Truth Is Bitter Series (Ep 6)

Short satirical reflections on faith, society and the uncomfortable truths we avoid. First published in the Ramadan/Shawwal 1436 AH (2015) print edition of The PEACE Magazine.

By Abdulfattah Abdussalam

A Desperate Obeisance
When a King prostrates, to his subject others who witnessed such, will conclude, it’s an abnormality. In governance, it’s odd for a President to prostrate almost on all fours before a King, Oba, or an Emir. Constitutionally, a local Government, chairman, can enthrone or dethrone any royal individual. President Obama, will not forget in a hurry, the black lash he suffered when he showed mild obeisance, to the late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia during a trip to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. To people’s disdain, when the former President of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, visited Kano, during the last presidential elections campaigns and prostrated to the Emir of Kano, Malam Lamido Sanusi, many saw it as a desperate obeisance, he did not even get the needed 25 percent of votes in Kano instead he had a paltry percent.

SAMBISA: The Evil Forest
Hitherto, many can never imagine, how evil, a forest can be in the history of a nation and the world. In literature books (English and African); evil forest depicts horrific enclaves; a place of no return into which evil people in the society are banished and made to die, with vultures, make, meat of their bodies. Sambisa is the real evil Forest of our time. Sadly, the dungeon is controlled by Muslim pretenders. When the military leveled a part of the forest, and rescued many Nigerians, particularly women and girls, the revelation was terrific. Many were turned into sex slaves, rapped, maimed, killed, and lecherously impregnated. Some others, were married off, sold into slavery, and made to be in captivity, under inhuman treatment. Their evil captors can never claim they are Muslims. Islam, never arrogate, such an inglorious attitude, to anybody in the name of Religion.

A Showmanship Trip
It is contending to see in the media, the President of the giant of Africa, Nigeria, showcasing his recent trip to Israel as if he was on a panoramic parade of picnic sites. Daily while the trip lasted, the media was awash with different postures of the President at different occasions. One can only imagine, why the media aides of President Jonathan or himself allowed what should ordinarily be a personal rite of religious worship to be turned into a picnic panorama. At any rate, the trip was a mere visitation that had no spiritual backing like the fifth pillar of Islam-Hajj. For a keen watcher of developments in the country, the trip might not be more than a jamboree, especially when considering the inclusion of the current President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, who is reputed for displaying showmanship in all his actions and outbursts. Until recently, he preached with a female jerry curls and posing on the pulpit as if he were in a photo studio.

Editor’s Note: Truth Is Bitter is a weekly reflective and satirical column drawn from the “Front of the Book” pages of PEACE Magazine. It seeks to provoke introspection, not hostility; reform, not ridicule.

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