Pelu Awofeso

Travel writer, author of 6 travel books and past winner of CNN/Multichoice tourism reporting award. I also write about African heritage and the creative arts.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

@LYZA_gh Every West African should visit Benin Republic. 🇧🇯

You may find this guide for first-time visitors helpful.

https://t.co/7JgFKjUGJy

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

@monARCH0oo @onu_slim Oh, no BBNaija this year?

I saw a BBC Reunion trending on X some days back. I thought it was the teaser before the new housemates would be revealed

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

The first Lagos International Trade Fair was held at the newly constructed Lagos Trade Fair Complex along the Lagos-Badagry Expressway from November 27 to December 11, 1977.

The newly built complex was started in 1973 finishing ahead of the 1977 Trade Fair.

The fair was declared open by Lieutenant General Olusegun Obasanjo.

[Slim @onu_slim]

@PuffPuffXplorer My brother, those people deserve nothing good. They simply connive with our leaders to exploit and rip off the masses.

[Nostalgic Naija @NostalgicVibeNG]

A glimpse of what NTA news broadcasts looked like in the early 80s

I’m willing to bet most of the people seeing this weren’t even born then 😅

Who else remembers?

[Vox Yoruba @voxyoruba]

Typical house, Bodija Estate, Ibadan, Yoruba Region, Nigeria, April 1976.

The Yoruba Region’s first housing estate, the Bodija Housing Estate in Ibadan was constructed in 1959.

Most of the early homeowners were judges, professors and high-ranking civil servants.

[Zamani Elewedu @Zamani_WLK]

Archaeologists recovered thousands of glass beads from Ile Ife, alongside evidence of local production centuries ago. Yoruba artisans mastered specialized manufacturing and luxury craftsmanship centuries before colonial rule reshaped the region.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

A word is enough.

[Slim @onu_slim]

A man spent 6 years in university studying Economics.

He cannot calculate his own tax returns.

His younger brother dropped out at SS2 to learn electrical installation.

He just finished wiring a N450 million hotel in Abuja cash.

We built a system designed to produce certificate holders, not solution providers. And we refuse to admit it is failing.

Think about what the Nigerian education conveyor belt actually produces.

3 years in secondary school learning about photosynthesis you will never use.

JAMB at 18, because your worth as a human being must be validated by a multiple choice test.

4 to 6 years in a university where ASUU strikes steal entire academic sessions.

Then 1 year of NYSC where you wear khaki and pretend the country has a future for you.

Then you enter the job market with a second class upper and discover that 500 other people applied for the same entry-level position that pays N80,000 a month.

That is not education. That is a processing system for producing docile, desperate labour.

Meanwhile the man who fixes your generator earns more than your bank job.

The woman who does your lashes earns more than your HND.

The plumber you waited 3 days to find charged you N35,000 for 2 hours of work.

The welder fabricating export-grade steel in Nnewi never sat for JAMB.

Nigeria has a youth unemployment rate above 40%.

Almost every unemployed young person in that statistic has a certificate.

Almost none of them have a trade.

We did not educate them. We certificated them. And there is a devastating difference between the two.

The world already moved.

Germany rebuilt its post-war economy on vocational training, not university enrollment rates.

South Korea’s technical colleges feed directly into its manufacturing export machine.

Dubai does not ask where you went to school. It asks what you can build.

Nigeria is still arguing about cut-off marks.

I am not saying university is useless.

I am saying a system that treats a plumber as inferior to a graduate accountant, while the plumber earns three times more and employs two apprentices, is a system lying to its own children.

Your child does not need a degree.

Your child needs a skill the market will pay for, the confidence to charge what they are worth, and a government that builds infrastructure around productive people instead of paper qualifications.

The classroom has a role but it is not the only room where a life gets built.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

@MurraySuggests I enjoyed reading this description of the avoidable mess this not-war has turned out to be.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

Wonderment.

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

He later became Eleko of Eko" a traditional title for the Oba of Lagos in 1925 till his death in 1928:

Prince Alfred I. Akitoye (born Ìbíkúnlé Àkítóyè in 1871) was a prominent Lagosian merchant and mercantile agent who later ascended the throne as the Oba of Lagos in 1925.

[Hausa Aesthetic @HausaAesthetic]

Found a 1956 edition of the Nigeria magazine, w/ content Katsina, Ibibio Monuments, Fika and more.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

I remember thumbing through a copy of this book at the Jos National Library, three years ago.

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

The Red Book of West Africa by Allister Macmillan.
Published year: 1920:

It was like a "Who's Who and Business Directory" for colonial West Africa. Profiles of prominent Africans and Europeans, companies, trade stats, etc.

Now You Know

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

Truly, Ojude Oba does need a bigger arena.

[LEGENDARY J.O.E @LegendaryJoe]

OJUDE OBA 2027 - MY RECOMMENDATIONS

1. A Bigger Space

Ojude Oba grows the way a great tree grows - it cannot be contained by the pot it was first planted in. We have long outgrown the King's courtyard. Only a stadium can now hold what we have become.

2. Local Combat Competition:

Spice the festival with the ancient arts of the body - ijakadi, eke, gidigbo. Let each family nominate their warrior. Let a champion be crowned. Let that title hunger to be defended at the next festival. There is no celebration more pleasing than one where men test themselves.

3. Horse Racing:

Those elegantly fashioned horses are the poetry of the festival - dressed better than most men I know. But the Yoruba did not breed such animals merely to be admired from a distance. Let them run. Let us know, once and for all, which family carries the finest horses in their bloodline. A parade is beautiful. A race is a verdict.

4. What will you suggest?

And in all of this - the basins of tears that must be donated annually by those who have no culture worth parading and no history worth celebrating - must grow wider every year.

By 2030, basins will no longer suffice.

A dam must be constructed.

Good Evening Severally...

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

Question: Does the amalgamation document of Southern and Northern protectorate into Nigeria have an expiry date?

No, Nigeria's 1914 Amalgamation documents signed by Lord Lugard do not have an expiry date.

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

December 1974: General Gowon Visits The Uncompleted Black Arts Festival Village/Later FESTAC Town:

1/2

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

@nwoko_greg62705 There's a car of his at the Ibadan National Museum of Unity. I wonder if it's the same one.

I made a short film from my visit, two years ago I think. 👇🏽👇🏽

https://t.co/ONi8LmMMtW

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

WAATECO (West African Automobile and Technical Company Limited) was a prominent Nigerian trading and distribution conglomerate.

[Pelu Awofeso @PuffPuffXplorer]

Comrades until the end.

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

When Lagos lost its Status to Bendel State:

Lagos had ruled the underworld for decades.

[Greg Nwoko @nwoko_greg62705]

How many of you remember this clock?