The World As I See It
Have you read Part 1 – In the Beginning?
The next Monday, 3 October 2016, Cranfield’s School of Water, Energy, Environment and Agrifood (SWEE) began its induction week. Then the following week, we had our first module, Dynamics of Fluidic Energy Devices.
Continue reading “The Cranfield Journey: Part 2 – Integration Shockers”
I finally get to write this article to chronicle my journey through Cranfield University, the UK’s only postgraduate-only university. Writing this has been on my mind since I finished my thesis and awaited final results, but I felt the time was not right. Before you read on, please be aware that despite my best intentions, this might turn out to be a narcissistic post. If such would disgust you, please stop here and read about my mom or my dad.
Continue reading “The Cranfield Journey: Part 1 – In the Beginning”
In economics, the concept of “Perverse Incentive” commonly refers to a situation where an incentive leads to detrimental outcomes for the enablers of such incentive. The most popular example comes from British Colonial India where an attempt to eliminate cobras in Delhi by paying for each killed cobra led to people farming cobras. Due to self-interest, the socially or morally optimal outcome will never occur as humans would rig the system to perpetuate the incentive. This is the rabbit hole that Nigeria needs to escape from.
It is no longer news that thanks to Nigeria failing to win any medal at the Paris Olympics, the world was deprived of the privilege of hearing Nigeria’s freshly authorised old anthem. Whereas some would say that we redeemed ourselves at the Paralympics which held right after the Olympics, one might ask how many viewers worldwide would have been privileged to hear the extolling rhythm of our brotherhood when Onyinyechi Mark and Folashade Oluwafemiayo broke world records back-to-back on their backs. But at the Olympics, we floundered.
Continue reading “At the Olympics to Mark Attendance”
As this blog marks ten years, I checked my files and found this article that was written within the first week of starting the blog, but somehow did not get posted because I felt it was incomplete.Continue reading “Changing Nigeria One Day at A Time”
On October the First, 2014, while Nigeria marked 54 Years of Independence, I was somewhere in Osogbo in Nigeria’s South-West when I posted the first article on this blog. “Ibosa – Welcome” was the first of more than 340 articles that I have posted here. In the intervening decade, I have managed this site from different cities in about ten countries, taking my writing with me as I explore life. I have gone from writing on paper to typing everything directly as the thoughts are parsed through my neurons.
Continue reading “Jilomes.com: Ten Years Later”
Recently, in a think-tank of sorts ensconced within a WhatsApp group, the issue of petrol subsidies came into play. Clearly, in Nigeria today, the issue of petrol subsidies, whether they are needed or not, whether they exist or not, is a serious discourse set within the context of a struggling economy. When someone suggested addressing the subsidy issue by digitising purchases tied to NIN, I had an eureka moment with an idea that could be seen as silly and unimplementable or provide a solution to a serious socioeconomic challenge.
Continue reading “A Different Kind of Petrol Subsidy for Nigeria”
Literally all of us, including the famous “Ọmọ get inside” squad would remember a time when we had no care in the world. As children, we had no reason to worry about paying bills or whether Sister Amaka thought our armpits stank, or Brother Paul thought our blouse had one loose stitch. In our carefree world, we believed we could be anything. That belief was what Jesus alluded to when he said that we need to be like children to enter God’s Kingdom.
Continue reading “A Desperate Search for Peace”
“Do not twist justice in legal matters by favoring the poor or being partial to the rich and powerful. Always judge people fairly.”
(Leviticus 19:15, NLT)
If you were to have a random discussion with 100 persons about injustice in our society, you are sure to get sustained lamentations about the perversion of justice by wealthy persons who are able to bribe their way out of being punished for their crimes or have “connections” to get a judge to declare that white is actually black because both have five characters. What you are unlikely to hear is any complaint about injustice that favours the poor or powerless.
Continue reading “Favouring the Poor Oppressor”
Very few persons will ever have the privilege of witnessing surreal ingenuity as magnificent as the silver bullet to national malformation. Jodi Picoult, the American wannabe pessimist once claimed that “…There are no silver bullets in life, there’s just the long, messy climb out of the pit you’ve dug yourself.” But even Auntie Jodi would be enthralled to live in the same era as the wise men in two chambers who have discovered Nigeria’s short walk to freedom.
Continue reading “An Anthem Better Than a Silver Bullet”
