Michael Jackson: Lawsuit and New Tell All Book

Michael Jackson died in June, 2009  but it seems that some will not let him rest in peace. Jackson’s personal assistant is asserting that him and other members of Jackson’s staff are owed $7.5 million. According to TMZ, Michael Amir Williams is suing The Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), the company that organized and then cancelled the This Is It tour, so that the staff can get paid for their services.

AEG hired Dr. Conrad Murray on behalf of Michael Jackon. Because Murray was later convicted of of involuntary manslaughter after administering a fatal dose of Propofol to Jackson, Williams asserts that AEG is partially responsible for Jackson’s death and is also responsible for the cancellation of the tour.

Williams is seeking an undisclosed amount of money, in damages.

Meanwhile, “Untouchable: The Strange Life and Tragic Death of Michael Jackson,” a new tell-all book about Michael Jackson’s life is now in stores. The book was written by journalist Randall Sullivan who spent three years alongside Michael Jackson. Sullivan describes the pop legend as a man who was overwhelmed by fame in such a way that it affected all his relationships. Sullivan described Jackson as a man who was fascinated by youth and even described him as “a child trapped in an adult world.”

Speaking on ABC Nightline, Sullivan said,

“I think he did all that he could to neutralize himself. I don’t think Michael was trying to be homosexual, heterosexual, pedophile, I think he was trying to be asexual: pre-s****l actually. I think he was aiming to be pre-s****l because he saw that as the one place where innocence and purity and great ideas and you know, artistic visions and poetic fantasies all abide.”

Jackson’ family refused to be involved in Sullivan’s attempt at chronicling Michael Jackson in his 800 page book and he speculated that maybe it was because he may have been too critical of some of the members of the Jackson family.

He said,

“People want to believe that the Jackson’s are a family of very, very talented people. Really there was one very, very talented person. I mean Jermaine has a bit of a voice, but I don’t think he’d have risen above the level of lounge singer without Michael.

Source -blacklikemoi.

Why Nigerians hate Igbo, by Chinua Achebe

Achebe

Nigeria’s foremost novelist Chinua Achebe has claimed that Nigerians, especially of the Hausa/Fulani and the Yoruba stocks, do not like his Igbo ethnic group because of the southeast’s cultural advantage.

He made this claim in his new book, There was a Country, which has generated controversy for his onslaught on the role of Obafemi Awolowo as the federal commissioner of finance during the Nigeria civil war. He accused Awolowo of genocide and imposition of food blockade on Biafra, a claim that has drawn rebuttals and contradictions of emotional intensity from some southwest leaders and commentators.

“I have written in my small book entitled The Trouble with Nigeria that Nigerians will probably achieve consensus on no other matter than their common resentment of the Igbo,” he wrote under the heading, A History of Ethnic Tension and Resentment. He traced the origin of “the national resentment of the Igbo” to its culture that “gave the Igbo man an unquestioned advantage over his compatriots in securing credentials for advancement in Nigerian colonial society.”

He observed that the Igbo culture’s emphasis on change, individualism and competitiveness gave his ethnic group an edge over the Hausa/Fulani man who was hindered by a “wary religion” and the Yoruba man who was hampered by” traditional hierarchies.”

He therefore described the Igbo, who are predominantly Catholic, as “fearing no god or man, was “custom-made to grasp the opportunities, such as they were, of the white man’s dispensations. And the Igbo did so with both hands.”

He delved into history with his claim, asserting that the Igbo overcame the earlier Yoruba advantage within two decades earlier in the twentieth century.

“Although the Yoruba had a huge historical and geographical head start, the Igbo wiped out their handicap in one fantastic burst of energy in the twenty years between 1930 and 1950.”

He narrated the earlier advantage of Yoruba as contingent on their location on the coastline, but once the missionaries crossed the Niger, the Igbo took advantage of the opportunity and overtook the Yoruba.

‘The increase was so exponential in such a short time that within three short decades the Igbos had closed the gap and quickly moved ahead as the group with the highest literacy rate, the highest standard of living, and the greatest of citizens with postsecondary education in Nigeria,” he contended.

He said Nigerian leadership should have taken advantage of the gbo talent and this failure was partly responsible for the failure of the Nigerian state, explaining further that competitive individualism and the adventurous spirit of the Igbo was a boon Nigerian leaders failed to recognize and harness for modernization.

“Nigeria’s pathetic attempt to crush these idiosyncrasies rather than celebrate them is one of the fundamental reasons the country has not developed as it should and has emerged as a laughingstock,” he claimed.

He noted that the ousting of prominent Igbos from top offices was a ploy to achieve a simple and crude goal. He said what the Nigerians wanted was to “get the achievers out and replace them with less qualified individuals from the desired ethnic background so as to gain access to the resources of the state.”

Achebe, however, saved some criticisms for his kinsmen. He criticised them for what he described as “hubris, overweening pride and thoughtlessness, which invite envy and hatred or even worse that can obsess the mind with material success and dispose it to all kinds of crude showiness.”

He added that “contemporary Igbo behavior(that) cab offend by its noisy exhibitionism and disregard for humility and quietness.

 

Nigeria is haunted by Biafran war’

Chinua Achebe’s new memoir suggests that Nigeria is still suffering from a refusal to face up to its insalubrious history

In our house in Nsukka, the small university town in eastern Nigeria where I grew up, my parents’ bedroom harboured a cupboard, reached only by standing on a stepladder. In that cupboard lay a battered brown leather satchel, filled with memorabilia from Biafra. I remember Biafran stamps, currency notes and coins, photographs, receipts, letters and a small green hard backed pamphlet: The Ahiara Declaration.

From time to time, under conditions of great secrecy, the satchel would be brought down and my brothers and I would be allowed to rummage through it as my parents told us stories of their harrowing experiences during the war. We would look at photographs of friends and family “lost” in the conflict, or during the massacres of Igbos that preceded it. We would marvel at the lightness of the Biafran coins. I don’t remember my parents explicitly saying it, but somehow it was communicated to us that the satchel and its contents were not things to be discussed outside the family home.

In Nigeria in the 1970s when I grew up, Biafra was only talked about in hushed tones, in an atmosphere of an unspoken fear that talking about it could bring reprisals.

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to be invited to an early rough-cut screening of the film version of Chimamanda Adichie’s book, Half of a Yellow Sun. At the end, in the darkened room in Soho, as I joined others to congratulate the director Biyi Bandele, I found myself hugging him instead and felt to my embarrassment, tears running down my cheeks. As I apologised, avoiding the bemused stares from some of the staff at the venue, I explained to Biyi that I had felt such a powerful reaction because the story he was telling was the story of my family – of my parents and grandparents.

That evening, as on the phone I described my feelings watching Biafran refugees fleeing the university town of Nsukka to my mother, who had herself fled the town with my father and elder brother in 1967, she said “I am glad that our story is going to be told, that the world will remember”.

Chinua Achebe’s new book There Was A Country: A Personal History of Biafra emerges into this landscape of memory and remembrance, 42 years after the war ended. In the book Achebe, a few weeks before his 82nd birthday, finally sets out to tell the story of his Biafra. The format he adopts is novel – involving a rambling mix of anecdotes, summarized histories, analysis, reportage, declamation and haunting poetry. In some ways, reading the book feels like I imagine spending an hour or two chatting with the distinguished novelist might.

He roams from the story of how Nigeria came to be, to his schooldays and burgeoning friendships with prominent figures like the poet Christopher Okigbo, whose presence looms large through the book. Interspersing the historical account is the story of his father, one of the early Igbo converts to Christianity, and his experiences growing up with newly Christian, trailblazing parents caught between the old traditions and cosmology of the Igbo people and the new Christianity. The personal glimpses into his early life are hugely enjoyable and indeed tantalizing – often outlined so succinctly, that he leaves the reader greedy for more detail.

Approaching the events leading up to the war – the descent of the first post-independence Nigerian government into an abyss of corruption and misrule; the role that the colonial government played in setting the stage for this descent and the first military coup in 1966 – he acquires a less personal and more straightforward recounting tone. This continues until the latter part of the book, when he begins to describe the counter-coup of July 1966, the massacres of Igbos that followed the coup, the failed attempts at negotiating peace and the subsequent declaration of independence and the harrowing consequences that followed.

Achebe, as is his right, does not pull any punches, although he does make some concessions to alternative points of view, especially in relation to the legacy of colonialism and the moral imperative on writers to produce committed literature. He is less conciliatory on the question of whether the actions of the Federal Government of Nigeria during the war constituted war crimes and, possibly, genocide. He is scrupulous in naming the officers and individuals responsible, and where possible provides their viewpoints based on news and other reports.

He also highlights the role played by Western countries and the international community. And he challenges the popular perception that General Gowon’s “No Victor, No Vanquished” policy at the end of the war in 1970 led to the successful re-integration of the Igbos into Nigeria, highlighting the egregious government policy which wiped out the savings of every Biafran who had operated their bank accounts during the war with an “ex- gratia” payment of just 20 pounds. He is also laser sharp in his conviction that part of Nigeria’s problem stems from its anti-meritocratic suppression of the Igbo people, and the refusal of the country to face up to insalubrious aspects of its history, issues that he argues continue to haunt it.

Of particular interest are the snippets that emerge of life in Biafra – the intense emotional connection of a people united by the fear and anger at the massacres, the ingenuity of the engineers who fond ways to refine petrol or build bombs and the efforts of artists and intellectuals to contribute to building a new nation. He also describes his own forays to foreign capitals to seek their support for the Biafran dream and the eventual withering and death of that dream. Sprinkled through the book are excerpts from a series of interviews commissioned by the Achebe Foundation with many of the key players in Nigeria’s history. These, when eventually published, should provide a rich resource and other perspectives on the events that the author describes.

The final section of the book picks up on Nigeria’s journey since the end of the war, dipping into the failures of governance and the consequences, raising several questions that need to be addressed for the future.

The book could benefit from a closer proof-reading and fact-checking process by an informed editor. Irritating errors crop up like “maul over” for “mull over” “deferral” for “federal”, “Iwe Ihorin” for “Iwe Irohin” and St Elizabeth’s Hospital for Queen Elizabeth Hospital, but these do not detract from Achebe’s attempt to present, from his perspective, an account of those dark days. As he says in the book, “My aim is not to provide all the answers but to raise questions and perhaps to cause a few headaches”. It is clear that this is his book, his view and his own particular nostalgic ramble. Ultimately, it is important that he has shared it, warts, unevenness and all. In doing so, Achebe has helped bring the contents of my parents’ brown satchel back into the open.

Culled from guardian Uk

The genocidal Biafran war still haunts Nigeria | Chinua Achebe

The persecution of the Igbos didn’t end with the Biafran conflict. Until the nation faces up to this, its mediocrity will continue

Almost 30 years before Rwanda, before Darfur, more than 2 million people – mothers, children, babies, civilians – lost their lives as a result of the blatantly callous and unnecessary policies enacted by the leaders of the federal government of Nigeria.

As a writer I believe that it is fundamentally important, indeed essential to our humanity, to ask the hard questions, in order to better understand ourselves and our neighbours. Where there is justification for further investigation, justice should be served.

In the case of the Nigeria-Biafra war there is precious little relevant literature that helps answer these questions. Did the federal government of Nigeria engage in the genocide of its Igbo citizens – who set up the republic of Biafra in 1967 – through punitive policies, the most notorious being “starvation as a legitimate weapon of war”? Is the information blockade around the war a case of calculated historical suppression? Why has the war not been discussed, or taught to the young, more than 40 years after its end? Are we perpetually doomed to repeat the errors of the past because we are too stubborn to learn from them?

The Oxford English Dictionary defines genocide as “the deliberate and systematic extermination of an ethnic or national group …”. The UN general assembly defined it in 1946 as “… a denial of the right of existence of entire human groups”. Throughout the conflict the Biafrans consistently charged that the Nigerians had a design to exterminate the Igbo people from the face of the earth. This calculation, the Biafrans insisted, was predicated on a holy jihad proclaimed by mainly Islamic extremists in the Nigerian army and supported by the policies of economic blockade that prevented shipments of humanitarian aid, food and supplies to the needy in Biafra.

Supporters of the federal government position maintain that a war was being waged and the premise of all wars is for one side to emerge as the victor. Overly ambitious actors may have “taken actions unbecoming of international conventions of human rights, but these things happen everywhere”. This same group often cites findings, from organisations (sanctioned by the federal government) that sent observers during the crisis, that there “was no clear intent on behalf of the Nigerian troops to wipe out the Igbo people … pointing out that over 30,000 Igbos still lived in Lagos, and half a million in the mid-west”.

But if the diabolical disregard for human life seen during the war was not due to the northern military elite’s jihadist or genocidal obsession, then why were there more small arms used on Biafran soil than during the entire second world war? Why were there 100,000 casualties on the much larger Nigerian side compared with more than 2 million – mainly children – Biafrans killed?

It is important to point out that most Nigerians were against the war and abhorred the senseless violence that ensued. The wartime cabinet of General Gowon, the military ruler, it should also be remembered, was full of intellectuals like Chief Obafemi Awolowo among others who came up with a boatload of infamous and regrettable policies. A statement credited to Awolowo and echoed by his cohorts is the most callous and unfortunate: all is fair in war, and starvation is one of the weapons of war. I don’t see why we should feed our enemies fat in order for them to fight harder.

It is my impression that Awolowo was driven by an overriding ambition for power, for himself and for his Yoruba people. There is, on the surface at least, nothing wrong with those aspirations. However, Awolowo saw the dominant Igbos at the time as the obstacles to that goal, and when the opportunity arose – the Nigeria-Biafra war – his ambition drove him into a frenzy to go to every length to achieve his dreams. In the Biafran case it meant hatching up a diabolical policy to reduce the numbers of his enemies significantly through starvation — eliminating over two million people, mainly members of future generations.

The federal government’s actions soon after the war could be seen not as conciliatory but as outright hostile. After the conflict ended, the same hardliners in the Nigerian government cast Igbos in the role of treasonable felons and wreckers of the nation – and got the regime to adopt a banking policy that nullified any bank account operated during the war by the Biafrans. A flat sum of 20 Nigerian pounds was approved for each Igbo depositor, regardless of the amount of deposit. If there was ever a measure put in place to stunt, or even obliterate, the economy of a people, this was it.

After that outrageous charade, Nigeria’s leaders sought to devastate the resilient and emerging eastern commercial sector even further by banning the import of secondhand clothing and stockfish – two trade items that they knew the burgeoning market towns of Onitsha, Aba and Nnewi needed to re-emerge. Their fear was that these communities, fully reconstituted, would then serve as the economic engines for the reconstruction of the entire Eastern Region.

There are many international observers who believe that Gowon’s actions after the war were magnanimous and laudable. There are tons of treatises that talk about how the Igbo were wonderfully integrated into Nigeria. Well, I have news for them: The Igbos were not and continue not to be reintegrated into Nigeria, one of the main reasons for the country’s continued backwardness.

Borrowing from the Marshall plan for Europe after the second world war, the federal government launched an elaborate scheme highlighted by three Rs – for reconstruction, rehabilitation, and reconciliation. The only difference is that, while the Americans actually carried out all three prongs of the strategy, Nigeria’s federal government did not.

What has consistently escaped most Nigerians in this entire travesty is the fact that mediocrity destroys the very fabric of a country as surely as a war – ushering in all sorts of banality, ineptitude, corruption and debauchery. Nations enshrine mediocrity as their modus operandi, and create the fertile ground for the rise of tyrants and other base elements of the society, by silently assenting to the dismantling of systems of excellence because they do not immediately benefit one specific ethnic, racial, political, or special-interest group. That, in my humble opinion, is precisely where Nigeria finds itself today.

Culled from-guardian.uk

Power Game

 

Right in front, the Asian lady with a tattoo on her back is China.

On the left, the lady full of concentration is Japan.

Dressed at the top looking sideways is USA.

Lying rather seductively is Russia.

The little girl standing by the side is Taiwan.

China “tripled” the Dong tiles (East Winds, this is a double up). This means that China has arisen with the circumstances (the winds); maybe that is the display of the “East Wind” missiles she possesses now. It looks like China is doing ok, but there is no clue about the other cards (tiles). Meanwhile she is up to no good under the table.

USA, appearing confident, is looking at Taiwan with an expression; perhaps to read from the look of Taiwan or to send some message.

Russia may appear indifferent but it is far from that. One leg is on USA and one hand is passing card(s) to China. They are some discreet exchanges going on.

Japan has all eyes on the cards, unaware of what others are doing.

Taiwan wears a red abdominal vest, maybe implying she is the last successor of the Chinese culture. She holds a tray of fruits in one hand and a fruit knife in the other, looking quietly at China with resentment. But she has no option. She is not in the game (a little girl too young to play the game?).

Dark clouds hang over the river outside the window implying tension over the straits separating Main Land China and Taiwan.

The portrait on the wall is interesting, mustache of Sun Yet Sun, the bare head of Chiang Kai Set, the face of Mao Tze Tong…

How the 4 ladies are dressed is also very interesting.

China bares her top, with panties and a skirt.

USA is almost fully dressed but bares her bottom.

Russia is left with only panties.

Japan naked.

These perhaps reflect the status of each nation;

The attire of USA appears to be most complete, probably because she is still the most powerful. Others are short of something here and there. Though USA is most presentable, she has nevertheless exposed her bottom (line). China and Russia look naked but keep their private parts are covered.

We assume this is a stripping game where the loser removes a piece of clothing.

In this game, if China loses, she will be like Russia today… (broken up).

If USA loses, she will also be like Russia…

If Russia loses again, then she has nothing left…

And Japan is already left with nothing….

Russia may appear to have drawn an extra tile (by the rule of the game, she cannot complete the game i.e. cannot win) and is hanging on for nothing … BUT she is actually exchanging tiles with China…

The other person hanging on is Japan since she has no more “chips”. She is out of the game if she loses.

In conclusion:

USA is pretending. She looks most glorious but faces great dangers. If she loses this game, she loses her dominating position.

Russia has a leg each on a boat, most sly … Her situation is a little like China after liberation (when the communist took over China), sometimes with the USSR and sometimes with USA. Due to her lack of self sufficiency, she has to yo-yo between two parties for survival and room of development.

China has many tiles but they are not in view. Does that imply China keeps her strengths under wrap? And she is exchanging tiles with Russia under the table.

USA can only guess from the expression of Taiwan what may be happening between China and Russia.

Japan looks ignorant as she continues to focus on her cards.

China’s hand (of tiles) is most unpredictable.

Poor Japan … there are so many things happening around her. She has no chance of a win and she is out the moment she loses.

Taiwan keeps watch as a bystander. She sees all that transpired in the game and she understands. But she is not qualified to, nor capable of participating in the game. She has no right to speak. She is full of grievances and is utterly helpless. She can only be the maid, offering fruits to the winner(s).

The winner should be a pick between China or USA , there is little doubt about this. Then again if you notice, they are playing Chinese Mahjong, not Western Poker.

Playing with the rules of a Chinese game, what are the odds for USA?

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