Monday, 29 December 2014
Singer/photographer TY Bello poses with her twin boys
Gay activist Bisi Alimi speaks on living with HIV and how he was nearly killed for being gay
Alimi's acting career was just starting to take off when his sexuality stole the spotlight. The student newspaper at University of Lagos, where he was studying theater, threatened to publish a photo of him with his then-boyfriend. So Alimi beat them to the punch. He went on "New Dawn with Funmi," one of the most popular talk shows in Nigeria, and challenged a long-held belief that homosexuality was brought to Africa by white colonizers. That was also the year Alimi was diagnosed with HIV.
Suddenly, his home country no longer saw him as a rising star. Alimi lost his roles on TV and on stage, many of his friends shunned him and the police even arrested him on unexplained charges. In 2007, things got worse. He was detained at the airport on his way back from the United Kingdom, where he gave an interview to BBC Network Africa, and was released two days later. Then a group of men entered his home and attempted to kill him. Alimi fled to the U.K. and hasn't been back to Nigeria since.Why are you happy about Nigeria's harsh anti-gay law?
I see the law as a catalyst for change for good in Nigeria. You don't understand what it is like to fight a beast that you cannot see. Before the signing of that law, between 95 and 98 percent of Nigerians were in support of it. The latest poll says 88 percent of Nigerians now support the law. That's a 10 percent drop. Some people who are not LGBT are now saying, "Did we just support a law that criminalizes people ... for falling in love?" [When] you see that your uncle or cousin is gay, it kind of changes the conversation.
Speaking of family, how does your family feel about your identity?
I'm
in a relationship that I can't talk to my parents about — it's like a
big elephant in the room. But [the fact that] they want to accept me [as
gay] is a form of support.
I
was diagnosed [with HIV] in 2004, and I've never discussed it with my
parents. This is my personal life, and I don't want them to get involved
with it. Many times when I struggle with the challenges of being gay
and being [HIV] positive, even living in diaspora and so many other
things, I just really want to have somebody I can cry to who has blood
lineage but I just said no.
So who is in your support network?
Mostly
close friends. Many times it's people I don't know. I remember one
incident when I was at my university. I was going back to my room at
night and I was stopped by two guys. They were making very derogatory
statements and becoming really aggressive. There was a [student] coming.
So I raised my voice: "What did I do to you, why are you guys so
frustrated with me?" ]The student] stopped and said, "What's going on?" I
told her these guys were attacking me, and they said, "Oh he's gay,
he's a faggot." She just looked at them and said, "What if he's a
faggot? What's your problem?" She stood up to them. These are the unsung
heroes of my existence because anything could have happened that night.
Back
in 2007, a group of guys tried to kill you and that's when you fled the
country. But did you ever want to leave Nigeria before then?
I
was lucky enough to go through a 2-hour ordeal of being beaten and
almost being shot in the head and escaping. If those guys are still
alive, they might have read one or two of my interviews. I wonder how
they feel that they almost killed me. But I felt that leaving was never a
choice until my mother said, "Do you still have reason [to stay]? I
think you should leave."
How did you react when when you were diagnosed with HIV?
By
2001 I started working in HIV prevention because I lost my best friend
[to the disease]. So I was kind of aware. That was why my diagnosis was a
shock to me. I broke down and started crying and thought like this is
the end of my life because I have seen my friends die. It's such a big
thing that even within the gay community, if you're positive, that's the
end of it. Nobody wants to talk to you or date you, but you become the
story everyone wants to talk about. So I didn't tell anybody. I carried
it for three years before leaving Nigeria. I didn't start medication
until 2009.
If you had known about the treatments and support for HIV then, would you have reacted differently?
No,
because then I might still be in Nigeria. And I still wouldn't want to
talk about it because it would still be a death sentence. Treatment is a
big challenge and people [in Nigeria] still don't have access to it.
And the support system is still not there because of the stigma against
gay men — it's a belief that [HIV] is a punishment from God. So it's
very difficult to exist with that system.
How would you assess the progress across Africa in providing HIV treatment?
We
are still betraying generations when it comes to HIV prevention and
treatment. Many people still need access to this treatment and we still
have children being born with the virus when we know we can prevent it.
We're lacking political willpower and funding to HIV projects. It has
become a political game.
Being an advocate gives you a different kind of stage than acting does. If you had a choice, would you go back in to acting?
I
think I studied theater because I was pretty much a drama queen
[laughs]. Acting is my biggest passion. The unfortunate thing is that
it's something I would never touch again because it left a big scar in
my life. Even when I did try to go back to acting, I kept thinking, "If
you keep doing this, you're going to bring up media interest again." I
have media interest now but it's very humane. It's not about who I
kissed last night or who I'm hanging out with.
So you're done with theater?
If
there's anything I want to go back to, it's acting. I want to be back
on stage dancing and acting, but I'm also very scared of it.
Comedian Chris Rock and wife split after 18 years of marriage
"After much contemplation and 19 years of marriage, Chris and I have decided to go our separate ways,' she said
I cried like a baby when Boko Haram attacked Kano college – Lecturer recounts ordeal
A lecturer at the Federal College of Education, FCE, Kabuga, Kano, Chief
Christian Ojimba, in a recent interview with Vanguard recounted the
ordeal he and some of his students went through when Boko Haram members
visited their school on September 17th, an attack that lasted 45minutes.
Below is what he said...
"It was a very serious attack and an unexpected one. Before the attack on our school, Boko Haram terrorists had attacked Kano State Polytechnic inside the city centre, with the new strategy of using female and male teenagers, who they arm with bombs. In broad-day light on Wednesday, September 17, our school, the Federal College of Technology, Kano, was attacked.
That day, I didn’t have lectures, but, in my usual way, I had to go to school, because I am very friendly with my students.
I am always in my office to solve their problems because I love my students. I must say that I had premonition which, if I had heeded, I wouldn’t have been involved in the attack. One, I didn’t have lectures; two, when I got to the school gate, I discovered my office keys were not in my bag; three, my wallet containing my identity card, driver’s licence and other important documents was not with me. But when I got to the office, my colleague had already opened the door with his own key. If the door had been locked, I would have gone back home.
I
stayed in the office, Room 78, upstairs at the new site of School of
Arts and Social Sciences, FCE, Kano. Around 1.15pm that day, I heard the
sound of multiple bomb explosions at close range. Before you knew it,
there was pandemonium. Students and staff were running helter skelter
for their lives. On noticing this, I came out of my chair to check what
was happening and what I saw was the Boko Haram people wielding AK-47
guns shooting sporadically and directly at everyone at sight.
Downstairs, they had killed one of our lecturers, Dr. Thomas Kayode
Ajamu from Ogbomoso, Oyo State. Dr. Ajamu, a former Head, Department of
Christian Religious Studies, CRS, was buried that same week.
So
when I came out of the door, there was no way to pass. Dead bodies
littered everywhere because this attack happened at the prime-time for
lectures.
Before
the attack, I have reason to believe terrorists came on surveillance.
Several male teenagers came visiting our offices in pretence that they
were begging for money. The one that came to my office said, teacher
good afternoon, please I am going to the hospital, I am not feeling too
well, but I don’t have money for transportation. Even though I don’t
understand Hausa very well. I replied him in Hausa, that I forgot my
money at home, that there was no money on me, and he thanked me and
left.
That
was the conversation during the surveillance time and they did it in
all the blocks in the five departments of the school- Department of
History where I belong, Department of Geography, Social Studies,
Christian Religious Studies, Islamic Religious Studies, and the Deanery.
They surveyed everywhere before the attack.
My
office is located on the first floor of a one storey building, so, I
couldn’t jump down. I saw students jumping down, some got injured, while
others didn’t. What I did was that I hugged a pillar from the first
floor, trying to come down through it. So, when students noticed I have
created an escape route, many joined me and it was in that process that
there was a stampede. I fell down and couldn’t move because the long
bone joining my right knee got broken and shifted out of its socket.
I
was trapped. I couldn’t run because a Boko Haram man was just a stone
throw. So, I told myself, ‘to God be the glory, God receive my soul in
heaven’. There was no escape, the man was directly shooting sporadically
at any person in sight. He was shooting directly at both the young and
old. They didn’t spare young boys and girls who came to the school to
sell groundnut and pure water. All of them where shot dead.
At
the end, there was a massive attack, many people were killed, several
others were wounded. The big testimony of it all, was that the Boko
Haram man was standing on me, while shooting at others. When I saw him I
played dead. I remembered when I was in Alvan Ikokwu College of
Education, Owerri, in 1984, there was this lecture we had then on
self-defence mechanism. I remembered the lecturer told us how to escape
if we were in situations like this. So, that knowledge came into me.
Another thing that came into my mind at that critical moment was that I
remembered that I and my wife had been praying and fasting against gun
shots, bomb blast.
At
the Boko Haram man stood on me as if I was a dead victim, I didn’t know
how God seized the pains I was going through as a result of the broken
knee bone and also my breathe was also seized.
Few
minutes later, the man left me and was walking away towards the school
gate. At that same time, there was one of the female lecturers in my
department who was finding her way out with four others. The man spotted
them and asked them to say their last prayers. While they put their
hands up to say the prayers, the bomb the man had on his body blew him
up.
Shortly
thereafter, a security guard came to me and asked me to stand up, stand
up, but I told him I couldn’t, that my leg was broken. He tried to pull
me but it was not easy because I was bigger than him. He managed to
pull me to hide behind a door inside a class. There too, I also played
dead because the sound of gun shots was still raging.
Some
minutes later, I peeped from the door and saw some policemen inside the
school. I was in dilemma as to whether to call them to come and help me
or not, because, sometimes, these Boko Haram people dress in police and
military uniforms. Everybody had vacated the school premises, nobody
knew I was behind the door writhing in pains. I said if the policemen
were not authentic security agents that means I am gone, because there
was still sound of gun shots.
God receive my soul
I
said within myself, if they were genuine policemen, I have a testimony
to tell, but if they were fake, God receive my soul. So, I summoned the
courage and called them, ‘Officer, officer, please come and rescue me’,
and they said ‘who are you?’ I introduced myself as Chief Ojimba of
History Department of the college. I told them I fell from upstairs and
my leg was broken.
It
was then that they mobilised other soldiers. They asked for my ID card.
I told them I left it at home. They didn’t believe me and threatened to
kill me. I said I couldn’t stand up, my leg was broken.
I
said they could waste me but I was a lecturer in the school and they
could confirm by going to my office at room 78. I said they could see my
two phones and a new laptop in the office. Yet they didn’t believe me,
so, they ordered me to pull-off my shirt and singlet which I did. They
further asked me to pull-off my trousers and I cried to them that my
legs were already swollen and my bones broken and I could not. In harsh
tone, they warned that if I fail to obey their instructions they will
shoot me. After doing that, they also asked me pull-off my short, which I
did and was stark naked.
Well,
one shouldn’t blame them, because they were actually doing their job.
They wanted to confirm if I was not one of the terrorists, and was not
concealing any bomb in me. When they noticed I was stark naked and
nothing was on me, they instructed me to put on my clothes. Then, they
rescued me out of the place. An Assistant Superintendent of Police, ASP,
that came with the team, an elderly man like myself, carried me on his
back, with three other soldiers carrying my swollen right leg to the
waiting school ambulance. I cried like a baby, as I was taken to the
Murtala Muhammed Specialist Hospital, Kano. I have never cried like that
before all my life. It was then that they brought out dead, Dr. Ajamu
of the Department of CRS. He was shot inside his office, because the
Boko Haram people went to offices, classrooms and toilets shooting
anybody at sight.
I
stayed at the specialist hospital with my broken leg inside Plaster of
Paris, POP, for about a week. But I must confess that I was impressed by
the way our school’s governing council, the school management,
students, staff unions, friends and relations rallied round me while I
was hospitalised.
Photo: Man kills son in Ebonyi
Government Area of the state. The Police Public Relations officer (PPRO) of the command, ASP Chris Anyanwu, said in Abakaliki that the matter was being investigated by the police.
“The police is prepared to get to the root of the problem that led to the killing of the boy,’’ Anyanwu said. He said that the suspect had confessed to the killing of his 16-year-old son who returned from Lagos to celebrate the Christmas with his family members.
An eyewitness told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on condition of anonymity in Abakaliki that Igbo killed the son due to a squabble between him (Igbo) and the deceased’s mother. “The suspect has, after a quarrel with his wife (mother of the deceased), banished her for reasons best known to him.
Oh wow...check out this adorable baby photo of John Legend
Mikel Obi reportedly building estate in Lagos called Chelsea Estate
Guys have you heard that Mikel Obi reportedly building an estate in Lagos called Chelsea Estate? now yo'heard!
There are reports by people in the know that Chelsea and Super Eagles
midfielder, Mikel Obi is building a mini estate in the Ajah/Badore new
development area of Lagos. Mikel and his partners (including a bank) are
planning to build over 100 housing units of 2/3/4bedroom service
apartments, a multipurpose hall and recreational facilities. The estate
will be called Chelsea Estate and construction has already begun.
Wednesday, 24 December 2014
Nigeria Military jail Lt. Col., 15 others over abduction of Chibok girls
According to Punch, the soldiers, Col. A.
O. Ojo who was in charge of Chibok when the abduction took place, Capt.
O. O. Ogunrinde, and 2nd Lieutenant V.I. Godknows were all handed two
years imprisonment for what the General Court Martial panel termed
failure to perform. Col. Ojo was reportedly found
guilty of passing out unverified information about the return of the
abducted girls as well as not reinforcing the military personnel the
night the abduction happened. In his response, Col. Ojo said he got
information about the attack at about 1am at his station in Biu which was already late as the sect members stormed the school at about 11pm.
2nd
Lieut. Godknows was charged with cowardly behaviour during the night of
the attack. Counsel to Col. Ojo, Mr. Shuaibu Isah has however said his
client would be appealing the verdict of the court martial through the
office of the confirming authority which is the Chief of Army Staff, Lt.
Gen. Kenneth Minimah.
Another black teen killed by white police officer in St. Louis
From NY Daily News
An outraged crowd of about 60 people gathered behind police crime scene tape early Wednesday morning as the body of Antonio Martin, 18, lay in the parking lot in front of the Mobil on North Hanley Rd for more than two hours, according to eyewitness reports.
Police allege that Martin drew a handgun on the officer as he approached during a routine patrol. Witnesses saw a weapon at the scene next to the body.The officer fired several shots, fatally wounding him, according to the St. Louis County Police Department.
Fearing for his life, the Berkeley Officer fired several shots, striking the subject, fatally wounding him," police said. "The second subject fled the scene."
Toni Martin, the victim’s mother, said her son was with his girlfriend at the time of the shooting, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
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