!  So, Crooks picked his father’s AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle. He listened to his confused brain again and headed to a rally nearby. Minutes later, he did a crooked thing by firing at Donald Trump!  Crooks wasn't a known professional crook. But he obviously had a enough crooked mind to store explosives in his car and home.  Yes, the Trump shooter was one man. But his name, “Crooks,” gave the impression of a multiple negative character. His crooked act and plans probably justified the addition of letter “s” to a his name, making him one but many crooks! Crooks’  “crooked shot missed Trump by an inch. Thomas Crooks was probably so crooked that he couldn't think straight. But thank God he couldn't shoot straight, either. Otherwise, the world would have missed a daring, straight...
Post a Comment

Soon, Camerounian Fish Will Issue Bakassi Visa

 

Let me warn all of you present here this morning that this is a funeral session. Not a circus show. So, you are all expected to cry. No, weep! Or, at least, pretend to. If I see your teeth in laughter, I would report you to the undertaker-general, Chief Babasanjo.

Beware! He brooks no nonsense. In fact, one wrong move and he might bury you with the people of Bakassi. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust. If the Lord won’t have you, the devil must! 

 

Look, you better start weeping now because tomorrow, you may wake to find you have no roof over your head.  It doesn’t matter if you have ten Nigerian passports and a worthless National ID card. Even if you’re from Gwagwalada, near Abuja, tomorrow you could be ‘donated’ to Chad. That’s the new PDP “zoning formula”. It’s all in national interest and for international peace.

 

Hey! The new “zoning formula” has grown thick, fatal horns. After bungling a supposed “zoning” of party positions, Obasanjo and PDP now zone Nigeria – both nationals and land mass – to foreign lands. So, start weeping. You might even win a national award, if you weep more than Florence Ita-Giwa. You see, that woman wept recently when 3rd term was murdered. Her flood of tears almost drowned the lawmakers. And her boss probably enjoyed watching the flood of her tears. So, he thought of how to make her cry some more. What better way than to send Ita-Giwa’s relations to Cameroon? 

 

Busybody: Madam, how do you feel now that Bakassi has been “dashed” to Cameroun?

Madam Bakassi: How am I supposed to feel? You want me to cry so that you would say I cried? In any case, don’t you know that I finished all my tears weeping for 3rd term?

Busybody: Are you saying you have no drop of compunction left for Bakassi?

Madam Bakassi: I don’t know what you mean by ‘acupuncture’. I’m neither Chinese, Japanese nor Indian. Bakassi was a virgin land that offered opportunities. I grabbed it and climbed. Now that it’s no more, why should I worry? 

Busybody: So, is it true that you only pretended to be representing the interest of Bakassi people? Some people say you’re not actually from that place that is why you do not feel for the land. Is it true that you are from Oron?

Madam Bakassi: Nonsense! I cannot answer that kind of question. Even if I’m not from Bakassi, I have a protruding ‘Bakassi’.

Busybody: Which of them, Madam? Bakassi of Nigeria or Bakassi of Cameroun?

 

In two months, Nigerians in Bakassi would become forced indigenes of Cameroun. Especially, as many of them have sworn they won’t shift ground. Well, it’s not as if Cameroun is very interested in them. Only on the deposits under the land. So, Paul Biya may allow them to stay without visa. That way, I can still visit my grandfather’s ‘great, greater, greatest’ grandmother. That is, if I can swim across the ocean with my Nigerian National ID card stuck in my mouth.

Gendarme: C’est … 

Me: Sorry, I don’t speak French, especially when I’m swimming.

Gendarme: Hey! I say, you Nigerian, Camerounian or Bakassian? 

Me: Well, I’m not sure, but I have a National ID card.

Gendarme: Who signed it, a Nigerian or a Camerounian fish? 

Me: Look, why all these questions? I thought we were African brothers? Besides, my people were counted in this village, abi? Now, do I need permission from your fish to swim here?

Gendarme: Yes. Bakassi of Nigeria, no more. Now, they – your people, land; plus water and fish - are from Bakassi of Cameroun.

 

Our leaders are really generous. Today, they chose to forget the origin of Bakassi. An unknown, unwanted area, industrious people of Cross River and Akwa Ibom ‘discovered’ it while trying to ‘catch’ fishes there for a living. Initially, they merely visited the settlement and returned to their real homes. Until some smart fellow decided to settle there, apparently to escape the inconvenience of traveling up and down. Suddenly, talk of oil in the area raised blood pressure. And turned history on its head. Today, the struggle for Bakassi is neither about the fish, nor about the people. It’s oil politics. 

 

Okay, I heard one ‘bigmouth’ official has promised to resettle the Bakassi people in Nigeria. Oh yeah? Don’t rejoice yet. How many displaced Nigerians have the government ever resettle? Just their pockets, families and, well, concubines. Take the Ikeja bomb blast victims. After big promises, many millions of naira spirited from the coffers. But victims never got any relief. Yet, the fund was for ‘relief materials.’  Few months at the Ikeja Police College, they were driven off the fields. To their death, perhaps. That’s resettlement, abi? 

 

Anyway, now that Bakassi has been “dashed” to Cameroun based on faulty premises, how many are we? Why are we always in a hurry to make fools of ourselves? If Obasanjo knew he would cede Bakassi to Cameroun, why did he deceive himself organising census? Can we still boast with that pretentious exercise? 

 

Oh, yeah! All of you weep! Weep on behalf of your grandparents. On behalf of yourself. And on behalf of your great grand children. If you weep the most, I swear, you might even win awards simultaneously from Nigeria and Cameroun. Weep because no part of Nigeria is safe. A tiny village in Badagry can enter into a treaty with Benin Republic and it becomes binding on Nigeria. That’s the implication of the Bakassi episode. 

 

But then, check out a brighter side of the nonsense. What would they really lose if not identified as Nigerians? The fish would still be in the water. Yes, certain ‘rules of engagement’ in the fishing settlement may change. But they might fare better in a Camerounian Bakassi than they did in a Nigerian one. All they need do is speak Efik to the fishes and they would all run into the nets. 

 

Again, note. This is a funeral session for Bakassi. Some have testified that as Nigerians, the Bakassi people enjoyed very little care from the government. The amenities were non-existent. It may be better on the other side. Look, maybe you should weep no more. Common, smile! What some people pay millions to acquire, they have free of charge! Dual citizenship!

 

 

  • First published in Saturday Sun of  June 24, 2006

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Losing My Senses

    I’ve been thinking. In the face of much disenchantment, what would happen if I lost my senses. Like many a depressed Nigerian, the mind veers off sometimes. Then, I wonder if life would be better without “number 5.”    If, for instance, I lost my power of “taste,” I could eat just anything, couldn’t I? That, I’m sure, would be the solution to the Obasanjo-induced hunger in the land. I could swallow stone, the way I do  eba , and still go on strong. On the other hand, I may not even be hungry, since I’d have no feeling,  abi ?  Indeed, I won’t need to know if a particular food had salt or fish or meat in it. It wouldn’t matter if the dish were Yoruba, Igbira, Efik, Igbo, Ibibio, Hausa, etc. Just stuff the thing down the throat, drink water and say thank you. I could drink tea with vinegar and lick my lips like I just had a breakfast of sugar sauce. All those would save me the problem of having to buy those tiny things that seem inconsequential but a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Go to London and Die!

  My daughter just loves jingles. For instance, once AIT signature tune starts, she surfaces before the TV set - prancing like a calf.  Super Story, Binta and Friends , etc also have a similar effect. She’s barely two, but m-e-e-n, she has already cut her own jingles. Samples: “I want to poopoo”; “I want to eat because I’m tired”; “You harassing me?”   But the other day, the girl ran from the TV. As if she saw a Chimpanzee. Or a masquerade. Or a ghost pinched her from behind. The way she shouted, you’d think she entered a “London trap” – like Alamieyeseigha. By the time I ran to the TV, a CNN newscaster was talking about a horrible New Orleans woman named Katrina.    Another day, the moment I switched to CNN, my baby turned to go. Just as a figure blocked the screen, shaking both hands like an  okrika  seller. The girl ran. I’ve blurred vision but somebody said the figure was General Olusegun Obasanjo. But then, you know how Nigerians lie against the p...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sometimes, I Forget My Name

    My wife and I get into a fight often when she misplaces her wedding ring. But I go mad when she forgets my baby somewhere and expects me to find her. “Skott dear, have you seen the baby? I hope I didn’t leave her in the bathtub with the tap running?” But I hardly can remember we have a baby until she shows me a picture with a “missing person” label. A nine-month-old girl who even forgets to say, “good morning daddy.” She only smiles every time she sees me, making my wife furiously jealous. And I can’t remember what for.   I am hardly sure of anything these days. I greet people “Good morning” and they tell me it’s already afternoon. I say some things and people say I lied. But I suspect the only time I ever lied was when I promised my wife I would “shift” power to her after our marriage. She reminded me the other day and I told her I couldn’t remember. Ok, I also lied when I filled an employment form. Under “Nationality,” I wrote: “Nigerian.” Now, I’m no longer sure. T...
Post a Comment
Read more