Sunny Chris Okenwa
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Articles by Sunny Chris Okenwa
February 03, 2009
Prophet Temitope B. Joshua is an evangelical enigma! Yes he is a charismatic phenomenon in Nigeria. The Head of the Synagogue Church of all Nations situated in Ikotun-Egbe, a Lagos suburb in Nigeria is stewing in controversy, in contradiction. But in spite of the controversy trailing the Prophet his...
January 19, 2009
President Robert Gabriel Mugabe of Zimbabwe may be an octogenerian but senility cannot be said to be afflicting him for now. He may manifest certain traits of paranoia sometimes but the old dictator is as fit as a fiddle. He is roundly educated and understands how to survive politically even when ...
January 14, 2009
Biblically, the Jewish state of Israel is a blessed land -- rich in culture, rich in heritage, in geography and in human capital. Historically speaking the Jews are a proud people, intelligent set of people doing many exploits in many fields of human endeavour around the world. The Israeli-Arabic ...
January 04, 2009
Few days to Christmas last year a report in a Nigerian tabloid had it that an estimated 5 million Igbos were heading home, hitting the hinterland, for the Yuletide. Captioned "Exodus" the "Sun" report painted a jolly picture of mass movement of a great ethnic group in South-eastern Nigeria with a ma...
December 20, 2008
The gory history of slave trade is known worldwide by the victims (Africans) and the perpetrators (Whites). Every part has some reason to defend themselves even when the core issue at stake is indefensible: the brutal abuse of Blacks by their White slave masters to foster superior domination by ex...
December 14, 2008
Before engaging myself fully in this intervention let me make my position very clear from the outset. I am not anti-Ribadu in the critical sense of the word. And I am not pro-Ribadu either! I am rather patriotically pro-EFCC, pro-rule of law and pro-due process in the entire system. I'm not wholly a...
December 07, 2008
His Excellency Sullivan Chime is a trained lawyer who has found life-changing favour and fortune in politics Nigeriana. He is presently the 'executive' Governor of Enugu State in South-eastern Nigeria. He is a quintessential gentleman, the essentially dour Governor whose moustache interestingly i...
November 29, 2008
For the past decades after independence from Belgium Zaire has been in the international news for wrong reasons. It has been a dark example of the most primitive politics played with bizzare arrogance and despicable neo-colonial schemes for indirect control through planting of a stooge. Late Mobut...
November 23, 2008
I love sports in general and soccer in particular. Apart from the 'beautiful game' I love boxing and wrestling. I follow developments in these popular sports around the world reIigiously. I am a football fan and not a fanatic, the type to goes to the stadium on weekends to physically support a soc...
November 16, 2008
The very last has definitely not been heard of the infamous electoral heist of April 2007 organised in Nigeria by INEC's Prof. Maurice Iwu and ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo. The judiciary as the third estate of the realm is doing justice to the injustices meted out to those who bluntly refused to...
November 08, 2008
If the Kenyan father of the newly-elected President of the United States of America were to be alive today (sadly he was killed in a car crash years ago) he would have perhaps regretted 'abandoning' the little Barack Obama to his mother who raised him to become today the most-celebrated mortal, th...
November 03, 2008
The global economic meltdown accentuated by the American fiscal crisis has exposed in full measure the monster of world capitalism and its concomitant greed, avarice and mindless pursuit of selfish wealth acquisition to the detriment of a greater majority. In a world where poverty, disease and une...
October 26, 2008
Fellow Nigerians at home and abroad,
I greet you all in the name of Allah the Almighty who is in a Supreme position to judge us all in all fairness and truth. The pleasure is wholly mine to break my silence after going through "hell" in the past two months in a gulag. My terrible experience has ...
July 25, 2008
The United States of America is about the greatest country in the universe. America is an uncommon super power whose military might could set the world ablaze if it so wishes or in the event of a Hitler taking up residence in the White House. An economic, political and military giant the US is ric...
July 16, 2008
The Lagos-based popular newsmagazine 'TheNews', whose motto is "Defining the present, Shaping the future", stirred a huge national controversy by its last week's edition captioned as cover: "The Scandal of Judges: How Osun Tribunal Was Compromised". The magazine reported shocking communication rom...
July 10, 2008
Few weeks back reports back home in Nigeria had it that the Delta State Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan's convoy ran into armed robbers on their way to the Warri Stadium where a ceremonial send-off football match was billed to take place in honour of retired international soccer star Austin 'Jay Jay' Oko...
July 07, 2008
Fellow compatriots,
Warm greetings to you all. It gives me joy to send across this missive. I should have written long before now but for two principal reasons which I am going to elucidate hereunder.
Firstly the untimely death of the father of our ruling party, the PDP, Chief Lamidi Adedib...
June 27, 2008
The former South African President Nelson Mandela is a living legend from all indications. Mandela has attained, even in his lifetime, the status of an icon, a world sage whose eventful history has many positivities, an uncommon history steeped in destiny, stoicism and large-heartedness. Mandela i...
June 23, 2008
The late Bashorun Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola was indeed a famous powerful distinguished Nigerian who unfortunately suffered state terrorism for his dogged insistence on actualising his June 12 1993 presidential mandate criminally usurped by the military cabal in power led by Gen. Ibrahim Ba...
June 17, 2008
Fellow Nigerians, sincere salutations to you all!
It has given me great delight to pen down these lines from heaven whose streets, I hasten to confirm, are paved with gold. Heaven is indeed, as is written in the Bible, a place of unrivalled wonder where there's celestial orderliness and peace an...
June 12, 2008
After the oppressors celebrated their democracy day last May 29 (when in 1999 the military bastards handed over power to one of their own Olusegun Obasanjo) today marks our own Democracy Day. On June 12 1993 an electoral wonder happened back home as millions of Nigerians went to the polls to elect...
June 08, 2008
Nigerian leaders (or rulers if you like) are globally notorious for their mediocrity and hypocrisy. What is new and news now is how they have broken records as experts in kleptocracy. Political scientists must, as a matter of importance, begin to give another definition to the unconsciounable klep...
May 28, 2008
When the article late March captioned "IBB: A Misunderstood Statesman?" was published online some readers wrote me privately in commendation. One of those who wrote in, names withheld, had said: "Mazi Okenwa: You write well. You write with courage, a quality which many Nigerian writers do not poss...
May 22, 2008
In April 2007 (a month described as 'cruellest' by the poet T.S. Elliot) Nigerians were subjected to cruel electoral drama organized by the then President Olusegun Obasanjo and supervised by Maurice Iwu and his INEC. In the general elections of that month (the outcome of which remains controversia...
May 16, 2008
Before the advent of a semblance of democracy in Nigeria in 1999 very few Nigerians knew or had heard of one 'Dr' Andy Uba. Far away in America Uba was said to be 'hustling' like other Diasporan Nigerians in the US -- barely eking out a living. As Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo was rigged into power by a ...
May 09, 2008
Late Niccolo Machiavelli it was who posited evergreenly that: "it must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old...
April 18, 2008
Nigerians abroad, in their majority, are not doing badly given the recently released fund remittance statistics involving Africans living and working overseas. According to a World Bank report $3.3 billion was remitted home last year by Nigerians in the diaspora who topped the list. Some 400 billi...
April 14, 2008
In this interesting intellectual platform I had, on more than one occasion in the recent past, argued and held that power and its politics of generation and distribution in Nigeria remained one of the plagues afflicting our dear motherland. Darkness prevails even today in the lives of fellow Niger...
April 11, 2008
For good reason I had attempted entitling this piece interrogatively thus: "Mugabe: Till Death Put Assunder?" and on another occasion I had toyed with another caption as a replacement for the above: "Zimbabweans Have Spoken: Morgan is More..." but in the end I had settled for the above title given...
April 07, 2008
When at about 10pm that fateful weekend of Friday 28th March this year the late Edo State Commissioner for Information and Orientation Barrister Calus Enoma left his residence in Benin City -- in his private car with ordinary number plate without his Police orderly -- to keep an appointment with ...
April 03, 2008
Islam, we are often told, is a religion predicated on peace! Prophet Mohammed who founded the religion thousands of years back in Arabia was known and reputed to be a great man of peace though some critics associate jihadism with his Islamic exploits. Prophet Mohammed must be turning in his grave ...
March 31, 2008
South Africa is an African rennaissant pride! The first time I ever landed in Johannesburg I had testified to the good side of Apartheid in spite of its many dimensions of evil and man's inhumanity to man. The Whites or Afrikaans that perpetrated Apartheid must be given credit for their infrastruc...
March 28, 2008
Last week Wednesday in Kampala, the Ugandan capital city, witnessed the elaborate opening ceremony of Africa´s largest mosque whose construction dated back to 1972 when late Idi Amin Dada was playing Nebuchadnezer. Over thirty years ago the huge edifice project was begun with a financial gra...
March 25, 2008
General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, IBB, the former Nigerian military dictator is a clever corruption-compromised political animal. To say that IBB was well schooled in military politics is obviously a statement of fact. He knew what he had wanted from day one of his enrolment into the Nigerian Ar...
March 21, 2008
America is a sophisticated rich country that loves and celebrates scandals. It is a modern society that craves for anything odd and strange. Americans like to hear what they have not heard before or see what they have not been opportuned to see before. Breaking news could therefore be a sex scanda...
March 16, 2008
"Otimkpu" is an Igbo language which literarily means a praise singer or sychophant. And "Itimkpu" simply means praise-singing or sychophancy. In Nigeria it's an industry. We have politicians, journalists, traditional rulers, contractors, supplicants and influence peddlers, musicians, businessmen a...
March 13, 2008
Forbes, the American international celebrity magazine that rates the mega rich and famous amongst us had penultimate week released a new list of the world´s wealthiest men and women. Forbes magazine annually celebrates wealth and those who are rich through verifiable dint of hard work. Anyon...
March 10, 2008
The gubernatorial election of April 2007 produced a 'landslide' victory for the PDP with the party 'winning' majority of the states of the federation. Following to the letter the doctrine of 'do or die' as pontificated by the 'father of modern Nigeria' all manner of thugs, security forces, INEC of...
March 06, 2008
Penultimate Tuesday was dubbed "Super Tuesday" by the Nigerian press because that day was set aside as the D-Day for the judgement of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal. The American 'Super Tuesday' had come and gone with no clear decisive Democratic primary winner between Senators Hillar...
March 03, 2008
Orji Uzor Kalu, the immediate past Governor of Abia State and Publisher of "The Sun" newspaper is a controversial politician and businessman who seems to court and enjoy controversy as it comes his way every now and then. Even before getting himself elected as Governor of the "God's Own State" OUK...
February 29, 2008
The ailing Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro is a living legend from every indication. So much has been said and written about this strong man that history has recorded him even in his lifetime as one of the greatest political figures ever to betraddle the global leadership stage. Historical...
February 25, 2008
Former Defence Minister and Chief of Army Staff, Gen. Theophilus Yakubu Danjuma is one distinguished Nigerian whose oratorical vibrancy and intrepid outspokenness marks him out as a courageous man versed in military politics. But sometimes while expressing himself Danjuma betrays the mindset of a ...
February 22, 2008
Justice James Ogebe is a no-nonsense Judge with high judicial pedigree. He has given courageous judicial orders in the past that altered some gubernatorial disequilibrium. He is a Justice known generally for his credible character and sound judgment. At a time the Nigerian Judiciary in general is ...
February 18, 2008
Last Thursday (February 14th) was celebrated world-wide as St. Valentine's Day. Of course love-birds exchanged love gifts like flowers, valued material gift items and surprise packages. With the new generation of youngsters seemingly re-defining love in tune with the jet age the day came and went ...
February 15, 2008
Idris Derby Itno, the colourless Chadian President came to power some 18 odd years ago after masterminding and leading a rebellion that toppled the dictatorial regime of Hissein Habre. As Habre fell and fled into exile Derby, and his military command structure, rode to power consolidating same as ...
February 11, 2008
The African Cup of Nations, Ghana 2008, which ended last Sunday with the Pharaohs of Egypt retaining the cup they won at home in 2006 saw soccer fireworks from sixteen African nations. It was a thrilling continental three-week soccer fiesta. The opening ceremony in Accra saw a colourful display of...
February 05, 2008
One of our church pastors here during the sermon of last Sunday caused an 'uproar' when he preached against infidelity among men and women describing his wife and her 'inner property' as his "private garden" which no one has any right to intrude into! "Oui c'est mon jardin privé! C'est appartiens ...
January 28, 2008
Last Thursday almost all national dailies in Nigeria reported the '419' bombshell dropped by Senator Nuhu Aliyu on the floor of the upper legislative chambers the previous day during a session on EFCC and the government's readiness to continue the battle against graft post-Nuhu Ribadu. Senator Ali...
January 25, 2008
The Roman catholic church is planted the world over with obvious grandeur. It has more than one billion people in its fold. Whereever one goes from the city to the remotest rural settlement there is every possibility that one would see a catholic church. In terms of religious organisation and orde...
January 22, 2008
Electricity remains one of the major parameters with which to judge a nation's socio-economic advancement. A nation condemned to a power paralysis (perennial darkness)cannot be said to have been a serious player in any field in a world that has gone nuclear. Nigeria is a Giant in Africa with the fee...
January 18, 2008
From Sunday January 20th a continental soccer 'war' will be officially declared in Accra Ghana. The African Cup of Nations, the most prestigious football bi-annual event will be hosted this year by Abedi Pele's Ghana. Sixteen countries and their national soccer teams are participating competitivel...
January 15, 2008
In the recent past I have confessed my fascination for royalty and as much as possible I accord it its deserved dues and deep respect. The African royalty is not only colourful but one whose mystical connotations are legendary. Some royal households date back to centuries and others from time imme...
January 11, 2008
The article entitled "Nigeria: Forgery and Perjury Incorporated" authored by yours sincerely after its publication drew the attention of one Tom Ilube, the worthy son of Engineer Nathaniel Ilube, former boss of Bendel Broadcasting Service, BBS, Benin City. Based in England Mr Ilube sought to clarify...
January 08, 2008
Kenya with Nairobi as Capital city is a beautiful tourist country east of Africa. Blessed with an impressive wild-life, flora and fauna and a beautiful tourism landscape Kenya is a destination for millions of tourists the world over. But politics (with its dark African variant) and politicians has...
January 05, 2008
Pakistan and India have few things in common and some other things otherwise. The two countries are uneasy neighbours; they both have big bombs, nuclear weapons. They have fought each other in wars over disputed Kashmir. But Pakistan and India are different in some other ways. While India is a pea...
January 02, 2008
Settling for a befitting caption for this piece posed some difficulties for me initially. As I mooted the idea to put my thoughts together in form of an article knocking it in shape was not as difficult as reaching for a title that says it all. Many titles competed for consideration, those like: J...
December 31, 2007
Soon in the next few hours the year 2007 would be history as another new year dawns on us in accordance with the human calendar. Just so soon three hundred and sixty five days has finished off its course giving way for a new beginning, a new calendar year 2008 with its hopes, promises and dreams. ...
December 27, 2007
During the general election in the Great Britain at the turn of the Millenium the Labour Party fielded one urbane charismatic politician named Tony Blair as its candidate. Labour swept the polls in a true landslide victory unlike General Olusegun Obasanjo's 1979 presidential election in which the ...
December 24, 2007
December 25th is upon us once again. This annual hugely popular international event commemorating the unique birth of our Lord and Saviour over two thousand years ago calls for joy indeed. Christians worldwide celebrate Christmas in remembrance of the birth of infant Jesus in the manger in Bethleh...
December 20, 2007
Nigeria is known the world over as a rich land in natural resources. She is equally reputed as producing small minds as leaders and experts in fraud and forgery. With huge deposits of oil and gas in the Niger Delta region Nigeria ought to be competing with the Asian Tigers or even America in societa...
December 17, 2007
Libya is a rich beautiful country where majority are living above poverty line and relatively happy with the socio-political system. Though I have not been there a friend from Rivers State who sojourned in Tripoli for about two years told me in Paris France last September that the country is prosper...
December 15, 2007
Music is the food of life, so the saying goes. Without music I wonder how we would have been stimulated melodically. Without music nobody would have known Michael Jackson, Bob Marley or Lucky Dube. Without music millions whose profession it is would have been deprived of the great opportunity to mak...
December 12, 2007
Nigeria as a nation is a victim of 1914! When you reverse those numbers starting from letter 4 you get 419, a national embarrassment. In 1914 Lord Lugard and his colonial collaborators decided without the consent of the diverse peoples that made up the then British-administered Niger Area to amalgam...
December 10, 2007
When I was in the college I remember sending some articles and letters on some occasions by post to 'The Guardian' newspaper Editor and none was published. Undettered I would send more until one day my letter to the editor was published on a weekend and I 'celebrated' it by buying a copy for keeps. ...
December 05, 2007
The United States of America is seen rightly or wrongly by not a few nations as an international bully -- military, political and economic bully. Blessed with the diverse talents of people from across the Atlantic and elsewhere who congregate in the free world in search of the vaunted 'American drea...
December 02, 2007
Just six months after relocating from the Elysée Presidential Palace in a democratic change of baton (having handed same over to his successor Nicholas Sarkozy) former French President Jacques Chirac has found himself in a hot corrupt soup linked to his past as the Mayor of the city of Paris. By his...
November 28, 2007
Beauty pageantry is a socio-economic entertaining industry in the world. The showbiz world has beauty pageantry as one of its pillars, a revenue-generating venture. A celebration of inward and outward beauties of the feminine gender the showbiz world seeks to showcase the talent, special features an...
November 21, 2007
The DSTV’s popular show Big Brother Africa (BBA) has come and gone with winner(s) and losers emerging. As the 24/7 show went on in Randberg South Africa it attracted a lot of patronage, viewership and criticisms. For over three months (98 days) the popular international controversial cross-cultural...
November 17, 2007
Politicians As Prostitutes: The Gain In "Shagarism".
Former late American "cowboy" President Ronald Wilson Reagan was a great man during his active years both as an actor and a politician. He climbed to the very top of American strong-willed high-wire politics getting elected in two terms as Pres...
November 13, 2007
Encounter With The Paralytic Preacher!
First Friday of November night like every other first Friday of every month I had attended an all-night vigil in my church tagged "la nuit de la liberation divine" -- (Night of divine liberation). Fire-brand pastors were invited from other evangelical minist...
November 09, 2007
Dog is known world wide as the best (animal) friend of man. Compared with other domestic animals the dog is man-friendly indeed; she serves him diligently going on errands for him and even keeping watch as he sleeps over his house and properties. Dogs has been trained to be reasonable 'seeing' witch...
November 01, 2007
The marriage institution is in crisis. More than any other era in history marriage as an institution ordained by God is undergoing serious re-definition. Men and women of this age no longer take marriage as sacred. In the good old days during the days of our fathers and fore-fathers marriage was c...
October 29, 2007
Amaechi: Who Knows Tomorrow?
A judicial volcano erupted last Thursday in the Supreme Court in Abuja with Celestine Omehia, the impostor Governor of Rivers State and his cult/gang-terrorised government swept aside. The Justices of the Supreme Court had supremely risen to the ocassion as they did i...
October 26, 2007
What is really in a name? This question has been asked as frequently as possible and answers to it bear some significance and import. At birth we were baptised and given names according to our parents' fantasies or wishes. Some however after attaining adulthood has sought to change their names to re...
October 24, 2007
Death could be described as the absence of life. Or better still the permanent end of existence by any mortal that has blood running in his/her body. According to the late literary icon William Shakesperare: "Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, ...
October 22, 2007
Before diving into the body of this piece permit me to make a confession: I had visited Lagos for the first time ever in my year two in the University in Benin City. My elder brother had invited me over for a weekend. Before leaving Benin City I was full of joy for the prospects of discovering Lagos...
October 18, 2007
The military institution in any sovereign nation ensures the territorial integrity and survival of that nation-state. That nations are powerful derives more from their military arsenal, capacity and professionalism. That America is the only super power today is because of her awesome military might ...
October 16, 2007
Yours truly was in Paris France taking a deserved break when the news broke that the French Socialist Party (PS) had accused the French President of suffering from "small man syndrome". According to the "Parti Socialiste Francaise" this syndrome explained why the shorter-than-average President Nicol...
October 14, 2007
My dear mother was married to my late father at the virgin age of 15! She had visited a neighbouring village with her mom when my father sighted her and went for her without compromise. When during my last trip home late January this year I jocularly asked her if she had any regret for not 'enjoying...
October 09, 2007
A very violent revolution is going on in Nigeria. It is one revolution outside what we have been advocating for. What Nigeria needs now is a true revolution a la Phillipines or Romania which would terminate the circus political show and send those responsible for our misery to the world beyond. ...
October 06, 2007
Quite unlike Olusegun Obasanjo (the 'dead' statesman whose dismal failure as President of the Nigerian Republic is still haunting him in spite of the hollow grandstanding on the contrary) I found myself holidaying in Paris for the past three weeks and reading Nigerian newspapers and magazines on-lin...
September 27, 2007
Burma, an unfortunate country somewhere inside the global village known today as Myanmar, is on my mind today. On my mind because of sordid events that are accumulating. Burma is notorious the world over for one thing: a military dictatorship that digs deeper in into infamy. Very brutal communal Gen...
September 10, 2007
Last Sunday of all days saw my absence from the church service here! As the secretary of the church administrative committee I was not expected to be absent from the church service for whatever reason unless I am out of town. But here I was Sunday morning torn between patriotism and Godliness and th...
September 01, 2007
Between Evangelical Opportunists and Opportunism
Religion, like politics, is an effective powerful weapon of social control. For good or bad it has transformed individual societies and shaped the faith of man towards divinity. Whilst the soul of man is in constant search of hope and salvation it ...
August 24, 2007
Monsieur Kouame, a very good friend of mine here, an alumni of the prestigious Sorbonne University in Paris France and my former lecturer invited me over the weekend for some drink and gist. I struck friendship with this radical University of Cocody teacher when I was still pursuing a French-languag...
August 19, 2007
When I wrote "Di Na Nwunye Obodo Oyibo" (Foreign Husbands and Wives) a month ago the essay generated a healthy minor controversy triggered by a thought-provoking response by one Mrs Patricia Daboh, an African-American woman married to a Nigerian. She wrote in her comments: "I find it amazing that ...
August 12, 2007
Gigolos are those lazy handsome men out there looking out for women who need their services. Always seen hanging out in hypermarkets, supermarkets, popular hot spots, show-biz events, recreation centers and beaches well dressed 'soliciting' amorous relationships or being solicited by these women for...
August 03, 2007
Vive La Paix En Cote D'Ivoire!
When the late founding father of the Ivorian modern republican nation President Felix Houphouet-Boigny was telling his people during his long years in power that "la paix c'est pas seulement une mot mais c'est une comportement" (peace is not only a word, it is a beh...
July 29, 2007
Something of international dimension and significance is happening in Bouake, Cote D'Ivoire Monday. Monday July 30th the Burkinabe, South African and Ghanaian Presidents are joining President Gbagbo and his Prime Minister Soro Guillaume to celebrate re-unification of the French-speaking country and...
July 22, 2007
Carnal relationships around the world between men and women (which sometimes lead to marriage) have intrigues, mendacity, honesty and outright wickedness and exploitation woven around them. Depending on the compatibility or otherwise of love birds the emotion and twists and turns connected with the ...
July 17, 2007
In the Holy Bible the story of the tower of babel was beautifully crafted and told by the spiritually-guided authors. According to the irrefutable accounts therein ancient men apparently questioning the supernatural wisdom and dominion of God decided foolishly to construct a skyscrapper that would r...
July 15, 2007
The world of sports is not only complex but dynamic. Heroes, heroines and legends have been made out of sports in general. From soccer (Pele, Maradona) to boxing (Mohammed Ali, Mike Tyson); motor racing (Michael Schumaker), to tennis (Boris Becker, Andre Agassi, Roger Federer); from track and field ...
July 15, 2007
Cote D'Ivoire as a country is not without her own bizzare tales, stories socio-religious and politico-economic that puzzle an impartial observer. Africa being a land of more pain than gain, despair than hope Cote D'Ivoire has had her fair share of gripping stories that continue to define Africa i...