Mary KennyCurrent events are all too typical of Nigerian disorder
‘Old Africa Hands’ was the chummy phrase of conferred veteran status that journalists who reported from Africa over the years called themselves; and my husband Richard West was among them.
He worked as a reporter in Africa in the course of many years and wrote six books about that continent, much of which he found entrancing. He especially loved The Gambia – which he always says is “utterly charming” – and delightful Senegal, which, in his time, had a poet and intellectual for president, Leopold Senghor.
But his worst African experience was always Nigeria, which he still calls “nightmarish”. Corrupt, brutal and violent, ruled by heartless kleptocrats – this is no more than Nigerian writers such as Lola Shoneyin have said.
Richard witnessed heartbreaking scenes in 1967, when the Ibo area, which called itself Biafra (and is mainly Christian) broke away from the main federation: many an Irish priest served with the Biafran people at that time.
The horrors of the schoolgirls currently abducted by Boko Haram are, alas, all too typical of Nigerian disorder. Yet most of the ghastly events that occur in Nigeria are not reported at all: last month, 57 male students were slaughtered in their dormitories as they slept at night. I don’t know that there was a word about that in the western media.
The forced conversions to Islam of the schoolgirls is but another aspect of this very dysfunctional country. Perhaps Nigeria never should have been one state, containing as it does, more than 300 disparate tribes and ethnic groups.
Imperialism
Perhaps British imperialism is to blame for simply drawing lines on a map and calling the territory ‘Nigeria’.
But where British imperialism led, other western powers followed: Biafra found almost no friends in Europe, including from official Ireland (although ordinary people were sympathetic). A senior diplomat from Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs told me that Ireland supported a united Nigeria “for economic reasons”.
Oil talks. And when it talks, it sometimes transmits a very ugly message.
Parental influence and vocations
Bishop Denis Nulty of Kildare and Leighlin – speaking on Vocations Sunday – has suggested to parents that they might encourage their sons to enter the priesthood. It’s not an unreasonable point to make, but I am not sure whether parental influence is as great as it used to be, in this, or any other, area.
Time was when parents, and perhaps particularly mothers, were desperately keen to have a son in the priesthood. It even became a standing joke. When my eldest son was born, a friend sent a jokey telegram: “Delighted to hear there’s a priest in the family.” (If only!)
Sometimes, the ‘encouragement’ went too far. It was said that the mother had the vocation, so the son could be a priest. I’m not convinced that parental influence carries much weight these days. I repeatedly tried to discourage my sons from going into journalism – an uncertain trade, I said, with a very uncertain future – but did they follow my advice? No chance.
Sometimes young people want to do the exact opposite, anyway, of what their elders tell them. So perhaps the best way of encouraging young men into the priesthood is for parents to say – “Donít, for Heavenís sake, think of becoming a priest!”
A sad parable of our times
Bill Clinton has always had a warm welcome in Ireland and he was especially welcomed in Ballybunion which he visited during the height of what was known as the Monica Lewinsky affair. While America was making smutty jokes about Bill and Monica, Co. Kerry was ready to welcome him to their splendid golf course and Ballybunion duly erected the first public statute in the world to Bill Clinton, in golfing mode.
But now Monica Lewinsky, aged 40, has written frankly about how her brief sexual encounters with the American President (in 1995-96) have blighted her life. She is never allowed to forget that transgression. She has never been able to get married and have children. Her name is forever notorious. Hillary Clinton, moreover, was more forgiving to Bill than to Monica.
Iím afraid this tale is but an endorsement of a very old affirmation, dismissed in our time as mere misogyny, yet still often proved by events: that a woman may pay a higher price for a loss of reputation or a fall from grace than a man. Bill Clinton was indeed subjected to public humiliation: but it passed and he has regained sufficient stature to become a respected international elder statesman.
For Monica, the ‘Monica Lewinsky affair’ will never go away, and it will dog her to her deathbed.
We all pay for our sins in one way or another ñ you really do reap as you sow – and the Monica Lewinsky story is a sad parable of that fact.
