Opinion
Ìkà
Published
1 year agoon
Ìkà
By Toyin Falola
Ìkà is an evil person.
Wicked people exist in numbers, littering every place they are with their evidently obnoxious, outrageous, and even sadistic attitudes. Yorùbá people accurately define the wicked ones whom they call Ìkà, in their sayings that Ìkà kò kò, kí oun tó dùn kó bàjé, which literally means “the wicked one does not mind if tragedy replaces joyous experience.”
An Ìkà attributes your success to diabolical means. To ika, your success can be turned against you. If the world honors you, the Ìkà thinks you don’t deserve it since those belong to him. “I do my work not for honors,” the Ìkà says, but when he gets one, the world must know, as an Ìkà can be narcissistic. To Ìkà, win a Nobel Prize, you are not a scholar! The Ìkà is an evil person whose skin is a parchment of evil. When he sleeps, the Ìkà’s dreams are about the downfall of another person, even of ex-wife or ex-friend. When you are on the road, the Ìkà stays glued to his radio, waiting to hear of the announcement of your death by accident. Get sick and go to the hospital; the Ìkà is awaiting the news of your death.
What did you do to an Ìkà?
Nothing. The Ìkà desires to be like you, and the more impossible this becomes, the more his anger and hatred.
Can you appease an Ìkà? Don’t even try. His composition is evil. Don’t leave your drinks and food on his table; he will poison you.
The Ìkà is a killer. A killer by words. A killer by deceit. He can kill physically, and he can kill verbally.
Usually, wicked people feel depressed, downcast, and discouraged when they realize that an individual or a group of people is joyous about something. They are internally disposed to seeing others sad and are happy when their evil intentions materialize. One can never know the reasons behind wicked people’s disposition towards others, and neither can there be rationality for their indignant behavior shown when others are making impressive strides in their lives. It is this tendency to be utterly dangerous, evil, or ill-intentioned that informed the reason why the Yorùbá people add to the adage above:
“ààlò ò ran eni tí kò féràn eni”
One’s enemies are never persuaded to change their hatred by the target’s good deeds to them.
This attests to the fact that wicked people are immersed in their evil intentions, thinking and disposition so much that innocent targets barely have anything to do to change their minds, notions, or opinions about them. While the results of their evil intentions cannot be difficult to identify, wicked people sometimes perfect their acts so well that one cannot readily associate evil activities with them. Despite these complications, however, some things define them more readily.
Wicked people are unexplainably cruel. There is a level of cruelty that wicked people show that one would never disagree if their mental status at that moment of their anger is categorized as some form of psychological sickness. Of course, it is even hard to defend against the idea that wicked people do not have effectively functional brain systems. But the fact is that most wicked people are conscious of their wickedness and sometimes invest so much into evil activities that one would think they derive a form of benefit from the engagement. In many cases, they are vocal about their hatred against others, show no remorse for the misfortune of others, and feel accomplished when they are even the architects of that melancholy of others. The cruelty of the wicked people is an investment that defies actual logic. One can never understand why others would be so interested in demolishing, damaging, and destroying what has been strenuously achieved by others for a very long time. Wicked people do not necessarily have any reason to be hateful of others; they are pushed into their evil activities sometimes strangely. When they are not visibly voicing their anger and displeasure to others, wicked people will undertake people’s destruct using stealthy methods. They sometimes destroy the foundation of other people’s happiness, knowing that it would crumble them inside out.
Meanwhile, wickedness is not defined by social status. People are rich who demonstrate cruelty of unmitigable magnitude. There are poor people in this category, too.
Wicked people have sometimes shown their incomprehensible commitment to other people’s downfall in different dimensions. Among other things, they have shown that they are happy when others are in pain, courtesy of their actions. For that reason, you cannot place a wicked person under the category of people who have sympathy or are empathetic toward others. Rather than feel remorse for their harmful actions, they are always seeking additional ways through which they could hurt people, regardless of who the victims are family, friends, acquaintances, and business partners, among others. So long that others are in a perpetual state of agony, pain, lack and inadequacy, wicked people do not concern themselves with the tranquility of others.
Unsurprisingly, they have a cold heart, evil mindset and hard nature that does not allow them to behave admirably towards others. It cannot be overemphasized that when evil individual commits themselves to activities that foster evil, they sometimes do not care about putting others down. Without minding the chain of people that would be affected by their disingenuous behavior, wicked people are always mindless of the consequences. In as much as their intentions are fulfilled, they are unbothered by the conditions of their victims. The strangest thing about wicked people is that they sometimes do not mind if their evil activities affect them in return. As long as that would mean that their target is maximally hurt, they are usually concerned only with the actualization of their terror on others.
Underneath the mind of every wicked individual is a desire to be manipulative and controlling of others. It is going to make sense when it is discovered that most of the evil people come to that condition because of their envy of others. Evil people cannot stomach the fact that another individual is receiving the necessary attention that would help to stimulate their growth. With the expectation that such development should be theirs, they resort to actively hating others in the expectation that their success will be redirected to them. This means that the evil individual wants to be in control. Where their wickedness is not encouraged by the desire to steal another person’s success; it is inspired by their intentions to remain in control. At every given opportunity, they always want to oversee other people’s lifestyles and involvement. They become so obsessed with this so much that they instantly switch to blackmailing others when they realize that their intentions will not materialize.
In some cases, when they want to achieve a dangerous and detrimental goal in one’s life, they sometimes may show a little act of kindness. That kindness obviously is not coming from their good-natured disposition. Instead, it is a tactic used to trap their target and make them susceptible to their evil manipulations. Wicked people would appropriate any formula or method that they believe would bring the downfall of their targets. They can appear as though they are with you, but deep down, they plan their evil activities in ways that the victims would never imagine.
Similarly, wicked people are most of the time spiteful. They are usually unconcerned about how they are being affected by a decision; if it brings woeful and dangerous consequences to their targets, the wicked individual is satisfied. Programs and projects that would bring financial liberation to others would be earnestly denied by a wicked individual if they are convinced it would necessitate the downfall of their targets. Whether they would be affected by that decision or not would not matter to the wicked people; they are only satisfied that others would never achieve that thing that they wanted. Usually, when opportunities prop up, people are expected to benefit from the engagement without ending. Whereas wicked people are always plotting ways through which the said benefits are not open to those who they think are their enemies. At the family level, it happens because there is an underlying unhealthy competition among members who believe that others are in a race of superiority over them. Wicked people at that level would disrupt opportunities that are made available to the family members, and if they have the power, they can completely deny the opportunity from coming at all. The one thing that is strange about wicked people is that they may be self-sufficient in this case. What they wanted is that others do not achieve or get to the point where they would be financially liberated to take decisions outside of the influence of this benefactor. Here, the wickedness is just unfathomable. At the business level, association level, countries level, wicked, powerful people impede the growth of their countries because they want to remain popular.
Wicked people across the world are self-serving. They usually expect that everything should revolve around them, and when this is not happening, they often become unsettled. The sense of overblown importance informs the thinking that other people cannot make great decisions for themselves that they have about themselves. They are often convinced that they have attained a higher pedestal of thinking to determine and decide what progress is for other people. They have the wrong evaluation of their importance and an over bloated imagination of their usefulness. Wicked people in this category often make decisions for others under the assumption that they know what is best for them, even without being in their shoes or living their experiences. Although this savior syndrome may appear great on the surface, it remains an undeniable reality that they always have exploitative ambitions behind it. In essence, they undertake actions and events that they assume would be in the best interest of their targets, but in the long run, they have always poised to take advantage of the situation without remorse. That way, they would have successfully blocked the individual from being successful and, indeed, effective.
May I conclude that wicked people are enticed to evil activities and consequences? Wicked people feel happy when others feel pain. They are joyous when others are confronted with melancholy. Without a dint of remorse, they would celebrate the fact that others are faced with troubling situations, and that has always defined how committed they are to their machinations. Generally, they feel a level of entitlement to the success of others, and for that reason, their ego is bruised when they are not being recognized by the people whom they expect to control their lives. They want to be praised, honored, and even recognized for the success of others, to which they literally have no contribution. When they are not given the recognition that they fantasize about, they would contribute to the destruction of the individual and feel no remorse or shame in doing it. If anything, they are convinced that the destruction that people experience is what they deserve. They do not feel bad at all when they cause the downfall of others.
By Leo Igwe
The Advocacy for Alleged Witches (AfAW) is concerned over the reported arrest of two men accused of being ‘witchdoctors’ in Zambia. The arrest underscores the potency of witchcraft fears and the connection between occult anxieties and the country’s politics. These individuals were accused of trying to bewitch the Zambian president, Hakainde Hichilema. The police claimed that they had charms. They planned to use the charms to harm the president. The report says the two persons have been charged under Zambia’s Witchcraft Act. The Act criminalizes “possession of charms”, “professing knowledge of witchcraft”, and “cruelty to wild animals”. The police found the two with assorted charms, including a live chameleon.
This development is utterly embarrassing and shows that the Zambian government is slowly losing its focus and bearing.The country has many socio-economic challenges. Suspicion of bewitchment or possession of charms should be the least of its worries at this time. There should be no place for witchcraft and possession of charms in modern politics because there is no evidence for these beliefs and practices. Zambian authorities should not weaponize the Witchcraft Act or use it to justify this incident. Zambian law does not recognize witchcraft. Zambia’s Witchcraft Act criminalizes naming or imputing witchcraft. It prohibits accusing or threatening to accuse any person of being a witch or a wizard. In this case, it is the police who are breaking the law.
Otherwise, how did they know the two individuals were ‘witchdoctors’? Did these persons identify as witch doctors? If not, the police are liable because they named and imputed witchcraft and have to prove that these individuals have witch-doctoring powers. The police claimed to have charged these individuals for possessing “assorted charms”, including a chameleon. Really?
The police in Zambia have questions to answer: What are charms? How did they know that what was in their possession were charms, not pets? Is a chameleon a form of charm? What makes possession of a chameleon possession of a charm? When and how does a chameleon become a charm? The police need to answer these questions and more before one takes them seriously.
Again, did the individuals describe what was in possession as ‘charms’? If they did, does confessing or designating something as a charm make it a charm? And if they did not, the police are liable because they need to prove how those possessions translated into charms.
In addition, the police claimed that the duo wanted to bewitch the president. What does that mean? How did they know? Are the police not contravening a provision under the Witchcraft Act by professing knowledge of witchcraft? Can one harm another person using a chameleon? They claimed that the two persons wanted to use the charms in their possession, including the chameleon to harm the president. How did they know that? What is the evidence for that?
The Advocacy for Alleged Witches calls for an end to this state-sponsored witch hunt. There is no evidence of harm through witchcraft or charms. The Zambian government should desist from witchcraft- related infractions and violations including arbitrary arrest, and detention of innocent citizens. These allegations are baseless and absurd. The arrest was politically motivated. This development demonstrates that Zambian authorities are out of sync with their duty and obligation to uphold the rule of law and protect accused persons.
Zambian authorities need to act in compliance with the 2021 UN resolution, which urged states to take measures to combat abuses linked to witchcraft beliefs and ritual attacks. End witchcraft allegations in Zambia. End witch hunts in Africa now!
Dr Igwe directs the Advocacy for Alleged Witches.
By Tony Afejuku
The other burning issue, apart from Farotimi and Babalola’s, which I wish to take a look at – and which I am taking a look at now – relates to what is happening in our capital territory. What is this burning issue – which our human rightists and civil society organisations and personages are surprisingly and un-satisfactorily not inclined to focus attention on and examine as they should? I may be wrong, but it surely seems to me that this issue, this burning issue, which is of more importance than Farotimi and Babalola’s – which has been given undue adulation – is deliberately being neglected and depreciated by proclaimers and heroes and heroines of human rights, justice, equity and equality of rights in your country my country our country. Why, why, why and why, why, why? Anyone who has any iota of patriotic sensibility, feeling and judgment well watered and buttressed by a very great influence upon his or her critical judgment will keep on asking the question I am asking.
Mr. Nyesom Wike, as almost everybody who can read and write a little knows, is the current minister of your, my and our Federal Capital Territory. His post or office is akin to that of a governor of a state. As the immediate past governor of Rivers State who was drafted, after his two terms there expired, to continue in the FCT as its new minister-governor or governor-minister under the auspices of a party he is not a true member of, Mr. Wike cannot but be seen as a lucky man. He is in every possible and impossible way. Minister-Governor Wike is a lucky man and a very fortunate one indeed. No former governor of Rivers State (or of any Nigerian state), as far as I know, has achieved what the famed political rouser of rabbles has achieved in one short gubernatorial life-time, and at a relatively young and fertile age. His dual achievement with and in two different political parties at this delicate point of Nigerian politics indicates to our politicians and us all that there is always time for a reminder that there are ready-made high rewards for arch-angels of betrayals. And Mr. Wike may go down in Rivers and Nigerian history as both an arch-angel and an emperor of betrayal of us all if we attempt to indicate what I have defined here as his dual achievement.
We can roughly divide, briefly, Wike’s political development into two periods. During the first, excluding his lower political positions before he became the governor of Rivers State, he quickly adapted his style to that of an emperor who became a rabble-rouser of rabble-rousers whose gubernatorial efficiency moved from stiffness to stiffness. He did not at any time feel that he needed suppleness to govern Rivers State. “Let the heavens fall if they must fall!” We are not there yet in this attempted analysis of the stiff-hearted and stiff-minded one. True? But he is already demonstrating this characteristic in Abuja. False? Judge and give the answer yourself.
Even after he left Rivers State a short while ago as governor, he is still trying to control happenings there to the political discomfiture of his hand-picked successor, his erstwhile “boy” and “son” – with whom he has fallen out. As the minister-governor or governor-minister of the FCT, Wike is occupied with the other taste of the emperor-juggernaut formulator – doing the work of two key political masters in one room and desk of political jugglery. Since his appearance in the FCT, minister-governor or governor-minister Wike has allegedly attempted to recover or transform for Abuja what is not traditionally or socially Abuja’s, for example, the city’s social idiom and landscape and terrain as well as its environs. In doing this he sometimes over-steps his bounds and mark of human/inhuman decency/indecency and psychological understanding of human nature, if you follow well what I am saying; he has so far become at best not really better than a typical pedestrian Nigerian lawyer and officer of political power: in his explorations so far in the Federal Capital Territory we have come to the realization, as T. S. Eliot would say, that “it is so often true that only by going too far can we find out how far we can go.” But one has to be a very negatively obstinate and self-serving emperor and a thorough-bred arch-angel of betrayal of the people and masses to justify such perilous and perfidious expeditions and adventures.
Last week, I saw on Arise Television “The Morning Show” Chief Rita Lori-Ogbebor, the dutiful widow of the late Nigerian supreme patriot and soldier, Colonel Ogbebor (of Benin stock) battling, so to say, to wrest the legacy of her late husband from the tight grip of the adventurous FCT minister-governor who has registered his name and signature in the hearts and consciousness of the people as the depriver of their possessions. The three anchors of “The Morning Show” were in their respective ways splendid in their structures of remarks and questions to Chief (Mrs.) Rita Lori-Ogbebor whom I have had occasions in times past to call patriotically Rita A-K 47 on account of her natural right to fire her beautiful tongue at any person, usually an enemy, of just actions. When she made the case she made to protect the estate of Paulosa Nigeria Limited, her late husband’s aforesaid legacy in the FCT, she was in her natural territory, habitat and element where even at age eighty-four, she never ever loses her stability – although she unusually restrained herself in the Arise Television appearance. Dr. Reuben Abati, Rufai Oseni, and Ayo Mairo-Ese clearly explored seriously but delightfully the mind of the mother-hen of Warri – my other coinage and appellation I gave her in my poetry. Her “The Morning Show” appearance enabled me to see the poignant cry de profundis of the FCT inhabitants whose property and residences in different guises have been demolished. She did not say anything that was out of joint. She spoke and came out as a mother, protector and symbol of the people who have suffered – and are suffering – from the state of affliction and anguish Wike’s demolitions have placed – and are placing – the people.
Ojy Okpe in her delicious and delectable “What is Trending” slot on the same show, showed without exaggeration but with further elaboration what people in and outside Abuja/FCT think of the mighty Wike’s demolitions, a burning issue that the Senate has asked “Let Heaven Fall” minister-governor Wike to halt as the committee the Senate set up on the issue starts its work. Of course, we cannot but assume that Chief Rita Lori-Ogbebor, Mrs. Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan as well as Mrs. Ireti Kingigbe, the senator representing the FCT in the Senate and other patriotic senators diligently did what they did on the floor of the Senate when the burning issue was tabled for debate with the gracious understanding and authorization of the Senate President.
I need to state further that the “The Morning Show” anchors did well and extremely so by giving the minister-governor the opportunity to air his anti-Paulosa story. His senior special assistant on public communication and social media, Mr. Olalere Olayinka, stood in for him. After he gave the reasons for the clamp-down, his responses to the questions the anchors put to him followed the usual pattern of denials by artificial men in power – denials that they always use to intimidate and betray the people. In fact, Mr. Olayinka’s ploy to ride easily over our dear Rufai Oseni, a wholesome representative of the deprived, that the chap (or is it guy?) and his boss always employ their colloquial speeches and remarks to dishonor, failed. Yes, the ploy failed woefully. In stanza after stanza of the exchanges between Mr. Olayinka and the Arise anchors, he deteriorated – and his deterioration was hall-marked when he unwittingly revealed that the Paulosa land had been acquired by his minister-governor’s close cohort, an act that was nothing short of gross abuse of power and authority.
Because the Senate is already using its authority, power and privilege to resolve the burning issue, hopefully, in a way that the late Colonel Ogbebor’s legacy and family will not be subjected to any kind of degradation, I will utter no more words for now. I trust, however, that the liberties the Senate is taking – or has taken – are for the sake of order to favour the down-trodden.
As for the minister-governor, the PDP emperor at large, here is an immortal quote from Marcus Aurelius, the magnificent and authentic Roman Emperor and philosopher (A.D. 121-180): “If it is not right, do not do it; if it is not true, do not say it.” You lose nothing by giving us a slice of your humanity by your right acts and correct words. Everything changes and passes. Be humane as a human being.
Afejuku can be reached via 08055213059.
By Leo Igwe
Recently, I facilitated a critical thinking workshop at the Bay Wreath Schools in Lagos. The theme was critical thinking and teacher development. As the theme stated, the workshop was on teaching, about teaching, and for teachers. It highlighted the pedagogical value of critical and reflective inquiry. The workshop exposed teachers to critical mental habits and skills. It emphasized how critical thinking would enhance expertise in the learning and delivery of subjects in classrooms.
I used the opportunity to discuss questionstorm as a method of teaching and learning. Questionstorm is a way that I operationalized critical thinking for primary and elementary schools. Questionstorm is the ability to interrogate all objects and materials. It is a habit of questioning ideas and experiences in all areas of human endeavor. Simply put, questionstorm is a question-driven inquiry. Children are naturally curious. They thirst for knowledge and understanding. Unfortunately, the school system kills children’s curiosity and dampens their interrogative appetite. The school system places much emphasis on rote learning and memorization. It makes the generation of answers not questions or problems the test of knowledge, and the determinant of intelligence. Teaching is largely a drudgery, a monotonous exercise, and a process of depositing knowledge on passive recipients, the students. Teaching entails dumping information on learners whose duty is to cram and reproduce during tests or examinations.
This teaching praxis has been criticized and blamed for the poor performance of students post-school (college and university) and their inability to think independently, creatively, and innovatively. Other teaching methods have tried to address these gaps and limitations. There have been suggestions to make teaching and instruction more active, and more student/learner/child-centered. One such method is the Montessori method. The Montessori method discourages grades and tests as ways of measuring achievement or determining intelligence and excellence. It emphasizes hands-on learning and the development of real-world skills. While the Montessori method stresses the practical approach to learning it says very little about the authoritarian teacher-to-student approach that is the mainstay of teaching and learning in classrooms. Teaching follows a pattern that leaves students and learners in the margins and unable to question and contribute to the learning process. Teachers present what is to be learned such as a text, and then generate questions that students respond or address to demonstrate knowledge of what has been taught. The student’s or learner’s main job is to answer questions, to look for or find answers or solutions. The teacher’s work is to get students to look for, and provide answers, and reproduce what they have been taught or told. But students are answer-depots. Students are not memory banks or reserves. They are active minds and thinking agents.
With questionstorm as a teaching method, the mode of instruction would change. Teaching becomes a cooperative endeavor that actively involves teachers and students. What is taught in the classroom is a collaborative note, not the teacher’s note, not a handout to students. Teachers present or generate texts or objects for learning, in response to intense questioning of the object or material by students, teachers provide information as required for that subject, topic, level, and time frame. No two instances of teaching – of the same topic or subject- are or should be the same because the input of students and teachers is not predetermined.
This is because of an overlooked principle in teaching and learning, that I call the “uncertainty principle”.
The uncertainty principle underlies questionstorm because knowledge is not fixed. Learning is a fluid process. All that is to be learned is uncertain, it is unknown and never determined. No teacher can say beforehand what is to be taught or learned because no one knows exactly the questions and answers or replies that would arise when a topic is presented or taught in a particular class. A topic or learning material elicits unique responses and exchanges that both teachers and students cannot exactly know or predict a priori, before the fact.
Teaching is a shared task and responsibility. Class notes are fluid materials. They are not texts cast on educational stones and delivered by teachers to students to copy, cut, and paste as is often the case. Class notes are not written or produced by teachers for students but by teachers with students. Teachers’ notes are incomplete and insufficient. They account only for a part, not a whole of the learning process and material. Students’ input completes and complements the teaching material and learning process. Thus every class note is unique because it is a product of a specific collaborative endeavor, a product of particular teaching and learning agents and circumstances that cannot be repeated or replicated.
Thus, as a teaching method, questionstorm is set to facilitate teacher development and improve the quality of instruction in schools. Questionstorm will help realize a paradigm shift in education and learning. I hope educators, teachers, and school managers will embrace this method of teaching and learning.
Dr Igwe directs the Critical Thinking Social Empowerment Foundation.
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