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Where are Naija's beauty Queens Now ? ...Those who are now Mrs

Posted by 9jabook.com webmadam on January 24, 2011 at 3:32am

By JOSFYN UBA and KATE HALIMoluchi-husband%5B1%5D.gif

Marriage is not very commonly seen in the priority list of many Nigeria’s beauty queens. Where marriage is possible at all, they end up playing second fiddle. Most often than not, becoming visible spare parts for highly placed men in the society is their regular beats..


Helen Prest-Ajayi

Former beauty queen, Helen, is the CEO of Media Business Company Ltd. Helen is also the founder of mylifestylesolutions.com, a lifestyle portal set up to help people find solutions to personal issues through the medium of social networking. She studied Law at the University of Ife, and then went on to Kings College, London for her Ll.M. “One never really stops practising law,” she replied, when asked whether she has abandoned the profession altogether.

She is married to to Tosin Ajayi and has three daughters, Tiffany,Tosan, and Tomisin. Helen doesn’t believe anything in life should be regimented because it is God who is in control. She confesses that parenting is not easy and with each generation comes a new set of unique issues with no manual on how to cope with the changing culture..12166297697?profile=original

Being a working mother is tough and sometimes it’s difficult to juggle the work load as well as focus on the development of the children, she had said. She tailors her career to do the things she can within commitments because your children are only young once and you can’t rewind if you miss their childhood. She gets home when when she needs to be.

Having been married once, Helen is not one of the women who rushed into marriage without being armed with adequate information about their spouses, and with unrealistic expectations. But she believes that one can not really be fully prepared for marriage because we can only have basic guidelines, as people only really show you their true selves after marriage. To her, marriage is very beautiful and it should be a partnership with unity and purpose. At the end of the day, if both parties communicate and understand each other, then marriage will be much easier.

Oluchi Oweagba-Orlandi

After years of strutting the runway in her modelling career that has blossomed beyond her imagination, Nigerian-born international model, Oluchi Onweagba-Orlandi started a new career, motherhood, on 25 April, when she was delivered of a baby boy for her husband, popular Italian fashion designer, Luca Orlandi. The super model revealed after giving birth to her baby that she was taken unawares when she realised that she was pregnant. Initially, she was not so pleased about it. It came as a real shock, but in her heart, she knew she had to get used to the idea. Oluchi preferred a a female child to the boy she had but her husband felt otherwise and was overjoyed when he learnt she was going to have a boy even though, he was aware she wanted a daughter.

Born on 1 August 1980, in Ayilara Street, Ojuelegba, in Surulere, a suburb in Lagos to a civil servant father, and a mother who is a nurse, Oluchi’s journey to the world of modelling can be said to be the work of God, which is the meaning of her first name in Igbo dialect. While growing up, she was relatively less bothered about fashion and modelling. But with the support of her family and friends, she decided to compete in the inaugural edition of the Face of Africa in 1998. This was the first-ever continent-wide model competition, as opposed to a mere beauty pageant. The pageant was organised by the South African subscription television channel, M-Net, in collaboration with Elite Model Management. With her slim, tall (6 ft. 1 in.) figure, and her natural beauty, she captivated the judges, and easily won the competition. She was just 17 years old then.

In August 2005, she married her long time companion, popular Italian fashion designer, Luca Orlandi, to become one of the most famous Nigerians known internationally.

Nike Oshinowo-Soleye

Oshinowo was raised in Ibadan and England, where she attended boarding school. Although she had intended to become an air hostess, she studied Politics at the University of Essex. Shortly after obtaining her degree, Oshinowo, who was mentored by former Miss Nigeria Helen Prest-Davies, represented Rivers at the Most beautiful Girl in Nigeria pageant and emerged winner.

After her reign, which saw her compete at Miss World, Oshinowo featured in a commercial for Venus cosmetics and hosted a fashion and beauty show on Nigerian television. Her business ventures included an African restaurant and Skin Deep, a health and beauty spa which ran for seven years before it was sold after she decided to create her own range of beauty products for the Nigerian market. On January 17, 2010, she released the workout video Nike Oshinowo: Fit, Forty and Fabulous -the first celebrity fitness DVD produced in the country -and is currently working on the beauty products which will include fragrance, skincare, and haircare.

Now in her 40s, Oshinowo, who is fluent in five languages including Japanese and French, is hailed as a style icon in her homeland. Although she had stated in previous interviews that she had no plans to become a wife, Oshinowo is now married to medical doctor, Tunde Soleye. In 2009, the couple was in the news following a lawsuit instituted by Soleye’s ex-wife Funmilayo, who claimed that he had been unfaithful with Oshinowo during their marriage.

Nike confesses to being deeply in love with her husband and she doesn’t have to compare him with someone else. Since her whole life had been about herself alone, marriage was not particularly on her agenda because she finds it very challenging and never thought she would get married. It took her husband seven years to convince her to marry him, a story he proudly relives to his friends. Nike didn’t give up her independence when she married Dr. Tunde Soleye, neither did she marry him for his money as people have speculated. She had said in a previous interview that she learns from her husband everyday, “he is remarkable and ridiculously patient with me. He adores me and I love him right back. He’s got a sort of grey hair I find incredibly attractive. He has a wicked sense of humour; he is very smart and clever and I love such people. He is not from my world at all; I couldn’t marry someone from my world because it will just be chaotic.”

Bianca Onoh- Ojukwu

When a now-rested soft-sell publication first broke their romance story in 1992, hell was almost let loose. Then the story sounded so unbelievable. Worse still, the dramatis personae vehemently denied the relationship. One of the parties even threatened to sue the publication ‘for carrying false rumour.’ But before anyone knew what was happening, the couple, Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu and former beauty Queen, Bianca Onoh tied the knots at a much celebrated society wedding, which remained the talk-of-the-town for many months.

When it happened, many were shell-shocked. And many questions came up. One, what could make an ex-beauty queen in her late 20’s, from a privileged background and with practically the world at her feet decide to marry an ex-warlord old enough to be her father? But it seemed no one understood better than Bianca herself. In- spite of threats from her father, the late Chief C.C. Onoh to disown her if she went ahead to marry Ojukwu, the beautiful woman stood her ground and called everybody’s bluff. It was obvious that she was (and still) in love with Ojukwu. In several interviews she granted, Bianca had described her husband ‘as the best man in the world who understands my feelings and knows how to take care of a woman. Widely described as one of Nigeria’s most admired couples, the story of Chief Emeka and Bianca Ojukwu’s marriage is a classic case study of Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu (born Bianca Odinakachukwu Onoh) is a Nigerian businesswoman and former lawyer, best remembered for her controversial relationship with Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, the Ikemba of Nnewi and former Biafran leader, who was over 30 years her senior. Their romance was a national talking point in the early nineties

As a wife and mother, Bianca now divides her time between her home, her cosmetics busines, Bianca Blend in Enugu, and her interior decorating outfit, Nourobella.

Although, she had stated in interviews her disdain for modelling in the past, the former beauty queen has fronted an advertising campaign for her products. She is in charge of the non-governmental organisation, Hope House Trust, centred towards rehabilitating juvenile offenders in Enugu. The couple have children together. Of her marriage, she admits that while she is happy to have found her older husband, she would not encourage her daughter to marry the same way.

Sylvia Edem- Emecheta

Former Miss Nigeria, Sylvia Ansa Edem, finally wedded her London-based heartthrob, Chris Emecheta, a Delta State-born international businessman whom she had met and simply exchanged telephone number with at the KLM business lounge in Amsterdam on her way back from Miss Universe beauty pageant

Weeks later, she got a call from him and they started talking. Although, nothing happened between them because she was still reigning, Sylvia and Emecheta would later meet again almost to the end of her reign when she travelled to the U.S.

She was still reigning then as most beautiful girl and nothing happened between them until after her tenure.

So, weeks later, I got a call from him and we started talking and that was it. And nothing else happened. He was based in the United States of America, we used to talk on the phone, anytime he is in town, we talk. I was also busy here with all the beauty competition I had to take part in. We met again almost to the end of my reign when I went to the U.S then, the chemistry of romance formally kicked off.

The couple have been together ever since and had been based in the US before they finally relocated to Nigeria last year. They got legally married in the US over a year ago and are blessed with a son, Drake.

Anita Uwagbele-Iseghohi

An only female child, Edo-born Uwagbale spent most of her early years in Lagos until she gained admission into Madonna University, Okija to study Accountancy. As an undergraduate, Uwagbale was crowned Most Beautiful Girl in Nigeria 2004, enabling her to take part in Miss Universe and Miss World later in the year. Although she was a contender for the crown, Uwagbale failed to make the top ten; however, she was named African Continental Queen of Beauty. As MBGN, Uwagbale’s projects included activism against environmental pollution.

Uwagbale is married to businessman Tom Iseghohi. Following a registry ceremony in America, in 2008, the couple had a society wedding in Lagos, and are now the parents of two sons. In 2009, Isegholi was accused of embezzling from NITEL shareholders; the charges were later dropped. Uwagbale continues to study in America while working at her private businesses.

Adaeze Igwe12166209498?profile=original

Adaeze Yobo was previously known as Adaeze Stephanie Chinenye Igwe. She is a former Most Beautiful Girl in Nigeria.

While she was an undergrad at the University of Abuja, Igwe pursued her childhood dream by representing Anambra in the pageant with 29 other girls.

During her reign, Igwe established her own charity, The Adaeze Igwe Foundation, an organisation which promotes AIDS and Breast Cancer awareness, and raises funds towards similar causes, including malaria and tuberclosis. Its mission is “to create and increase access and opportunities to Nigerian youths and communities towards addressing [their] needs and challenges in relation to health and sustainable development.” She has since left the University of Abuja, and started a Communications course at the New York Film Academy.

In 2010, the former beauty queen married FenerbahÁe S.K. player, Joseph Yobo in a midnight ceremony held in Jos. The couple who dated briefly in 2009 before formally walking down the isle, are now parents of their first child.

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The gun that changed the world

Posted by 9jabook.com on December 12, 2010 at 10:02pm

In 1980s Afghanistan, a Tajik commander attended the funeral of a soldier who’d been killed in their war against the Soviet Union.

At one point, he picked up the dead man’s Kalashnikov rifle and presented it to his younger brother. With a ceremonial flair, he asked the man, “Do you want to be a mujahid?” The man took the gun and replied, “I am going to take my brother’s weapon. I am going to be with you.”

The importance of the weapon was more than simple ceremony. Later, when elements of the mujahideen evolved into al Qaeda, the first class taken by new recruits was a lesson on the Kalashnikov..

Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle

The Kalashnikov, or AK-47, is the gun that assassinated Sadat, armed the PLO and allowed Idi Amin to become the devil of Uganda. A favorite of both Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, the AK-47 and its offshoots are by far the most plentiful guns on Earth, with over 100 million in circulation — one for every 70 people on the planet.

In his fascinating book, “The Gun” (Simon & Schuster), Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist C.J. Chivers shows how the world was forever altered by the pursuit of automatic weapons and especially the invention of the Kalashnikov — an easy-to-use automatic rifle that allowed any one man to possess the firepower of an army.

By the time the AK appeared, of course, military men already were enamored with the machine gun. In the 1860s, North Carolina’s Dr. Richard Gatling invented “the first reasonably effective rapid-fire arm” in the Gatling gun, which weighed about a ton and was operated by a bulky hand crank.

The Gatling gun proved effective in battle, although many rejected it for its size, fearing that it would slow an army’s movement. (Before the Battle of Little Bighorn, Lt. Col. George Custer was offered Gatling guns but opted for single-shot rifles instead, likely leading to his massacre.)

The world got a taste of the Gatling’s power in 1879, when the British faced down 20,000 Zulus. Outnumbered four to one, the Brits started shooting, and Zulu lines “began to melt away.” The Zulu’s were conquered in a half-hour, with only 11 British casualties.

The next advance came via New Englander Hiram Maxim, who sought to design a weapon with a trigger instead of a hand crank. Realizing that the energy from a gun’s recoil could be used to power the crank’s tasks, he created the Maxim gun, which weighed less than 150 pounds and became the world’s first truly automatic weapon.

With the Maxim, the British showed how easy killing had become. In 1893’s Matabele War in South Africa, they killed 1,500 natives without suffering a single casualty. In another battle, four dozen policemen with four Maxims reportedly killed 3,000 Africans.

Despite — or sometimes because of — their clear success as killing machines, the global verdict on automatic weapons remained divided.

Theodore Roosevelt, who had been a colonel in the Spanish-American War, wrote of hearing a particular sound in battle.

“I leaped to my feet and called, ‘It’s the Gatlings, men! It’s our Gatlings!’ Immediately the men began to cheer lustily, for the sound was most inspiring.”

But the ease and brutality of murder inspired opposition as well. In 1898, 23-year-old British journalist Winston Churchill watched his countrymen kill somewhere between 10,000-20,000 Sudanese in one day — all before noon, in fact — while losing only 48 of their own men.

Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle

Churchill wrote of seeing men “destroyed, not conquered, by machinery.”

“At such sights,” he wrote, “the triumph of victory faded on the mind, and a mournful feeling of disgust grew stronger.”

Certain governments were too entrenched in tradition to truly embrace the leap forward. The US was still enamored by the romance of the frontier rifleman, and through World War I, the British — despite their own experiences — made bayonet training the priority for new soldiers, even though they caused only 0.5% of casualties in that war.

With Germany issuing 16 machine guns to their infantry battalions while the British offered only two, the Brits’ hesitation would have devastating consequences.

In one 1916 battle, the British marched in formation, equipped with bayonets, against a German army with machine guns. In the first hour, 30,000 British soldiers were killed or wounded.

One German soldier later said that, “The English came walking, as though they were going to the theatre or on a parade ground. We felt they were mad.”

While rifles changed little during World War II, the Soviets held a secret contest among their designers during the conflict, challenging them to create a light, compact, reliable gun that was made from few parts and easy to assemble and use.

Sgt. Mikhail Kalashnikov led the team that ultimately created the weapon that bears his name, and which became a much-touted tool for Soviet propaganda. The exact details of the weapon’s creation, though, are impossible to discern, due to the secrecy and lies of Josef Stalin’s government. It was surely more of a socialist team effort — possibly assisted by captured German weapons and designers — than the Kremlin ever let on.

The Kalashnikov’s critical feature was that, unlike most automatic weapons, its parts were designed to be loose fitting, which drastically reduced instances of jamming. It also consisted of very few parts, making it so easy to use that Soviet schoolboys — who were trained in these matters — could dissemble and reassemble the guns in 30 seconds flat.

Reliability and ease of use combined with two other factors to make the AK-47 the world’s most popular gun: Stalin relied on manufacturing the weapon to boost the Soviet economy, which led to eventual overproduction; and Nikita Khrushchev’s use of it as political currency, as he regularly sent arms to smaller nations in order to curry favor.

In 1955, the Soviets included in the Warsaw Pact the condition that all Eastern Bloc nations use the guns supplied by the Soviets. Many of those nations then set up their own factories for the production and export of the weapons, laying the groundwork for global saturation.

Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle

In September of that year, Khrushchev made a massive arms deal with Egypt that delivered the guns to the Middle East, and which soon lead to deals with Syria, Iran, and Iraq.

By the time of Vietnam, the US had failed to keep pace in the world of small arms development.

The American military — which dismissed the AK as being of “limited value” — had long been addicted to heavy ammunition, and larger ammo required larger guns. In the 1950s, they developed the 12-pound, 4-foot-long M-14, thereby committing themselves to a big weapon for their next war. But by that point, modern warfare relied more on rapid fire than precise fire. That required bullets to be smaller.

It wasn’t until the 1960s, when the AR-15 — later the M-16 — finally was rushed into production to address the new reality of war.

Chivers’ section on the subsequent development of the M-16 is enough to make any American’s blood boil. While today the world’s second-most prominent automatic weapon, the M-16 was far from combat ready when it was made standard issue for soldiers in Vietnam. It was shockingly susceptible to rust and, worse, jammed with alarming and deadly frequency.

Developed in a non-competitive environment — the AR-15 was chosen because it was the only automatic rifle available — the gun was tested with different ammo than it used in the field, and decisions about it were made by systems analysts who had no experience in weaponry or combat, and who failed to test it for possible rusting.

Politics also played an odd role in saddling our soldiers with the weapon. An arms dealer working with Colt’s Firearms Division, the AR-15’s manufacturer, arranged for the Air Force vice chief of staff, Gen. Curtis LeMay, to sample the gun at an outdoor party.

Three watermelons were set up as targets, and when struck, the first two “exploded in vivid red splashes,” leaving the general so impressed that he didn’t bother shooting the third, which was eaten instead. LeMay was promoted to chief in 1961, and in 1962 the Air Force bought 8,500 AR-15s from Colt.

In 1966, soldiers arriving overseas found their rifles “hard to clean, fussy and prone to untimely stoppages.” Inspectors from Colt later reported that the weapons were in such bad shape that they were “literally rotting in troops hands.”

By the summer of 1967, the Viet Cong were killing 800 US servicemen per month, with the majority of deaths coming from small-arms fire: the VC’s far-more-reliable AK-47s.

Chivers lays out numerous scenes in which trapped American soldiers faced enemy fire while trying to revive jammed weapons.

In one, a gunner with no counter fire to cover him is shot in the head. As the assistant gunner moves to take his place, he’s hit as well. Another company sees 40 rifles jam during one battle, leaving a quarter of them unable to return fire.

Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mikhail T.Kalashnikov holds his world-famous AK-47 assault rifle

Increasingly, as Marines faced enemy bullets, they needed to “thread together several sections of narrow metal pipe . . . and plunge the rod down the barrel” to dislodge trapped shell cases — the same movement, Chivers notes, that “Revolutionary War soldiers had to do to reload muskets nearly 200 years before.”

Marines began to develop cuts on their hands from using their M-16s as clubs.

The situation got so bad that healthy Marines would walk among the wounded, asking if their guns still worked so they could trade. Others bought black market M-14s from rear echelon and aviation units. One platoon commander, conceding to the M-16’s ineffectiveness, ordered his company to “fix bayonets” before advancing on the enemy.

Chivers quotes a soldier, in an interview with the Asbury Park Evening Press, saying, “You know what killed most of us? Our own rifle. Practically every one of our dead was found with his rifle tore down next to him where he had been trying to fix it.”

Meanwhile, the AK-47 continued to spread around the world, as Eastern Bloc countries, now with massive stockpiles, sold off some and simply lost track of many others. When Palestinian terrorists took the Israeli Olympic team hostage with AKs in 1972, the world got its first horrifying look at the automatic weapon’s next fans.

In the ensuing years, the Kalashnikov became the weapon of choice for Middle Eastern terrorists and African despots, with AK coming to mean “Africa Killer” as African nations increasingly found themselves embroiled in brutal, oppressive and nightmarish civil wars.

Chivers includes a blood-curdling section on Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army, which not only terrorized the nation through the arming of soldiers as young as 9 — who had no trouble mastering the simple-to-use AKs — but had these children intimidate villages by choosing citizens at random and slicing off their noses and lips as a warning to others.

In 2001, the UN did a study that found that small arms had been the main weapons in 46 of the 49 major conflicts in the 1990s, in which 4 million people were killed — 90% of them civilians.

Toward the end of the book, Chivers includes a horrifying seven-page scene detailing an assassination attempt in Iraq in 2002 that — at a time when more than 50 nations and countless terrorist groups rely on the weapon to further their causes — illustrates the Kalashnikov’s human cost from a victim’s point of view.

Chivers says that today, the AK has achieved a point of full saturation, with even the American military, understanding that their soldiers will have to face it in battle, training their people in its use.

As with nukes and land mines, the reduction of automatic rifles is hoped for, but ultimately futile. With some of the first AK-47s ever made still in service in Afghanistan, it’s a gun that has altered global politics for multiple generations.

There is only one factor, Chivers says, that will bring about the end of the AK: time. Perhaps a century from now, when enough rifles have been backed over by trucks, exploded in war zones, or simply erode with time, only then will the violent legacy of the Soviet Union’s most lasting accomplishment finally come to an end.

YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION?

The proliferation of the cheap, dangerous AK-47 has contributed to Third World instability. Got four grand? You have a militia.

Troops: In the Congo, 4 million have been killed in ongoing wars between the army and local warlords. A regular government soldier makes only $10 a month, double that (with the promise of spoils) and you have a happy mercenary. Get a dozen. Initial cost: $240

Transportation: Your choice here will be a Toyota Hilux pickup truck, popular for being indestructible and big enough to carry all your men. (There was even a conflict named after them, the Toyota War between Libya and Chad). Doesn’t matter if it’s 20 years old, it will still run. Cost: $1,000

Weapons: Prices vary, with some (likely apocryphal) reports saying an AK can be bought for $30 in parts of Africa. But one reliable figure is that when US troops seized the hard drive of Taliban leader Mullah Omar, it showed that he planned on arming 2,000 fighters with AKs at a cost of $202 per. Cost: $2,424

Dress: A good scarf, bandana or keffiyeh protects soldiers from dust, obscures identities and generally instills fear. Cost: negligible.

Total: $3,664



Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/the_gun_that_changed_the_world_59zxZTe83AHZjMqZmdDnoK#ixzz17yrXrgdx


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IBB "bribes" Journalists

Posted by Paul "EFCC" Hawk Adams on August 31, 2010 at 11:25pm

Five months ago, a friend of mine, who edits a national daily, sent me a text message agreeing substantially with my column, ‘The Punch and the rest of us’, except the generalised conclusion that “all (journalists) have sinned and fallen short of the glory of the profession”. There are still some journalists, he submits, who toe the narrow path of integrity. Of course I knew where he was coming from, but I also knew the context in which I had made that statement.

I revisit that statement in light of the stories spewing out of the political beat, specifically on the race for the 2011 presidential elections and how it affects the integrity of news.

As part of the effort to sell his candidature for the presidency, former military president, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBB) invited as many as 40 journalists to his Minna home on August 14 for an interview. I have heard questions asked about why he should invite journalists to his home instead of a public place if he didn’t have an ulterior motive, and why he should offer monetary gifts to the journalists in the name of paying for their transportation.

One news medium, which has championed this opposition in the open, is the online agency, Sahara Reporters. According to SR each of the journalists received N10 million for heeding Babangida’s call on his presidential ambition. That is N400 million just for one night’s interview from an aspirant yet to win his party’s nomination if it were true. But it was not. When some of the journalists complained about the fictional sum, SR changed the story on August 19, saying it was just “a paltry N250, 000 each”. Rather than admit its initial error SR simply said, “our accountants have told us that going by the number of 40 journalists in attendance, we are still around the same ballpark of N10 million”. So much for credible reporting!

Three days later, SR followed up with ‘IBB and his Rogue Journalists’, accusing the journalists of roguery and professional misconduct; roguery, because they collected money from two sources—their employers who presumably authorised and funded the trip and their news source, IBB; misconduct because it is unethical for them to demand/receive gratification from news sources for their services.

And on August 23 in ‘IBB Nocturnal Press Parley: Punch fires Editorial board Chairman’, SR stayed on top of the story by reporting that Adebolu Arowolo, editorial board chairman of the Punch, had lost his job for going on that trip without his management’s approval..

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How N100,000 changed the life of a street barber

Posted by 9jabook.com webmadam on May 23, 2010 at 10:18pm
How N100,000 changed the life of a street barber
By Ebun BABALOLA
Saturday, May 22, 2010

Uche Alagbaso, 32, a barber, had been hoping that one day, fortune would smile on him. He opened a shop owner 11 years ago hoping for success. Alagboso won a sum of N100,000 at the just concluded WAHL Barbing competition held at the Eko Hotel & Suits, Lagos.

According to him, “I heard the jingle on the radio and I decided to participate. This is my first time to participate in this competition since it started about 18 years ago. The entry came up in March and April and here I am with a sum of N100,000. “

Alagboso said things had been rough and unpleasant, especially when he picked the profession 11 years ago. With the expectation that things would turn in his favour, he shunned all negative advice that wouldn’t let him be what he wants to be.

His parents tried to discourage him from his barbing but his mind to become a professional and international barber of his generation was made up.

“I left my hometown just to earn a living here in Lagos. People say Lagos is like London but unfortunately, life has become so miserable that I hardly eat three square meal. This is the only profession I enjoy doing. When I started this profession, I’ve always believed that God would shower His mercies on me. “I’ve been faced with different challenges.

I’ve lived all my life here in Victoria Island, no friends, no relatives. I was living fro hand to mouth. But I thank God for giving me the ability to be a man today”, Uche said...

Uche-Alagbaso1[1].jpg
Uche Alagbaso doing his thing says:...Things are rough but pleasant
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Uche Alagbaso

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Sunday Sermon:Are You Feeding Your Soul also try out our evangelistic tool.

Posted by frank adeche Mr Netchurch on January 10, 2010 at 12:13am
Are You Feeding Your Soul? Are you happy with what you see when you look in the mirror? And I’m not talking about your physical body when I ask this question — I’m talking about your spiritual body. Has your soul been getting the nourishment it needs to grow in health and strength, or have you deprived it from the Word it so desperately needs? If what you see in the mirror doesn’t even begin to reflect what you know you can be, it’s time to make a change, time to dive into God’s Word and receive all the love and forgiveness He has been waiting to give you . . . a time to release your life into God’s hands. The Word tells us, But whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17 For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image (2 Corinthians 3:16-18 NLT). You may not like what you see now, but just wait. Rely on God’s faithfulness and perfect timing and begin to make changes when God shows you it is necessary. And soon, you’ll be able to look back and say, “Look where God moved me from. Look what He saved me from. I stand blessed where I am all because of the transforming grace of God.” An Evangelistic Tool The following is an evangelistic tool. Feel free to use this tool to lead someone to the Savior. It can also be used in your church. Tony lead the members of our church through this process, and then commissioned them to offer the good news to those they come in contact with in the course of their day. This is one of our outreach programs for this year. OPENING QUESTION: Has anyone ever shown you from the Bible how you can be sure you are on your way to heaven? Would you allow me to show you? I. First the Bad News a. The Problem: Every person is a sinner before a Holy God and unable to save themselves (Romans 3:10, 23). b. The Penalty: Every person is under the sentence of death and will be forever separated from God because of their sin (Romans 5:12; 6:23). I. Now the Good News a. The Provision: Through the substitutionary sacrificial death of Christ, God has addressed the sin problem for us (Romans 5:8, 17-21). b. The Pardon: God offers a free pardon and eternal life to all who place faith alone in the Lord Jesus Christ for their salvation (Romans 10:9-10; 4:4-5). CLOSING QUESTION: Would you like to trust the Lord Jesus Christ right now as your personal Savior? PRAYER: Lord Jesus thank You for dying on the cross for my sins and rising from the dead to save me. By transferring my total trust to You alone as my Savior, I now receive the forgiveness for my sins and the free gift of eternal life that You offered me.
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How a simple elderly advice changed my life —Sola Fosudo, actor

Posted by NollywoodMohits on June 6, 2009 at 7:55pm
Looking resplendent and gorgeous in his milk-coloured suit, all smiles, he moved around majestically in a nobly fashion, depicting his gargantuan status as a seasoned actor and erudite scholar as he welcomed in warm embraces very eminent personalities to the Ptotea Hotel, Ikeja, Lagos, venue of the Bread Fruit Foundation’s (BFF) 1st Annual Patrons Dinner held recently.BFF is a non-profit organization that famous actor and Lagos State University lecturer, Sola Fosudo founded to plaster smiles on the faces of widows, widow’s children, orphans and other vulnerable children in the society. A man of charisma, who has been described as an astute personality with a golden heart, and inspired by God to care for the underprivileged, Fosudo has established the foundation because of his experiences in life.But what was his growing up like? How has it been in the Nollywood industry where he has held sway over the years?How has he been able to combine teaching and acting? What about his pet project, BFF, as a president and founder? All these and more were extracted from philanthropist Fosudo. Excerpts:For Sola Fosudo, growing up was like that of a normal child from a middle class family. He was well trained and had the privilege of a good education.But then he confessed to have been very lucky to receive the grace of God. “Personally, I have been very lucky to receive the grace of God in my life. I had a very fruitful and well trained growing up. It is really with the guidance of God and of my parents. I have been privileged to have a very good education, privileged to have had several opportunities in my profession, my career both as an actor, director and a teacher, so I am grateful to God.”According to Fosudo, the journey to acting stardom all started while he was in primary school. Then they used to have end of the year activities in the school and he turned out to be one of the prominent artistes, a hero in those events. The same thing happened when Fosudo got to secondary school where he was a very strong member of the dramatic and cultural society. But it was while at the Teacher’s College that the turning point happened.He was involved in a play and one man in the audience who happened to be a seasoned and accomplished professional saw him on stage, summoned him and said, ‘you are the man of the theatre. I think you should consider theatre as a profession when you grow up’.Fosudo recalls: “I didn’t know what he was talking about because I was just having fun doing school plays. But he saw something that later metamorphosed into what we are appreciating God for now, because eventually I found myself taking to that advice. I took the necessary actions and steps to go to school and to be immensely involved in the profession. It is by providence, and planned by God. By the time he said that to me I had other plans. I wanted to read History which was my best subject in school. At a time, I wanted to go abroad to study Computer Science, when it did not work out, I went back to the man and said ‘sir, tell me more about that Theatre Arts, I want to do it now’, that was in the 1970s. It was that encounter that eventually saw me in the theatre.”The actor cum University lecturer is enjoying the best of two worlds. Fosudo believes he is doing just the same thing as an actor and teacher of Theatre Arts. “I was not combining anything. If am a medical doctor and at the same time acting then I am combining. But I teach and practice Theatre Arts so, they are one.”But as a popular actor and lecturer, how does Fosudo cope with his numerous female admirers? His response: “I don’t have anything to cope with. I have not experienced advances from women because I don’t recognize it. There was no room for it .My lifestyle does not allow for such things. From the way I was brought up and trained, those things did not count.”Movie industry, says Fosudo, is moving in an unsure direction. It is an uncertain industry that can collapse anytime unless practitioners move away from passion for home video production and move into cinema, while government should also encourage production of films to be shown in cinema theatre where the private sector people can begin to invest in cinema structures.“This is how Nigeria can grow in terms of movies. It is then you can talk of movie industry. For now, they are doing television video drama, home video and they call it movies. Go to Hollywood and ask them if it is this kind of camera we use here that they use to record their films. Our people carry TV cameras to locations. When you say movies or films, you are talking about motion pictures, so the television is also motion pictures, that is why they are saying movies or films. Film is cinema and big business. If we are actually doing films or have film industries in Nigeria you can’t be seeing actors anyhow. But here, you see actors at Idumota bus stop. God will help us.”Does Fasudo have any regret for being an actor? He responds thus: “No, God has been very gracious to me. I had good parental care from the beginning, good education and good opportunities for career development. I have a job and a family. God is supporting my endeavours, and He puts in my heart this time around to set up a foundation to take care of other people. So, it is marvelous in my heart.”On the future Of Nollywood, Fosudo says it’s difficult for anyone to forecast into the future. The actor is even afraid that if care is not taken, the movie industry may crash.He says the imminent crash can only be aborted only if the practitioners take advice and move away from the present deception in which they are and move into the right direction. But then there is still hope as Fosudo predicts a booming and vibrant industry very soon.The actor, however, asked a nagging question thus: “Is Nollywood a concept, a notion or an entity, or is it a place? Go to San Francisco in USA, they will take you to where Hollywood is; it is a big city where stars live and where they have their studios. It is the same thing in India. If the Hollywood people come to Nigeria and say ‘Hello, we have been hearing of Nigerian movies, can you take us to Nollywood?’ Will they take them to Idumota? Or is there any other place? It is Idumota where they are selling films in the streets, inside noise and rowdiness. Since this Nollywood thing has been on, no government whether state or federal has deemed it necessary to begin to build infrastructure for the development of Nigerian movie industry. No government, no professional studios, no serious policy directed at driving the industry to really make it a world class, the way it is in America.”One of the things Fosudo has been advocating as a lecturer in LASU is the development of the curricular for a film education in Nigeria. A curricular that will cover cinematography, film techniques and film production among others.He says: “We don’t have the theatre people who we can rely upon to fill the gap for film industry. They are not really trained for films even though they can find relevance there. I am a theatre person and not film, I will say that anytime. Even though, when I was in school, I received some training about acting which is a general course. You can act on stage or on different media, television, film, etc. You are also taught as a director, you should be able to direct plays because it is only about production in different media which have their own techniques.“The stage where artistes are principally trained has different techniques to the medium of television or film. There is a serious gap in Nigeria. These other people, many of them are not interested in joining Nollywood, you will be surprised to find out. The only other thing that comes near film education is mass communication and those ones are not really trained to be producing films. Also, they are communicators even though they might have done some courses in television production, but not in details as they would do in film schools. Theatre education and mass communication are different from film education, and there is no university in Nigeria where they are offering film studies, yet we have many people who are practicing it. Where did they come from? They are roadside people and we cannot be driven intellectually so they are all merchants doing business.”BFF, which means Bread Fruit Foundation for widows and orphans, was launched in 2008. Luckily for Fosudo, that event was also used to mark his 50th birthday. According to him, the foundation is a non-profit organization, whose sole objective is to cater for widows, widows’ children, orphans and other vulnerable children in the society. It is duly registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.“This is the first dinner organized by the foundation and it’s going to be an annual event where we bring together our patrons, board of trustees and raise money even if it is just for next year, we will keep it on,” he concludes.
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