“You seem to have catarrh, and that is the more reason you shouldn’t take cold beer, until you are through with the harmless disease. So in the interim, Iya Basira would give you a bottle of beer, of room temperature.”
“Forget it; I will still drink my criminally cold beer, mortuary standard. Catarrh, yes, has come and it will go. Whether you drink cold things or not, it has its tenure and once that tenure expires, it will go and good health will be sworn in.”
“Clown, I wonder why you have not been going around with Ali Baba or AY, in a world where jocosity is money-spinner. Or don’t you know that all these comedians get mega-bucks for making people laugh? After all, government said we have got out of recession and yet we are suffering. So we need things that will make us forget our sorrow.”
“Kay, do you know that Ali Baba once recalled that his son never believed that dad was working anywhere? According to him, the boy would tell anyone who cared to listen that ‘oh, my father doesn’t go to work; he only goes to play!” (Laughter).
“Look o, Iya Basira is yet to bring our catfish, almost one hour after the thing was ordered for. Even though its tantalising aroma from the kitchen has been whiffing pass my nostrils, making me salivate like a caged dog that is barred from reaching stewed meat.”
“Well, while not ruling out the fact that the fish may not be ready, it is also on record that such delay tactics are common with beer sellers. While your ordered pepper-soup is still bubbling on fire, they will keep ‘shelling’ you with beer and by the time you are set to eat the catfish, for instance, you would have drunk three bottles…and when the pepper soup lands, they will ensure that it is indeed peppery, requiring you to drink no fewer than three additional bottles.”
“Charles, the vigilant drunk! I think you need to gather beer drinkers in Lagos and environs, to a seminar, and lecture them on how to be a successful drunk. Under that circumstance, this Iya Basira’s prank of delaying our catfish to make us drink more beer will come as a special module.”
“I hear you Kay…en en, when is President Buhari going to constitute another cabinet? Hope it won’t take another six months as we witnessed in his first tenure?”
“Well, we believe it shouldn’t take him up to that, because some of the ministers are going to be retained, while he will only shop for a few new hands.”
“Hmmm, you think somebody like ‘deposed’ former Governor Ambode will make the list? Remember, shortly before he left, he brought Buhari to Lagos, to show him all his gargantuan achievements, especially his scores of overhead bridges.”
“My friend, you talk like a kid. His godfather who removed him is not blind. He too saw those big achievements but achievements are not enough in politics; you have to play the ball with others, not playing it alone.”
“So what you are saying in essence is that Jagaban can still stop him from getting a ministerial appointment from Buhari, despite the humiliation he suffered through his defeat at the APC governorship primary election?”
“Yes, Jagaban is still a beautiful bride to Buhari now. The latter needs him to consolidate things, more so his rival, Atiku, is in court. And as you know, Atiku is Jagaban’s friend, forget about politics. And Jagaban too is a colossus in the native knowledge of the Bench.”
“I think I get you, I get you. More so, Fashola, the former three-in-one minister is not likely to be dropped. So, will two ministers come from Lagos? Or will Ambode accept to be Minister of State?”
“Look, that’s their wahala. What I’m thinking now is how to get enough money to change my rickety car. Be you Buhari, Jagaban, Fashola or Ambode, they are all made.”
“Oh, thank God; Iya Basira’s delayed pepper-soup has landed at last, just like a typically delayed budget…and that reminds me of the election-time tradermoni thing; have they stopped the freebie?”
“Well, election is over, and why should they give money to people who are no longer needed? Above all, they say it’s Abacha’s loot. Maybe the money is
exhausted.”
“Well, the 10k was distributed to some cheeky, privileged traders. No member of my family benefitted; maybe because we refused to trade.”
“Yah; the money should be distributed to each financially disadvantaged Nigerian at the rate of N10, 000 per head. Rest assured that for three months, there will be no suicide incident in the form of anyone rushing to the Third Mainland Bridge to jump into the Lagoon. Or someone going to hang himself inside a church building, so as to enter paradise on sympathetic grounds.”
“You are indeed a drunkard economist. No economics department of a university or polytechnic will give you a good grade…please, our bottles are ‘leaking’. Let your Bakassi-shooting Iya Basira replenish our stock.”
