Right Of Reply: Commenting On The Comments Part 2

Dear Anonymous Commentator,

It is with a huge dose of sarcasm and the eternal quest for objectivity that I have decided to handle this matter this way. Normally, being the blogmaster, I could have easily deleted your comments and no-one would have been any more the wiser except you and I. But maybe I deceive myself when I say I am objective. I may have to warn you however that my reply - in exact opposite of yours - will be long.

First, of all, Thank you for helping me stick to my decision not to turn off Comment Moderation in my blog. I’m sure you must have agonized for hours trying to choose the right words to convey your opinion and I’m sorry if good manners and Comment Moderation prevented you from publishing all the swear words you might have used in my blog without my permission. Once again, thanks for unwittingly demonstrating to less discrete Bloggers out there, the immense power of this little invention of Censorship.

Secondly, I usually don’t publish Anonymous comments on my blog. From experience, most of them are usually useless comments packed full of hidden links to spy ware, spam and advert sites none of which I endorse. Whenever I break this rule, you ought to know that either the said comment is apt, harmless, boosts my ego or makes a whole lot of sense. Your comment in this case, doesn’t fulfill any of these criteria but I’ll just make an exception all the same.

On the issue of Kelly Hansome’s (“hansome I repeat Hansome”, according to you - mixed upper and lowercases regardless) Maga Don Pay video, I guess I may have been a bit too harsh on that video. Sorry. Maybe we can safely blame that on my period. Like I said then and will always say, I love the song. I actually HATE the lyrics and subsequently, dislike the video.

I’m grateful for your enlightening me on the location for the video shoot. I’ve watched the said video twice and no where in it was it captioned “Shot in L.A.” so I guess my speculations that it was done in S.A. was a safe one. Honestly I do need to research more or call on people like you when I need such info. By the way, do L.A. chicks hear Pidgin English nowadays? Can they now lip-sync Kelly’s song? And I think S.A. is so much cheaper to shoot in. Remind me to ask P Square…

Since you seem so conversant on the Hansome family matters, I take it you must be very close to Kelly or any one of them so please tell him when you do see not to take my views too badly. So many people dislike Tupac’s “Hit ‘Em Up” even while admitting it is really a great song so maybe Mr. Kelly can take solace in that. And thanks for letting me know the family background too. Was the fact that they would be mistaken as being related to the Clifford Orji family partly responsible for their change of name?

You know, you are right on so many things! I was wrong on the spelling of the name and I admit I mistakenly thought the video was actually called “Mugu Don Pay” but there are several things on which you are horribly wrong. One, every one of us, yourself included, has a criminal mind. The only thing stopping most of us is after due consideration of the consequences. Second, I have never practiced 419 (you won’t believe me anyway, so why bother?) neither do I condone it in any way, the very reason I spoke out about this song in the first place. For you see, this song has everything to do with 419 (a.k.a. Advance Fee Fraud, Yahoo, Obtaining By Tricks, etc).

If you may not have grown or lived in Nigeria long (for example, if you are a refugee) then you must not have known that the phrase “mugu” or “maga” is mostly used to denote a person - usually expatriate - who has fallen prey to the trickery / dupery of an Advanced Fee Fraudster (also called a Yahoo boy in some quarters although this term may soon become trans-gender). Thus when the slang “Mugu / Maga don pay” is used, it actually means an unfortunate person has just fallen victim of the fraudster’s antics and lodged / transferred a huge amount of money (usually in dollars) as an advance payment into the fraudster’s accounts. And if you still don’t believe me, please ask the Nigerians who run your refugee camp. Or better yet, read Charizard’s “THE CHARI AND EXSCHOOLNERD SHOW”

I’m taking a lot of pains (and boring most readers here) explaining this because like I said, you may be unfamiliar with these terms. I hope you are more enlightened now to see that your friend’s choice for a song title and hook was most inappropriate to say the least. The same applies for the places in the song’s lyrics where these terms were also used.

For you to then imply that the lyrics “Maga / Mugu don pay / Shout hallelujah” means “Praise God for the breakthrough in my musical career” as you put it is a collective insult to the entire crop of Nigerian audiophiles, song writers, performers and critics like us that actually do listen to music lyrics and not just nod our heads to the beat like you do. And I think you do owe us a very big sincere apology for rating our intellect so low.

You and I both agree on one thing though: we both like the song and I thoroughly enjoy the beat, tempo and flow. Permit me to suggest to your friend that if he’s doing a remix, he might just think of changing the lyrics to say, maybe: “Hard work don pay / Shout hallelujah” I’ve tried it out in the song and believe me, it works. I give the idea to him free of all copyright charges and I don’t even want the credit for the suggestion. I just hope you don’t plan on passing off the idea as yours!

I also agree with you too that censorship should be a personal thing except if you’re a kid who runs around the streets yelling “Maga Don Pay” at the top of your lungs (in which case your father then becomes the Censors Board). And have you noticed that songs with the most questionable lyrics are actually the easiest for kids to copy and sing? I recall a song called “Pickin” by D-Smart last year or so that had kids chorusing for bottles of Small Stout (an alcoholic beverage). But then, I don’t think you’d mind if your little son tells his mom to lick his lollipop, would you? Or asks the maid to take down her drawers ‘cause he wants to give her a real good banging all night, non-stop?

But what am I saying? This reply is getting too long probably because I have a weakness when it comes to brevity and I always write with passion. I also try to be very careful with my grammatical structure and syntax (unlike you), but I notice that like me, you too write with passion. I could easily spot 14 grammatical errors in the comment you sent me (the funniest was you spelling opinion as “opp ion”). Or maybe your cyber-timer ticket was running out and so you had no time to edit and had to beg the café attendant for a few extra minutes to log out properly. There’s no need to feel ashamed about that. I’ve also done it too.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed this correspondence with you and I’m glad I could restrain myself from totally insulting you but please may I advice that next time you want to indulge in any sort of exchange with me or this blog, that you please get an ID? It could even be a pseudonym. So many fools like I said earlier happen to share the same “Anonymous” first name with you.
Opinions they say, are like body hairs. Everyone’s got them.

And he who has them a lot especially under the armpits is more likely to stink.

In case you haven’t noticed by the time you read this, I’m bored with replying you so I rest my case…

You are stupid.

PS: Ok, so I admit I’m just being petty but I’ve really wanted to hammer somebody like this in a long time but never got the opportunity!
And I’m still very much open to criticism please so keep hammering me too. I promise to take them seriously so I can keep on improving. Just don’t call me a 419er in them please (that’s what made me mad in the first place if not I’d have shunned the whole thing).
I HATE (hate I repeat Hate) 419.