The wife of the president (not the first lady, mind you), Aisha Buhari, may have stirred the hornet’s nest.
In a recent interview with BBC Hausa Service, the delectable lady voiced her disapproval of the goings on in President Muhammadu Buhari’s government and the ruling APC, saying a cabal that has hijacked the government, leaving those that laboured for its electoral victory in the doldrums. She warned that she would not be supporting her husband, if and when he declares interest to run for reelection in 2019, unless he re-jigged his cabinet and government.
If Aisha expected the president to appreciate her candour, she was totally mistaken, as the President Buhari fired back from far away Germany that Aisha belonged to only three rooms in his life, the kitchen, living room and ‘the other room’ (bedroom).
Poor Garba Shehu, presidential spokesman, was quick as ever in his ardous task of cleaning up the president’s impolitic gaffes, saying the president was only cracking a joke by his statement that showed his obvious scant regard for women but too late; the women are up in arms over the insensitive statement.
Anyway, the president should listen to his wife, who, I believe, must have been forced to speak out publicly after several failed ‘bedroom tricks’ to get the president’s attention. Rather than attacking her husband as many want the world to believe, Aisha actually spoke out of her conviction that some opportunists were out to reap where they did not sow and thereby rubbish Mr. President.
The lie of Mr. President Buhari’s mindless reaction is that gone are the days when women are restricted to the living room, bedroom and kitchen alone. We have seen that women have proved to be better managers when given the time and if I had my way, I would rather a proven women, like Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, preside over our affairs in this country instead of these cocky men, suffocating the land.
However, I don’t agree with immediate past First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan, that women should quit the kitchen; that is their major office. They are the homemakers and managers of even these ego-tipsy men and that’s very noble. Without that exalted office, which the president seemed to denigrate, a woman’s motherly role is gone. Nevertheless, women should not belong only in the kitchen. Neither are they good only for pleasuring the man in his bedroom nor sitting as chatter boxes in the living room.
Surely, just as President Buhari ‘belongs to everybody and to nobody’, his wife, Aisha, and every other woman, belongs to ‘every room and to no room’.
‘Are you Jesus?’
“A few years ago, a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago. They had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night’s dinner.
In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table, which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly-missed boarding…Then the salesman paused, took a deep breath, got in touch with his feelings and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned.
He told his buddies to go on without him, waved good-bye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor.
He was glad he did. The 16-year-old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying, tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her; no one stopping and no one to care for her plight.
The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organise her display. As he did this, he noticed that many of them had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket.
When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to the girl, “Here, please, take this $40 for the damage we did. Are you okay?” She nodded through her tears. He continued on with, “I hope we didn’t spoil your day too badly.”
As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to him, “Mister….” He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes. She continued, “Are you Jesus?”
He stopped in mid-stride… and he wondered. He gently went back and said, “No, I am nothing like Jesus – He is good, kind, caring, loving and would never have bumped into your display in the first place.”
The girl gently nodded: “I only asked because I prayed for Jesus to help me gather the apples. He sent you to help me, so you are like Him – only He knows who will do His will. Thank you for hearing His call, Mister.”
Then slowly he made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning and bouncing about in his soul: “Are you Jesus?”
Do people mistake you for Jesus?
That’s our destiny, is it not? To be so much like Jesus that people cannot tell the difference, as we live and interact with a world that is blind to His love, life and grace. If we claim to know Him, we should live, walk and act as He would. Knowing Him is more than simply quoting scripture and going to church. It’s actually living the Word as life unfolds day to day.
You are the apple of His eye even though you, too, have been bruised by a fall. He stopped what He was doing and picked up you and me on a hill called Calvary and paid in full for our damaged fruit.”
NB: Friend, I lifted this from my WhatsApp page. My advice: Don’t remain or return to a wicked world that would have you perpetually squashed and battered. Jesus has already made that choice for you; is that beautiful choice acceptable to you?