Weighty Words of Reflections on the First Lady's Mission Mansion

Such weighty words cannot be brushed past in a hurry without pausing to deeply reflect on their connotative essence and didactic values. Our nation needs potent gongs in the hands of virile "town-criers" - and that's what we are - to serve as barometer and checks for the excesses of our leaders.

This, therefore, brings me to a noble urge to share these words of wisdom from no other person but the much respected literary icon, staunch activist and an astute Voice of the voiceless, Prof. Wole Soyinka in his article: "Ghost Missions on the Gravy Train" (The Guardian, Thursday, March 21, 2013, p.11). Let me, however spare you the trouble of verbosity and present to you the punchy summary of the African's first nobel Laurette's submission on the "groveling sycophancy" of some leaders in Nigeria on the issue of the First Lady's "Mission Mansion"  as captured in The Guardian newspaper; and then you are entitled to your varied extrapolations. 

I do quote:

"Here then are two contrasting expositions - that of the Minister of the FCT, and that of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. The FCT Minister even claimed that this mission is an NGO; the Minister for Foreign Affairs insists that it is not, that it is an 'international obligation'! Please, spell it out more clearly. Since when? Under what protocols, resolutions or whatever? And of what international organisation?

President Goodluck Jonathan must be stoutly applauded for declaring that he cannot grant Amnesty to ghosts. Let me add also that 'he' (emphasis mine) cannot make budgetary allocations to ghosts. Like ghost workers through whose invisible entrails billions have vanished into Nigerian burial grounds, First Ladies are nothing but constitutional ghosts, and that means that their 'pets projects', wherever they lay claims on national budgeting - individually or collectively, and however lofty sounding - are nothing but spectral emanations, already Dead on Arrival.

Lest I am misunderstood: First Ladies have the same rights as all citizens to 'leave a legacy behind'. They must however work hard to source their funds where the rest of the world does - in the private domain, not dig their hands into public funds on which crying needs, far too numerous and deserving to mention, have prior and - most important - legitimate and constitutional claims. Too bad, Bill Gates has decided to keep away from Nigeria owing to the latest incontinence of power - Madame should have tried touching Mr. Gates for small change. Then she would have learnt that hard working millionaires are painfully discriminating about what causes they espouse."