Saturday 14 December 2013

THE GOVERNOR AND THE VERY LUCKY WIDOW

This is not a romantic story, so dispel any thoughts that it is. It's also not news cause if it were, I'd be presenting it very late, wouldn't I? I'll just begin with the general gist of what went down before I get to my main reason for this post.

A couple of weeks back, a widow selling her wares got insulted by the current governor of Edo State in Nigeria. From the gist I heard, he (the governor) decided to take rounds around the state capital himself. There had been reports that the officials put in place to checkmate any unlawful practices like street hawking were taking bribes and allowing some people carry on. Now since he's assumption to the office of the state governor, he has tried everything to beautify the state. He started by making sure that nobody sold things on the road-sides. This helped to greatly reduce traffic in many market areas. He also went ahead to redo the roads to standard specifications with drainage systems, walk-ways and all.

The Governor and the Widow

On this fateful day, The widow was selling her stuff on the road and she got caught. Her things were thrown away (that's what I heard oh!). I don't know what transpired between her and the governor, but he issued a curse on her. "Go and die" he said. A few people heard his utterance, blew it out of proportion and the media helped. Before anyone could say Jack Robinson, it became the talk of the town. The governor conceded and apologized to the woman. Unfortunately by that time, it was a bit late for it had become a political affair.

The opposing party decided the best thing to do was to give the woman the sum of N250,000 as compensation. When the governor's party heard of it, they decide to retaliate. They gave her a job, her son received a state scholarship. It didn't end here, he went ahead and gave her the sum of N2 million naira.

Now to the crust of today's matter. I totally understand the need for an apology if necessary but a compensation? Hmmm.... Remember guys, this woman was at fault. She was doing the wrong thing by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. She can't say she wasn't aware of the state code on such matters. It has been on for 5 years. It's just like saying you enter Benin today and start riding an "Okada" (motorbike) on the street after it has been banned. What do you think would happen?

The media grabbed at this new piece of info. Some called it a political agenda or propaganda. I don't know. Others said a little amount could have been enough and the millions used in building new markets which would be more beneficial to a larger number of people who are forced to be on the streets everyday because as they say, "they have no shops". My mum said "he should has tried to control himself and avoid being put into such a situation in the first place". What do you think? Let me know.

13 year old boy


An almost similar thing happened some months back when a 13 year old boy snuck into a plane through the tyres and got to Lagos. He said "he thought the plane was headed abroad". After so much noise, he was awarded a scholarship by 2 state governors. A few months later, another boy tried it, he was caught. He too wanted a scholarship, unfortunately, he got none.

Finally, what are our leaders trying to portray? Is it that we should be the first to break a law, commit a crime and then get rewarded for doing so? Cause I think they got it backwards. To me, that kid should have been sent to a correction facility for a few weeks before anyone starts thinking of a scholarship. My mum still doesn't understand how the boy survived for more than 30 minutes in the wheel stowaway. What do you think?

Cheers......

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