Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column

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Farooq A. Kperogi

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Mar 23, 2020, 12:59:54 PM3/23/20
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Sunday, March 22, 2020

Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column

By Farooq A. Kperogi
Twitter:@farooqkperogi

After so much pressure, which my widely shared Saturday Tribune back-page column added to, the Aso Rock cabal finally forced Buhari, a dementia-plagued, insentient old geezer who masquerades as "president," to address the nation today on the new Coronavirus.

Although his speech was pre-recorded, (which means it wasn't live), his handlers couldn't get him to retake the portion where he mispronounced COVID-19 as "Kovik one nine"! And the video clip of the mortifying pronunciational disaster was shared on social media by Buhari's paid social media aide by the name of Bashir Ahmad.

Incompetence is supposed to be the strong suit of the Buhari regime, but they've shown themselves to be incredibly incompetent at even being incompetent!

More crucially, though, the video is powerful, irrefutable evidentiary proof of my assertions (which I repeated in my Saturday Tribune column) that Buhari is too wracked by the ravages of dementia to even know what's happening around him, much less in the world.

There’s no sentient, living being on this earth today— and certainly no world leader—who doesn’t know that there’s a global pandemic tipping over the world that is called the new coronavirus or COVID-19. Watch the video below:

Apparently, his speech writer avoided “coronavirus” because Buhari’s dementia-inspired speech impediment would make him slur the word. COVID-19 is easier to say, yet Buhari bungled it. He obviously had never heard it said anywhere even when it's the most commonly heard word on earth now.

That is all the evidence you need to know that Buhari is practically in the land of the living dead. As I said in my Saturday column, Nigeria is currently presidentless.

Postscript:
Buhari's social media aide, Bashir Ahmad, took down the video clip of Buhari's 27-second broadcast a few hours after this post, which went viral on social media. But the video has already been downloaded and shared by millions of people. As usual, Buhari's handlers chose to close the stable door after the horse has bolted!

Related Articles:
Coronavirus: Why Buhari Won't Address Nigerians
Buhari's Physical and Mental Health is Now a National Emergency
The Tragedy of the Abba Kyari Surrogate Presidency
Buhari Doesn't Rule Nigeria. His Wife Conforms It
Aisha Buhari and the Evil Aso Rock Cabal
Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

Harrow, Kenneth

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Mar 23, 2020, 2:08:53 PM3/23/20
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say what you will, a country that permits free press to exist is apt to be more just in the long run since govt abuses have a chance of being reported on and seenby the people.]
farooq wrote of buhari, below, "After so much pressure, which my widely shared Saturday Tribune back-page column added to, the Aso Rock cabal finally forced Buhari, a dementia-plagued, insentient old geezer who masquerades as "president," to address the nation today on the new Coronavirus."

if he had written the equivalent of the presidents in rwanda, burundi, or the drc--cases about which i know--he'd be dead or in prison, and the president would continue to do as he pleases with no public check on his actions.

i have always been impressed by the nigeria press, ever since living in cameroon in 1977-79 where there was no free press whatsoever. when i went over to nigeria and saw the guardian and other papers, i was astounded.

you all should know about one troubling recent case in burundi: the iwacu 4. https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/02/04/burundi-journalists-convicted-flawed-trial

if you want tohelp, write a letter of protest to the burundian authorities. here is the url for the amnesty action: https://www.amnestyusa.org/urgent-actions/urgent-action-update-journalists-sentenced-to-imprisonment-burundi-ua-149-19/
ken
On 30 January, the Bubanza Tribunal in northern Burundi sentenced journalists Agnès Ndirubusa, Christine Kamikazi, Egide Harerimana and Térence Mpozenzi to two years and six months in prison. The initial charge of “conspiring to undermine state security” was changed during the sentencing to a charge of “impossible attempt to undermine state security”. The tribunal acquitted their ...

The conviction of four Burundian journalists in a flawed trial on January 30, 2020 is a clear example of the misuse of the justice system to stifle freedom of expression, Human Rights watch said ...


kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

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Michael Afolayan

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Mar 23, 2020, 2:59:44 PM3/23/20
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I am 100% in agreement with Ken here, and I have said the same in the past, rating the press freedom in Nigeria higher than what entailed in many European countries and the United Kingdom, not to even mention China, Russia, the other Eastern Block or the Middle East. Come to think about it, despite the death of Dele Giwa, and even during the Abacha regime, the Nigerian press was hardly ever docile. Of course, you have to pray for them, as I do weekly for Farooq. whenever I'm reading him, wishing him well and hoping he would never accept any invitation to Abuja any time soon, regardless of the benignity of such invitation. Farooq's column is well circulated and well read in Nigeria - I know that for sure, I just came back from there! That the "Tribune" office has not been burned down and the editor has not been summoned to Ask Rock for questioning have agitated my intellectual curiosity.  Even our other colleagues on. these forums, Professors Olukotun and Olaopa have not been butt-licking with the government of Nigeria in their columns either. My point: regardless of how we slice it, it is some degree of credit to the freedom of the press that we enjoy in Nigeria. Would it be something to celebrate? No, we are to there yet; but let us face it, it's not bad at all.

Thanks, Ken; your observation is valid!

Michael O. Afoláyan




Farooq A. Kperogi

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Mar 23, 2020, 2:59:44 PM3/23/20
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Ken,

If I lived in Nigeria, the same fate that befell Burundi journalists might have befallen me, too. But my geographic distance hasn't even given me complete "immunity." The government has mulled (actually planned, according to insiders who revealed this to me) assassinating me here in the US.

An entire government-sponsored online troll factory called the Buhari Media Center has been created and unleashed on me. They invent libelous smears against me in hopes that they will get me to stop writing about their ineptitude and fascist excesses. Hasn't worked and won't work.

The Nigerian domestic media has been effectively tamed.  So there's nothing to make a song and dance about here.

Farooq


Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM6PR12MB3419879E7F2D4A435A8E40F7DAF00%40DM6PR12MB3419.namprd12.prod.outlook.com.

Harrow, Kenneth

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Mar 23, 2020, 4:21:01 PM3/23/20
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ah. it's always good to learn the truth. sometimes it is the hard way!! so sorry they are after you like that.
i know freedom of the press isn't absolute; i know people might print untruths, etc. but we learn to rely on certain sources, and if they were not out there for us to read and evaluate, we'd be left in the dark.
keep on shining your light.
ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

Sent: Monday, March 23, 2020 2:46 PM
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Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column
 

Farooq A. Kperogi

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Mar 24, 2020, 6:24:41 AM3/24/20
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Not too fast, Oga Michael. Recall that my column was stopped at the Daily Trust at the prompting of the presidency. Tribune has also been under tremendous pressure from the presidency to stop my column, but the people there have refused to give in to the threats, intimidation, and blackmail of the presidency.

Conscientious reporters are often attacked, harassed or jailed; social media critics are "disappeared," fired from jobs; critical, anti-regime broadcast stations are shut down arbitrarily, etc. Read this November 10, 2019 Premium Times report titled "Under Buhari, Nigeria records worst attacks on journalists in 34 years — Report"    

Snippet: "An analysis by www.pressattack.ng, published by the Coalition for Whistleblowers Protection and Press Freedom, shows that 352 total cases of attacks and harassments on journalists have been recorded from 1985 till date.

The year 2018 was initially recorded by the analysis to have witnessed the highest number of attacks (58). But the group’s latest release shows that 2019 has already surpassed that record with the 61 attacks so far, and is still counting.

According to the research, as at May this year, the total number of physical attacks on reporters was 189; equipment searches and seizures, 9; equipment or property damage, 17; arrests, 60; denial of access, 21; threats, 44 and ‘harassments’, 12.

Of these attacks, 322 were on media houses, while the remaining 30 were meted on individuals. Also, 95 per cent of journalists affected were males while the rest were females.

About 114 of such attacks were carried out by uniformed personnel (military, police, SSS, SARS, NSCDC, prison officials, EFCC etc)."

Full disclosure: I was interviewed for an expert opinion on the story.

Farooq


Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/576937573.525401.1584989815362%40mail.yahoo.com.

OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Mar 24, 2020, 9:43:54 AM3/24/20
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I do not agree that the Nigeriam domestic press has been effectively tamed given the facts of what they write and standing their ground without rushing abroad.

I join Ken in celebrating the Nigerian media.

OAA



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Date: 23/03/2020 19:08 (GMT+00:00)
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Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column

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Ken,

If I lived in Nigeria, the same fate that befell Burundi journalists might have befallen me, too. But my geographic distance hasn't even given me complete "immunity." The government has mulled (actually planned, according to insiders who revealed this to me) assassinating me here in the US.

An entire government-sponsored online troll factory called the Buhari Media Center has been created and unleashed on me. They invent libelous smears against me in hopes that they will get me to stop writing about their ineptitude and fascist excesses. Hasn't worked and won't work.

The Nigerian domestic media has been effectively tamed.  So there's nothing to make a song and dance about here.

Farooq


Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

On Mon, Mar 23, 2020 at 2:08 PM Harrow, Kenneth <har...@msu.edu> wrote:

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OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Mar 24, 2020, 9:44:10 AM3/24/20
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Ken.

Nigeria did not have a free press thrust on it on a platter of gold.

Members of the press had to unite to fight running battles with the Babangida/ Abacha government who wanted to cow them  dodging. military bullets because they saw no reason why Nigerian press should not be reduced to what obtains in the countries you cite such as Burundi and Cameroons.

OAA



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Date: 23/03/2020 18:22 (GMT+00:00)
To: USAAfrica Dialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column

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Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column
 
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Harrow, Kenneth

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Mar 24, 2020, 1:36:32 PM3/24/20
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we have one of the "refugees" of those attacks on the press, here at msu, folu ogundimu. brave and wonderful people.
ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of OLAYINKA AGBETUYI <yagb...@hotmail.com>
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Michael Afolayan

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Mar 25, 2020, 9:49:25 AM3/25/20
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"Members of the press had to unite to fight running battles with the Babangida/ Abacha government who wanted to cow them, dodging military bullets because they saw no reason why Nigerian press should not be reduced to what obtains in the countries you cite such as Burundi and Cameroons." OAA

Still, that is credit to the relative "protection" enjoyed by the Nigerian press. If its ranks could united to fight Babangida/Abacha and survive and its remnants still refuses to be docile, we have come a long way; and of course, we still have a long way to go. 

MOA




Salimonu Kadiri

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Mar 25, 2020, 3:27:58 PM3/25/20
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​Kenneth,
​Your negative reaction to the claim of Farooq Kperogi earlier that his Saturday column in the Nigerian Saturday Tribune newspaper, had forced Aso Rock cabal to compel Buhari, a dementia-plagued, insentient old geezer who masquerades as 'president' to address the nation on the new Coronavirus, has been obliterated by your acceptance of his own version of the truth. For all we know, Mallam Farooq Kperogi is not a physician and, even if he were, President Muhammadu Buhari is not his patient. Granting that Kperogi were a qualified physician and Buhari were to be his patient, the Hippocratic Oath that all medical doctors normally swear to uphold makes it unethical for Kperogi to make public the health condition of Buhari without his consent. Here, Farooq Kperogi has usurped the right of a professional medical practitioner to declare Buhari demented without conducting any medical examination on him.

​The truth which you seemed to have learnt from Farooq Kperogi is his diagnosis of Buhari as a dementia-plagued and insentient old geezer, which is just a repetition of part of his previous medical diagnoses on Buhari. On what did Farooq Kperogi premise his truthful dementia diagnosis of Buhari? Kperogi answered the question self as follows, "Buhari's *Kovik One Nine* Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column." According to Farooq Kperogi, the way Muhammadu Buhari pronounced COVID-19 in his broadcast to Nigerians on the new Coronavirus is what depicted Buhari to him as a dementia-plagued. It is very plain that not even a logopaedic wizard in English can differentiate the pronunciation of the alphabet, C, from K as claimed, spelled and credited to Buhari by Farooq Kperogi in KOVIK instead of COVID. The President, obviously pronounced COVIK instead of COVID but Farooq Kperogi has mischievously distorted Buhari's audio-vision pronunciation of COVIK to KOVIK. It is not unlikely that in Buhari's mother tongue the pronunciation of the last alphabet in COVID is pronounced K just as when English speaking Oyo, Ekiti and Ijesha persons of Yorubaland usually pronounce, for instance, the word Church as Source. Normal Nigerians understand Buhari's English dialect and accent. Furthermore, Farooq Kperogi as an eccentric Associate professor of English language took offence in Buhari's pronunciation of nineteen (19) as One-Nine. For decades a fraudster has been referred to in spoken English in Nigeria as a Four-One-Nine criminal, in reference to the special 419 criminal laws. It is never pronounced Four-hundred and nineteen but 4-1-9. The US incidents in which some hijackers crashed their planes on 11 September 2001, is always referred to as 9/11 incidents, orally or written, and no one has ever attributed Americans pronunciation of 9/11 incidents to dementia. When in his televised broadcast, Buhari read COVIK One-Nine every normal Nigerian understood him as saying COVID-19 and nothing else. Farooq Kperogi self grew up, and received all his education in Nigeria before becoming academic migrant in the US and as such he can only mimic American nasal sound of speaking English. And no matter how much he struggles to twist his tongues to produce the American nasal sound in spoken English, he will always be recognised for not speaking in the accents of a person from either the Northern or Southern part of the US. His Arabic name, Farooq, is spelled and pronounced by most Nigerians as FARUKU. The word Yoruba is spelled and pronounced by the Benin and Urhobo as Yonuba. Buhari speaks English in one of the various dialects and accents of that language in Nigeria which does not make him a dementia just like anyone pronouncing the name Farooq as Faruku.

​Following your submission that what Farooq Kperogi wrote about Buhari would have caused him death or imprisonment if he were to write such things about presidents in Rwanda, Burundi, or DRC, Farooq responded : If I lived in Nigeria, the same fate that befell Burundi journalists might have befallen me too; The government has mulled (actually planned, according to insiders who revealed this to me) assassinating me here in the US; They invent libellous smears against me in hopes that they will get me to stop writing about their ineptitude and fascist excesses. When I read this, I was compelled to consult medical dictionary to look for the description of Farooq Kperogi's self-portrayed character. Therein, I found narcissism which is subdivided into three basic personality types (1) Narcissistic personality, defined as a person characterized by excessive self-love and self-absorption, unrealistic views about one's own attributes and little regards for others. (2) A paranoid personality, defined as a person who denies real self because he/she sees it weak and inadequate and therefore invents a grandiose (big) self-image and pretends to be it. The paranoid wears a mask of existential importance and wants other people to collude with him/her and see him/her as important. When the paranoid feels belittled and demeaned, he/she gets angry at the person he/she thinks is degrading him/her. He/she is always fighting with people and accusing them of doing what they have not done; he/she is suspicious and does not trust anyone. (3) Anti-social personality : I skip this since its definition is not relevant to the subject at hand. Farooq Kperogi has not only invented a grandiose self-image but also invented a threat to his life by the government of Nigeria because of his constant diagnoses of leaders of the government with wishful illnesses. From the invented platform he proceeded to exhibit personal symptoms of hallucination i.e. hearing and seeing things that do not exist, and delusion i.e. believing in things that are untrue. His hallucination and delusion caused him to assert that the Nigerian government actually planned to assassinate him in the US because of his writings against the government but the paranoid claimed his insiders (spies) within the government revealed the purported plan of assassination to him!! Yet, the Nigerian Tribune where Farooq Kperogi regularly used to publish his journalistic junks is in Nigeria and if the government has considered his writings damaging or obstructive to its interests, it would have taken necessary actions against the newspaper. While the Nigerian government, like other countries of the world, is concerned about curtailing the spread of COVID-19, the primary concern of those beset with brain aneurism is how bad COVID-19 has been pronounced in a television broadcast by Muhammadu Buhari and not measures being put in place to protect lives. And for the quack to proceed to diagnose Buhari a dementia on the basis of his pronunciation of COVID-19 is to me insane.
S. Kadiri        


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Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column
 

Femi Segun

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Mar 25, 2020, 4:29:20 PM3/25/20
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''Yet, the Nigerian Tribune where Farooq Kperogi regularly used to publish his journalistic junks is in Nigeria and if the government has considered his writings damaging or obstructive to its interests, it would have taken necessary actions against the newspaper '' Ogbeni Salimonu Kadiri,
Please what are the necessary steps that you expect the Government to take against the Paper? In your unbridled zeal to defend anything written or spoken against this your beloved President, are you not unwittingly calling for dictatorship, repression and tyranny that we fought against under the military rule? If the Press is not free, what is the use of claiming that Nigeria is a democracy? And by the way, I  have not heard where Ekiti people pronounce Church as Source. My dialect is Ekiti and I don't pronounce Church as Source and by the way, if this ever happens, it will be done with agility and presence of mind-which is the point you appear to willingly ignore in Farooq Kpeorgi's write up on the unpresidential weakly manner in which tPMB made his broadcast. As mortals. we can be sick, which falls under what JS Mill will regard as a self-regarding action. But sickness becomes others regarding action, as the public is left to suffer from poor leadership under the sick public official. Objectivity is very critical for meaningful engagement. 

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Harrow, Kenneth

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Mar 25, 2020, 4:29:20 PM3/25/20
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salimonu
my posting re farooq's column had to do only with freedom of the press. please don't ask me to get in between you and him in your disparagements of each other.

i'm not sure how others on the listserv feel about the personal attacks, but i am made uncomfortable by them. as for the issues at stake over buhari's competence, i have no insight or knowledge. the only countries on which i feel safe pronouncing are rwanda and burundi, and most people on this list are not terribly interested in them.
ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Salimonu Kadiri <ogunl...@hotmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, March 25, 2020 3:25 PM
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Farooq A. Kperogi

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Mar 25, 2020, 5:39:17 PM3/25/20
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Chief Femi,

Salimonu Kadiri's drivel automatically goes to my trash folder, so I don't get to read his ignorant, diseased thoughts. That smart people like you take him seriously enough to read and respond to him is a marvel to me.

Farooq

Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperogi
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CAN_y-4rgwcDEbfGbefUYLb0kAAdWpt_1omk7SWGtjuv9iB48Vg%40mail.gmail.com.

OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Mar 25, 2020, 5:39:36 PM3/25/20
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I know certain dialects in the north due to their native tongue peculiarities pronounce 'f' as 'p' and vice versa.  e. g People as fieful and farm as parm.  

There is nothing wrong with that within group context. As an English as Second Language teaching specialist we see that as our point of engagement for inter cultural differences and exchanges

At national level President Buhari could defuse the tension by showing his humorous side by making a joke at his own expense in subsequent presentations ( of course at his media aides' promptings- this falls squarely within their remit).  I can recall how Alagba Wole Soyinka handled a similar situation in ' Barthes, Leftocracy and Other Mythologies' inaugural when he dramatised the confusion between the two words ' la langue' and ' l'engage' from the point of view of an anglophone speaker by stumbling on each before he suddenly realized quizzically  irs the other he wanted. It provided a comical overall effect that enriched the lecture ( I almost fell off my chair with the rib tickling episode.)

Mr President could seize the occasion to make a policy statement on the commencement of teaching of the other lingua francas across the country.  By now, frankly there should be legions of Hausa language schools dotted all over the south from Lagos to Port Harcourt to Enugu and Ikot Ekpene.  While there should be Igbo and Yoruba teaching schools from Sokoto to Kaduna to Kano  Makurdi and Maiduguri.  As far as I stated before, apart from the cultural integration it formally promotes, it will facilitate job creation prospects and programs.

OAA




Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
-------- Original message --------
From: Salimonu Kadiri <ogunl...@hotmail.com>
Date: 25/03/2020 19:29 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Sv: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column

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​Kenneth,
​Your negative reaction to the claim of Farooq Kperogi earlier that his Saturday column in the Nigerian Saturday Tribune newspaper, had forced Aso Rock cabal to compel Buhari, a dementia-plagued, insentient old geezer who masquerades as 'president' to address the nation on the new Coronavirus, has been obliterated by your acceptance of his own version of the truth. For all we know, Mallam Farooq Kperogi is not a physician and, even if he were, President Muhammadu Buhari is not his patient. Granting that Kperogi were a qualified physician and Buhari were to be his patient, the Hippocratic Oath that all medical doctors normally swear to uphold makes it unethical for Kperogi to make public the health condition of Buhari without his consent. Here, Farooq Kperogi has usurped the right of a professional medical practitioner to declare Buhari demented without conducting any medical examination on him.

​The truth which you seemed to have learnt from Farooq Kperogi is his diagnosis of Buhari as a dementia-plagued and insentient old geezer, which is just a repetition of part of his previous medical diagnoses on Buhari. On what did Farooq Kperogi premise his truthful dementia diagnosis of Buhari? Kperogi answered the question self as follows, "Buhari's *Kovik One Nine* Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column." According to Farooq Kperogi, the way Muhammadu Buhari pronounced COVID-19 in his broadcast to Nigerians on the new Coronavirus is what depicted Buhari to him as a dementia-plagued. It is very plain that not even a logopaedic wizard in English can differentiate the pronunciation of the alphabet, C, from K as claimed, spelled and credited to Buhari by Farooq Kperogi in KOVIK instead of COVID. The President, obviously pronounced COVIK instead of COVID but Farooq Kperogi has mischievously distorted Buhari's audio-vision pronunciation of COVIK to KOVIK. It is not unlikely that in Buhari's mother tongue the pronunciation of the last alphabet in COVID is pronounced K just as when English speaking Oyo, Ekiti and Ijesha persons of Yorubaland usually pronounce, for instance, the word Church as Source. Normal Nigerians understand Buhari's English dialect and accent. Furthermore, Farooq Kperogi as an eccentric Associate professor of English language took offence in Buhari's pronunciation of nineteen (19) as One-Nine. For decades a fraudster has been referred to in spoken English in Nigeria as a Four-One-Nine criminal, in reference to the special 419 criminal laws. It is never pronounced Four-hundred and nineteen but 4-1-9. The US incidents in which some hijackers crashed their planes on 11 September 2001, is always referred to as 9/11 incidents, orally or written, and no one has ever attributed Americans pronunciation of 9/11 incidents to dementia. When in his televised broadcast, Buhari read COVIK One-Nine every normal Nigerian understood him as saying COVID-19 and nothing else. Farooq Kperogi self grew up, and received all his education in Nigeria before becoming academic migrant in the US and as such he can only mimic American nasal sound of speaking English. And no matter how much he struggles to twist his tongues to produce the American nasal sound in spoken English, he will always be recognised for not speaking in the accents of a person from either the Northern or Southern part of the US. His Arabic name, Farooq, is spelled and pronounced by most Nigerians as FARUKU. The word Yoruba is spelled and pronounced by the Benin and Urhobo as Yonuba. Buhari speaks English in one of the various dialects and accents of that language in Nigeria which does not make him a dementia just like anyone pronouncing the name Farooq as Faruku.

​Following your submission that what Farooq Kperogi wrote about Buhari would have caused him death or imprisonment if he were to write such things about presidents in Rwanda, Burundi, or DRC, Farooq responded : If I lived in Nigeria, the same fate that befell Burundi journalists might have befallen me too; The government has mulled (actually planned, according to insiders who revealed this to me) assassinating me here in the US; They invent libellous smears against me in hopes that they will get me to stop writing about their ineptitude and fascist excesses. When I read this, I was compelled to consult medical dictionary to look for the description of Farooq Kperogi's self-portrayed character. Therein, I found narcissism which is subdivided into three basic personality types (1) Narcissistic personality, defined as a person characterized by excessive self-love and self-absorption, unrealistic views about one's own attributes and little regards for others. (2) A paranoid personality, defined as a person who denies real self because he/she sees it weak and inadequate and therefore invents a grandiose (big) self-image and pretends to be it. The paranoid wears a mask of existential importance and wants other people to collude with him/her and see him/her as important. When the paranoid feels belittled and demeaned, he/she gets angry at the person he/she thinks is degrading him/her. He/she is always fighting with people and accusing them of doing what they have not done; he/she is suspicious and does not trust anyone. (3) Anti-social personality : I skip this since its definition is not relevant to the subject at hand. Farooq Kperogi has not only invented a grandiose self-image but also invented a threat to his life by the government of Nigeria because of his constant diagnoses of leaders of the government with wishful illnesses. From the invented platform he proceeded to exhibit personal symptoms of hallucination i.e. hearing and seeing things that do not exist, and delusion i.e. believing in things that are untrue. His hallucination and delusion caused him to assert that the Nigerian government actually planned to assassinate him in the US because of his writings against the government but the paranoid claimed his insiders (spies) within the government revealed the purported plan of assassination to him!! Yet, the Nigerian Tribune where Farooq Kperogi regularly used to publish his journalistic junks is in Nigeria and if the government has considered his writings damaging or obstructive to its interests, it would have taken necessary actions against the newspaper. While the Nigerian government, like other countries of the world, is concerned about curtailing the spread of COVID-19, the primary concern of those beset with brain aneurism is how bad COVID-19 has been pronounced in a television broadcast by Muhammadu Buhari and not measures being put in place to protect lives. And for the quack to proceed to diagnose Buhari a dementia on the basis of his pronunciation of COVID-19 is to me insane.
S. Kadiri        
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Buhari’s “Kovik One Nine” Pronunciational Mishap Proves My Saturday Column
 

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Salimonu Kadiri

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Mar 25, 2020, 5:39:36 PM3/25/20
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​Thank you Kenneth,
​Your admiration for freedom of the press as practised in Nigeria vis à vis the Saturday column of Farooq Kperogi's diagnosis of President Buhari's as a dementia-plagued was what attracted my involvement in the discussion. As I am not engaged in any disparagement with Farooq whatsoever, your assumption that I am soliciting for your support against him is not correct.

​My point of departure on this matter is your own established fact, whereby you stated, "I know freedom of the press isn't absolute; I know people might print untruths." For me, to expose untruths in a published material by Farooq is not a personal attack. I stand to be corrected on that.
S. Kadiri


Skickat: den 25 mars 2020 20:46

Salimonu Kadiri

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Mar 25, 2020, 9:52:11 PM3/25/20
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​Femi Segun : I am not against criticism of President Buhari as long as it is objective facts-based. It does not seem sane when quacks jump up to diagnose Buhari, or anyone at all, for dementia because of a pronunciation of a particular expression and label that criticism.

​Concerning freedom of the press, you must know that there is no absolut freedom, in all its varieties, anywhere in the world. If you don't believe it, find out why the American, Edward Snoden, is a refugee in Russia?; Why Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 75 years imprisonment but was pardoned by Barack Obama on leaving office? Why is Julian Assange being incarcerated in a London prison pending court decision whether he should be repatriated to the US or not? Why is US asking for his repatriation?

As for the Ekiti dialect when it comes to CHE sound, you may probably have modernised and trained your tongue to pronounce the CHE sound correctly. Of recent, I met an Ekiti man who pronounced the name Innocent as Unoshent. That was as a consequence of his Ekiti dialect  although I knew he meant Innocent.
S. Kadiri 


Från: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> för Femi Segun <solor...@gmail.com>
Skickat: den 25 mars 2020 21:11
Till: 'Chika Onyeani' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>

Femi Segun

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Mar 26, 2020, 12:15:01 AM3/26/20
to 'Chika Onyeani' via USA Africa Dialogue Series
This link provides an insight to what might be in the offing in respect of press freedom in Nigeria. https://punchng.com/villa-coverage-pdp-csos-knock-buhari-for-barring-punch-others/

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM6PR07MB5020CEA4DD897ED307CD215CAECE0%40DM6PR07MB5020.namprd07.prod.outlook.com.
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