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Obituaristic and marital nonsense
It was a yearly ritual. Every year, on the day her husband died, she dressed up beautifully, went on top of his grave and danced to her satisfaction. For several hours, she’d boogie up and down, style after style, until she could dance no more. She’d then descend the grave and walk home panting yet contented.
When asked by reporters why she had taken to the yearly open-air disco dancing, the widow said it was in honour of DEATH which took away her husband. “When he was alive. I never had a moment’s peace,” she said.
What an honest confession about a dead person. She minced no words. The man gave her no peace, and that was exactly what she was saying. A widow in Sikaman would dare not say that of her deceased husband. His family members would procure pick-axes, hoes and cutlasses and descend on her with red eyes and tear her to pieces.
It is traditionally not proper to speak ill of people when they are dead, but some people are beginning to feel that the custom of speaking well about even dead criminals at funerals is not helping society either.
They claim that if the living know that all their misdeeds will be recounted at their funeral when they are dead, they will endeavour not to misconduct themselves while alive. I think that is a valid point, because the dead have had it too easy.
When someone volunteered to say that a deceased fellow died of alcohol, his neck was nearly twisted. What right did he have to air the cause of death even if it was true that the guy had died of too much bitters? In any case, did he perform any post mortem to ascertain the cause of death? And for what earthly or heavenly reason did he have to associate their loved one with an evil called ALCOHOL? “Next time you talk nonsense, we shall physically weaken your jaw.
It was at a funeral when a pastor undertook to say nice words about a dead common criminal that he was corrected by the deceased’s own professional comrade.
He raised his right hand to signify that he wanted to chip in a point of order as the resident pastor spoke of how exemplary the dead man’s ways were. When no one bothered to give him the chance, he stood up and raised both hands, meaning that he had the constitutional right to slot in a rejoinder before the lies became over-whelming.
He was heavily drunk. Asked what he wanted to say, he broached the subject that first and fore-most, he would recommend that the pastor be ex-communicated from the church because he was a congenital liar, a quality unbecoming of a clergyman. He then proceeded to say the deceased was a criminal just like himself and deserved no praises in any church.
He intimated that the deceased, when he was alive, cheated him out of a booty, not once or twice, but many times, for which he never forgave him till he died. He said such a person’s body should not be brought to contaminate the holiness of a church room. Before church elders could drag him out, he had spoken his mind.
I guess if the dead man had a soul that was present where he was laid in state, the soul would have repented right in the church room.
Well there are many problems associated with modern-day funerals. One of them which is getting solved gradually is the wake-keeping palaver. The Akyem Abuakwa Traditional Council has banned wake-keepings as a means of cutting down cost of funerals in the traditional area. The Presbyterian Church is also not encouraging its members to opt for wake- keeping in any event of death of a member.
What are wake-keepings for anyway? When there were no mortuaries in the past, wake was kept because family members could not leave their dead bodies and go to bed. Keeping wake has, therefore, outlived its usefulness in present day circumstances.
A wake-keeping today is an occasion where you can get a married woman drunk and seduce her, where young girls elope with married men for amorous purposes, and where people either get married or lose their spouses. Everything is under the cover of darkness, supervised by Jimmy Satan.
A funeral that is without an elaborate wake-keeping can save at least a lot of money. A funeral that is without frivolous eating and boozing can also save a fortune. The dead must not be a burden for the living, just like getting married shouldn’t be any big deal.
The average Sikaman bride is married at least three times without any sane reason. Her Caucasian or Anglo-Saxon counterpart gets married just once in a very simply ceremony.
Why are many young men unable to marry? The fact is that they can’t. They don’t have the dough. They must KNOCK DOOR, ENGAGE and WED-three in one. By the time they are through, they are in debt to a tune of 5 million. No marriage is stable when the foundation is built on a $5 million debt.
I guess my great grandfather married his loving wife with two bottles of akpeteshie, five tubers of yam and a bottle of zomi. Check out how much I have to spend when I want wife. You can’t get a woman with akpeteshie, yam tubers and palm oil anywhere in Sikaman today. Even in the remotest cottage, they ask you to “do wedding”. It is a command, not a suggestion.
The result is that the young men can’t get married, and once they are virile and not impotent, they continue impregnating the young and unmarried girls, littering communities with kids born out of wedlock, many ending up as the street kids we see everywhere hawking barefoot instead of studying in school.
This article was first published
on Saturday, April 18, 1998
THE typical itinerant salesman in Sikaman is a herbalist. He is normally a slim macho with the capacity to perambulate the expanse of area covering the triangle of Accra-Tema-Ashiaman. In short, he can walk a total of 60 miles a day, marketing a product that cures every disease, including poverty. 
The door-to-door herbal pharmacist advertises his product by word of mouth. He has nothing to do with the Food and Drugs Board (FDB). After all, his concoctions do not feature on FM stations.
Those herbalists who cannot walk to propagate the herbal gospel, liaise with drivers of mass transportation and their mates. They are, therefore, given the chance to sell their products on Benz buses that ply the routes.
Normally, the herbalist starts his sales message with a prayer and Bible study. He asks the passengers to bow down their heads in supplication to God the father, the son, the Holy Spirit.
When a herbalist asks the passengers to close their eyes and bow their heads, Moslems on board naturally feel offended. They feel that the herbalist has no right to assume that every passenger is a Christian. They think such an assumption is an affront to Islam.
So a Moslem on board will raise the hand for a point of order. He’ll remind the herbalist that it would be in his own interest to mind his language.
“Be careful the way you address people in a public place. Not every person here is a Christian,” he’d state assertively.
Of course, the herbalist will promptly ignore him, but would all the same “watch” his tongue. Who knows whether or not the Moslem brother is inspired by Quoranic zeal to defend the tenets of Islam to the hilt?
When he starts saying, “Wallahi!” and “Inshallah!” it could be the beginning of proclaiming Islam as supreme, a point which must be driven home with talibanic precision.
So the herbalist must tread carefully lest he steps on fire.
The herbalist could even add a measure of mirth to it all, by announcing that Christians on board today have very interesting company on the journey, but that should not detract from the business of the day.
The Moslem brother will weigh the words carefully and offer a wry smile.
He must be careful the occasion does not degenerate into the use of semantics and proverbial oration to deride his conviction that public utterances must be mindful of religious sensibilities. He has made his point very clear and expects that it is taken in good faith in the interest of a peaceful journey.
The herbalist will now open the New Testament and preach salvation, stating clearly that salvation can come only through Jesus Christ and NOBODY else.
The Moslem brother will now start twitching his moustache. The visible and almost revolutionary reflexes of his upper lip can be an indication that sentiments have begun superseding reason, and the outcome could well be tragic now shift uneasily in his seat.
The time has come for him to also express his right to the religion of his fore-bears. He’ll put his hand into his pocket and rise to his feet. The time has indeed come!
This article was first published on Saturday, September 9, 2006
When the cause of a particular problem like sickness, disease, sudden illness, a social issue etc. are not known, it stands to reason that resolving it becomes a huge challenge.
Citizens would understand the government when public announcements are made to the effect that government is trying to find a solution to the issue, even though it is taking a while for it to be resolved because citizens are rational beings.
On the other hand, if the solution to a particular issue is known to everybody but the government for whatever reason, is dragging its feet in resolving it, citizens become frustrated and begin to lose trust in their leaders.
One such issue is the heavy traffic along a section of the Kasoa – Odokor road. A short stretch of bad road between the traffic light at the Weija Government Hospital and the entrance to the entrance of the overhead that leads to the N1, is the cause of the problem but nothing is being done about it, day after day, week after week, month after month. Thus is clearly unacceptable.
Another issue that requires urgent attention is the lack of pavements along a lot of streets in parts of the various Municipal Assemblies. Exercise is a prerequisite for long life and healthy living and for those of us who it has become a way of life, this issue of people putting up structures right to the edge of the drains beside the roads, are making life difficult for us.
We are compelled to walk along the roads, putting our lives at serious risk. Pedestrians should never be compelled to compete with vehicles on our streets and roads. Roads and streets are made for vehicles and pavements are made for pedestrians. That is the norm. Any attempt to normalise a situation where pedestrians are mingling with vehicles is insanity.
It is the road regulations that makes it so and therefore district or municipal assemblies are to take responsibility and ensure that spaces for pavements are not encroached upon. Citizens have rights that must be protected by their leaders and making pavements available to pedestrians, is one of them.
When we hear of teachers having sex with students, it appears it is something recent. It is not a new phenomenon. It has been there since Adam. Perhaps this issue is getting much attention due to the proliferation of social media. It was an open secret in times past when Teachers were in relationships with female students and some married them immediately after completion of school.
Some teachers were also known to be having unholy interactions with female pupils but due to the times that these acts occurred, human rights issues and the awareness around it, allowed such unscrupulous teachers to get away with their crimes.
Now we are in a different era and so a Headmaster is now in hot waters. He is alleged to have raped about 19 female students and as usual, some officials tried to cover it up and are also in hot waters and their actions or inactions in the matter are under investigation.
Why the man has been allowed to roam freely without being arrested is simply mind boggling. It appears that the law applies differently, depending on who you are. This issue came to public attention sometime in August this year, yet the police had not arrested or invited this man for question regarding the rape allegation.
It has come out that he is a Constituency Secretary of the ruling party and the question in the public domain is that, is it because he is a political figure that is why he is still walking around without questioning? I believe in the rule of law so let us hold our breadth and let the proper thing be done.
The police must however be seen to be active in this matter. God bless.
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