Nigeria Hip-Hop sensation, Ayo Balogun, popularly known as Wizkid, received a lot of congratulatory messages from top personalities in Nigeria after winning Music Of Black Origin (MOBO) Awards for the best International Act, a situation that raises the question of why Nigerian leaders only seem to recognise achievements from the sport and entertainment industry.
Wizkid edged the likes of Jay-Z, Drake, DJ Khaled and others to claim the prize for Best International Act at the awards which is established to recognise artistes performing black music.
Last month, ETN24 reported how PremiumTimes‘s story took the first position at the Global Shining Light Award for the best Investigative Journalism, beating stories from Al-Jazeera, BBC, others.
The award recognizes PremiumTimes, a Nigerian Media outfit, as a force to reckon with when it comes to Investigative Journalism.
Despite this remarkable feat by an indigenous news Media, Nigerians did not see congratulatory messages flying around from the Government and leaders like that of Wizkid.
Some say, PremiumTimes did not get the same accolades because it exposes the ills of the Government.
In July, Nigerian Novelist, Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche, was a winner at the Le Grand Prix de l’héroïne Madame Figaro.
The prize, which was established in 2006 by French Magazine, Madame Figaro, was to celebrate heroines of French and foreign literature.
Adiche’s story, “Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions” was selected alongside a French Novel and a non-fiction work.
The story won in the category of “Foreign Novel in Translation”.
There was no report of her being congratulated or recognized for this great feat in Literature.
In November, two Nigerians emerged as winners in 2017 Shell LiveWIRE Top Ten innovative competition; a global contest which is aimed at recognizing innovative businesses.
Precious Adeho and Ngozi Deborah Atalor along with four others won the Merit Prize, while business innovations from the United Kingdom and Pakistan took the first and second runners-up respectively.
Adeho and Atalor were reported to be the only Africans to claim the prize and they were rewarded with $5,000 each.
The achievement also went unnoticed by the Government and leaders of the Country.
Also in 2017, Katherine Eta, a 16 years old Nigerian won Bronze beating 47 other countries at the 2017 Microsoft Office Specialist World Championship (MOSWC) when she represented Nigeria at the contest final in Carlifornia. As a whole, Eta came 3rd out of 1.1 million students from around the world cutting across 140 countries.
All of these and many more outstanding Nigerians, Wizkid beat them to get the commendation of a sitting President, a former Vice President and a former President, with what? This kind of “brilliant” lyrics from his 2017 song:
Ride, naughty ride
Ride, naughty ride
Oh, my girl, naughty ride, ride, ride
Ride, naughty ride
Ride, naughty ride
Oh, my girl, naughty ride, ride, ride
Ride, naughty ride
Ride, naughty ride
Oh, my girl, naughty ride, ride, ride
Ride, naughty ride
Ride, naughty ride
Oh, my girl, naughty ride, ride, ride
