NOTHING IS PERMANENT!
By Mr. Donald Duke
"When I See Public Office Holders Misbehaving, I Used To Have This Thought, "Probably They Do Not Have a Good Wife/Husband or a Good Marriage"
As governor, I was on call 24/7 sometimes.
I got very angry and could take my anger on anyone.
So, my chief of protocol bore the brunt one day.
I had a reception for guests and he placed them in rooms, not the way I would have done it, but he didn’t do anything wrong.
He used his own judgment.
I would have done it the other way, but I over reacted.
I spoke very harsh to him.
While I was doing this, my wife walked in and didn’t say a word.
She came in, did some other things in my office and left.
When I got back home in the evening, I’d forgotten about it. It’s just a normal event in the day.
My wife went on her knees in front of me, looked straight into my eyes like a penitent sinner and said, "The way you spoke to this guy was wrong and we have to go and apologise to him."
She said I had no reason to speak to anyone like that.
I said, "What! He did this..." and she interrupted me, "Yes, I heard everything.
"The way you would have done it was different, but he didn’t do a bad thing. He used his discretion. So, what are you going to do? You have destroyed his self esteem. Tomorrow, he is not going to do anything discretionally.
He would wait for orders and then you will get irritated at that. You have made him lose his self-confidence and that is wrong. You need to go and apologise to him. Why should you speak to someone like that? Because you are governor?"
I ignored her, stood up and went into the bedroom, still fuming. As she will always do if she wants to have her way, my wife followed me into the bedroom and went on her knees again to plead the cause of a man as if he had begged her to plead his case.
"You have to do it this night and not tomorrow" because I kept saying I would do it tomorrow.
Onarie, still on her knees and almost in tears, insisted and said, "No, tonight. That man is not going to sleep well and so you do not have the right to sleep well when he was not sleeping well."
Clearly defeated, I got into the car and we drove to his house.
His gate man froze when he discovered I was the one. In his confusion, he did not know how to properly open the gate till Onarie told him to take two deep breaths before attempting to open the door again!
We were ushered into the living room by an equally confused maid who had to stumble over chairs.
His wife turned in.
They were about to go to bed.
She was in her night gown.
She saw me and was scared with the expression of, ‘Okay, you have come to fire my husband finally’.
The guy came downstairs, petrified as my wife and I walked into the private living room.
The wife wanted to get up and leave.
I told the guy I came to apologise for my rude and harsh behaviour towards him and I told him am sorry.
They all got emotional but I got relieved.
It was like a heavy load had been taken off me.
I still get upset with things going up wrong, but I don’t get to a point I feel I am too big to say sorry.
And am learning to treat people better.
You can be referred to as "Your Excellency" today, but, for the best, it will only last eight years.
Senator?
Minister?
It is not forever!
Permanent Sec? It is still not permanent and we all know it's just a title and not a life long position.
Director?
CEO?
DG?
etc.
Life is a stage, a platform for services unto God.
So let everyone take heed. Forgive and have regard for Human beings"
@aronprins I tried the wiki and could not get it installed.
I'll check through the docs but if you have a link to install the plugin I'll appreciate it.
Still pushing through with our AI tool Ventory at GDG Build with AI Buildathon. This is close to the 24hour mark and we are gonna push our web app successfully 🏆🥳
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Still pushing through with our AI tool Ventory at GDG Build with AI Buildathon. This is close to the 24hour mark and we are gonna push our web app successfully 🏆🥳
#BuildwithAILagos2026
My wife calls me, panicked.
The call is from her number, and her voice is unmistakable- that’s my wife.
‘Babe, our son is hurt. He got in a bike wreck. I’m at the emergency room but they won’t take our insurance and I need cash to get him help. Please send me 3000 dollars as soon as you can, he’s really not doing well.’
Me- ‘Wow, that’s scary. Tell me our passphrase and then I’ll send the money.’
Her (it) - ‘What? What passphrase? This is your wife, our son is hurt. Send the money now!!’
Me- ‘I’ll call you back. I don’t believe that this is my wife. If it is, I’m sorry, but we discussed this.’
The number? Spoofed. Easy to do and there’s no way to tell if a phone number is being spoofed aside from hanging up and calling back to confirm.
The voice? AI generated. Easily done. A few seconds of audio is all it takes to create a realistic audio deepfake.
What can you do?
1) Create a family safe word or passphrase. Ours is definitely not ‘Keep Going’ although we considered it. Discuss the passphrase far away from phones or any recording device. This is as analog as possible. Don’t forget that the trigger for the passphrase is just as important as the phrase itself. So instead of asking ‘what’s the safe word?’ have a separate triggering question. For example, you could say ‘I’m eating banana cream pie’ and this would trigger your spouse to respond ‘purple velvet pillows’ if that’s the safe word.
Make it fun, silly, and easy to remember. And DON’T WRITE IT DOWN.
2) Cognitive security is an essential skill in 2026. Assume every image and video you see online is fake until proven otherwise. Expect scams and spammers, and be pleasantly surprised when it’s not.
3) Figure out a backup communication option with people who you absolutely need to be able to reach. Don’t just rely on a phone number for communication. Have redundant, ideally encrypted methods of communication with family.
What did I miss? I think (hope) Nikita is wrong on the timeframe- agentic bots like Claude bot are impressive but not quite ready to flood the phone lines in just 90 days. But I think it’s going to be a huge problem by the end of the year. I already get dozens of increasingly realistic spam calls and texts daily- it’s only going to get more annoying. Have a plan to keep your family and your finances safe!
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One day, as a small child, Thomas Edison came home from school and handed his mother a paper.
He told her, “My teacher gave this paper to me and told me to only give it to my mother.”
His mother's eyes were tearful as she read the letter out loud to her child:
“Your son is a genius. This school is too small for him and doesn’t have enough good teachers to train him. Please teach him yourself.”
Many, many years after Edison’s mother had died, he became one of the greatest inventors of the century.
One day he was looking through old family things. Suddenly he saw a folded paper in the corner of a drawer in a desk. He took it and opened it up.
On the paper was written:
“Your son is addled [mentally ill]. We won’t let him come to school anymore.”
Edison cried for hours and then he wrote in his diary:
“Thomas Alva Edison was an addled child whose mother turned him into the genius of the century.”
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