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Tessie Udegboka Nkechi - My Blog
Tessie Udegboka Nkechi - My Blog


WORLD AIDS DAY 2008
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Get involved: World AIDS Day 2008 Is Around The Corner
World AIDS Day (WAD) emerged as the first international health day in December 1988. First observed in 1988, WAD was instigated by health ministers worldwide who canvassed for a spirit of social tolerance and a greater awareness of HIV and AIDS on an international scale. The intention is to bring to our attention the global challenges and consequences of the epidemic, eventually reducing the spread of HIV and improving the lives of people living with the virus.
This year 2008 marks the 20th anniversary of WAD. For twenty years, WAD has stood as a time to jog peoples’ memory of the HIV and AIDS crisis, and to commemorate souls that have been lost to AIDS. Yearly, the campaign is an opportunity for relevant stakeholders throughout the world to plan events that highlight the HIV pandemic, raise awareness and bring about change. Also, draw attention to the crushing number of individuals infected with HIV and honour those who have passed away from AIDS. Many organizations also use this time to focus on prevention efforts.
The international theme for World AIDS Day 2008, “Stop AIDS: Keep the Promise - Leadership” The international theme, I believe is developed as an overall theme which each country is expected to adapt to suit more specific issues around the epidemic in their region. This is the second year the theme is focusing on the topic of leadership. It is calling on everyone; including families, communities, civil society organizations, and governments to take the initiative in helping meet the targets.

Why the red ribbons?

The red ribbon has been an international symbol of AIDS awareness since 1991. The Red Ribbon Project was created by the New York based organisation Visual AIDS, which brought together artists to create a symbol of support for the growing number of people living with HIV in the US. The red ribbon became the result of collaboration between these community artists who wanted to create a non-copyrighted image that could be used as an awareness-raising tool by people across the world.
The red ribbon is worn as a sign of support for people living with HIV and for interventions aimed at controlling the epidemic. Wearing the red ribbon is not a sign that one is HIV positive as I have been queried severally. Wearing a red ribbon for World AIDS Day is a simple and powerful way to challenge the stigma and prejudice surrounding HIV and AIDS.

Everybody is a leader - What can you do?

WAD is not just about wearing T-shirts, raising money and marching/racing round the streets, but also about helping to increase the awareness and education, aiding in the fight against HIV and its stigma. Discover what is happening in your local area to commemorate WAD 2008. Encourage your church/mosque or organization to get involved. Plan an ecumenical special service for the Sunday before WAD or on 1st December itself.

If In Your Neighbourhood:

• Wear a red ribbon as a symbol of hope or distribute red ribbons at community gatherings.
• Put up some posters - get people talking about HIV and AIDS, raise their awareness and enlighten them.
• Organize a candlelight vigil at a community center or at a public park and invite local performers and speakers.
• Decorate a World AIDS Day tree or bulletin board to display in a local library or courthouse in memory of those who have died of AIDS.
• Write a letter or editorial to your local newspaper urging news coverage of World AIDS Day.
• Organize a creative writing and poster campaign.
• Set up a table or booth at an existing community event to display HIV/AIDS exhibits, posters, flyers, or brochures.
• Get children and youth to present drama transmitting HIV and AIDS information.
• Get your friends, family, colleagues or teenagers to express their feelings and expand their knowledge about AIDS.
• Send AIDS greeting cards to friends and family urging their support for AIDS awareness and love for those infected.

If At Work:

• Have a fancy dress day, put on a red ribbon and ask others to do the same.
• Ask your employer to help establish December 1 as a day to address the issue of HIV and AIDS in your workplace.
• Educate employees about the prevention of HIV/AIDS: display posters, flyers, brochures and invite guest speakers.
• Make and sell red ribbons, and make hand-made greeting cards depicting HIV messages and send to friends and colleagues.
• Have your company/office sponsor community events by donating products to local HIV/AIDS programs, organize an AIDS fundraising events (run, walk) or set up a display in the office lobby.
• Distribute World AIDS Day ribbons, posters, flyers or brochures in company mailboxes, eateries, and hotels or break rooms.
• Protect yourself and your partner(s) – the best way to stop the spread of HIV.
• Use your initiative and imaginations for example, I made local red ribbons and small hand-made greeting cards and gave to all who came for HIV counselling during the 1st week of December, 2007.

If In the Lecture/Classroom:

• Set aside class time for a special lesson or speak on HIV and AIDS.
• Create a brochure or video for teaching parents the facts about HIV and AIDS.
• Invite a person living with HIV or HIV counsellor to come and talk to students about HIV/AIDS discrimination.
• Create a special HIV/AIDS writing assignment for December 1: essay, poem, book report, brochure, poster or research report.
• Distribute red ribbons and information leaflets about HIV and AIDS at an exhibit set up in the school.
• Decorate trees, school buildings, classrooms, lamp posts, or fences with red ribbons.
* Prepare a current events bulletin board for students to fill with newspaper articles about HIV and AIDS.
• Set up a debate or a quiz - there are lots of areas of HIV issues to discuss
In all and above all get tested and encourage others to do likewise. Learn more about HIV and AIDS. There are great deals of information to be disseminated on that day, so avail yourself of the opportunity.

By Udegboka Nkechi, Couple/HIV Counsellor, +2348033842029


November 24, 2008 | 1:55 PM Comments  0 comments
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CBN: The Remaining Way To ‘Force’ Nigerians To Accept And Use Coins
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic



Naira coins, still official tenders in Nigeria, are near extinction as business men and even beggars in the street avoid them like a leach. Even beggars preferred to be offered alms in naira notes rather than in coins, likewise some pastors who prefer offerings in naira notes to coins. Traders in shopping centers and markets have devised means of avoiding naira coins by fixing prices of their lowest commodity at either N5 or two for N5.

Traders hardly had anything to sell for N1, N2 or 50k and they hardly ever collect N5 coins from customers. Customers also reject coins as balance in other words demanding for a naira note value of the coins. Saying it is of no use to them since they cannot buy any valuable thing with it. Truly, Nigerians are not used to coins and they are not getting used to it in any way. Some consider it too heavy for comfort and easily misplace them compare to the naira notes they are used to.

Last year, 2007, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) reintroduced the coins after several years of its disappearance from the Nigerian financial system. CBN spent billions of naira to re-design lower naira notes and re-introduced the coins into the market. They followed it up with nationwide campaigns to re-orient and sanitize the minds of Nigerians into accepting and making use of the coins. It mounted spirited publicity to convince Nigerians into accommodating the coins in an effort to further enhance its purchasing power.

As part of its publicity campaigns, the CBN gave directives to banks that 2% of all cash withdrawals to customers be paid in coins. Some banks kept to the directive but today, most, if not all banks have gently turned down the directive due to lack of interest on the part of the customers. Banks should not give a customer what he/she does not request for.

Many quarreled the CBN over the directive. Why should they collect coins from the banks when it cannot be accepted for transaction in the open market? I cannot buy something of N2.50k or buy goods in the market that require a balance of N1 or 50k. So, why accept the coins? What can one use it for? It is going to be useless because no deal in the market requires you to use it.

The widespread rejection of the coins by Nigerians seems to mean that CBN has failed in its bid to make Nigerians accept and use the coins through the methods they introduced. But there is only one method remaining and if that fails, I suggest CBN abandon the campaign for other initiatives that will improve the efficiency of our financial system rather than continue to ‘waste’ money on imposing compliance on coins usage.

It is improper for CBN to give such directive to the banks or force Nigerians accept and use coins when it has no relevant in the market. This is the major reason why it failed woefully. CBN did not plan the strategy well before embarking in the campaign. CBN should first of all create an enabling market environment where those coins could be used. There is no transaction today in the open market that demands one to pay or accept the coins, so why go for it. CBN can help to fix or give directives on fixing of prices of goods in a way that will necessitate Nigerians to demand for, accept, value and use the coins in our everyday transaction.

Par example, late last year, the N5 biscuit rose escalatory (100%) to N10 because the dealers want to avoid the coins, when the biscuit ordinarily suppose to go for N7.00k. same goes for the recent price increment of sachet water which now sells for N10 and which normally should go for at least N6.50k or N7.00k. the prices of other goods could go on like that for examples GSM recharge cars of N200 can go for N203 or N199; N7,550 bag of rice – N7,548; . . .

By directing transporters to stop charging fares by rounding it up to naira note equivalent. N50 transport fare can go for N48 or N51.50k. et cetera. this will enable passengers to guard, value and appreciate and demand for that 50k balance they would have abandon, because definitely, they will still make use of it may be on their way back. This can be applied to other goods and commodities. With this, coins including 50k will become valued again by Nigerians.

I sense this is the only way remaining for CBN to undertake in order to make Nigerians embrace and use coins happily without any complaint or rejection. But if this remaining way fails, CBN should forget about coins issue and let it die and be buried instead of wasting billions of naira in printing and minting more coins. After all, it is not a must or compulsory that coins must be included in our currency. Nigeria can equally join the likes of other countries that are not using coins as their currency.


UDEGBOKA TESSIE NKECHI, public affairs commentator, 08033842029; tessyleen@yahoo.com

October 18, 2008 | 5:04 PM Comments  0 comments
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HOW I WITNESSED AND SURVIVED THE JOHANNESBURG ATTACK
Related to country: South Africa
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic


It was SATURDAY evening,31st of May,was preparing to get my materials ready for a workshop in Capetown, so i left Jules street in Joburg to Randburg to copy some needed materials from a friend's system to my flash disk. Since my flight is 9am the following day and still have vital preparation to make that night, i took a metered taxi straight to Jules. Passing through the famous Bree street and before getting to Jeppe street. We saw helicopters hovering in the sky and beeping out an unusual noise.

Initially, nobody knew what was going on,so we kept on moving. As we are about to enter the Jules street, we found out that the policemen blocked all the connecting roads leading to Jules with their vehicles. As we reversed to take Hans street, the frightening noise from the helicopters increased and sounds of gun shots everywhere and people were running for their dear lives. I saw some who were hit by the bullet and fell down while running.
Immediately, the taxi man said he is taking me back to Randburg, that a serious danger lies ahead should we continue moving. As he turned to drive back to Randburg, knowing that i'll fly to Capetown the next day by 9am, i started pleading with him to let me alight there, that i will pay him his complete money. He refused saying he can't leave me in that danger zone. I insisted, so he let me go.
Immediately i alighted, i started shivering, the gunshots kept on coming. i started running but no where to run to, all the shops and houses are locked and winter cold that night was unbearable for me. I started regretting not following the taxi man. I was crying and calling my relations on phone but nobody dare drive out that night.
At about 10.30pm, a cab drove past, i stopped it and entered to Jules, then the gun shots has minimised and the police have ublocked the roads.I saw the rarely-seen poice armoured car patrol round shooting. I asked the driver what is going on, he said they are fighting the foreigners, immediately, i became more scared. On getting to the complex where i stay in Jules, the security men to open gate for me where no where to be found. They've all run for their dear lives too. I stood lonely in that cold winter night looking up to heaven to know where my help will come from.
Immediately, the sound of shots came close to where i was standing and shivering, i hid under a parked car and they later set the car ablaze. I was informed through the phone that i should enter the complex through the back gate, where the security men are hiding. I went round and lo! entered through the back gate. This is how i escaped.
It was already past midnight when i entered the house. Throughout that night till the early hours, the helicopters kept on distracting the the criminals from carrying out their planned actions. On Monday morning,as i was going to the airport, corpses littered the streets of Jules and its surrounding. Smokes were still coming out from the cars they set ablaze. All the foreighner's shops in the area was attacked but they didn't succeed in getting into all. The shops they gained entrace into, were completely raided and nothing left inside them. But the ones they couldn't enter were destroyed with bullets. One of the known club house in the area and owned by a Nigerian was raided too.
May God console my Nigerian brothers whose shops were affected by this recent attack and set them up with progress. May the souls (could have been one of them) of those who died that same night rest well in the Lord and may those injured during the violence and still hospitalised, gain quick recovery. Amen.

UDEGBOKA TESSIE NKECHI
, tessyleen@yahoo.com, 080 3384 2029

October 14, 2008 | 3:43 PM Comments  0 comments
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