Punocracy

… where sa-tyres never go flat

satire

From Our Allies

Dear newly sworn-in government officials …

by Guest writer

After four years, you’ll be left with our doses of curses and prayers. We’ll forget the roads you built. The two-room block of classrooms you commissioned, the borehole you drilled with a manual pump. But we’ll never forget how the economy went down and how we battled recession. How the megawatts of electricity never increased. How you canvassed our votes by promising us our rights and how you never did more than wear agbada and pass bills about increasing your salaries. And yes! We will not forget how you raise your two fingers and shout democracy o!

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The T.A. Report

Tokunbo cars petition UN, lament ‘cruelty’ in Nigeria

by Tubosun Ajanaku

Mr Volkswagen Jetta, the network’s public relations officer, lamented that it is only in Nigeria you find seven people sitting in a place clearly meant for two.

“One large buttock or two will now be dragging our gearshifts with the driver,” he said. “And, for our minibus-members, those ones called conductors even have one leg in the vehicle and one outside because of lack of space. Let us not even go into how one car is forced to carry loads meant for a lorry.”

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FeatureFrom Our Allies

How to be a Nigerian Scholar in the West│James Yékú

by Guest writer

You are “in the abroad” and your views must be seen by these irrational colleagues you have left in the dark as the absolute and irrefutable truths. After all, their research is a mere survivalist response to a parlous postcolonial state you are so generous to theorize in your peer-reviewed essays. Yours is the finest example of scholarship and your prestigious location is the desired Mecca those at home dream only about.

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FeatureFrom Our Allies

How to write about Africa│Binyavanga Wainaina

by Guest writer

In your text, treat Africa as if it were one country. It is hot and dusty with rolling grasslands and huge herds of animals and tall, thin people who are starving. Or it is hot and steamy with very short people who eat primates. Don’t get bogged down with precise descriptions. Africa is big: fifty-four countries, 900 million people who are too busy starving and dying and warring and emigrating to read your book.

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Unseriously Serious

Behind the scenes: Buhari’s prayers in Medina

by Tubosun Ajanaku

Somewhere in the Arabian desert, two frames dressed in white ihram, one much taller than the second, are seen discussing in hushed tones and with a seriousness characteristic of Nigeria, one of the world’s very advanced nations. The Sun provides a natural filter for the faces of His Excellency, the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and his most senior media adviser… but Bayo Omoboriowo, the president’s photographer, is not close-by to capture the unique scene.

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Holy Mountain

Why you should continue to loom — a financial advisory guide

by Elder Aurelius

Leave Loom not, Agents. Borrow nothing from events of the past. Yes, I agree, to some extent, your falling prey to obscure investment schemes is not your fault. “Poor souls are desperate souls.” Isn’t that what we hear? “Unemployed men are ever eager.” Isn’t that what we know? Add to those the fact that your government does not care about you for all it cares. At ordinary oversight and regulatory roles it miserably fails.

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