Stella Dimoko Korkus.com: Nigerians Love To Celebrate And Observe Protocol!

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Friday, July 22, 2016

Nigerians Love To Celebrate And Observe Protocol!

Nigerians love events and ceremonies.  




The engine of governance in fact runs on this special fuel, which in many ways has become an occasional excuse for waste and idleness. I have in the course of work attended and compered many of such events; one thing that I find curious is the obsession with acknowledgements. If you are the compere at any typical Nigerian event, the organizers are bound to give you what they call a protocol list, usually a long list of persons whose presence must be acknowledged. You are also expected to recognize persons, especially if they are government officials, according to an established ranking order. 


     This means you can’t recognize a Member of a State House of Assembly before a Member of the House of Representatives, and you can’t “acknowledge the presence (as it were) of” a Minister before a Senator. Any slight mix up is likely to fetch you a reprimand and complaints about how you are such an insensitive compere who wants to ruin an event that had been so well planned. 


Getting the pecking social order right is not even enough, you must be politically correct when you deploy such egoistic phrases as Your Excellency, The Distinguished, The Most Honourable, Your Honour, Your Worship, My Lord, Your Grace, Your Eminence…Only God knows what these honorifics do to the Nigerian big man or big woman’s mind. When you get it right, you can see the person actually believing the myth about he or she being so excellent, distinguished or honourable.  Some would even rise and wave to the crowd.


      The institutionalized flattery involved, is of course not limited to the special guests, sorry special guests of honour (!) who occupy the high table, or the top table, or better still, the reserved table. Other guests also have to be introduced. The rule is never to overlook any important person.  If it is a government or corporate event, nearly everybody is important.


 If certain persons are mistakenly overlooked, they would insist on sending their personal assistants to the compere to remind him or her of how a grave error has been committed. Some would send their business cards, or a note or summon the compere to their table to register not a complaint but a protest! 


     Indeed, being a master of ceremony at a Nigerian event could be the ultimate test of humility and human patience. I once introduced a certain VIP as Chief XYZ. I was summoned and reprimanded. “He is not a Chief, but a High Chief”, he said.  Correction taken, apology offered.  “It is now my pleasure to introduce once more High Chief XYZ, the whatever 1 of anywhere.” The man grinned cheerfully. His retinue of assistants applauded so loudly, you would think the event was all about him.  


There certainly must be something special about being a High Chief; ordinary Chiefs, I guess, must be less human. But consider this: on another occasion, I mistakenly referred to another VIP as a Chief. The man sent for me, and whispered into my ears: “next time you call me a Chief, I’ll sue you, only unserious people go about saying they are Chief this and Chief that. I have never taken a chieftaincy title in my life; I am simply Mister. You understand? ” Yes, sir!  

       Again, apologies tendered. I went back to the microphone to introduce the Mister properly, cleverly leaving out his anti-chieftaincy commentary.  But how do you deal with royalty? Now that many Nigerians act and behave like Republicans, traditional rulers and the royalty have also learnt to leave the comfort of their palaces to hustle like other Nigerians on the streets, and so, you can’t miss royal presence at most events. But there is a challenge, acknowledging them. You have to know who is His Royal Highness or which traditional ruler is better addressed as His Royal Majesty. 


       To play safe, it is always advisable to refer to every traditional ruler as His Royal Majesty. It doesn’t matter if the man is a common village head. The word “Royal” is where the magic lies.  Leave it out, and you’d have palace jesters rushing to you to insist you emphasize that special phrase.  To get the protocol right, the titles of female guests of honour must also be properly mentioned, the problem is knowing who is what:  Yeye, Erelu, Lolo, Alhaja, Hajia, Dame, Mrs, Miss or Ms.  And there is at least one female VIP who objects to any young compere mentioning her first name: she says that is rude! “I am old enough to be your mum, and you know my dear, we are Africans!” Etiquette lesson taken: “Sorry Ma.” Not to talk of the Igwes. the Knights of numerous Saints, the Otunbas and holders of honorary degrees who insist on being addressed as “Dr.”


        By the time a Nigerian compere struggles with these imposed standards, half of the time is wasted on absolutely unimportant niceties. And wait a minute, most of the guests would arrive late anyway and insist on being seated close to the high table, at a visible location, preferably in full view of the television cameras. Important guests like to be noticed; they want to appear on television and have their photographs taken by photojournalists who criss-cross the floor, blocking people’s view, blinding guests with camera flashes, thus constituting extra nuisance. But the real notice-me tactic often adopted is when in the middle of a programme or a speech, some really self-important guest arrives noisily and holds everything up, making a song and a dance, sashaying across the hall. 


The compere is expected to suspend the programme and massage the ego of the latecomer: “Announcing the arrival of….” I imagine it is precisely because of this elevation of bad conduct into a side event, that nobody is allowed to arrive late at any event where the President of Nigeria is already seated. The security people will not allow such breach of protocol.  And if anyone at all must be allowed in, he or she would have to sneak in quietly and no official compere would dare announce such rude arrival. That is another delicate protocol matter, though. 

        Then, the speeches: no event is complete without speeches and do Nigerians love to make speeches? Oh yes. Most of the time, many of the speeches are unnecessary. Those who are not supposed to say a word are invited to say a few words and they take an hour.  There is so much repetition, with some speakers not having enough sense to leave out what has already been said. You are also likely to find someone who starts with “I don’t have much to say” only to go ahead and bore you silly. Or, some would start with: “I’ll try to be brief.”  When you hear this, it’s better to be on your guard. Be prepared to listen to a rambling sermon. Even when time is allotted for every speech, this is usually ignored.


 I have been at events where the microphone was deliberately muted when the speaker started wasting time. Some speakers would still insist that they should be allowed to finish whatever they believe they are saying and they’d go on rudely, without the microphone! 
     Then, the acknowledgements: Every speaker begins with a long list of acknowledgements: Your Excellency, the President of the world, Your Excellency the Governor of this, Your Excellency the Governor of that… (if ten or twenty governors are in attendance, some speakers  will mention each one of them by name!), and the Distinguished Senator whatever, The Right Honourable somebody, My Lords, spiritual and temporal….this alone may go on for close to five minutes.  Before then, the compere would also have taken about five minutes giving the biography of the speaker. 

And he does that with every speaker, who again takes the microphone and repeats the same protocol list, only to end it all with “All protocol(s) observed.”  Sometimes,  all protocols are not just observed but “duly observed”, followed by the ritual of time-wasting salutations. 

       And in some cases, the protocols are “respectfully and fully observed.” The truth is that speakers don’t have to worry about protocol being “duly, respectfully or fully” observed.  Career diplomats often protest that these phrases are incorrect and offensive. But this has not stopped speaker after speaker adopting similar short cuts: “Madam Chairperson, permit me to stand on existing protocols”.  Or: “Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to adopt existing protocols.”  On one occasion, a speaker said: “I am sitting on existing protocols, Mr. Chairman.”  That was something novel except that it didn’t stop the next speaker from standing on the same protocols that someone had just sat upon. 


       Elsewhere, in Britain, United States, Canada, and Europe, when speeches are to be made, people don’t sit or stand on protocols and there are no long introductions and acknowledgements. The speeches are delivered in a pre-arranged order, promptly, briefly and to the point.  And of course, the guests arrive on time. Prefacing a speech with “Ladies and Gentlemen” is considered adequate. Here and in other African countries: Kenya, South Africa, Uganda, Namibia, Ghana…the reverse is usually the case. We should perhaps begin to worry about African protocol, very much like African Time (!). Our public events and ceremonies could become more purposeful and business-like, however, if we dispense with lengthy introductions of titles and biographies.

 I once embarked on the onerous task of measuring the time spent on protocol at a particular event: two full hours. The main business of the day - an award ceremony - was just a little under an hour! 

BY DR REUBEN ABATI



37 comments:

  1. Reuben abati abi? No strength.

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    1. Lol it was a fantastic read, made me laugh, cos I could relate, hate or love Reuben this was the truth. So should we stop saying, ild stand on existing protocols to save time? And no even the British people address her majesty if she's at an event, so I guess it's not just Africans but maybe we stretch it.

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  2. Haha.. Had to quickly scroll down. Itz Abati! Will read it at night.

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  3. The author's title made me laugh...I get the joke.

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  4. M sorry I didn't read this.

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    1. Ah you missed oh! Very funny! I laughed all through. I could relate to it.

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  5. Reuben o... Meanwhile, he did not observe protocols before this long note... Not good at all Reu, don't you know it is unAfrican. Abeg Stella, I beg to stand on the existing protocol. All protocols duly observed.

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  6. I knew it was my Boss who wrote this.

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  7. hahahahaha lovely one by Oga Ruben. There is something fundamentally wrong with our DNA. One of my former clients stupidly told me to respect him more because of his blue blood. Trust myself to investigate his stupid claim only to discover the imp was a nobody in his hometown. Do I also talk about academicians in Nigeria, there own sef nor be here.

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  8. Reuben have come again, I was just reading and gigfling till I got my senses back. I told my self that this must be Reubens handwork. I didn't bother to finish tho

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  9. Couldn't finish reading biko.

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  10. Didn't read,belle dey pain me biko.

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  11. No other person but Reuben.

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  12. I know it's Reuben Abati!!!

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  13. Rotfl! !!!... yawns don't be deceived, I didn't read a word😢😚

    Kelvin Dat Edo Boi ( Stellz Cousin )

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    1. Yeye... Because no be bwest to pwest.

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    2. It was worth the read child, you should read sometimes okay, nor be only movie and series make you dey watch Hian

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  14. I agree, DR Ruben all this protocols are indeed a waste of time. I however agree with the lady that wants to been addressed, only by her surname. Careful, next time you don't want Mister to sue you.

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  15. A simple "Ladies and gentlemen, all protocols duly observed" should suffice really- who has the time for this crap?

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  16. Reuben at it again! Good job! loved it and I must say that I read the whole epistle to the end and had a good laugh. I believe it is not only a Nigerian factor but African as well.

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  17. Chai bvs why are u guys patience to read a long epistle of "rumor has it" long amino gist of a popular celebrity but can't hv the patience of reading an educating article from Reuben Abati.

    Stella thanks for sharing. Nigerians love title since time immemorial.

    My huby studied Petroleum Engr in futo with a 1st class. But he doesn't like to be addressed as Engr...... he will always say he is an half baked Engr. That they only studied the theoretical part of the course nd never visited an oil field.

    He earned my everlasting respect on that honesty because most people hide under the title just to survive inferiority complex.

    Nice write up by the way.

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    1. And they will always intimidate those of us in the school of health then. Lol

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  18. Reuben Abati has got a good sense of humour.

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  19. #The best things are usually found when you're not looking for them*

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  20. After reading this beautiful write up, I decided to read comments,,,,,,, then I gave up. some one once said to moi, if u wanna hide something from a Nigerian, Put it in a book, cus they wee never read. y wee u refuse to read this beautiful write up......... :(

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  21. After reading this beautiful write up, I decided to read comments,,,,,,, then I gave up. some one once said to moi, if u wanna hide something from a Nigerian, Put it in a book, cus they wee never read. y wee u refuse to read this beautiful write up......... :(

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  22. I quite disagree that this is a Nja thing, I have seen this happening in other countries I have lived and work, also on some aljazeera programs. If a presenter/host refers to the guest as Dr and he is a prof, he will correct such. When you receive mail from your superiors at work in all countries I have worked, the signature goes to state every qualifications first before the name! The only difference is that In an informal setting, you can refer to the same people with just their first name but in Nja, the boss/chief still wants the protocol observed at all settings even when you are both getting drunk

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  23. Lol it was a fantastic read, made me laugh, cos I could relate, hate or love Reuben this was the truth. So should we stop saying, ild stand on existing protocols to save time? And no even the British people address her majesty if she's at an event, so I guess it's not just Africans but maybe we stretch it.

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  24. Women Supporter25 July 2016 at 19:32

    Naija I hail

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