Bits And Pieces 5: I’m Still Watching My Neighbour’s Idiot Box

Foreword:
Shortly after my last post, someone hit me up on FB to say: “Ol’ boy, why are you talking as if you wan die. Abi your girl leave you? Remember that people like me are still there for you.”

The message was private so I don’t know who the sender was but Thanks all the same. It would have just been a little bit nicer if I knew who exactly “was still there for me”.

No, I no wan die and yes, my girl did leave me a very, very long time ago but I’m going to be alright. Thanks for all the concern, blogville and here I present my B & P Part 5:

The Ass of an Ass is what?
So, all the conjecture was just that: conjecture, eh?

Plenty has been said already about the N.B.C.’s suspension and eventual release of the broadcasting license for Channels Television for supposedly announcing that Yardie was set to resign from office but I read an interesting piece by Steve Nwosu in the Daily Sun of Wednesday 17th September, which raises a lot of questions to mind.

Apart from all the back-and-forth between the Presidency and the Media, blaming the gist on hackers and all that, let’s not forget that the detention of some Channels TV and N.A.N. staff by the S.S.S. no matter how brief sharply brings to mind the gory glory days of Abacha when the same security arm used to hound staff of Tell Magazine for actually telling the truth.

Looking at it from one angle, Channels truly ought to have verified the authenticity of their stories before broadcasting giving its security implications - imagined or otherwise - and they have paid the price for putting sensationalism before professionalism. So I guess you could say Channels TV made an ass of themselves, right?

However, the NBC’s parodied flexing of its muscles in this way is just downright laughable to me. This was the same NBC that also suspended AIT’s broadcast license for the simple “crime” of being the first media house to give accurate accounts of the Lissa Village plane crash when various Ministers and top Government officials were busy contradicting each other, misleading the public on the actual location of the missing plane and prolonging the anguish of relatives.

Last I heard the Presidency is unhappy with SaharaReporters.com for publishing unflattering pictures of one of the First Kids or so. Who knows? Maybe, the next thing will be for the NBC to try suspending bloggers’ licences for blogging. At least that would give them something else to do (and apart from suspending licenses, what does the NBC do to promote broadcasting anyway?)

As far as I’m concerned the NBC is the ass of an ass. I would have stopped at just calling them an ass but this ancestor of the donkey took offence…

The Esama @ 74
NTA did it again! What’s making me indulge in my favourite sport of NTA-bashing this time? Well, they took up the entire morning of Sunday, September 14, 2008 broadcasting Igbinedion’s 74th Birthday celebrations. Of course I wasn’t so bored as to watch such drudgery but given I didn’t have much choice (haven’t been able to start up that cable TV fund I’ve been thinking of) I had to skip to the channel from time to time.

My personal Highlight of the broadcast was where the NTA reporter was interviewing the Esama himself after the church ceremony and tossed him a question about his happiest moments during the celebrations.

Esama started answering with the usual “every-day-is-a-happy-day” speech politicians know so well when he spotted someone off-camera. After enquiring from no-one in his entourage in particular if that was the Governor (?), he suddenly realized the microphone was still his face relaying his question to the over 40 million strong viewing audience. Displaying dexterity that belied his 74 years, he then deflected the mic down far away from his person and towards the floor leaving the said reporter feeling very embarrassed.

Luckily the director must have read the situation quickly and cut to another scene inside the church. By the time the Esama was ready to do the interview again, NTA decided they had had enough and this time they had the last laugh. They cut the interview on him!

Happy Birthday in arrears, Esama. May we all live till the glorious age of 74.

And while we’re praying Lord, may we never have EFCC-hounded children too. Amen!

So I Said It FIRST!
Remember when I spoke about the under-utilization of ATM’s when it comes to their advertising capabilities? Turns out the words were hardly out of my mouth before the banks finally caught on the idea. How do I mean? Just pay a visit to an ATM belonging to Bank PHB and you just might spot their adverts showing real time on its LCD display in full living colours.

Or at least there’s one I know that does. Went to the No. 53 Gbongan Road branch of the bank to carry out my plastic transactions and was pleasantly surprised to find the “Alfie The Talking Driverless Car” ad showing on the ATM screen. And it plays continuously from the very beginning through till the end until you pop in your card and the transaction menu takes over.

As a title screen clearly educated me, the real name of the ad is actually “Autodrive Version 2” (which is Version 1?) and it was directed by Jorge Rubia for Insight Communications/ Bank PHB and runs for all of 45 seconds.

And as the financial menu told me, my ATM card belonged to an Invalid Account and so I couldn’t withdraw any cash.

I still haven’t learnt the Twelfth Commandment obviously.

Another First
I swear, Sele Eradiri (of Newsline) reads this blog! If not, tell me how come she went about doing a story for Newsline on Sunday, 21st September about enforcing the use of helmets by commercial motorcycle riders and their passengers? Remember I told you the helmet allegations would soon hit Newsline?

Turns out what the helmet enforcement law the FRSC is trying to make mandatory by January 1st, 2009 has long been enforced in Calabar for years now. And thanks to Sele Eradiri and her many years of investigative journalism for bringing the helmet issue to the forefront. Lord knows she’s the only alive person on Newsline nowadays.

And please people, the helmets are for our protection. Having worked with radiology personnel for some months now, I have it on good authority that motorcycle accidents are usually the deadliest.

Pure Water Just Got A New Name…
Also of note on the same episode of Newsline was the product launch of Chi Industries’ ChiSecure Mineral Table Water, the first time ever that good old table water comes packaged in… wait for this… TETRA PAK!

That’s right! Chi Industries latest attempts at re-inventing the wheel now means that high class yoghurts, milk and fruit drinks shall have to suffer the indignity of sharing their cubic cardboard packing with our dear ordinary “pure” water. The ad for this innovative concept (please note the intended sarcasm) shows Nollywood’s Saint Obi all dressed up as Captain ChiSecure, a superhero character who battles it out in a with another disease-carrying superhero when the bad guy tries to infiltrate Chi Water’s much-touted double seal.

Interestingly, before the appearance of Captain ChiSecure in the aisles of the supermarket where the battle takes place, the dirty superhero succeeds in contaminating a bottle of what looks suspiciously like the re-launched Table Water of a competing leading brand with the label carefully blurred out. One would have thought the Nigerian ad companies have better things to do than this sort of underhand mud-slinging they’re resorting to nowadays.

On the plus side, the idea of Tetra Pak-ing is actually good news for environmentalists as it means more use for recycled cardboard and less plastic / PET bottles littered all over the place.

Chi’s table water does have a certain cool factor about it especially in its looks. And just think about it: at a recommended retail price of 70 Naira per liter, you can now fool your more ignorant friends, visitors and neighbours into thinking your fridge is fully stocked with Tetra Paks. After all no one’s to know it’s just water.

Unless you tell them of course.

Happy New Month!

Is It Me? Or was this Chronicle really “Lost”?

TV - Reality - The Gist

When the curtains rolled by around 11pm Saturday 19th July to unveil the new season of Gulder Ultimate Search 5, many a people were glued to their seats as Nigerian Breweries PLC began yet another legend in the quest for money, a car, fame, fortune and failure for 10 youthful representatives of the Nigerian population. They were originally 10 called The Heroes of the Order that set foot on the Agwu Hills in Enugu State to recover the Lost Chronicle and exactly a week ago, the life of the last one standing, Michael Nwachukwu changed for good.

GUS is mostly about characters and the individuality of this year’s contestants was not in doubt. However it is no big secret that the physical rigours of the GUS series have been designed to screen out the weaker sex so that an Ultimate Man will always emerge just as in the past 4 editions. This year, there was a conscious effort among the females to turn this around even though one couldn’t help but wonder how their constant bickering was going to help them achieve this purpose. And of course, there’s always a quiet, brilliant contestant in this case, 24 year old graduate Abiola Olanrewaju who many thought would remain as the last girl standing.

The eviction drama in GUS 5 kicked off with one member each of different sexes been given the boot. First to take the curtain call was 22-year-old Law student, Rita Uloko whose departure was in connection to the physiological damage she suffered to her knee. It would be recalled that the issue of Rita’s knee had cropped up when she first suffered a fall during the drills which she soundly dismissed by jogging on the spot to prove her point. But the body does not lie. Another fall again on the same knee and Rita was history.

As if to dispel the underlying notion that GUS lauds only the display of brute strength over mental abilities, Brian Mokelu failed to solve his puzzle and thus forfeited not only his role as totem bearer but his chance for the big prize. In the words of host, Bob-Manuel Udoukwu, the 25-year-old UNN Geography student’s “relevance in the camp had hereby been terminated.”

Next to leave were Abiola and 25-year-old Fred Dutman for failing at the spear throwing contest but the fact that the other contestants scored points at all was nothing short of a miracle given the warped nature of the spears’ aerodynamics. Aspiring model and Rivers State indigene, Abigail Opuogulya aged 22 and smart but conceited JJ Okop were next to get the boot when their team came last as Abigail failed in yet another physical task.

The other males in this year’s edition, though not lacking in macho looks all seemed to lack the necessary grey matter needed to solve riddles apart from the seemingly haughty JJ who, true to history, would never have been the Ultimate Man. Into the mix were the fishwives Ruphina “Phina” Ohakwe (who at 27/28 years old was the oldest Hero and mother figure in the camp) and Abigail who were so intent in carving a niche in the viewers’ minds with their quarrelsomeness.

With the camp reduced to four the female cause was left to Phina and yet another quiet female, Linda Iweka, UNIABUJA Computer Science student aged 21, who never seemed too sure of herself to take charge at any time. There was a bit of melodrama when both females came last on yet another physical/mental task and everyone thought they would be evicted but this was not to be as both were thrown a lifeline. The dream for an Ultimate Woman was however further shattered when another set of physical removed first Phina and then Linda leaving Marketing graduate Frank Mohammed and 26-year-old “Big Mike” as he was fondly called to jostle for the crown. Of course, by now the outcome of GUS 5 is well known.

GUS 5 didn’t fail in its tradition as one of the (if not the most) popular reality TV shows but Despite its cult status, GUS Season 5 fell seriously short when compared to previous seasons 1 and 2 and sadly followed in the tradition of GUS 3 and 4 by failing to live up to its billings. There just wasn’t enough flash to keep the viewers’ attentions.

Take the characters for example. Maybe it was the editors’ fault but GUS 5 looked more robotic and less realistic. There was no bonding, no romance, no drama, hardly any comedy or friction between characters (apart from Phina and Abigail) and all the crucial socio-dramatic elements that go to make up a popular TV reality show. But then maybe it was the fault of the screening panel who seemed to focus mainly on contestants with materialistic tendencies instead of diverse, eccentric and radical personalities. Hardly a tear was shed when any contestant got evicted unlike in the previous editions as the remaining ones saw only each eviction as a chance for them to lay hands on the cash prize and the SUV.

The choice of host also had a few question marks. A reality TV show usually requires the services of a vibrant, versatile, convincing and witty host but disappointingly, host Bob-Manuel Udokwu has still remained the same Bob-Manuel of Season 4: The Golden Age with no improvement whatsoever. At least one can be grateful that he is far more bearable than the “Tin-Tin” host of Season 3 at NIFOR. Jungle Film Works (the TV Production company) wowed us with their cinematic prowess in previous years but like Bob-Manuel they also decided not to tinker with their magic formula this year showing exactly the same cinematic capabilities they displayed before.

The scenic Agwu Hills location of this year’s Search sadly excluded marine activities from the tasks which was a shame actually giving that the ability to swim was one of the criteria for choosing contestants. The tasks themselves while solely lacking in creativity, focused so much on the physical and less on the mental aspects thus successfully eliminating females from the Ultimate prize which, if one really thinks about the way Michael discovered it, actually had nothing to do with these much touted physical attributes. Any female doesn’t even need to go through the National Youth Service scheme to know they could overcome the obstacles en route to the prize but maybe at a slower pace.

And on a final note, there’s the issue of the Legend itself. There’s something about that Chronicle story that accompanied the Search that definitely didn’t stand up to the test of time and maybe therein lies the problem. The myths that surround every season of GUS are beginning to sound more absurd nowadays and even the tiniest tot in your house can see through the charade. The sci-fi tale of the emergence of a despot in the future who radically altered the Star Wars-like landscape and banned all forms of intellectual improvement (a la the movie “Equilibrium” and several others), leading to the Heroes of the Order sending the Lost Chronicle back in time to be discovered in Enugu was laughably ridiculous. The animated cartoon than came with the story was even more so.

In case there is a GUS 6 planned in the future (which is doubtable given that all the elements for brewing a good beer - which the Ultimate Search is about anyway - have been found) it would be great if NB Plc as well as Insight Communications as well as Jungle Filmworks put heads together to review the flaws apparent in GUS 5. The Scriptwriter, Director, art directors task builders/grips and film editors need to do more work to make the storyline more interesting the and the tasks more diversified while the narrator, host, contestants and even we the viewers need to put in more spirit in GUS.

I would have gladly helped too, but no one asked me to anyway…

PS: For more info on the past editions of the Gulder Ultimate Search such as previous winners, rewards, tasks and locations, click this link. To find out about the crew members a.k.a. the “Men” behind the Scenes click here. All referenced materials are copyright of NB Plc and related Agencies.

Bits And Pieces 2: No More Drama

TV - Drama - Summarized

Once upon a time, there was a hit TV series called Inside-Out that featured Barbara Soki. Then there were others such as Ripples, Checkmate, Behind The Clouds, and my personal favourite, Basi & Company. All these programmes had a peculiar characteristic in common: they made you hunger for next week’s edition. Viewers of today don’t just know what they missed.

How would they know, when examples of what they get as Drama include:

Un-Super Story
Much as I RESPECT and ADMIRE Mr. Wale Adenuga and his PEFTI productions, I am SO NOT feeling the current edition of his Super Story series titled: “Omajunwa - The Child of Destiny”. The artistes are stellar and all the necessary ingredients are sprinkled into the plot but the script seems somewhat dry (for lack of a better word).

Enebeli Elebuwa’s screen renditions of an invalid are right on the money but I think he delivered his act better while he was on his feet instead of just lying down all the time whining. His cheating wife, her Manager-boyfriend’s schemes, his insolent children’s continuous disobedience, the pseudo-serious security man (who by the way fails to amuse me every time) and the sudden introduction of a previously-unknown son aren’t helping in reviving the plot either. The only other person that may just keep me watching is the woman who portrays Adesuwa, the dedicated house help.

Mr. Adenuga, can you do something… Maybe like give us another better series. PLEASE…?

And TARIMA too…
Ok, so Emeka died long ago. Point One taken. OK, his widowed wife has been pregnant all this while. OK, Point Two. So, his village people still think she’s a witch. Big deal… When is TARIMA (Tribe And Religion In Marriage) going to come to an end? The deceased/widow plot has been flogged even far worse than a dead horse that I can’t just help thinking if the script writers can’t come up with something else. Why torture us so?

Now, as if to answer my prayers, Emeka’s ghost has taken to appearing to certain people in the village scaring the bejeezus out of them while mysteriously leaving the very people responsible for his demise and the ill-treatment of his widow looking none the worse for wear. And to make matters worse they decided to freshen up the musty storyline by reviving several formerly dumped characters and giving them a new lease of life with recycled dialogue.

Sigh… There isn’t any tiny morsel of suspense in the whole thing! And pray, when will his wife EVENTUALLY give birth?

What Area Are We In?
A certain drama series which features Patrick Otoro (as Barrister) as well as a certain long-legged, cute-in-her-own-way babe called Seyi Olu-something-or-the-other (as Rali) is supposed to mirror our country Nigeria in its own little way. Throw in Ikponmwosa Gold (as Vendor) and certain other obscure idiosyncratic characters together in an extremely boring script and that’s Area Eleven for you.

Area 11 (supposedly located somewhere in the FCT) is supposed to be a microcosm of our society with its attendant issues and its possible solutions but it misses the fine points of Drama horribly.

The character I most love to hate is a certain Senator - a caricature of the members of our dear National Assembly - who by the way says exactly the same thing every time.

Just 3 TV Dramas and I am already weary. The list could go on and on. Little wonder I favour the TV reality shows nowadays. Ever wondered why so many people are shunning evening Television to embrace the DVD craze, grabbing pirated copies of foreign TV series like “Desperate Housewives”, “Lost”, “Prison Break” and “24”?

Now you know why.

No Victor, No Vanquished: Who Really Cares…?

TV - Documentary/History - The Gist

Sometime in the ‘90s…
It must have been around the holidays because I was mighty bored that day. Seeing that my elder brother (who was majoring in History at the university by that time) had left one of his textbooks around, I decided to kill time by reading about notable historical personalities.

Adolf Hitler, Mahatma Ghandi, Yassar Arafat, Winston Churchill and a couple of colourfully paged biographies later and I couldn’t help reflecting: “What the hell were some of these guys thinking? Bet I would have done that better…!”

March 2006…
Fast-forward to the first quarter of 2006, in the service of the Fatherland. 3 weeks after sharing a camp with total strangers, I was being shunted off to a tough Local Government Area that suffered from water problems but had the most picturesque scenery I’d ever seen.

After being rejected from my initial posting, I trade places with a stuttering colleague to take his teaching place in a school. Despite the rapidly dwindling student population, the shrill voices of the kindergarten kids still carries into the “staff room” as they religiously chant the names of the 36 states and capitals, thrice a day - just like medicine.

Before I gladly terminate my appointment a year later, another female colleague spots what has been bugging us concerning that recital. The kids are just mentioning 35 out of the original 36 states! The one being omitted is another issue altogether…

May 5, 2008 circa 11:00pm...
I’m lying down awake in my room closely monitoring the NTA broadcast and wishing I had enough money to pay for a cable TV subscription. Due to a certain eccentric employee of the Power Holding Corporation who runs a crazy rotational power-sharing scheme, my house only gets to receive power on alternate days. Predictably, this messes up my TV-viewing schedule when it comes to daily Reality TV. By the same time next week, I’m guaranteed to miss any great weekly TV show I happen to catch this week. Now I’ll have to add a generating set and fueling costs to that cable bill…

Eagerly anticipating that day’s episode of Star Quest (I missed the previous day’s and I’ll miss the next), I am therefore shocked when NTA starts broadcasting their post-Civil War chronicle; a series of documentaries called “No Victor, No Vanquished” which is a historical and analytical narrative of the events that led to and occurred during and immediately after the Nigerian Civil War.

Why am I bringing this all up? Well, for those of you who do not know, the Nigerian Civil War was fought from June 6, 1967 to January 13, 1970 between the Federal Republic of Nigeria soldiers and the secessionist Biafran forces (led then by General Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu) who wanted to pull out of the country to form the Republic of Biafra. Nigeria at that time was ruled by General Yakubu Gowon.

For 30 months, the war raged taking its toll on the military and civilian populace as fierce battles, air strikes, reprisal killings, community decimations and totally false political propaganda became the order of the day. The financial, moral, ethical and psychological scars as well as the many other unknown effects of that war are still present till today even though the newer generations of Nigerians have tried hard to bury the events and forget the memories.

What is my view concerning all this? Despite my semi-Eastern Nigerian origins and the tales of horror I’ve heard my parents recount, I have chosen to largely remain blissfully ignorant and never to take sides in a battle I wasn’t even around to witness. But every once in a while, whenever sectional violence breaks out across the ethnic divides of my dearly beloved country the deeply lodged animosities boil up again to the surface to confront the ideals of ye leaders past of older generations who strove hard to ensure that Nigeria remained one at all costs.

The younger generation, who by now mostly embrace the notions of intermarriage, are immediately faced with tough and confusing challenges as one’s wife, lover and friend suddenly attains the enemy status just because a tiny group of people many hundreds of kilometers clash with an equally tiny group of herdsmen over cattle grazing rights.

Or aspiring lawyers, mechanics, doctors, businessmen, seamstresses, car washers, area boys and prostitutes each hustling in equal measure for their daily bread, lay down their lives all for the noble cause of a young man who chooses to defecate in a rival’s uncompleted building or a young sixteen year old swollen with the passions of her first true love and the first stages of gestation for a misguided Youth Corp member serving in her school.

The things that have continued to spark off the raw tinder of the fires of our national divide have even lesser values than these cited examples and once in a while a movie is screened, a book published or TV documentary broadcast each portraying the events of the past through the eyes of its intellectual creator while carrying an underlying message that this evil should not visit our doorsteps again. But are these lessons in history really necessary? After all, are we really listening?

NTA’s “No Victor, No Vanquished” will not be the needed balm for soothing these long-hidden wounds nor will it be the panacea to the millions of people who lost friends, neighbours, siblings and relations and whose collective destinies changed with the drop of an exploded shell. For while critically watching it(as opposed to casual viewing), I only find a programme which will give the older generation a new cause to cast fresh accusing fingers over debatably outdated facts and also give the new generation an even bigger reason to feel disdain and disconnect from the labours of our leaders past.

Caught up in the web of wide-spread economic devastation brought about by some of these precedent hallowed, halo-clad despots, inspired by the glamour-filled lifestyles and quick wealth of the nouveau riche and bombarded by the peer- and parental pressure-filled mandatory success guidelines of top-notch jobs, fat salaries, fast cars, duplex accommodation, work-hard-play-even harder life standards and the obligatory multiple sex partners all acquired before the ideal age of 24, many a Nigerian youth is not interested in watching old men trade blames over who caused a war that may or may not have brought about all these problems in the first place.

Instead, we are watching Star Quest and hoping to be instant musical stars. We are watching The Apprentice Africa and hoping that through hook or crook, we just might be Mr. Shobanjo’s apprentices. We are glued literarily to AMBO and The Next Movie Star and hoping to break into the sleazy lifestyle of our dear Nollywoodians or we are reading about their crazy scandals in the soft sell magazines. We have lost our senses and buried our attention in following old Mexican soaps with more twists and turns in their plots than the Onitsha-Owerri road.

Don’t blame us. In our usual way of passing the buck, maybe part of the blame should go to the national education system. Let’s blame the schools who are now so good at brainwashing and indoctrination that our children are now shunning Physical and Health Education and the playground to go for junk food during break time. My niece’s boarding school in a quest for Religious neutrality recently decided to conduct joint Worship services instead of allowing the kids go to their individual churches. And in kindergarten, the letter ‘Y” doesn’t stand for Yam anymore. That’s so uncool. It now stands for Yacht… Or maybe Yahoozee!

That fresh generation will never know the black and white Television or any electrical device for that matter that has no remote control. Many will never see a turntable, a spin dial telephone, VHS tapes or a dugout canoe. Many have never been taken to museums by their over-worked, over-stressed parents whose notion of a family get-together is plunking down their kids in the latest fast-food outlet that probably has a bouncy castle. And many will never care to know or be taught about the Nigerian Civil War or its repercussions.

When a school chooses to teach her kindergarten kids just 35 out of the 36 states in Nigeria, then we can now say: Congratulations! What do we care about history? After all, Social Studies is now truly and totally dead.

As for me, I do not still know Nigeria well enough and so I must search for more. While continuously doing my research and even prior to writing this piece I still find that the debate over who was right and who was wrong and who did what still rages on till now, 38 years after. You can gather all the information you want, my dear generation, and hear all the horror stories your parents will tell but the truth is that we were not there when it happened. Whatsoever you will hear, read or view will depend on the perspective of your sources. And in wars, the greatest casualties are women, children and common sense.

They claim there was No Victor, No Vanquished. The choice of what to believe is YOURS…

Woomie's Comments

At June 10, 2008 3:00 PM, Woomie O! commenting on my blog wrote:

4NE, i have been embittered by the TV content for our young children. Their brains haven't formed well as a result of what they see on TV.
I say this because a great part of the things i know today, i learnt on TV as a child (you will agree with me). Now, when i tune to local TV stations, I don't see the Sesame Street, Barney, Sarafina and other educative Sci-Fi cartoons I saw as a child, instead, these stations 'hammer' our children's brains with Johnny Bravo, Animaniacs, Pinky & the Brain, Cow & Chicken, I am Weasel etc etc.
I try not to let my neices watch too much of these things, they learn ablsolutely NOTHING postive from them...truth is, they don't even understand any message (if any) behind these cartoons.
I look at these kids and I want to cry...I am embarassed by what this new generation do with their spare time.
911!!!
our loval TV stations are brain-draining our average Nigerian Kids.
Somebody should ask the Bruces of Silverbird TV, John Momoh of Channels TV, Tinubu (or whoever is in charge) of LTV and the now-reduced-to-mediocres of NTA network, if it is what they watched as kids on Nigerian TV stations that they have reproduced and are presenting to our kids...If these things didn't work for them then, what makes them think they will work for our own kids (and their own too) now?
Did the defunct ClapperBoard and the old NTA network emmigrants leave with the tapes???

4NE's Reply : Well said! There's NOTHING more for me to add... For those of you who don't know, Woomie is a very intelligent young female and I'm not just fronting. Check out her blog here

Inform, Educate and Entertain… And VOLTRON

TV - Flashback - The Gist

Turn your TV to the NTA every morning and it’s a mantra you are bound to catch at least one of the A.M. Express presenters reciting as they flood into your living rooms or wherever your TV set is kept. The flooding this time is pleasant. Believe it or not, you don’t have to cringe every time you see the words “Nigerian Television Authority” on the glowing end of the TV tube. Even a mediocre has to excel once in a while.

OK, I digress… back to the issue at hand...

I love Television, no two ways about it, but for some years now, our relationship has started becoming shaky as I begin to seriously doubt the authenticity of its mandate. Is Television keeping true to that Inform, Educate and Entertain (I.E.E.) Broadcast Creed we swore to on that day when I told her “I do”?

Yes, watching the TV can be very entertaining at times, and if you bother to watch the increasingly socialized social diary called the News you just might get a nugget of information here and there but as for getting an education, I’ve been very skeptical if the idiot box dishes out much in that line.

Fact is, the only set of people who got any proper sort of education from TV were those who were lucky enough to watch programmes like “3-2-1 Contact” and “Sesame Street” in the hey days of B & W programming or even the early episodes of NTA’s “Tales By Moonlight” (as a kid then I used to love any story that featured animals. I felt I must be very smart because I realized early that animals didn’t talk so it must be humans in those costumes! I digress yet again…).

What fun it was in those glorious days of watching “Voltron” and longing to possess the gymnastic skills of Pidge, or Lance’ suave looks or Keith’s leadership abilities or marrying the Princess Allura for that matter. We flew across the skies in their aerodynamically-challenged space vehicles and our fantasies were limitless for even when the black-and-white screen failed us, we filled in the colours with our vivid imaginations. Television taught us how to D.R.E.A.M.

In those days Science was a daily discovery and you could master the rudiments of killer courses like Mathematics or all the tongue-tying complexities of Oral English straight off the TV set. Television programme schedulers were always all too conscious of the slightest details of the school calendar and would arrange programmes accordingly to sooth the tastes of their young audiences during holidays.

Those days are long gone. The youth of nowadays simply have no imagination.

I was therefore pleased when I spotted a tiny glimmer of hope for this generation. From amidst the Babel that is daily programming we occasionally catch a little ray of insight as it shines out to Inform, Educate and Entertain us. Take for instance, A.M. Express, Wednesday the 4th of June. A doctor comes on-air from the Benin Network centre some time around 6:40 am to Educate us on Infertility. Now that’s an important subject so I put a hold on my breakfast preparations to watch.

What really grabs my attention is his definition of infertility which I will try to reproduce as well as I can. In his own words (all the emphasis are mine):

“… Infertility is medically described as the inability of a couple to conceive after participating in active coitus, that is full sexual exposure, for a period of one year”.

(And here I am thinking, slowly chewing on a slice of bread: what does this guy mean by “full sexual exposure”? He isn’t talking of photography, is he? Or radiography, for that matter.)

And he continues:

“…It is medically agreed that the normal frequency of full sexual exposure for a couple in that one-year duration should be at least three exposures in a week...”

Three exposures a week! My hackles immediately rise, I don’t know why. Okay… Cool down. Quickly discarding breakfast to do the math I come up with this:

3 full sexual exposures a week (medically agreed) x 52 (chronologically agreed) weeks in a year = 156 full exposures! For those of you that don’t get this, that means you have 156 chances to get Junior.

Now isn’t that Education? I won’t vouch for the authenticity of this M.D.’s statements neither will I swear by all things terrible that his quoted sources for the “medically agreed” definition are accurate. The only thing I can be sure of is to say I was well and truly E.D.U.C.A.T.E.D.

PERIOD…

So all you lovebirds out there trying for a shot at replicating handy toy-sized copies of yourselves, here’s some very good advice: If after 156 full sexual exposures successfully carried out within a duration of 366 days and the female in the equation isn’t throwing up in the mornings and getting a belly that you can’t attribute to excessive drinking of alcoholic beverages, then YOU BOTH NEED TO GET YOURSELVES CHECKED by a doctor who specializes in full sexual exposures. A pity they never scrolled the Doc’s name onscreen so I can’t help all you desperate peoples with that vital piece of info.

As for all them people who always strive to break all the records in the Guinness Book of Full Exposures, I have nothing (yet) to say to you. And if you find you aren’t batting at the A.M. Express endorsed average of 156, then what the hell are you waiting for?

Breakfast temporarily forgotten, I take a stroll through my cerebral garden, rocking on my mental rocking chair, smoking an intellectual pipe and reflecting on all these. (Would Keith have been too busy defending the Planet Arus from Hagar’s Robeasts to worry about giving Princess Allura her due 156 full exposures whenever he’d eventually get to marry her? How innocent Black & White TV romance can be.)

Yeah, I miss the Glory Days of Television. I do miss Voltron.

PS: Yes, I’m still trying to work on my TAA review titled “And Then There Were Three…” but the devil seems to be in the works. I’m thinking of re-editing it for posting it later this week tentatively re-titled as “And Then There Were Two…”

Stay posted!

Showing On A TV Near You: The Ten Dumbest Things

TV - Observation - The Gist

It has happened to virtually every one of us…

You sit down and turn on the TV. After watching in amazement for a few minutes you can’t help but to wonder how much dumb programming manages to slip through all the broadcasting barriers of programme conception, creation, marketing, censorship and transmission to land on your idiot box.

Yeah, I know. I’ve been there too. So here I am watching and thinking: why am I watching this? And what can I do about it? Rather than spend the next few hours of your short lives watching DUMB TV, here are some things you just might want to consider steering clear of.

Several warnings though before you read this:

a. The term “dumb” means: incapable of speech, silent, lacking intelligence (in other words, stupid), taciturn, etc and can even be used as a term of endearment akin to dum dum, dummy, etc where the person being so affectionately addressed does not fully grasp the subject in question. (If you didn’t get the above definition, then you are well…dumb)

b. Sequel to the last section of above definition, some of the programmes listed here aren’t totally dumb themselves but do contain Elements of Dumbness.

c. I’m going to step on a few toes. Not everybody reading this is going to like it.

d. Drawing up a list of the Top Ten Dumbest Things on TV is probably a dumb thing to do. You’d be shocked just how much of the stuff there is out there!

f. And in case you don’t figure it out, the rankings go from 10 (Dumb) to 5 (Dumber) and up till 1 (Dumbest).

OK, (Drum roll)… Let’s BEGIN!

10. Ultimate Soccer Experience: Anchored by Mike Maiyaki, one of the greatest sports analysts alive, there is actually nothing dumb about this great sports programme apart from the half-screen format used during sports analysis. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why the producer insists on squeezing the visuals into just the right half of the screen. What’s up with the left side? If there was some sort of marketing or sports info scrolling there, it might probably make some sense but as it is, this is just so dumb, dumb, dumb.

9. Moments with Mo: Yet another talk show but this one has got CLASS. Check out the avalanche of sponsors and you’ll be left drooling if you are a media marketer. But if you’re a member of that audience you must be dumb! Why? Because THE AUDIENCE IS CUED! Cueing an audience is as fake to Nigerians as canned laughter and occasionally on this show, the fakeness shows way, way too wide. Case in point: the episode that featured John Fashanu and Nkechi Okocha. Someone must have given the wrong cue signal because when John Fashanu was describing the ankle injury that put him out of professional football for good, SOME MEMBERS OF THE AUDIENCE ACTUALLY APPLAUDED!
Hello??? The right cue card was supposed to say: GASP!!!
And don’t rejoice either if you catch Modenine on this week’s episode. It was most likely recorded last year (Copyright 2007 Inspire Africa, if you catch my drift…)

8. Morning Ride: Showing live on the NTA every Sunday morning circa 1000 hours, this Becky Madojemu - produced programme suffers from just one great big mishap: it is full of broadcast transmission glitches. The presentation is OK and the guests typical of any breakfast show but an evil sprite seems to be tweaking with the transmission knobs. It isn’t uncommon to have several cuts during a single broadcast forcing someone on the editing deck to keep a stack of ad inserts handy for such moments. For a programme that has been around since 1988, not having sorted out its transmission issues till now is just plain... dumb!

7. The New Onga Advert: Yes, the new one featuring Kate Henshaw-Nuttal. I love the chick to pieces but I just don’t get what she and her “daughter” are yapping about in that ad about cooking and not forgetting tradition. Given the foreign trip and the hype that preceded the shooting of that ad, I’m sorely disappointed. Someone must have fallen asleep somewhere during the production process, but it definitely wasn’t Kate.

6. Quizline: It’s a BIG waste of talent really. Three (in my opinion) very good TV personalities trapped almost every day in a programme where they talk mostly to themselves for all of 50 minutes while playing sometimes crazy music and giving away money to people equally dumb enough to phone in. Here’s a secret you didn’t know: Guess what? The odds are stacked against you wining anything substantial or else how do you think Akin would have been able to maintain his dreadlocked hairstyle? Or Omowumi, her eye shadow? 3 o’clock can be a very boring time on TV. And yes… I was dumb enough to try phoning in too.

5. National Sports Lottery: Ify might have gotten popular on Big Brother Nigeria but she must be really determined to lose that popularity fast. I’ve tried not to help it but watching her host the NSL show is nothing short of irritating. And her shrill voice, funny wardrobe, non-flowing lines, the civil servant/bus driver-type audience and the occasionally odd co-hosts aren’t helping matters. Check out the SA versions of TV Lottery. At least the witty hosts do look like they are enjoying what they’re doing. In line with the NSL slogan of “Levels go change”, her levels are changing alright… for the worse!

4. The Guinness Football Battle Advert: As a follow-up to their Udeme campaign, the guys of the Brown (or is it Black?) Bottle decided to go for a football-battle style ad where two opposing teams work together to retrieve a football from a runaway truck. Simple. The ad is nice and even funny in some parts but why, oh why, is the truck driver sleeping? Check out that portion of the ad just before he looks into the rear view mirror and sees the chasing crowd and you’ll see his eyes are FIRMLY closed for a couple of seconds or so. Naughty, naughty! FRSC ought to hear of this. On another note, the FULL ad shows the two teams’ henchmen opening their bottle caps against each other’s bottles. The fact that the National Association for Food and Beverages (a body to which the Brewery Bottle Boys belong) launched a campaign seriously kicking against such means of bottle defacement meant that part of the ad had to be edited out. D. U. M. B.

3. The Presidential Media Chat: ‘Nuff Respeck’ to Mr. President, Ijeoma of Thisday, Reuben Abati of The Guardian and all the others that graced the May 27 edition of the Presidential Media Chat. At least the journalistic panel wasn’t as patronizing as their predecessors of the Obasanjo era and they did throw some barbs at Oga Nigeria (the most recurring adjective was slow-coach). But what did we learn from the hour-long Question and Answer programme? NOTHING… Same old story 9 years later. Different presidents, same robes.

2. Some Reality TV Shows: Remember “House 4”, that Big Brother wannabe? It was dumb. Remember “Angels”, the Reality show where some so-called Angels showcased “African” traditions and values in the bush while referring to the show’s mystery voice as “My Ancestor”? It was dumber. Watched several episodes of it and couldn’t figure out what these “angels” were actually supposed to do apart from gossip around a tree clad in wrappers. Now they say they want to do Season 2. That sure takes the cake for dumbness…

1. The Yo Yo Bitters Advert: The third advert to make the dumb lineup and winner of the Dumb and Dumberer Awards, this ad is probably half of the reason why Morning Ride made the line-up in the first place. Sponsors of the Health Monitor segment, the poorly produced ad with a wack soundtrack highlights the miracles of the wonder drug as seen from the eyes of a “healthy” man who now no longer suffers stress and “is now useful in bed”. Whoever the man is, he must be confused about the sexes of his children because he goes ahead to refer to the boy and girl as “Junior and her sister”.
His wife too must be given credit for increasing his bed usefulness seeing that she wakes up from bed with an unattractive nightgown and FULL makeup on! She then “catches” him taking the said Bitters which was openly “hidden” in the fridge (remember Junior and her sister have been taking the drug obviously without the knowledge of their mother). But wait a minute! Wasn’t she the one who put it on the dining table sometime earlier in the advert? Confusing, weird… and TOTALLY DUMB!!!

PS: Now that I’ve done this, I can’t wait to begin List 2. Nominees, anyone?

Watch out for more dumbness…

The Grandest Finale of All

TV - Reality - The Gist

All photos courtesy of the Star Quest site



Located somewhere in Lagos is an event venue that will go down in history as the one place that has been a cradle for a new bevy of stars. That place is the Ocean View Restaurant.

The Expo Hall of the Ocean View Restaurant was the cradle, 10:05 pm on Saturday, 10th May, 2008 was the Estimated Date of Delivery and the Star Quest Grand Finale was the birth event.

The thrilling star-studded event - anchored by Gbenga Adeyinka The First - kicked off with a mini-documentary called “The Journey so far” chronicling how 36 talented musicians who were chosen out of the multitude that applied for auditions formed 6 great bands and were later whittled down to just 3. For the 3 remaining bands, Expozee, The Diamonds and Da Heritage, this was their night of glory as the finals of Star Quest 2008 were broadcast live on the NTA.

Next on the programme after “The Journey So Far” were stage performances from each of the 3 finalist bands doing two of their originally composed and produced tracks. First up on stage were The Diamonds who got to strut their stuff with two locally-flavoured, energy-filled dance performances. Despite their obviously well-rehearsed pieces and being spurred on by their huge fan base, the performances looked a tad weak compared to their Fameland average. Their choice of Afro-rhythmic dance tunes: “This Life Wey We Dey (Face Reality)” and “Ju’di” (roughly translated to mean dance in the Yoruba language) delivered a relatively weak punch and left beautiful Ajumoke Nweze, best vocalist that she is, conceding most of the vocals and stage presence to pot-bellied band leader, Anthony Iwediunor.

The fine boys and lovely sisi of Da Heritage were next. The purpose of this band as revealed by band leader and lead male vocalist Chukwudi Ubido, in the mini-documentary that preceded their performance was to fuse Western and local influences into their music. As female vocalist Glory Odey was also apt to point out, this group didn’t have the best in the vocal department and their first song, “Why You Go?” a love ballad imploring a runaway heartthrob to return, did bring this vocal flaw to the fore. Adding to their troubles was the clash of musical instruments which drowned the vocals at certain times during the performance. “Why You Go” was a very sentimental track with its slow beginning, touching lyrics and crescendo ending but Da Heritage just didn’t seem to carry the stage well not unlike their Diamonds predecessors.

“Jisi Ike”, their second track which was a sort of clarion call did far better than the love song. The motivational/solidarity anthem with a catchy hook encouraging the struggling peoples to “Jisi Ike” (Hold On) and be strong no matter the hardships they face was very sing-a-long-ish, reminiscent of Styl-Plus’ “Stay Alive”. Da Heritage did their crescendo bit at the end again which seemed to work well for them.

And then it was the turn of Expozee… Trust me, it’s hard to take back all the bad things that have been said previously about this group because tonight of all nights they seemed to finally realize what they came there for. And it wasn’t passive bandleader, 25-year old Emmanuel Aika or the dance seductress, Nnedi Ezirim who held the magic wand either. It was lead guitarist turned male lead vocalist, Seun Adegboye who blew the crowd away!

Taking off straight from the launch pad, all boosters firing, the group led off with “Jaiye”, a song extolling the uniqueness of Life and celebrating living fully in the moment. Seun, in a style which called to mind the likes of King Sunny Ade, led the group in the rendition of this piece which predictably got everyone off their seats and gyrating to the soulful tunes of Highlife. There wasn’t a single soul, African or expatriate, that wasn’t moved by that song! And boy! Did they dance…?

Omale Sunday, probably a little bit conscious of the spell Seun had placed on that crowd then took up the spotlight tearing everything lyrically apart as he took it on down, way down to the Ghetto. And Expozee showed everyone that when it gets down to the streets, they too can play dirty. The track title, “This Gbedu Na We Own” was self-explanatory. Whether it was galala, konto, makossa, whatever, Nnedi laid it down on that dance floor and Seun once again threw the lyrical mud all over the place with his Yoruba rap. It was a no-contest. If Star Quest was to be won solely on that night’s performances, then Expozee were the clear-cut winners: this Gbedu was definitely theirs.


The Music Videos

After the live performances, it was time again for the bands to try and impress second time around but this time in celluloid as their debut music videos were unveiled to the public. The Diamonds cleverly decided to do a switch, this time screening a music video called “Tempted” which showcased Blessed Edewor’s singing abilities. When the video ended, I couldn’t help but wonder why he had been content to stay behind all this while. Da Heritage, on the other hand chose not to change a winning formula as “Jisi Ike” came on once again. Expozee, also following the same pattern, stuck to the “Jaiye” song for their video maybe hoping lightning would strike twice.

In all fairness, all three videos were wonderful in showcasing the cinematic skills of the TV production company, though Heritage’s video was the champion here. The transition of the video from its Black & White intro till the screen burst forth in living colours towards the start of the chorus was visually gratifying.

But all these last minute climatic bursts of brilliance weren’t going to determine who would carry the day. After all it was the votes would count…

And the Winners were…

Their name was The Diamonds and that night was their time to shine. Parading arguably the best female vocalist, talented instrumentalists and a cool-headed band leader, The Diamonds wooed their audiences with their harmonious teamwork and hassle-free performances. While their stage work wasn’t always top-notch and their musical choices weren’t the best, they were guaranteed to deliver anytime unlike their rivals Expozee who sadly left everything till late and Da Heritage who maybe narrowly missed the winning formula.

Maybe in the end it boiled down to taking chances and the winning band continuously showed versatility in every task they had been given. The opportunities the music videos gave to showcase yet another of their songs was their trump card and The Diamonds fully grasped it with arms wide open. Apart from some hue and cry over the initial Eviction, this time a lot of Reality TV viewers went to bed satisfied that the REAL WINNERS had emerged.

And so the party wound to an end, the champagne was popped and The Diamonds got their ticket to stardom as they lofted high their cheque while the other groups felicitated with them and looked on in envy. Another era on the Nigerian musical landscape had come to a close with Diamonds becoming the official winners of Star Quest 2008.

It was a journey that had started weeks ago with a dream, a hope, a struggle, an online entry, a chance for an audition, cracked vocal chords, numb fingers, frustrations and evictions. It was a tough shot for stardom and they all won.

But for now The Diamonds shine with the stars…

Yet another Award Ceremony…

TV - Event - The Gist

Photos for this post are courtesy of Funmi Iyanda's blog

Saturday 26th April circa 2000 hours G.M.T plus 1 was the day, date and time and the TV was the way and held the sway. N.T.A. decided to infiltrate our airwaves with the broadcast of yet another Award ceremony, this time the 2008 UBA/AMMA Awards (so named by the organizers). Somehow I had managed to miss the hype surrounding the event so it was a pleasant surprise of sorts as opposed to the excessive hype that has heralded similar Award events this year.

Broadcast time kicked off with the Red Carpet event anchored by Klint da Drunk and I-honestly-don’t-know-who and typical of any Nigerian award ceremony the usual glitches began unraveling way right from the start. The poor audio, uncoordinated appearances by artistes on the Red Carpet and the NTA network cutting into the broadcast with their Abuja mini-documentary and “Heart of Africa” advertorial inserts (hey! I thought UBA was sponsoring the event?) totally ruined the already soiled Red Carpet. Klint did work hard at being funny but mercifully, NTA pathetically salvaged the situation by cutting in again around 2100 hours (that seemed to be the only thing NTA was good at anyway) for “Weekend Extra”- the weekend news package.

AMAA broadcast resumed one hour later smack-dab in the Award ceremony itself with petite comics Chinedu Ikedieze and Osita Iheme announcing the categories and ushering in the announcers for each nomination. Their not too heavy vocal sparring did manage to keep a slightly upbeat tempo on things though Kunle Afolayan seemed to have other things in his mind when called to announce his nominees. Seems he probably just missed his sleep… or who knows, maybe Aki and Paw-paw’s occasionally assassinated English put him to sleep!

The night held its Brightest and Best Moments when Basorge Tariah Jnr ABSOLUTELY murdered that stage with his well-aimed barbs at notably Kate Henshaw-Nuttal, P-Square’s “Do Me” track and the millions of Nigerian movie fans who according to him address him as “one of the actress”. His humorous recollection of his Immigration experiences and trying to pass himself off as a striking semblance of Martin Lawrence tore everyone’s ribs apart – GUARANTEED!

Timi Dakolo’s renditions of Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song”, Aerosmith’s “Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing” and the ending line of “I Don’t Know Much (But I Know I Love You)” proved once again why he wears the Idol West Africa crown at least till this year. His totally A+ performance undoubtedly made the ladies squeal their hearts out and made the guys jealous as usual.

The FCT Minister was another surprise, successfully proving he wasn’t just a politician in a stuffed shirt as he regaled his audience with his attempts at auditioning while seriously championing Abuja as an AMAA venue. It was tempting enough to wish more politicians were like him…

Speaking of venues, the set decorations were very good too and the LCD panels seemed to be functioning as expected. There did occur one ugly moment of total blackout though if the lighting was at fault or if NTA lost the signal wasn’t too certain. What was for certain was that everyone was literally left in the dark when the hall was darkened during the screening of the nominees’ video clips.

The Goge Africa lovebirds were on hand to showcase their exceptional onscreen romance and Isaac Moses did look good with his woven hair no matter the distaste with which the men in black suits might hold such a hairstyle. He seemed to concede to corporate Nigeria though by reappearing in an Afro hairdo and business suit for his UBA Mortgages advert which screened after the mandatory sponsor’s speech which NTA (gratefully) cut again.

Another person who truly deserves kudos is whoever conceptualized the logo for the Awards. Though it was a straightforward merger of the UBA and AMAA marques the effect was graceful, simple yet graphically astounding.

Reading through this piece, what might be instantly noticeable is the lack of mention of the African movies that made the AMAA lineup. Well, the supposedly 3-hour broadcast barely managed to scrape through in roughly 50 minutes scarcely affording home viewers the chance to analyze the big movie winners or the sore losers - the very essence of the AMAA in the first place. Watching on TV made it a totally useless exercise trying to comment on any of the featured movies and their categories unless the reviewer was at the AMAA venue itself.By 2200 hours, NTA terminated broadcast of The AMAA to switch over to yet another Network Service program thus successfully ruining their Live Broadcast of Nigeria’s premier African Movie award ceremony. Their choice for a replacement? The Nigerian Breweries PLC Music Reality show, Star Quest!

Now we know who paid bigger money…

PS: My advice? They are three actually:

1. First, Nigerian event managers should plan on how to iron out the hitches and glitches from Award ceremonies especially the Red Carpet events where sound and artiste coordination are the biggest headaches. Better mics, please?

2. NTA spent most of the day running into countless hours uselessly broadcasting a boring Live discussion programme on the Adamawa State bye-elections called “Adamawa Decides” and yet they couldn’t effortlessly broadcast the AMAA without broadcast signal flops and audio losses. Little wonder the word “nta” in the Ibo language which means small aptly reflects their ability and mentality.

3. Assuming you had the patience to stay awake till the botched ending of the AMAA broadcast, you might as well have sacrificed the next hour to watch Star Quest. It was definitely more satisfying than the AMAA.See ya next post!

PSs: Just for those who think I'm just bashing the AMAAs or NTA, no problem... While I thought the broadcasting was crap, just check out the views of someone who was live at the event!