Psychopaths

Culture as Institution | Musings | Social Relations

The Tooth of a Toad [Ako re’Oghwokpo]

ByGrimot Nane Zine June 4, 2020January 4, 2022

There is an old African tale in former times used as a universal allegory. There was once a flourishing pond with an environ full of animals and provided enough for all their needs. Strife was minimal. A Monitor Lizard in the pond had a big reputation for perpetrating wickedness, slander and treachery against other animals that inhabited the environs of the pond. The pain of others was his chief daily joy. His stripes, complexion, eyes and movements made him look both alien and wretched – perhaps the source of his deformed personality. Lying by raising reasonable doubt or obfuscating facts was the essential deception he used to harm and ruin others for no good reason at all. He also had gotten many animals severely punished and banished from the pond despite their innocence. Above all, he was a master flatterer who could easily get former victims to support him and his many schemes. Alas, the animals that lived by the pond accepted the Monitor Lizard’s evil ways as inevitable possibly because they dreaded him. Then a day of reckoning emerged.

Corruption | Governance

“Blame or Claim” Governance: Buhari’s Only Hope

ByGrimot Nane Zine May 25, 2018December 30, 2021

There is an insightful article for those interested in governance by Taiwo Makinde titled Problems of Policy Implementation in Developing Nations: The Nigerian Experience. In the paper, the Makinde explains quite persuasively why policy implementation in Nigeria routinely fails with successive governments. He implicates, among other factors, a lack of continuity of policy implementation from a previous government to a succeeding, e.g. from Presidents Babangida to Abacha [or Jonathan to Buhari]. Ego [of the leader] is the reason he provides for this. The logic is simple; it is better for the current president to sabotage the good works of a predecessor and initiate his own that will place his mention high on the lips of posterity. It holds for all forms of organisation in Nigeria. The significant exception is President Muhammad Buhari and for strange reasons; blamocracy [and claimocracy].

Short Stories | Social Relations

The Near Death Experience of a Petite Man: Part 2

ByGrimot Nane Zine August 9, 2015December 30, 2021

Taba and Tomos, who were allies and bitter enemies, were working together by themselves on a plot at Marioka’s house in Catford, South London. They could never meet up for a humane activity. Abetting, not cooperation, brought them together. Marioka had a sudden emergency to attend in Southgate, North London. It was an imposing, well-decorated three-bedroom house with a grey brick facade overlooking the leafy Mountsfield Park. They were in the computer room upstairs working on their gentleman’s club server. Tomos was gradual in his disdain towards anyone he considered beneath him, yet again. Wearing a smart suit as ever, Tomos was smug in taking ever bold verbal jabs at Taba. He bragged about his father’s exploits as a notable architect and his birth in the UK. His dismissal of Taba as a person descended from peasants and obsessed with social-climbing was harsh and unnecessary. Tomos went further to inform Taba, one is well-born or not. Self-made men without pedigree are usually “one generation wonders.” The limit came when Taba was told living in England could never elevate his type. Read More “The Near Death Experience of a Petite Man: Part 2”

Social Crisis

Fraternities and the Tolerance of Psychopaths

ByGrimot Nane Zine February 8, 2015January 5, 2022

The Nigerian university campus grown fraternity (UCGF) tended to start well but end up acquiring a good number of psychopaths. Most members of these fraternities are serial victims of these psychopaths (sometimes the same ones) who eventually and permanently hold the reins of power. Why would educated men endure being repeat victims indefinitely? Richard Dawkins’ Self Gene holds the answer; these fraternities are enclaves that contain cheats (psychopaths), suckers (victims) and grudgers (resistors to psychopaths). The tolerance of Cheats in fraternities reveals far more about them than is sanely desirable.

Social Crisis

Fraternal Psychopathy as Charity

ByGrimot Nane Zine December 25, 2014January 5, 2022

One growing and disturbing phenomenon of Nigerian university campus grown fraternities (UCGFs) is their transformation into “charities”. It is a purely psychopathic phenomenon, set up by psychopaths purely for the benefits of a cabal of psychopaths who run these fraternities. It is just another ruse for fraternities to hit the goodwill of funders of charitable agencies with criminal and fraudulent activities in the name of do-gooding. Read More “Fraternal Psychopathy as Charity”