I grew up imbibing the notion that the Nigerian society is highly corrupt. A fact which I was made to understand can be seen in her rankings by Transparency International which on a yearly basis shows her as one of the top three corrupt nations in the world. And really from my experience, Nigeria is corruption sick. A plague not helped at all by our police officers.

While I was a student in the University of Nigeria Nsukka I witnessed police corruption at first hand. It was a usual sight on a daily basis to see police men (and even the military) working along the main roads surrounding the university, on the way to the Nsukka market and virtually at every check point in the Nsukka rural township, stopping motorcycle riders and commercial motor drivers to collect a mandatory #20. This became a tradition in replacement for checking of vehicle particulars and general vehicle checking. At midday and at 6pm they would switch posts to be able to get new victims. As the law was #20 a day to the policemen at every check point, when a new “regime” came in you had to do the same. So commercial riders and drivers ended up parting with #60 a day at every police point. And being they passed at least two check points everyday, along with the financial burden of vehicle maintenance in a bad-road ridden Nsukka and daily Transport Union dues they had to pay, you can know how much expenses/losses they incurred in a day. This was blatant corruption and my heart could not but go out to them (the commercial vehicle operators).

But on the other hand I think I don’t blame the policemen too much. It might be because I’ll very soon be a new entrant into the Nigerian labour market (being a fresh graduate) and I’m beginning to think as a worker. And knowing the labour market for what it is: harsh and highly competitive with few jobs, poor salaries in relation to the high cost of living, I get amazed when I think of how suffering Nigerians get through life. For a start how much are the policemen paid? Those at the check points on the lowest levels, probably about #30,000 a month. And can that cater for a person independently? Definitely not. In one’s early life in the labour market one needs back up. A parent, relation or Godfather to fall back on. At least primarily for accommodation and feeding. Even the higher level policemen, they’ll likely have a family to cater for. And with their meager salary I wonder how they manage. So sometimes I just feel they deserve at least the money they make from their unlawful activities. What, with the laborious job of standing in the sun. Uhm, life is hard and anyhow, any which ways man must survive. What do you think?

A commercial driver slipping a bribe to a policeman

It ain’t getting it while it’s hot; I’m talking of shooting it while it’s hot. And precisely I mean music videos. I’ve come to realize that many Nigerian music artists don’t have the sense to shoot videos for their chart topping song when they should do so. And it seems this problem is mainly with ABJ (Abuja) based artists. I got the idea to blog on this when I watched the Styl-Plus video for ”Run away” this morning on NTA. “Run away” has been making waves in Nigeria, along with “Olufunmi” right from late 2003 when it was released, but it’s only now in late 2004 that the boys of Styl-Plus thought it wise to release the video, damn. Right now I’m sort of getting sick of “Olufunmi” as is normal with anything which becomes over popular. When “Run away” was blazing fresh and hot, we begged, pleaded and hoped in vain for a video. Which if it had come out then would have made a massive impact in popularizing Styl-Plus, and to a very large extent popularizing them internationally. In the US it’s common practice for hit songs to get their video’s shot within a month of their blazing the charts. And we all know that Television gets the message across where Radio is limited. Nigerian artist better learn from this if they want to reap maximum profit and popularity for their sweat. A case in study is Age Beeka. He’s an ABJ based R&B/Soul artist. Man I love his songs “Girl of my dreams” and “Angelica” to death. But alas our friend never shot a video for them while they were blazing hot. Nowadays I don’t hear about him that much on the radio, talk less of on the TV.

Another aspect of shooting videos is shooting videos for the right singles. And in my opinion US artist are most guilty. For example why the fuck did Snoop Dogg shoot a video for “from tha chuuuch to da palace” when there are by far many better videoless songs on his “paid tha cost to be da boss” album. Tracks like “Lollipop”, “Wasn’t Your Fault”, “I miss that bitch”, “I Believe in You” and “From Long Beach 2 Brick City” if they had had videos would have done more to promote his album than “from tha chuuuch to da palace”.

A picture from a rap video shoot.

UNN University of Nigeria Nsukka Home Page

Hey this is actually a prank post people.it’s just to try and see if i can draw hits to my blog from the buzz about the new UNN (University of Nigeria) site. especially with the recent increment in school fees. on the real i’m a fresh UNN graduate. just finished my economics/political science degree there (thank God the fee hike no go concern me). although i still got my project to tidy up (no man wey no get problem oh!). but you can learn a thing or two about life in UNN here:

http://www.traedays.com/blog/2004/09/my-life-in-unn-university-of-nigeria-nsukka/.

i bet you don’t know what the negative image of nigeria online from our 419 email scams have done to UNN on the web. well then checkout:
http://www.universityofnigeria.com ,
http://chippla.blogspot.com/2004/09/university-of-nigeria-fraudulent.html
and
http://www.dawodu.com/onuora11.htm . that’s why the university authorities had to settle for
http://www.unn-edu.net/. i also came across this site:
http://www.unnportal.com. it seems it is an actual UNN second site. well i’ll have to verify. the internet really is a means of free expression, whether negative or positive.

UNN’s logo

Hype does one thing: it makes u wanna see what all the noise is about. and that’s what happened with Modenine and I. I’ve heard peeps be like “this nigga is the shit in Nigerian hardcore hip hop circle”. and man after finally listening to his CD (if if u see it: cop it…get it. spread the love) I’m beginning to feel the same way. honestly this rapper is fucking tight. his punch lines and metaphors are one in million. they’re very much above what could come to the mind of an average Nigerian MC. no doubt Modenine got me when he said:

I kill paper when I pen punch lines with murder ink/
every cipher in my lyrics makes you scratch ur head and think/I wish I wrote that…
(from “orisuna basement freestyle” track 17)

now who the fuck said that to make it in the Nigerian music scene u must come African and use the local flavour and pidgin English thing? well to me that ain’t shit. all that matters is that u come out tight in whatever style u use. and that’s what Modenine has done. very unlike most acts out there the self proclaimed lyricist flows largely with a foreign accent and style, plus he swears. true to the hardcore feeling his beats are complex and involve some sampling (sampling is like what Kanye West does when he puts an old school feeling into his tracks. it’s a sort of mixing).

my favourite tracks in the album (in descending order) are:

1) head ft Baron and Terry tha Rapman
To me that’s one hell of a freak song, just like Snoop Dogg’s “don’t tell”. u should put it on when u wanna fuck (smiles). cool smooth beats with pimping lyrics. check the chorus:

don’t lie everybody knows u like (head), so be a cheerful giver/
don’t be shy we’ve all heard about your (head), you look like a brainy diva/

2) elbow room ft Callen
damn I love the orchestral feeling of this song’s chorus. added with tight flows by the Ninestein, the song’s a hit.

3) small boy
funny song. it’s one of the only songs you’ll hear Modenine rapping in Pidgin English. but the production is poor. and that’s because a rock feeling was added to it to make it different from the original in Modenine’s debut: the nine files. u can listen to the original at: paybacktymerecords.com

4) 419 state of mind part 2
This song really captures the current phenomenon like Six Foot Plus’s “millennium bugging” did in it’s time. all those sick of Nigerian scam emails will relate to this.

5) you can’t fuck wit dis
a bounceable-party sort of track. I like the Hausa used at the end. makes we wanna theorize that Hausa is good for hardcore, Igbo for funny songs, and Yoruba for party.

on the critic side I think Nine has got an ego problem. a lot of the tracks on the album were just plain bragging tracks, where he’s tryna proclaim his tightness and supremacy. a more mixed themed album might have been better. and Mode why u ain’t hola at Six Foot Plus and Callen in the “hola back outro”? just asking though. also some of the beats could have been better along with better production.

on the whole the album’s really worth ur time and cash. all em hardcore freaks might be quick to proclaim Modenine Nigeria’s Nas.

shit, I can’t believe I’m on this track talking about (head)/yo peace I’m out/
(terry tha Rapman in “head”)…shit I can’t believe I’m on the net talking about (Nine)/yo peace I’m out/

Stanclef might be Modenine’s number one fan, but I’m a sucker for Terry…I don dey kolo oh!

Modenine. Call him a rapper or an MC and he’ll tell u that he’s a lyricist