Obi Cubano's Mother's Burial in Oba vs. Yusuf Buhari's Royal Wedding

[Okey Iheduru]

Mr. Obi Cubano "sprays" his own money and receives 46 cows for the carnival called his mother's burial in Oba and all the holier-than-thou "pundits" were besides themselves about such a "travesty", "debasing of our morality,' "crime against the Naira," bla bla bla moral outrage of all kinds, etc. How dare Obi and his friends spend their money? So far, we haven't heard that he stole the money from anyone. The USA-Africa Dialogue Forum was animated for days with debates for or against.  We even saw suggestions for future research about "Obi Cubano Entrepreneurship Model" -- perhaps the most reasonable of all the flatulence that followed that mother of all burials.

Meanwhile, an unemployed youth and son of the president of the Poverty Capital of the World who was so poor in 2014 that his "friends" had to contribute N25 million to pay for his party primaries form; the wizard who has vowed to kill corruption before corruption kills Nigeria; the man who told the world how lazy the youth in his country are, etc., etc. throws the mother of all "royal weddings" attended by over 80 private jets and guests each of whom was lavished with I-Pads and I-phones (both worth about N580,000!), designer anything sold in Dubai shops and plaza's and/or manufactured in Switzerland, etc. ... and not a word on this forum!

Lord have mercy! 

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Okey C. Iheduru

e-mail: okeyi...@gmail.com

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

Fine one Okey.

Both are challenging,if not disturbing.

The Obi Cubana wealth spray likely involved much less money than the Buhari wedding.

The Cubana spray likely attracted more attention because of it's sense of showbiz and beceause he used to be unknown.

The Buhari wedding demonstrates what is known about some of the Nigerian elite.

Cubana is using his money. The Buhari wedding is likely using our money but we are used to our money being so used.

I wonder, though, what the relative attention to the Cubana event and the Buhari event is and will be.

Which will attract more media and commentator attention?

I'm responding, not to whitewash our collective moral problem, but to try to understand it.

Thanks

Toyin

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[Toyin Falola]

Okey:

Why did you not write about it? “Of Bandits and Silence!”

TF

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[Ololade Bamidele]

It takes one person to start this, and you've done so sir! 

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

The Obi Cubana discussions actually went viral on Facebook before coming to this group but it can start anywhere.

Truth is, what Cubana did is unprecedented and had richer resonance than the Buhari party.

We all know who Buhari is. We expect him to spend Nigerian money as he likes. We expect Nigeria's political, business and other universes to converge at his son's wedding.

If the wedding was any different, it would have been news. 

Is this wedding anything new really?

 Did a Lagos socialite and her millionaire husband not give out such gifts too, although the Buhari gifts would be more and more expensive?

In contrast, who is Obi Cubana?

Before the burial, an unknown Igbo man.

Ethnicity is vital here because he is a descendant of those people whose only economic identity after the war might not have been far above the 20 pounds egg rasher( see Achebe Girls at War for the reference) they got after the delegitimisation of the Biafran currency, people who have distinguished themselves in a variety of legitimate and illegitimate businessess within and outside Nigeria, from trading to banking and in various professions, from academia to the public service. being particularly innovators in the Nigerian film industry.

Who could this be whom he and his associates treated money with joyous abandon, even perhaps mockery, kicking bales of cash like footballs, throwing leaves of notes into the air to descend as rain, slapping people's faces with thick bank notes as gifts, in a carnival in which women cavorted in bikinis  in a pool as they were sprayed with money, where dozens of cows arrived for consumption in trailer loads?

What spectacle!

Can the Buhari wedding beat that?

I doubt it.

Mystery.

How did Cubana and his associates makes this money?

What are their antedecents, their history, their businesses?

Are they fully or semi legitimate?

Echoes of the exhibitionist rich man eventually arrested for fraud-Hushpuppy?

Was this another such or simply a grass to riches story?

Does the Buhari wedding have such mystery?

No.

The source of the money in the Buhari wedding  is largely known, the actors are known, their trajectory largely public knowledge.

Nigerian govt money or money from well wishers happy to associate with the centre of power for various reasons.

Is there any entrepreneurship model concept to be derived from the Buhari wedding?

None that I know of, except that of how to gain political power partly through claims of being incorruptible, claims of being  economically challenged in the world of Nigerian big money politics as well as  frugal and  to show a different face on getting power.

Is there any inspirational story there?

None that I can see.

As for the Obi Cubana story, at the very least he has a legitimate business visible to anyone and is evocative or representative of an ethnically foregrounded apprenticeship business model that has worked for many, a model resonant in other contexts, a positive model of human development.

Is this model the only source of his money?

Part of the mystery.

So, one may say that through the spectacle, mystery and social contexts of the Obi Cubana display, much talk was excited.

The Buhari wedding, in contrast, might be seen as more of what is expected than what is new and suprising.

Thanks

Toyin

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[Cornelius Hamelberg]

With regard to ostentation and conspicuous consumption, my own Yoruba grandmother's upbringing had this drummed into our ears: “Wilful waste makes woeful want!” Not that we were exactly poor. In later years I was to learn that according to the Talmud, it's forbidden to throw away as little as 7 grams of bread...

We could countenance the public display of wealth with a more forgiving spirit. After all, these gentlemen are merely showing us what they have received as God's blessings, and we should be neither envious nor covetous when we see them counting their own portions of God's blessings...

Comparatively speaking, during my brief time here in Sweden ( land of milk and many kinds of honey) from 1971 and still going strong – touch wood - the Swedish social media has scarcely featured that kind of coverage of wedding and funerals; not that we are lacking in money-men and honey-women, but , so far in the realm of extravaganza there was some coverage of Tiger Woods's wedding ( to a swede ) and a more down to earth affair, the wedding of Kofi Annan ( another Swedophile) and understandably those kinds of international events with a tinge of “showbiz” attract the world press, but otherwise, over here, the main events have been the Royal wedding of King Carl XVI Gustaf and Miss Silvia Sommerlath followed by the Royal wedding of Crown Princess Victoria and her gym trainer Daniel Westling and that of her youngest sister, the royal wedding of Princess Madeleine and Christopher O'Neill – all national and international events, full of pomp, ceremony and glory. More recently, the national and international publicity media accorded Harry and Meghan an equal share of the limelight but there too, we are still talking about royalty whereas even as we wish them the best of God's blessings, it's unlikely that Yusuf Buhari's engagement , betrothal and Nikah ( holy matrimony/ taking the plunge) was caught the attention of the media's international radar.

If we want to be comparatively critical, how does Yusuf Buhari's wedding compare with that of Saeb Erekat which incensed many poor Palestinians at the time?

Given the veneration we all have for our mothers, how does the awujo largesse showed by Obi Cubano - feeding so many ( 46 cows) purchased by his own generosity compare with the case of the Chief Melford Okilo the then Governor of Rivers State who - at a point when the official rate of exchange for one Nigeria Naira was £1 Sterling spent either 8,000,000 or 80, 000,000 naira ( I can't remember which) on his mother's funeral and when queried about this dip into the state treasury replied “ Don't you want me to honour my mother?” - and that was the end of the matter...