Apology to Innocent Tuface Idibia

Tuface. Source:http://www.naijaloaded.com.ng/

Electric power influences everything in a nation. We are a nation in which jobs have become elusive, with the population of the unemployed climbing every day. I am lucky that I have a job that has saved my life from ridicule. However, I have had a number of experiences that showed me how regressive, a paucity of electricity supply or lack of it causes a community, region or nation.

One painful thing about the power supply is not the fact that it hardly comes, but the fact that you cannot predict when it will come. If one is certain that every morning there will be electricity, he would wait to accomplish whatever task that demands electricity the use of electricity. Sadly, however, the supply pattern is never predictable. If the few hours of supply come with a rhythm that one can predict, however, it would be better than an unpredictable pattern that can be of no use to one.

It was after I joined a writing forum, online, that I saw, vividly, how lame power cables can slow down the progress of a nation. In the forum, called Fanstory, there are members from all parts of the world –Australia, USA, Canada, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Germany, Jamaica …  On Fanstory,  which is a union of authors, you write and then post. Other members will read your post and write reviews. Since I, at times, stay for days without electricity, it is the reason why I don’t always post: I will stay for days without logging on to the site. By the time power returned, other members would have posted uncountable numbers of short stories, book chapters, poems, scripts, etc. Each time I post a single stuff other members would have posted dozens of their work pieces.

Every month, I often buy up to 3 Gigabites of data for my browsing, but I never use all of it due to power shortages, or lack of it. On the 10th of May for instance, I lost 1.4 Gigabite of data at expiration because there was no electric power for a greater period of the month. I felt like crying, losing that amount of data. Yet, at the end of the month, the power authorities brought a funny bill, expecting me to pay for electric power not supplied, a service not provided. I just laughed and threw slap across the face of their manager.

This brings me to the purpose of this article. Some years back, I discovered Nigerian pop music King, Innocent “Tuface” Idibia, let loose a brand new album titled Away and Beyond into the market. I bought the album to listen to it and write a review, but there was no electricity. So, I resorted to buying fuel to power my electric Gen and play the album. Since I was not using electricity, I never settled down to listen to the songs adequately. Usually a music album is most understood when heard for a good number of times. I listened to Away and Beyond hastily and, in the end, I wrote a review that wrote off the album as the worst album Tuface has ever released. I remembered writing that Tuface’s fame and fortune had made him lazy and explained the horrible nature of that album, that he needed more time to spend his money than the time to make new albums.

A few years later, there was news that Tuface’s wife had given birth to a bouncing baby child. The story as I monitored it on one of Nigeria’s music channels had the video of Blood on the Dance Floor, a song from that very album. But, since I never listened to the album, adequately, I was unaware that the song, which turned out to be a hit based on my judgment, was from that very album that I had reviewed. The album was tucked somewhere in my CD rack. Funny enough, I had to go online looking for the song to download when it was, actually, in my room.

One day, when something let me to play the album again. I, then, discovered Blood on the Dance Floor was in it. That beautiful song was not the only good one, but there were many other good songs from the album, as well. They were songs Usman “the Wizzle” Agio had often played in his show on Peace FM, Jos. I had thought the songs were singles, each time he played them. My conclusion now (sincerely speaking) is that the album is the best album Tuface has ever done.

I felt extremely bad that I had branded the album as the worst in Tuface’s music history. Remembering that many had read the review, I was left wondering how people had rated my status as a music reviewer.

Nightingale writes this apology to Tuface for the injustice the review did to him. It is what the notorious power authorities, an organization that is riddled with corruption to the pit of its rectum, caused. We pray Tuface accepts Nightingale’s apology.

 As a Nigerian, Tuface makes me proud each time he performs overseas. I feel the pride the most when songs from that very album are featured in the concert, as they exude maturity and sophistication.

I am not sure I will find justice if I should take the Power Holdings of Nigeria Plc to court; as birds of the same feathers, the judiciary and the power authorities are sympathetic of each other. I pray things change with the new government.