The world, we are
told is made up of the Capitalist and the communist broadly speaking, where do
you stand?
Communism had collapsed with the Soviet Union,
China
is struggling and so is
Cuba
….well… ehm call me a Capitalist...if
I can help it.
Ordination of gay priests
The notion of the priesthood we were taught as kids
was that of men living the life of- if you will- celibacy. We were told that a
Priest is to live a pious, austere and celibate lifestyle. The idea of a Priest
with sexual preferences: whether heterosexual, bisexual or gay was unthinkable
in the past and therefore is awkward in the first place… If we are to go by the
established scriptures and norms. Moving forward however, I do not discriminate
against anyone merely because of his or her sexual preferences. Lets not be the
judge… lets leave the judgement to God. So
long as these people are genuinely happy, not just craving the media hype and
truly enjoying what they are doing without breaking any laws. Let’s give them a
chance. I was in
Washington
DC
in 2006 during the gay pride
march and I did notice that those folks were genuinely happy with what they did
and who they were. .believe me when I say that I never found a group of people
that happy together in my whole life.
Does that imply that you do support same
sex marriages?
Same sex unions you mean? There is nothing like same
sex marriage. It is a total misunderstanding of the institution of marriage and
a cruel misapplication of the concept, for anyone to coin that sort of oxymoronic
phrase. Please do not get me wrong here. Listen to me consenting adults are
free to enter into any form of union but I am not going to call those
arrangements marriages… marriages are defined, and clearly so, in our religious
and law books. With the greatest respect to the men and women whose sexual
preferences are being discussed here, the trouble they have is calling their
relationships or unions “marriages”.
So those ones are not marriages?
Without a doubt, those are not marriages in the
strict sense of the word. In marriages, the notion is that one of the spouses
is going to be female, able to bear children and so on. It does not include someone for instance, who
underwent a sex change operation. Having said that much, we do not have to
alienate whole swaths of the population merely on account of their sexual
orientation and or preferences. Alienating them cannot achieve anything. You
are going to allow them to live their lives they way they want it. But let’s
get this clear, for me though, am not going to do anything that is not approved
in the holy book neither am I going to encourage any of my kids or close
relatives to indulge in anything of sort. Until my attention is drawn to a single
gay union or relationship in the Bible, am certainly not going to indulge in it
as the norm…but like I said, that is my choice and I do hope my choice is
respected. There is a piece am writing on the subject and will be ready very
soon.
Which brings to mind the fact that the Vice President His Excellency
Atiku Abubakar recently presented one of your numerous books to the public in
an impressive ceremony. You indeed pulled the crowd at what has been tagged the
biggest book launch yet both in the calibre of guests in attendance. For how
long have you been writing such a voluminous work?
I
worked tirelessly for almost six years on that book. Travelling across the
African continent; conducted interviews and met with relatives and other
members of the Belgore family. I said a while ago that I consider myself an
artist chasing the legal profession merely to spite my parents, permit me to
put that in perspective. While as a pupil at the highbrow Christ the
King
School
,
Uyo
Akwa
lbom
State
, I horrified my teachers and
parents alike by routinely spending hours drawing images in the sand and also converting
all my notebooks into drawing books anytime my classmates had left for lunch
break. So I needed a fresh set of exercise books every other week. As a mere
second grader at
Ibiono
High School
, Edem Urua, lbiono lbom in
Akwa
Ibom
State
, I was a prominent
member of the literary, dramatic and debating society. Five years ago I went to
the school and discovered to my amazement that the laurels we won for the
school back in the 80s still adorn the Principal’s office till date. At the
University
of
Uyo
, I was a regular columnist for about
every media outfit on campus (and there were quite a few). I was a newscaster
cum presenter with the campus radio station and won several awards in those
areas.
I did a piece on oil and
gas way back in 1998 and because of a dearth of materials at the time; I had to
truly struggle to make a mark. It was captioned “Natural gas ownership,
the true position of the law in
Nigeria
”. I also did a 32
week old review of the doctrine of bias on the university of Uyo journal which however, without a doubt, writing the
authorised biography of Justice Alfa Belgore remains till date, one of the most
daunting single intellectual effort undertaken by me. I spent nearly six years
on the book, travelled across four continents and interviewed about a thousand
people in the process.
Republican or Democrat?
Democrat
Political Party?
Nil
Political views?
Can’t reveal that… am sorry
President Obasanjo?
Arguably the most successful Nigerian leader yet
President Olusegun Obasanjo recently
celebrated his 70th Birthday and you were widely publicised as
Chairman of certain aspects of the 3 day long festivities in
Abeokuta
,
Ogun
State
. What was there to celebrate
really?
In our part of the world, a 40 birthday is more like
the average. A 70th birthday is more like a gift… and for someone
like the President who fought a civil war survived a bloody military coup de
tat way back in 1976; became a military head of state; midwifed a democratic
regime went to prison and barely managed to survive the prison experience; was
released by divine providence; became civilian President and recently lost his
most dear wife and just turned 70 a few weeks to scheduled elections that could
make or mar his legacy in governance, then if you think there is nothing worth
celebrating then you could be the most unreasonable critic of this
administration. Nothing annoys me more than one criticising for the heck of it.
Maybe we have come to the end of this interview?
      
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