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This is not about “ Freedom of Speech”
And how do the speculators know that all that they have reported so far are factually correct?
Nigeria’s First Lady Aisha Buhari deserves a lot of respect.
No respect : Violence in words, insults, slander, indeed, we ( all of us/ some of us ) “are better than this”, we are for example better than this brawl in Senegal's Parliament in which during their parliamentary session convened to discuss the budget, a male opposition MP didn’t like what a female MP of the ruling Government Party said, could not control himself and therefore went over to where she was sitting and gave her a slap, whereupon she in turn picked up a chair and threw it at him, in no time at all thereby causing Senegal’s Parliament to be converted into a war zone, a free -for-all !
Now, our imagination doesn’t have to run riot, but if we could just pause for a minute and imagine the Nigerian senate in session and that - God forbid - it was Nigeria's First Lady Aisha Buhari or anyone else’s wife or first lady that had been on the receiving end of that slap by someone like the miscreant in question Aminu Mohammed Adamu. Some sentimental human rights/ amnesty international sort of fellow is going to say that the miscreant's slap wasn’t “ physical” - that sticks and stones may break someone’s bones but seditious words, calumny, whether libel, slander and assassination of character etc don’t hurt and do not deserve or merit any kind of punishment or that at best such behaviour only deserves a mild reprimand, a slap on the wrist
According to the author of the piece , Prof. Usman Yusuf , “Did Aminu kill someone to deserve such lethal force of the state on him, one might ask?”
Pathologically speaking - and he is a professor of medicine , so what does he mean by “ lethal force `” ? I ask, because 22 year old Aminu Mohammed Adamu, a lot worse off for all his shufferings , is still very much alive and hopefully in no hurry to commit a repeat of his transgressions the direct cause of an example being made of him - and thus he will have saved many others from making the same kind of unfortunate mistakes
Islamically speaking, the horrible things that he said about First Lady Aisha Buhari - that sort of backbiting, and entirely without any justification in sight is tantamount to “ eating her flesh” - i.e . murder and cannibalism - a different order of reality in connection with Shia views on Lady Aisha
“Aminu and his father could have discretely been invited by either the Emir of Azare in Bauchi state” etc, pens Prof. Yusuf
And what about those malicious twittering idiots “stationed overseas” who for their daily bread accost the Buhrais on a daily basis - should they be given a green card to continue with their havoc?
Perhaps of peripheral interest by Prof. Edward Dutton ( The Jolly Heretic) :
How Do You Spot an Autistic Woman, Such as Liz Truss?
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju,
I know that you’re not a pugilist, so how do you respond to this kind of truth:
“Social media made y'all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it”(Iron Mike)
Chika:
I am enjoying this thread.
The debate is being mis-focused. Adamu does not disagree with you or Adeshina Afolayan with respect to the core issue: abuse of power. Indeed, my reading is far more complicated: I see a maniac behavior. The First Lady needs medication.
The refocusing by you and Adeshina Afolayan is on the cultural ingredient of criticism. I can assure you that a father in Japan, Malaysia, Qatar, China, etc. will say the same. I have been to Japan and you will see how criticisms and culture are connected. Parenting cannot be divorced from safety and survivalism. I joined in anti-military protests as a young man. Most parents told their sons and daughters not to join, as they also did with #Endsars.
Aisah is the issue here, not Adamu.
PS: Nothing makes me happier more than polite arguments.
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Chika:
What do you think they call Mrs Biya in Cameroon, and Grace, the Guchi woman?
I was once at a state dinner in Uganda, and no one was standing up to even speak with the First Lady. You were on your knees.
I am not justifying this, to be sure, but to understand the subtext.
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IB:
Go to Nigerian campuses!
Baba, Mama, etc. are now used as higher, sometimes, than Professor dash
But is this naming a problem by itself?
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Ojogbon:
Do you have examples in world history where parents do not warn their kids to be careful of the state?
Philosophy and values are different from History!
We have minority parents, like Fela’s mother, all over the world, but the majority of parents, even in the West Bank, tell their kids not to throw stones on the Israeli police.
It is actually in becoming adults, as part of that transition, that kids rebel.
TF
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Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju,
A Real African like you and me ought not to be “puzzled”.
” Manners maketh man”, true, and for both boys and girls, good home-training begins at home. For anyone not clear about the matter, here’s Sierra Leone’s Rogie with his Advice to School Girls - and much of the advice applies to school boys too.
Real Africans are in deep sympathy with the plight of the destitute Almajiri . It’s a crying shame.
But (Adab) Adamu clearly was not merely, “lucidly criticising a public figure”. If anything, the miscreant was being unnecessarily abusive and very rude to Nigeria’s venerable First Lady Aisha Buhari, who is old enough to be his mother and who he ( the miscreant) is obliged to respect ( at least in public) as much as he respects his own mother. I for one am incapable of respecting someone who does not respect me, no matter how exalted he may believe himself to be in his own chosen sphere of influence whatever that may be ( finance, supernatural powers, military intelligence, electricity, proficiency in this or that language in the Babel Tower of Babylon…
As Daily Post reports, “The post ( tweet) which suggests President Muhammadu Buhari’s wife benefited from alleged corrupt practices, generated many reactions.”
How dare he accuse Nigeria’s First Lady of grand larceny, of pilfering the state treasury, as he implies? If she took him to court, would he be able to substantiate his allegation? Of course not, and after suffering many more days in detention he would eventually, probably find himself apologising and saying that his speaking out of turn was just ”a manner of speaking” and that he “didn’t mean any harm”
As a 23 year old final year university student Aminu Mohammed Adamu is not a “child”. He knows - is aware of the recommended Quranic punishment for stealing, or at least the punishment enshrined in the Sharia Law in Jigawa State where he is currently pursuing his studies.
If he was living in any of these Muslim countries and one has in mind heartlands of Islam such as Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Jordan, Turkey, the Gulf States, any of the North African states such as Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Libya, Somalia, or Sudan further South, in the East, - Indonesia, Malaysia , and the Muslim Majority States that were formerly part of the USSR , he should know the kind/s of trouble he would have brought upon himself by thus accusing the President’s First Lady or Queen of any such countries : “Su mama anchi kudin talkawa ankoshi “ : “Mama is feeding fat on poor people's money”
So, what makes Nigeria so different? Do I hear you say, “ Because Nigeria is a democracy”? “ Because he said it on Twitter ''? “Because he has a constitutional right to say whatever he wants, anywhere”? Some loudmouth who doesn’t know how to spell her name is talking about “Barbara Streisand effect” - he must have been thinking of his Bariba people because - toda raba - the whole world knows that her name is BARBRA - Barbra Streisand - so in effect were talking about the so called “ Streisand effect” and nothing has been gained - expect - inadvertently, an aura of notoriety…and maybe a somewhat deterrent effect , and hopefully, no besserwisser would like that to happen to him, if he’s not careful ( kidnapped and tortured )
Of course there are many precedents - I mostly remember Jeff Holden ( Englishman) a lecturer in African History at Legon being given less than 48 hours to leave Ghana because he said “The Money of the workers and peasants in Ghana, is not being used in their best interests” He was interviewed on the BBC shortly after he arrived at Gatwick, on the following day.
And then there's the most famous case from early Islamic history, the case of Abu Dharr Al-Ghifari ( said to be the first Muslim Socialist) he was banished to the desert because of his opposition to Muawiya ibn Abi Sufyan and the corruption and nepotism that dominated his Umayyad Caliphate
More importantly , there’s no evidence that Aisha Buhari ordered Adamu’s arrest, detention and torture - she’s absolutely not that sort of person , and my hunch is that some people /the Department of State Services did what they did, not on her orders or even with express permission from her - for all we know, she was not even informed about all this - but now that it has happened, she has been magnanimous enough to ask Nigerians for forgiveness - for what has happened to the unfortunate Aminu Mohammed Adamu thus far.
Winston Reedy ft.Joseph Cotton - Feel The Rhythm