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How Nigeria Turned Her Majesty’s Prison into a Place of Pleasure, Articles | THISDAY LIVE

How Nigeria Turned Her Majesty’s Prison into a Place of Pleasure, Articles | THISDAY LIVE

A major musical highlight in Lagos is the monthly Afropolitan Vibes show at Freedom Park.
It is a chance for lovers of live music - no artificial, auto-tuned voices here - to blow off steam with the option of a calabash of fresh palm wine.

But some of the revellers may not realise the dance floor has history. It is the exact spot where, for many years, female prisoners were incarcerated in what was then Broad Street Prison.
The clue is in the thick white wall surrounding the compound.

This was the first of Her Majesty's Prisons to be established after the British navy had captured the town and set up Lagos Colony in 1861.

The initial prison structure was built in 1882 with mud walls and grass thatch but did not last long as it was an easy target for anti-colonialists.

"They kept throwing fire into it and setting it ablaze and so then in 1885 the colonial government imported bricks from England and rebuilt the prison," says architect Theo Lawson.

"What was even more remarkable was the bricks were imported for £16,000 and that year the British spent £700 on education in the colony, so it shows the priority then was on law and order," says Mr Lawson, who drew up the plans to turn the former prison into Freedom Park.

The colonial report for 1898 tells us that 676 males, 26 females, and 11 juveniles were imprisoned at Broad Street during the year.

They would have been arrested by the Hausa force - the colonisers deliberately chose military recruits from northern Nigeria in order to have a disconnect between the local population and the personnel tasked with imposing law and order and violently suppressing any resistance to their rule.
At the time, the colonial powers were keen to protect the flourishing trade between Britain and Lagos and expand into the interior.

Records from 1897 show that goods valued at precisely £892,863 came into Lagos port - the top two commodities being cotton goods followed by wines and spirits.

Exports totalled £882,339 - a large chunk of which were palm kernels for lubricating Britain's industrial machines and rubber.

Over the next few decades the prison housed several notable thorns in the side of the British colonialists including the writer and political activist Herbert Macaulay and Pa Michael Imoudu, a trade unionist who led strikes in the 1940s and whose release prompted a massive anti-colonial rally. The politician Obafemi Awolowo was also imprisoned in the 1960s.

In one corner of the prison is where condemned prisoners were executed by hanging.
"It was very shocking indeed - to watch this guy being brought in, cloth over his head and then prayers for him," recalled Kofi Duncan, who worked as a doctor in the prisons in the early 1960s shortly after independence.

"The guy who carried out the executions had to be brought from northern Nigeria. He has to be somebody who knows nobody at all," said Mr Duncan.

"All he has to do is come into this small room and when they say 'go' he pulls and the trap door opens. Brrrrrm bang," he said, adding that he then witnessed the prisoner's tremors and after one and a half hours he had to do a medical examination to confirm he was dead.

Some of the last prisoners to be detained here were separatists during Nigeria's post-independence civil war.
Broad Street Prison was pulled down in 1976 and Mr Duncan remembers it becoming "a dumping ground and a place where highway robbers were able to enjoy themselves".

In the 1990s, Mr Lawson had joined the CIA - not spying for the Americans but working with other professionals in the Creative Intelligence Agency to come up with ideas for the new millennium to improve Lagos.

Thanks to political upheavals the prison site had not become yet another high rise office block.
"Various developers were allocated the site and even brought in their equipment but you know the history of Nigeria: coup after coup and the contracts were ripped up," says Mr Lawson.

Some members of the CIA focused on plans to reduce the legendary traffic jams or go slows - Mr Lawson wanted to give the congested city some breathing space.

He helped design a park which would be a home to the Arts and a mirror for visitors to contemplate the city's history.
"We didn't want to rebuild a prison. We wanted to create a space that was a park where people could enjoy with reference to the past without it being macabre," he says.

"So, where the kitchen used to be, we put the food court. Where the records office was, we put a museum to tell the story and where the gallows were we put a stage."

In the centre of Freedom Park one cell block has been rebuilt and is a chilling reminder of the conditions. Each cell is just 1.2m x 2.4m (4ft x 8ft).

Even today the cells are not empty as some people use them as a cramped place to work.
"I find solace here to rest and focus on work. It's a very iconic place," says graphic designer Ayodeji, as he looks up from his laptop.

"It's pretty difficult to position a table and chair in it but because of what it represents I find comfort in it," he says as people wander through the park taking in the latest photo exhibition.

"I think that the fact that the present band stand or stage is where the gallows used to be is a perfect example of the palimpsest that is the Freedom Park," says businessman and blogger, Tunji Lardner.
"Lagosians have inscribed a new joyful narrative on this colonial parchment, and its stories can only grow with time," he says.

As the musicians keep belting out the music, the organiser of the Afropolitan Vibes event says it is a special place to perform.

"It used to be a place of sorrow and with music we've been able to transform it into a place of happiness," says musician Ade Bantu.

"All kinds of people mingle, interact and that's the beauty of this space and I hope it stays like this for a very long time," he says as the crowd leaps up and down to the song, "Lagos Jumping."
Who would have thought Her Majesty's Prison would one day be hosting such a party?
• Culled from bbc.co.uk

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Centenary awards boycott: Sadiq Abacha replies Wole Soyinka - Vanguard News

Centenary awards boycott: Sadiq Abacha replies Wole Soyinka - Vanguard News

An open letter supposedly written by Sadiq Sani Abacha and shared by his sister Gumsu Sani Abacha on her Facebook wall in response to Professor Wole Soyinka’s remarks that it was an insult to share an award with their father Sani Abacha at the just concluded Centenary celebrations.

Read the letter below…

If you want to think, speak and act logically then you should know all three.

1. The law of identity

2. The law of excluded middle

3. The law of non contradiction.

Now let’s look at each one of these and see what they mean in practice.

1.The law of identity

The law of identity means that things are what they are, which at first doesn’t seem very illuminating, but wait; it implies also the following, that things are what they are, whether you like them or not, it implies that things are what they are whether you know them or not, it implies that things are what they are whether you agree with them or not.

*Sadiq Abacha, Wole Soyinka

However, if you don’t like the facts as they are you are going to have to put up with them, because facts are what they are, if it’s raining on your golf day, get used to it! Because the facts are what they are and are often not what you want them to be, like if the traffic lights turn red when you approach, stop complaining! The law of identity means that you must adapt yourself to the facts and start your work from there, it implies that the facts will not bend to meet your expectations. You must first adapt yourself to what life is and then get to work changing and improving things in your life, be brave to meet reality as it really is and not how you would wish it to be.

2. The law of excluded middle.

The law of excluded middle means that you should give a straight yes or no answer always and there is no middle ground. The law means that there is no kinda yes and kinda no, there is no ‘sort of’ being married because you are either married or you are not, you are either a thief or you are not, you are either on time or not, you are either living in Nigeria or you are not. The law is the idea that you should not try to keep all of your options open by staying in the middle or hedging, when it suits you, like when you accepted an appointment during IBB’s regime as chairman of FRSC. I bet that was a military regime you partook in. Please pick one wife and state your claim 100% to her, pick one idea and go for it 100%! Decide and commit Sir! There you might find great power and self satisfaction in the doctrine of decide and commit. No half way measures, no middle ground, exclude the middle! Here! The law of excluded middle Sir.

3. The law of non contradiction.

The law of non contradiction says don’t contradict yourself simple. If you say you will be there then be there. If you say you will do it then do it. Don’t say or fight for one thing and then do the opposite. Don’t say one thing and then later deny that you said it. Don’t say one thing and then later contradict it. Be consistent in your thoughts and actions. Observing someone who was a socialist in the morning but then became a capitalist in the evening is a textbook on contradiction, these are two polar opposites, such a person is clearly inconsistent and is therefore considered a flip flop, confused, easily led or misled or at best a lunatic who has no clear understanding of the basis of either doctrine.

Apply these three logics to others with consistency and then you can ask for the same or expect the same from others, and then you can also ask for others to deal with facts not fantasy, which is the law of identity. Ask others to make up their mind to decide and commit. The law of excluded middle.Then ask others to follow through on the things that they say they would do. The law of non contradiction.

Sir, I believe brilliance is not perfection. I have grown and watched you criticize regime after regime and at that young and naive age I was thinking why wouldn’t this man just contest to be president so that Nigeria can be saved, I would have defiantly voted for Mr Soyinka if it would have brought an end to Nigeria’s woes. To my utter surprise, I heard about your FRSC leadership and how funds were misused and a great deal of it unaccounted for. “Oh my God! In the end he turned out to be just the same as everybody else” were my next thoughts. My hopes for you, all ended up in great disappointment.

Here I find myself defending my father 15 years after his death because some of you have no one else to pounce on, or rather, you have chosen a dead person to keep pouncing on over and over again when you have more than an array of contestants.  A coward’s act I believe.  “A common writer” is what I have heard you being referred to lately, and I believe a mature mind would now agree to such referrals. With all due respect, there is a great challenge that faces the country, we have to put our heads together, rather than clashing, our collective ships must sail in the same direction, let us leave the ghosts of past contention and face the future bravely as one, criticizing the past does not help the present or define a path to the future.

You say, with the weight of your sense of history and the authority you possess on national issues that ” a vicious usurper under whose authority the lives of an elected president and his wife were snuffed out” referring to my late father, you must be growing old, or you would rightly recall that that president elect you refer to did not die while my father was alive. Did you slyly change your facts to fit a history that would better serve your narrative, or are you just plain forgetful? Either way, it shows you are losing your grasp of reality.

Comparing my father’s leadership to Boko Haram’s current reign of terror,  is a rather cheap shot, you are in no position to examine, judge and sentence an entire regime based on the information you think you have, you are privy to almost none of the true facts, what is at your disposal is at best, hearsay, or were you ever minister of defence? did you ever sit in during security meetings, evaluate the facts and subtleties of national security? You remind me of Obama criticizing the Republicans  before he became a sitting president himself, vouching to put an end to all American occupation, this all came to an abrupt end once he had access to the briefs and security issues, economic and political, facing his nation. Surely he did what he could, and history will judge him. To lead is not to be a rock star, and to be a Nobel laureate is not to be a an antagonist of this countries legacy..We are Africa’s leaders, whether we like it or not, we cannot trivialize the centenary celebration, it happens only once, let
us come together, if only for this one occasion and agree to disagree.

Open rebellion against the current government at this time, on the manner of the centenary celebrations, for whatever reason, is tactless, it is not about you, it is about our nation, our beloved country. There is a time and place for everything. My late father was a Nigerian, lived in Nigeria and died protecting our interests to the best of his ability, critiquing placing him on the honor roll, along with many deserving dignitaries is your right, you have the right to your own opinions, but you do not have the right to your own facts. Facts stand alone, regardless of who espouses them, let posterity judge, but you are clearly politicizing a dead issue, how could you not be? Having an issue with the naming of a hospital after the late General and leader? really ? Now ?

It almost seems as if you want to turn back the hands of time, what else would you like to undo besides the naming of the hospital, would you like to unmake Bayelsa state, Zamfara state or the others?  What about the advances we made in commerce, reducing the inflation rate, what about security and welfare, how many projects, hospitals and schools were created? inflation went from 54% to 8.5%! my father oversaw an increase in our foreign currency reserves from 494 million dollars in 1993 to 9.6 billion dollars by the middle of 1997, that is unprecedented , 15 years after the PTF the benefits are still being reaped today in Nigeria, What of peace keeping and nation building, not just in West Africa but the entire continent, restoring democracy in Liberia and Sierra Leone, all these under my father’s leadership, are all these not laudable? Or would you like to undo them all. All this on 8$ per barrel of oil! You have to be kidding me.

You are a learned man, you would have to undo all your learning to knowingly wish to undo all these achievements! I will be the first to proclaim that my fathers leadership was not pitch perfect or spot free, that does not exist, maybe in utopia but not here on this earth, so let us keep our discourse set in the sphere of reality please, he deserves the award, and he did not campaign for it, let it go, Sir…and allow Nigeria to at least bask in our survival and endurance in our growing prosperity and development in these trying times. I have been accused of being an optimist, hence, I am optimistic that you will come around and accept that we can all come together and face the future together, forgive each other our wrongs while celebrating our rights, I am still an admirer of your works after all, however, I cannot and will not attempt to answer your every charge, this is not the time or place, this is a time for solidarity, if only you were wise enough to grasp this.

I applaud the patience of President Goodluck Jonathan and his composure and restraint in not having a knee jerk reaction at such a pivotal moment in our nations history, but you would mar the occasion, Sir, in the future, please pick your battles, and do better to safeguard your relevance,  Enough Sir!

Sadiq Abacha.

- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/03/centenary-awards-boycott-sadiq-abacha-replies-wole-soyinka/#sthash.P23AtYkf.dpuf

Reflections of a Renowned writer...

The sheer weight of indignation and revulsion of most of Nigerian humanity at the recent Boko Harma atrocity in Yobe is most likely to have overwhelmed a tiny footnote to that outrage, small indeed, but of an inversely proportionate significance.  This was the name of the hospital to which the survivors of the massacre were taken. That minute detail calls into question, in a gruesome but chastening way, the entire ethical landscape into which this nation has been forced by insensate leadership.  It is an uncanny coincidence, one that I hope the new culture of ‘religious tourism’, spearheaded by none other than the nation’s president in his own person, may even come to recognize as a message from unseen forces.

            For the name of that hospital, it is reported, is none other than that of General Sanni Abacha, a vicious usurper under whose authority the lives of an elected president and his wife were snuffed out.  Assassinations – including through bombs cynically ascribed to the opposition – became routine. Under that ruler, torture and other forms of barbarism were enthroned as the norm of governance.  To round up, nine Nigerian citizens, including the writer and environmentalist Ken Saro-wiwa, were hanged after a trial that was stomach churning even by the most primitive standards of judicial trial, and in defiance of the intervention of world leadership. We are speaking here of a man who placed this nation under siege during an unrelenting reign of terror that is barely different from the current rampage of Boko Haram. It is this very psychopath that was recently canonized by the government of Goodluck Jonathan in commemoration of one hundred years of Nigerian trauma.

            It has been long a-coming. One of the broadest avenues in the nation’s capital, Abuja, bears the name of General Sanni Abacha. Successive governments have lacked the political courage to change this  signpost – among several others - of  national self degradation and wipe out the memory of the nation’s tormentor from daily encounter. Not even Ministers for the Federal Capital territory within whose portfolios rest such responsibilities, could muster the temerity to initiate the process and leave the rest to public approbation or repudiation. I urged the need of this purge on one such minister, and at least one Head of State. That minister promised, but that boast went the way of Nigerian electoral boast.  The Head of State murmured something about the fear of offending ‘sensibilities’. All evasions amounted to moral cowardice and a doubling of victim trauma. When you proudly display certificates of a nation’s admission to the club of global pariahs, it is only a matter of time before you move to beatify them as saints and other paragons of human perfection. What the government of Goodluck Jonathan has done is to scoop up a century’s accumulated degeneracy in one preeminent symbol, then place it on a podium for the nation to admire, emulate and even – worship.  

            There is a deplorable message for coming generations in this governance aberration that the entire world has been summoned to witness and indeed, to celebrate. The insertion of an embodiment of  ‘governance by terror’ into the company of committed democrats, professionals, humanists and human rights advocates in their own right, is a sordid effort to grant a certificate of health to a communicable disease that common sense demands should be isolated. It is a confidence trick that speaks volumes of the perpetrators of such a fraud. We shall pass over - for instance - the slave mentality that concocts loose formulas for an Honors List that automatically elevate any violent bird of passage to the status of nation builders who may, or may not be demonstrably motivated by genuine love of nation.  According generalized but false attributes to known killers and treasury robbers is a disservice to history and a desecration of memory.  It also compromises the future. This failure to discriminate, to assess, and thereby make it possible to grudgingly concede that even out of a ‘doctrine of necessity’ – such as military dictatorship -  some demonstrable governance virtue may emerge, reveals nothing but national self-glorification in a moral void, the breeding grounds of future canker worm in the nation’s edifice.

            Such abandonment of moral rigor comes full circle sooner or later. The survivors of a plague known as Boko Haram, students in a place of enlightenment and moral instruction, are taken to a place of healing dedicated to an individual contagion – a murderer and thief of no redeeming quality known as Sanni Abacha, one whose plunder is still being pursued all over the world and recovered piecemeal by international consortium – at the behest of this same government which sees fit to place him on the nation’s Roll of Honor! I can think of nothing more grotesque and derisive of the lifetime struggle of several on this list, and their selfless services to humanity. It all fits. In this nation of portent readers, the coincidence should not be too difficult to decipher.

            I reject my share of this national insult.

                                                                                                                        Wole SOYINKA

Nite Of A Thousand Berths in Calabar, Articles | THISDAY LIVE

Nite Of A Thousand Berths in Calabar, Articles | THISDAY LIVE