J. Martins On Wizkid & "Broke Fan" Comment : Don't Diss The Fans!

J. Martins who was in Abuja days ago, gave his opinion on the altercation between singer, Wizkid and a follower of his on Instagram. The fan noticed some faulty grammar in a post by the star musician and told him that he needed to "go back to school". 

Wizkid hit back at the rude poster, by saying - "broke people always have an opinion"

The Instagram altercation

Super producer/neo-highlife musician, J. Martins addressed Wizkid's comments in an interview on Hot FM 98.3 and had this to say -

"J Martins on the show said ‘I’m not taking any side, don’t mean no beef, no disrespect, and no hate but let the truth be told. I don’t believe because you feel you have a few change you didn’t have a few years ago and which you cannot guarantee having in a few years to come then you wake up and look at those people who have cheered you up, loved you, supported your music, bought your CD’s, prayed for you, just because you can lay your hands on some phone and you call them ‘poor’. Am not in and will never be in support of anyone who has such bad attitude.

“It needs to be corrected, we owe our fans the duty of being good examples that’s why they hold us in high esteem, that’s why you are a role model and if you know you cannot be a good role model you have no business in Music. You don’t know if it’s that person that might help you tomorrow, whoever does that should be checked.

You have to decide why you are in the music industry. If you know you cannot be a role model then you have no business being there”

While J. Martins may have a point about respecting the fans and not being arrogant, we cant ignore the fact that the fan in question here could have been more polite in giving advice and correcting grammar. If I made a mistake and somebody corrected me like that I would likely give him a piece of my mind.

Why Are These Nigerian Soldiers Dancing "Your Waist" (Etighi) ?

Npak Eto!, Figure eight o!

These troops were pictured sweating it out to some external stereo, booming Iyanya's monster hit - "Your waist" and doing a very good job of the etighi dance step too. Iyanya had better watch out before these guys (especially the dude in the middle) put him out of business  These gallant soldiers of ours are based in Mali, following the tradition of helping to beat back rebels and fundamentalists in the West African sub-region. Our boys are among the best ground forces in Africa and have over the years, contributed above their quota to ECOMOG and now as part of UN coalition forces.

Its not clear if they are dancing because they heard of the death of Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, they got paid today (friday) or they just felt like it. Whatever it is, these guys have earned the right to boogie every once in a while.

Big up to "Africa's Finest" Infantry keeping the peace !!

New "BOYONA" Army Division Takes Over Operations Against Boko Haram

Starting from Monday August 19th, a newly formed Nigerian Army division dedicated to counter-insurgency will take over all operations against the Boko Haram insurgency in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa States. This group will take over the command and assets of the JTF which recorded notable success in dislodging the boko haram sect from their camps in hills and forests in North-Eastern Nigeria since the declaration of the State of Emergency three months ago in those states.

FLASHBACK: Alex O, Nigerian R & B Icon

Album cover for his 1988 debut album

In 1988, Nigeria's foremost record label, Polygram Records released an album titled "Gettin Loose" by a little known studio engineer/songwriter/singer known as Alex O. Born Alex Okoroigwe in Imo State, he was new to the limelight but like many good artistes back then he had spent a number of years under the tutelage of a pair of titans in the persons of late great musicologist, Elder Steve Rhodes and uber producer Lemmy Jackson. 

The album turned out to be a good bet for Polygram Records as it sold fairly well for a debut and was nominated for the defunct Nigerian Music Awards for two years in a row. He was hot cake. A sensitive lover-boy in the mould of the leading Pop/R & B stars of the 80's like Michael Jackson, Ray Parker Jr and later in his career like British singer, Rick Astley. He had jerry-curls, was an enthusiastic dancer and wasn't afraid to try and rap sometimes in his songs. Though it was always the nursery rhyme type of flow that singers were forgiven for in those days.

Pharrell & Nile Rodgers "Get Lucky" With Daft Punk

Scene from "Get Lucky" video with Pharrell & Nile Rodgers

Fans of genius French House Duo Daft Punk are used to their brilliance from 2001's "One more time" made even more popular with the song's manga anime style video and the robot themed "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"  famously sampled by Kanye West. 

Their latest single "Get Lucky" off their fourth album titled "Random Access Memories" features vocals by Pharrell Williams and was co-written by legendary producer/guitarist Nile Rodgers who also played rhythm guitar on the track. For the uninitiated, Rodgers has been responsible for producing loads of hits since the 1970's with his band Chic, Diana Ross's masterpieces "I'm coming out" and "Upside down" as well as Madonna's signature tracks "Like a virgin" and "Material girl" etc. Pharrell allegedly got involved with the track by meeting both "Daft Punk" members Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter at one of Madonna's parties and practically begging to be given a role, even if it was just to "play the tambourine".

CBN Attracts Heavy Criticism For Introducing 50% CCR Rate

The Central Bank of Nigeria has received knocks from analysts and concerned voices over its soon to be introduced 50% Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) on all public funds deposited with commercial banks. This rule will require commercial banks to forward 50% of all its deposits by any government entity to the CBN and is a system employed to mop up excess liquidity in circulation primarily to control inflation.

CBN Governor Lamido Sanusi

CBN Governor Lamido Sanusi announced this at the end of a meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) held in late July. He cited among a number of reasons, the fact that banks were receiving the monies at 0% interest and lending back to the government at 13 to 14 percent. However its suspected that this move is also designed to strangulate a stream of funds that government officials may use to prosecute the 2015 elections. The banks in total have about N1.3 Trillion Naira of public sector money. It didnt help matters that these our banks have been sporting such obscene balance sheets while they efficiently screen eager small and medium scale entrepreneurs by raising the risk management parameters that the average joe definitely cannot meet.

Financial analysts and eggheads alike have poured scorn on the decision on several fronts some of which are the fact that politicians do not patronise the banking system enough for the measures to limit spending public funds for the 2015 elections, that our romance with the "IMF manual" system of finance may demand the trimming of bank staff numbers due to the reduced balance sheet  and hmm... that the Sanusi led MPC meeting had no business tinkering with banking supervision matters in the first place. 

Capitalist food chain.

While the CBN definitely has a number of questions to answer, what on earth were the banks doing sitting on top of N 1.3 Trillion while maintaining sadistically high standards before granting loans to small and medium scale entrepreneurs who  they love to fence off with acres of requirements. Well one surefire explanation is the patronage of "easy money" in the form of investments in CBN issued Treasury Bills. With T.Bills the bankers have no fear of losing their money as they might entertain with a young man trying to start a barbing salon who may be unable to pay back as at when due. Fencing off the bulk of SMEs looking for credit may just turn around to the be the quirk that turned round to bite the originators in the butt!

Seriously I hope the baby faced assassins in the banks and their scowling board of directors do not use this as a reason to reach for the eject button in various Human Resources departments just before they order the 2014 Mercedes Benz "E class". Similarly CBN' needs to needs to get a grip on it's monetary policy flip flopping and focus on keeping our economy stable. These people should take it easy on the common man for once

"Putting people first" shouldn't be just a cliche.  

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