Thoughts of a Lost Drinker

And if reverence lies in beards
And forever it should be
That we shall dwell long with our beer
For it is our sanctity

A healer to our bleeding hearts
Our escape from the gas of this world
Then our silent suffering and toil
Shall be nothing, but duff.

For no light is left of us
As man's mind has become dross

Their Peace

I'll say it
They are lost

I'll say it
These roughs

I'll say it
They are lost

When life becomes a circus
Where we all move in circles
For fun and bravery-
We love our very value

Yes they are lost
But i have no clue

Yet

Daunting
A voice danced
Our road is dusty
pam gbam-
Our dam goes down
They weep.
Infants in suits
They beg me: Twisted men
In children panties: bearded women!
Their minds naked
Raging in the evil winds of the desert
They have nothing
Grief dreams
vum vum vum
Like ghosts
Their ideas gaunt
Nothing.
kri kri kri
The devil in their deeds
Not a thing
shii shii shii
They sleep
That i see
Awake them!

But When Will We Change?

So Nigerians--no, some Nigerians--have voted. The dirty irregularities were manifested. It's unfortunate a nation like Nigeria cannot hold a fair election. Ironically, France held its presidential elections the same period as the Nigerians and France's own has gone smoothly. Shameful is what occurred in Nigeria.

So what happened? The elections in Nigeria obviously was flawed with late arrival of ballot boxes, people were not able to vote for the whole day of the elections and violence and violence and violence. That was what happened. Nothing more!

I don't know what is wrong with African leaders. I am a Ghanaian: as far as i know, we have a very good relationship with the Nigerian governement. At our independence golden jubilee celebrations, president Obasanjo was the guest of honour and president Kufuor made a statement like there is a new wave of African leaders... It's a shame prez Obasanjo has betrayed that speech. He couldn't conduct a credible election. The opposition and local and foreign observers have called for a re-run of the elections. Granting an interview to the bbc which was aired yesterday, prez Obasanjo said the "elections was flawed, but not so imperfect that it has to be re-run." Did you hear him.

The head of the EU observers, on bbc, said the elections was a disappointing and needs a serious debate. Foreign observers have called it "a sham and a charade." What's more? They accurately describe what happened. The political vindictiveness that prez Obasanjo rehearsed on vice-president Atiku, just because he objected to his evil third term presidency proposal, said it all before the elections commenced.

With population of about 130 million people, only 6o million thereabout registered and about 26 million voted. Quite a scare. When the irregularities were reported and compared to that of France, most people in and out of Nigeria who in ideology sided with the government said Nigeria is far bigger than France. What a disgrace! What about nations like China and India. And if Nigeria is so big and large, how come the results were declared so soon in about 48 hours? The elections were clearly rigged! No doubt about it. What happened in Nigeria shows how outgoing African leaders elect their successors.

This is one of the worst elections ever to be held in Nigeria. So are they moving backwards or what? One of the presidential candidate, Buhari, have said they would contest the results and take to the streets. In his words, Nigerians would be selling themselves into self slavery.

So what is left? Candidate Omaru Yaradua is a former governor and he is known to have implemented sharia in his former state. So what has he up his sleeves? How safe are Nigerians? I hope the best for Nigerians. For now their path appears gloomy and dusty

Shame on the Independent Nigerian Electoral Commission (INEC) and prez Obasanjo who hailed such turbulent elections. The best Nigerians and the government can do is to have a re-run of the elections.

An Overview of the Policy: What People Say and What it Truly Is

This "new" educational policy (i still don't have a white paper, or whatever) says 2 years for kindergarten, 6 years of primary education (no change), 3 years of Junior High School (no change, except in the name and what it comes with) and Senior High School of 4 years (a change in name and 1 more year).
In addition, there will be a certain form of apprenticeship (great idea considering the definition of a policy: I will explain later) just after High school.

Okay. So what's in a name or a change of name? When can we change the name of an institution? What goes into such acts? These and many more legitimate and zero bias questions are what we should be asking the government, policy planners and implementors and at the highest point of the mountain, we must ask ourselves as citizens, what it means for us. NOT OPEN OUR JACKAL-LIKE MOUTH AND INVEIGH ANYTHING FROM GOVERNMENT. Why should i say this? Ghanaians, and Africans in general, are fond of such trivial stupidities. What shames me most is when we have supposedly intellectuals also trailing the path of such dickheadedness!

Let's proceed and talk sense, not those myopic monologues. The name of an intitution may change on many grounds. A "false" analogy may be drawn between this and the naming of a child, but the child gets the name without his consent (ha-ha) and none of his fault. It is also done among a persons (parents and perhaps grandparents). An institution has a governing body and takes a long time to come out such acidic matters. You may change the name of such bodies for a new identity (important when you feel there's a deteriorating nature in the former one), assigning new functions to such bodies, or overhauling the whole system of the institution. You see. Be patient. We can go ahead and change the name of that institution upon a considerable level of planning and involvement of the required experts in the field. There must be a clear reason why the change should take place, and the necessary infrastructure must be ready. In all these, finance should be key so as not to calapse the system.

Now, a policy should define its role or purpose as short, medium or long term solutions to problems. Be careful, the policy should solve a problem. Yes, if you don't know--now you know. A policy also could capture an action already on the ground or a totally new thing. So then we must ask: does the new policy rescue any situation? I am afraid it does. I don't like answering questions not meant for me, but this time i will. Most students in Ghana, after senior high school, do all sort of jobs before applying for university in the following year. So if one is bringing a new policy, the policy must reflect and solve this. That is what this policy, at least, seeks to do. What's more, most senior high school or senior secondary school graduates cannot write application letters! That true! But remember they are taught how to write formal and informal letters alike. So letting them have one more year sound reasonable.

To recast on what i have said so far, a friend suggested that the 1 more year should be optional. Quite interesting and logical. After all, it's a free world. Watch out, man. Ghanaian like cheap (easy) things and i believe it may be a human characteristic. I bet my house on the matter that if there should be 40 students in a class who had the option of 1 more year, 38 would opt out. Very true. So then, what would such a policy have achieved? Novisi? Explain to me.

I don't beleive in just castigating people or political leaders for the sweetness and pleasure of it. No matter how corrupt and crazy they may be, we put them where they. We have a right to ask them why they take some decisions. We cannot wake up every morning opening our dirty noses for them to lick just because they said or did something. We must first make something work first.

Undoubtedly, our evaluation of old policies has been poor. Consequently, we have been repeating the same old sins. It is also partly because we the people: farmers, fishing folks, teachers; civil and public servants, opposition parties, academics and intellectuals alike--have made the system fail. We pray and pull each other down thinking ours would be better. We throw stones into a market place and it hits our own family. Unfortunately, this has been our bane.

I hope people would not only constructively criticize this policy, but also offer better solutions and together help make the education system a better one.

Right now, i got a meal to chat with...

New policy? Where is the old?

President Kufuor has launched a new educational reform. As to whether it is new, we shall see. I don't have a white paper on the new policy-in-education, but i watched the report on tv3, a local tv station based in Accra. Interesting. Why? Are you wondering what i think is interesting?

You know, i am a student of Linguistic at the university of Ghana, and i am currently working on Tanzania's language policy which include education. Ghana currently runs a policy of language which does not favour much of our indigenous languages and dialects. There may be factual reasons why, and you will know very soon.

The reforms introduced by the president change Senior Secondary School from 3 years to 4 years and also the name changed to Senior High School. I'll give you more later...

What is it again

You know, humans are always crazy about one thing or the other. But this time around it is serious. We are talking about human life and the only chance a woman has got to have children. Anyway, what has that got to do with me. WHYS (i suppose you know that by now) brought the issue up on tonights discussions.

The normal issues crop up: Human Rights and whatever. What's so funny about this is that the ex-boyfriend of the lady, Nathalie Evans, does not want the baby or babies. He had given his consent when they were together to have Nathalie's embyo's freezed because she had cancer, but the relationship is no more. The woman is arguing that the eggs are hers, the man says he fertilized it. Funny, ha? The man is saying he should be allowed to choose when to have children (a popular saying of the women).

So is it that the man is using the women's sword against them? Well, i have a project work to submit.

Easter-a Shift and Change of Tradition?

Why would the celebration, oops! No. Why would the remembrance of Jesus Christ's remarkable death pass without me passing a word or two? Well, the season had once again tickled my poetic instincts. I wrote a poem on death again. I mean a new poem this week not last week's. I think it was on Thursday. Anyway, you can read the earlier poem on death at my poetry blog.

I hope to paste all my recent poems there. I have been a little busy:my exams is coming up shortly. I also have some group project works to catch up with, you know. Okay. Enough! Let's talk Easter.

I am not taken aback when i see people now wanting to commercialize Christ's death. They need to eat, of course. A friend at my university (university of Ghana, Legon) asked how are we celebrating the Easter? I had replied what is there to celebrate about somebody death? I may be wrong, but come to think of it, why would one rejoice at a sad moment. Unless you want to be like my good pal and producer Martin who is sometimes laissez-faire in his speech (that's my opinion anyway). But I'm sure even he would do no such thing!

As i write, some section of Ghanaians are at Kwahu mountains in Ghana, para gliding away Jesus' death! Enjoy.... Sure! Why not? It's all good. I am staying back on campus. It's relatively quiet because so many students have gone for the Easter holidays from wherever they came from.

I watched a report on tv3 (a local tv station in Ghana) which questioned whether the purpose or value of Easter is been lost or not realized. The man-of-God who was speaking assigned some excuses for the low level of Easter commemoration as compared to previous years. But he never attested to the very fact that Easter may be a period for sober reflections and that is why there is not hue and cry about the whole thing. He said Easter is not Christmas and also not at the end of the year. Well...

The thing is that words and concepts undergo meaning change, shift and extension-but why Easter?

I wish all bloggers and readers a sad and memorable Easter. I got to read now...

Weird Indeed

I have always maintained that we humans can be weird. We do all sort of things, sometimes irrational. And our feelings run wild on the little provocation. Is it provocation? I'm not sure that is the word i want to use. And when it is about religion, crazy we charge.

Last week there was the picture, or caricature, if you prefer that, of Jesus Christ as chocolate. Was that it? Holy shit! Christians in America are all crazy about it. The bbc World Have Your Say programme was flooded with the issue, asking if it is freedom of speech or nothing else. You can be pretty damn sure no Christian fundamentalist would concur to that.

The thing is that, these religious provocations have been running for a long time now. Mostly perching between holiness and human freedom of speech. But why would someone make Jesus look like a chocolate? Or just retaliation for Muhammed carrying a bomb under his robe? So you see? There is no sense in that. We are only back-biting ourselves.

What pains me about religions of today is not the religions. The religion that people profess to love so much.... No. Let me sya it this way. They do not actually know what they worship. They never practice it. Misinterpretations head to toe, all over. Surely we do have truthful ones. I cannot pretend i don't know. But we put our emotions in whatever we do, rather that this our head. Even the Bible says the heart is the most deceitful thing. So what's up?

Well, i surmise we humans may never change. That is how we are. And let me tell you, the man that ties frogs around his legs must be ready to have snakes dancing behind him. I have a lecture to catch. Catch you.