Ambrose Ehirim : Profile of: @ BNW Magazine: Biafra Nigeria World Magazine:: Writer: The Ambrose Ehirim Files @ BiafraNigeriaWorld: Biafra NigeriaWorld

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I would say that with the exception of my humble self and a very few Los Angeles area residents of BiafraNigeria extraction, the rest don't give a damn about the ruckus going on with BiafraNigeria community in cyberspace. Angelenos do not have time for local and tribalized politics. Angelenos are the Hollywood wannabes, who dine and wine at Georgia, the famous eatery known for its fine wines and patronized by real Hollywood celebrities. The first time I entertained my guests who came from out of the country, a bottle of Champaign cost a staggering one-hundred and fifty bucks. Georgia served Hine Vintage Cognac and the famous Australian wine, Penfolds.

Now, we know why the lifestyles of East Coast and West Coast BiafraNigerians differ. When they say "L.A. is the place," that's what it all means - where it's all happening. Their topics of conversation have nothing to do with politics and BiafraNigerian problems, grand and small.

In a BiafraNigerian Hollywood wannabe crowd, you don't discuss politics or why Biafra, Nigeria, Ogoni, Idoma, Urhobo people, the Kalabaris, and other ethnic "sovereignties" should go their own separate ways. The theme of discussion among these Hollywood wannabes is talk about fast girls, making money and smiling to the bank, and the trick is to find ways to create the impression they've got some high-level connections to a hi-tech scheme that would make things happen. When this impression is created, no matter what it is, actually nobody cares, automatically one is admitted to the club of delusional idealists, con artists, otherwise known as 419ers, and in extraordinary cases, intellectual bandits.

The case of BiafraNigeria Angelenos, the Hollywood wannabes should be cause for concern, especially when their East Coast and European counterparts are in cyber land, "battle-ready" to tell you why George W. Bush should not attack Iraq without the consent of the Kofi Anan led United Nations; why all of a sudden Olusegun Obasanjo's impeachment generated by Ghali Na'Abba had degenerated to Pius Anyim v. Arthur Nzeribe, or the loss of Bakassi Peninsula was payback to Yakubu Gowon's so-called war strategy to seal the fate of Biafra.

That doesn't bother me. As a fervent Igboist, and since I bid farewell to radical "leftism" resulting from youth experience and embracing the conservative right as time went by, I sometimes try to play the role of a centrist just to balance out in certain political and cultural debates, even though I very well know that, at center, nothing at all works when it comes to Biafranigeria's epidemic of political and cultural confusion, not even a consensus to have some donuts and coffee at Cyberworld Cafe, which is much better than Starbucks because of its fascinating stories. Based on this very perspective, I find it difficult to pretend or hide the facts regarding BiafraNigeria, a nation that has never been one since birth.

The conflict in cyberspace has not been fair since the emergence of some Internet crackpots. The haves had problems subduing the have-nots which amazingly is becoming scary. There is no end in sight to the jab-throwing between the educated and the semi-educated on who makes the best move to change the way business is conducted in cyber forums. The most fascinating battle between the intellectual rogues and the akpurukas-by-nature, has taken the entire cyber show to another level. The cash carrying akpurukas who had joined the intellectual elites in forming an alliance, creating the new coinage "intellectual akprukaism" got their way in proving it's all about money

The tussle between the literate and the illiterate is quite intriguing even in practical terms. The illiterate becomes the master and the literate succumbs and becomes the servant who feeds from the crumbs of his master. That's the way it works in our neo-political arena, which as it turned out, the servant becomes his master's voice, defending his boss at all cost and under any circumstances. Take for instance, Ojo Maduekwe, ABC Nwosu, Kema Chikwe, et al. now taking orders from Obasanjo. Who would have in their lives imagined that Obasanjo would use them as rubber stamps against their own people.

The wrestling match between the political class and Brahmins, if you really know what I mean, is no longer a fair game. It had been a cycle of warfare. It has been an ongoing conflict before they brought their cases to cyberland forums and courts. The political class and Brahmins have a lot of common characteristics. Besides the commoners in the political class who rose up the ranks through hard work and perseverance, and the street smarts in the house of Brahmin who got there by any means necessary, a la "the end justifies the means," both sets of ruling elites, the BiafraNigerian way, share one sole purpose in their quest for leadership: Lootocracy.

Moshhood Abiola was a lootocrat after graduating from a crash course in lootology, a program on how to inflate contracts and embezzle public funds. Ibrahim "Maradona" the thief Babangida, Sani Abacha, Muhammadu Buhari, and the rest military juntas belonged to the military political class, becoming lootocrats as they climbed the nation's top ladder. They were merciless. Whatever is left of BiafraNigeria today is their "crafted" handiwork.

But, the good thing about cyberspace is its anonymity. Anyone can take cover under any handle and start attacking his or her opponent whether at peace time or in time of war. Another thing good, though, is, even though the jabs and punches may hurt emotionally, they do not hurt physically. Somehow, one should thankful because if cyber world's "Operation Bulldozer" as fierce and bloodthirsty as it sounds were as deadly in real life as bloodlust Sharia, which has claimed innocent lives for its fanatical religious beliefs, we in cyberland probably would have been history by now. Activists like Seun Oshodi and TAEF, who once were threatened with hate mails just for speaking their minds in the cyber forum should be grateful they were invisible and they made their points clear on the ingrained pervasive injustice and lies instituted by Moses Ebe Ochonu and his cohorts at egbeomooduduwa.com.

The cyber forums and courts including BiafraNigeriaWorld and her sister links- IgboNet, YorubaNet, HausaNet, WaZoBia+, BiafraNet, and AfricaWorld are still not Angelenos and their Hollywood wannabes cup of tea, even though BNW is the most trafficked political website covering African and BiafraNigerian issues today.

I took a tour not long ago to conduct a mock survey to see how we Angelenos are connected to the cyber world, especially on politically-related issues about BiafraNigeria. My first point of call was a telephone conversation with an old friend I happened to have run into, in a community gathering of iri isi ewu and tabloid sensationalism. You know how this malicious gossips, typical of the loafers, can be cooked up by the money bags just to get even at you for not kowtowing when their rite of passage is becomes due, a roll call ritual of the American-based "chiefs" with no Indians, followed by the goofy iwa oji, breaking of kolanuts.

In my chat with this fella who really didn't "give a damn" about Internet "crackpot," I had asked him for his email address in order to be able to send him some of the nerve-racking stuff from Igbo "Yahooligans." I puzzled his brain to see if he was familiar with the ugly battles at Yahoogroups' "melting pot," the Ellis Island of cyber world. He acknowledged paying occasional visits to cyberland and it only happens when he pops up at Public Square.

"Man, be sure to get online because you are missing a whole lot of stuff and actions in cyberspace, particularly the free for all no holds barred authentic MessageBoard of BiafraNigeriaWorld," I told the Hollywood wannabe freak who do not want to be bothered with Internet crackpots and Yahoogroupies, the addicts who engage in trash talks.

"Ol' boy, I'm not gonna gain a damn thing from that crap. I can use the money for something else," he argued.

"You are right, practically right, and besides, you are not getting paid being online which means I would presume if I had told you the Internet crackpot of Yahoogroupies were to be a money-making opportunity venture, I bet, you would have been the first to subscribe and join, right?" That was my response to the cyber world ignoramus.

"Ol' boy, make you leave that crap alone, that kind stuff no fit pay my bills, oh," he insinuated. "Abi you wan tell me say that kalabule na im be the real show now? Make you carry your agoro go where you get am. Tell them say you no see me if na them send you. Na my talk be that oh!"

Well, that was one of my several mock surveys to see what Angelenos, the Hollywood wannabes think about Internet crackpot and Yahoogroupies. Ironically, these Yahooligans are no fraternities or buccaneers with say, a sense of purpose; they are no political think tanks as in interest groups who can lobby or influence a legislative body; they are no woman rights advocacy groups, for instance, like National Organization of Women (NOW) who fight for women's right; and all in all, these Yahooligans are a bunch of opportunists and freeloaders who can start any group for their respective talk cyber shows. You won't believe what may pop up when you type in any word into Yahoogroups search engine. For instance, I typed in reggae and hundreds of reggae and pot advocacy groups emerged. I started a group and see who is coming in: classic rock freaks writing about music reviews. It's anybody's ballgame.

If Yahoo was charging a fee to start a group, no question, very few groups, if any at all, would have surfaced. It is also interesting, as the wave of these discussion forums continues to expand reaching every family household, and individuals producing their own files and databases for posterity, but never occurred to us how four "hobo" postgraduate students from Stanford, under a Palo Alto, California tree, conceived the idea of Yahoo and bought the list serve from E Groups, which has been provided to us free of charge.

It is not free, though. Ask Yahoo email subscribers to BiafraNigeria mushroomed business centers in Owerri, Port Harcourt, Lagos, Enugu, Benin City, Onitsha, Abuja, Degema, Ibadan and many other cities about their email accounts and they would tell you it's not free at these 419 bound business centers who go through your mails before you can even access them. Would that not be criminal in cyber world? Of course they are the "black hats."

But my problem with Angelenos who don't care about Internet crackpot rage is arriving to conclusion, that Internet Yahoogroups is all about nothing, and specifically "nothing to write home about." In this case, I picked on a high school teacher to seek his views and opinions as part of my continued mock survey on what he suggests should be done to have Angelenos participate in cyber politics, which would give them an idea of how East Coast-South West-European BiafraNigeria political class operates on the net. However, I did not reveal to him the jabs, body punches and head-butts which is commonplace in all BiafraNigeria-related Yahoogroups before he cocked his eye blaming our know-it-all and so-called intellectuals who parade cyber world in red carpets while in real life their companions, the confused efulefu bunch are feeding from the crumbs of the Northern caliphates and "generals." "I would rather spend a good time watch the acrobatic Kurt 'You Suck' Angle than join the notorious Yahooligans," he exclaimed.

Something strange really happened as my survey progressed. I had gone to Headmaster, the celebrity wannabe barbershop located at Pico Boulevard and Fairfax in West Los Angeles. There, every barber and hair dresser had his or her ear and tongue pierced. Some, their belly button and nose pierced, too. When I arrived, both the barbers and patrons had assumed I was one of the fast growing chain of Larry Ellison's salesmen who try to market anything in these days of high-tech--from chipped eye lashes to digital nails and hairdo--a sign that indicated they weren't ready for me since I didn't belong, not wearing a freaky look. Meanwhile, ndi njakiri, trash talkers and foul language users as in all barbershops were the kinds of hairdressers and clientele I had a ball with at Headmaster.

But nonetheless, before I began to pose my questions regarding the ongoing survey about Angelenos and surfing the web, some of the patrons who were also football freaks alongside the loquacious barbers, had begun to discuss college football and the pros, majority acknowledging Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers, the "cheese heads" were "looking good" with a record 8-2 and Favre's streak at 164 straight at quarterback, an NFL record should give Packers the edge of going to the Super Bowl. Some were also worried about UCLA's fate in the Pacific 10 Division, notably the injured quarterback Cory Paus who was out of the 17-12 loss to California with a separated throwing shoulder. "I mean," all these guys talked about was football, Lakers poor performance in the opening season due to Shaq's sore toe and why Barry Bonds lost the World Series to California Angels.

BiafraNigeria politics was no issue. You see how Angelenos operate? They don't care about you Internet crackpot addicts. "That is fantasy," they would say, and "it's all about nothing." "It's all about nothing?" "Really!"

True, Internet "crackpot" and Yahooliganism is really about nothing and could be turned to something formidable if the cultural elitists, political heavyweights, the czars and their czarinas, the "intellectual elites" and "business moguls" could agree to reach a consensus in building something out of nothing, then, maybe, Angelenos may have a sense of direction in joining the cast of BiafraNigeria cyber world.

But, though, I had a mission to accomplish - a thorough survey to seek the opinion of Angelenos about cyber life and how it affects them in their daily lives. In my own case, I must confess, I have been addicted to cyber life. It is now baked in my genes. When 'am jogging, driving, at work, playing tennis, melting away in night clubs and praising the Lord in my church, I'm stuck to the cyber hook thinking about what is going on--the war of words and personal attacks, the use of f-word and b-word, and all kinds of putrid hogwash coming out from the mouth of cyber politicians and their thugs in what should be nothing to talk about under normal circumstances.

Anyway, my survey at the barbershop went thus: I had asked a twenty-something freaky Hollywood celebrity wannabe barber at Headmaster if he ever surfed the web to see what's going on within his own community in Yankee land. First, he paused, pretending not to know what exactly I was talking about. "Ol' boy, you dey online?" I uttered in fractured English.

Like the question I posed to the guy at Headmaster, barbershops and hairdressing salons in the Los Angeles area are unique and have one thing in common. They are not the T-shirts and stone-wash jeans wearing wannabe hippies you see on Hollywood Boulevard and the Sunset Strip. They dress to impress the women with their superb sense of sartorial style -- picking up their fashions on the blocks of Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, California. The guys at Yvette St. Laurent, Giorgio Armani, Alfani, Cole Haan, Rolex, and Versace will attest to Angelenos spending spree on the tourist block of Beverly Hills.

They lease exotic and big SUVs, the latest trend customized with big tires and blown-up bumpers, some (low riders) built low down to the concrete with big speakers blasting Eminem and Nelly's kind of hip-hop all day long. As a matter of fact, one of them took me for a drive in the SUV through Pico and Sepulveda. "Check this out," he said, as we passed Westside Pavilion in West Los Angeles. He flipped on the soundtrack 8 Mile CD, rolled down the windows, pumped up the volume as high as it could go, and revved his engine. I was like, wow! "Ol' boy," he said, obviously glad to be in Los Angeles. "This is it."

With all this, when I asked "let's talk about something" West Coast spoiled brats about Internet warfare, what should I expect? "They don't give a damn, and they sure don't wanna know about any crap" if it's not dinning and winning at celebrity restaurants, checking out the movies in Century City and Kodak Theater in Hollywood, or patronizing the nightlife coast of Hermosa Beach.

The barbershop, as it turned out, Headmaster, to be precise, was not the right place for my survey about BiafraNigerian list serve and discussion groups. I wasn't done yet, and hadn't given up my quest to see what L.A. is all about when it comes to cyber world. I tried Veronica's Fufu Land to see what the take there was. I had expected the same response from previous attempts. At Veronica, it was entirely a different ballgame, erotic and morally unbecoming. Veronica has more female waitresses than any African restaurant in the Southland. I would say the patrons frequent the eatery to flirt around and having no clue of Yahooligans shattered my hopes of a good survey.

Veronica was another disappointment in my wild goose chase mock survey. That said, most of what they do at Veronica, they do it nicely. The lady on this very day of my survey, named Linda, who used to be a waitress, noticing I was an occasional visitor, approached me while I parked on the front lot. She told me Veronica had annexed the store next door for an African produce market, making her the general store manager. I took a tour of the new store at her request and promised to "stop by every now and then" for my grocery needs.

I walked out and headed to the restaurant and sat down at a corner. Noticing the way I dressed, the waitress asked if I was a football coach. The waitresses are not the type you meet at Italian restaurants or other standard eateries. They don't feel the need to announce that, "Hi, I'm Tiffany, and I'm going to be your server tonight." They take your order, bring your food, get you a gallon of water and a glass coupled with tissues, sometimes--and understand that if you want a friend, you'll get a dog. There are no smiling faces, the kind you encounter at American standard eateries.

I did attempt at conducting a survey, though, asking from the corner of the table where I sat: "Wetin dey happen for Naija now?" In response, one of the patrons who had ordered for his meal and waiting, yelled: "Wetin you think say dey happen?" That country na yeye country. One day sha, alarm go blow and we go hear nwii. Na dat time everything go scatter."

That was the voice of an angry man who'd lost faith in BiafraNigeria and really wants out as the only solution if the most populous country in Africa wants peace and stability. From his disgust at a troubled country, I took it that he may be an Internet crackpot addict. He was not. He had no clue about BiafraNigeria websites, talk less of the garrulous characters on the message boards, Mobolaji Aluko, Adamu, Bababoyz, Joe Onwuatuegwu, Dikeanatuegwu, Amucha 1, Folanke, Ayodele, Muda Kaduna, and Adekunle; the bookish Jude Olisa, CSE, Patrick, Mojo Long, Udonsit, and Mustapha Kount; the eloquent Tunde Onabanjo, Seun, and Nwokeoma; the arrogant Ednut; the extreme rightists Ohafia Udumeze, Damian, Wind, Ojoto, Ukaobasi, Chiboy, rudek30may, Nwa Aro, Okwyonwuka, Olugbuo Nwoke, Waypoint1Biafra and Igbondeewo; the moderates Benbella, COLO, BNW Last Writes Olu, Fumi Onodipe, Looma Farris, and Chudi Sokie; the feminists Amanda Wekson, Chinyere and Ijeommannuntu; the crooked Dr. Damages, Chike, Michael, Bob Marley and Emmi Koussi; the abrasive Anu Nti, Ochiagha, Kabaka, Ifeanyi Chukwukere Obigbo, Egwuatu Ozoemena, Ogechi Odili, Odili, and Biafradieharder5; the moralists Pastor Oriago Ibegbunam, Ukaoha and Rev. Igbomaluife; the comedian Thompson Buraimoh; and the tacky Yvette--who in the comfort of their homes use the keyboard to slug it out politically, culturally, intellectually and comically as a way of reaching their audience in cyberspace. Quite some serious stuff at the message boards, good enough to make a romantic and action thriller you wouldn't want to miss a bit of it.

Other familiar characters include Williamson, Nobiorah, Africa West, Chi m, Law Guilde, Grapevine, Sundiatta, Idowu, Gtorino, Uncle Sam, Big K, Ibibom, C. Ikpatt, Adaeze, Renee, Yara Wasa Bature, Teddy, Nkem E. Ejiofor, Joy, Kajethan O., Onyemaechi, and many others who are also hard punchers.

As it happens, a friend I made recently invited me to his town's meeting. On that score, I concluded a quarter of my survey would be met at this town meeting. I called my host before schedule to let my host know I would be running late. "That's fine," he noted. "I would be running late, too. Just come, so my people will know who you are." When I arrived at the meeting, my host was not there and would eventually not show up. I could only recognize one face when I walked in to where the meeting was held. I was offered a seat and asked to introduce myself--making sure I wasn't a "devil in the flesh" or "sabo in the midst" -- before the meeting could proceed with its deliberations.

I introduced myself and told them what my mission was all about. I threw in the puzzle: "For some who do not know, there is a new kid in town who has changed the way business is conducted in cyberspace. It's BiafraNigeriaWorld, and its traffic, day-by-day, is becoming scary. It came a long way, folks!" Some who could not grasp what I said, as if I had a hot yam in my mouth when I spoke, thought I meant Biafra-Nigeria War, (apologies to the late John Chukwu).

Actually, I was going to call it quits and forget a survey whose data was not going to take me anywhere. Besides, I was not going to change the mindset of Hollywood celebrity wannabes who flock the Sunset Strip and Hollywood Boulevard desperately trying to belong, but would never be the real Hollywood stars or even the extras and stunts we see in the movies. There'll always be the Angelenos, the Hollywood wannabes who could care less about Yahooligans.

All in all, the result of my survey was a staggering eighty-five percent who really don't "give a damn" about "Yahoogroups invasion forces" and Internet crackpot airheads. Seemingly, they may be right. The sensationalized "crackpot reports" talk shows, and trash talks "ain't gonna pay their bills."

BiafraNigeriaWorld

Ambrose Ehirim
Los Angeles, California