Category Archives: UCGFs
What Pirate-Captain Entities Should Be Doing for Democracy
There is a keen fascination among young men, particularly at leading schools and universities around the world with the “captain-pirate” mode of rebellion or disobedience against the injustices and excesses of the status quo in society. It is not surprising. The literal meaning of a pirate and the piratical life is one of thieves and the means of thieving, respectively. Its significance in the context of fraternal orders of young men is consanguineous with the metaphor of Robin Hood – stealing from the rich or powerful to give to the poor or weak. The young or seasoned pirate, as he solemnly swears at his initiation, under the direction of his captain is thus necessarily an agent of social justice in society.
The Bad Brother’s Victims 3: Namadi Sambo
Namadi Sambo is yet another victim of Wole Soyinka’s and the Pyrates Confraternity’s mischief. As an ambitious and bright student, in 1974 Sambo as an architecture undergraduate at Ahmadu Bello University (Nigeria) chose to join the Pyrates Confraternity. Namadi Sambo later became Governor of Kaduna State and subsequently the 13th Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We must understand that Islamic Northern Nigerians, particularly of the Hausa-Fulani stock rarely ever join University Campus Grown Fraternities (UCGF) since their ethos goes against the everyday sensibilities of Islam. Sambo’s (and others) interest as a Hausa-Fulani to join the Pyrates Confraternity seemed like a breakthrough in expanding the network of membership among Northerners. Nigeria is lucky today to have him alive considering the consequences of his initiation into the Pyrates Confraternity.
The Bad Brother’s Victims 2: Usani Uguru Usani
Usani Uguru Usani is another example of the protean victim Wole Soyinka, and the Pyrates Confraternity create. Again, in the late 1990s, Usani was made a commissioner in the cabinet of three governors from 1995 to 1999 holding various portfolios in Cross Rivers State. He was then seen as a future governor the state and today he is currently Minister of State for Niger Delta in the government of President Muhammadu Buhari. However, if the Pyrates Confraternity had their way, his political career would have ended a long time ago.
The Bad Brother’s Victims 1: Ben Oguntuase
Ben Oguntuase is a prime example of being a systematic victim of the mischief of Wole Soyinka and the Pyrates Confraternity. A very bright and energetic graduate of petroleum engineering from the Universities of Ibadan (Nigeria) and Louisiana (USA), Big Ben as he was often called, quickly rose through the ranks of National Oil plc (an oil marketing concern). And was a star in the corporate class of Nigeria. By the late 1990s, he had become the Capoon of the Pyrates Confraternity (a.k.a. National Association of Seadogs International). One thing he tried to achieve as the Pyrates Capoon was to eliminate the heinous and proliferating incidences of University Campus Grown Fraternities’ (UCGF) violence causing death, mayhem and ruin to the lives of so many young higher education students across the country. It was a great national concern of the day which persists. As noble as this quest of Ben Oguntuase was, it cost him his brilliant career at the singular order of Wole Soyinka.
Who is He, the Bad Brother? Wole Soyinka & His Goons
Wole Soyinka and his “goons”, as the man affectionately calls them, are the “Bad Brothers” and the Pyrates Confraternity is the “Bad Brotherhood”. It is only the long staggering history of theft, manipulation, racketeering, corruption, abuse, brutality, slavery and many inhumane practices that unambiguously establish the justification and evidence of the descriptor “Bad”.
The physical and psychological victims of this very “Badness” run into the thousands but have no voice and fear a vicious myriad of accusations, smears and violence if they speak out. There are the survivors too. But most of them have cut their losses with the Confraternity even in their daily thoughts. Hundreds of men blindly every year join the association, not knowing the realities within. Such men with high expectations of personal advancement but end up with one invariable outcome (cf. the road to Europe via Libya). Many within the Confraternity are still suffering as victims. And these members held captive, only cope through mutual [imposed] mechanisms of sheer learned helplessness and stupefaction; alcohol and song provide much solace. The adopted but subtle indoctrination associated with aggressively absorbent cults around the world is well-documented. These are in evidence in every prescribed action and thought of the Confraternity.
The Bad Brother’s Nemesis: 2
Fire!!! Fire!! I have to repeat it, Fire!!! When two or more Otukas gather, a fire is nearby ready to consume habitually bad men mercilessly. No ashes remain, and the Fire is too hot to scream in. Kegs of rum and seas of brine cannot quench it. The Fire though is always a potentiality, and it is only the purity of the human spirit. The Otuka encases that which turns him away from such an eschatology of the wicked. Inevitably, sometimes it has to be done. Plenty of indications, no announcement required.
May one resort to God’s word in this endeavour? For those who read the Bible or never will, I want to interest them in the “Book of Kings” 1: v 9-10;
The Bad Brother’s Nemesis
The Otuka (a.k.a. Akanda Eniyan) is born into this world very lonely, living on his terms, mostly. He misunderstands everyone else; he is someone everyone else misunderstands. For those he encounters, everyone else is his challenge, and he is everyone else’s challenge. Trouble? His life is never easy even if gifted, successful, influential or content and is harder when this is not the case. He, as the intersection of misunderstandings, cannot find a like mind as others naturally, e.g. as thieves and drunkards do. What frustration! Yet he thrives.
Professor Soyinka’s and the Pyrates Confraternity – I Disagree!
Comment: Over the past six years I have written several articles about the wrongs and decadence of University Campus Grown Fraternities (UCGF) (some deleted) with insider knowledge. I more recently even developed two essay series out of them, namely, Fraternities are Viruses in Nigeria and The Leadership of a Bad Brother (both which do not names persons or fraternities) with another series in making that does mention names. A major international media house and a documentary filmmaker have even contacted me for my expertise on the matter. However, over a decade before me, Omoleye Sowore (in 2002) had written one of the most important articles on the source problem of cults (UCGF) in Nigeria and its possible remedies. I am sure many readers will agree.
Sowore writes: “It takes a lot of gut to disagree with someone of Professor Soyinka’s standing in the world. In almost every sense he has used his courage, expertise, connections and skills to intervene on behalf of Nigeria to obtain freedom from terror, democracy and respect for human rights, it is common knowledge that he has done very well and I mean excellently well in his capacity as a literary giant, activist, Nobel laureate and Pan Africanist. Continue reading
The Leadership of a Bad Brother – Level Seven
