Interview with Angelique Kidjo, Being a gay porn star in Nigeria | Here are the best Nigerian articles of the week

Each week here at YNaija, we round up the best Nigerian writing on the internet, highlighting the stories, profiles, interviews and in-depth reporting that rise above the daily churn.

Here are the ones that caught our attention:

Dear Affy: A Futile Desperation for Laughter – Daniel Okechukwu

Does a Nollywood romantic comedy have to be silly to be funny? It is a question many have asked one too many times. When people complain about Nollywood’s comedy obsession, sometimes, it is not because of their abundance, but their desperation for laughs; this was evident in last year’s Knockout, which felt like a series of Instagram skits. Ditto The Wedding Party 2, Merry Men 1, The Accidental Spy, etc. Dear Affy is the latest inductee into this Comedy Hall of Shame.

Angelique Kidjo on Success, ‘World Music,’ and Championing new African Talent – Damola Durosomo

Last month, Angelique Kidjo won her fourth Grammy in the ‘Best World Music’ category. But it wasn’t quite like every other year she had been nominated for the award. This time she shared the nomination with fellow African act Burna Boy, the first artist of the continent’s current afropop scene to earn a nomination. While there’s no question that Kidjo, who won for her 2019 album Celia, was beyond deserving (this was by no means a Kendrick-Macklemore scenario), Kidjo made the conscious decision to dedicate her award to Burna and urged viewers to pay attention to the wealth of new talent coming from the continent.

What’s like Being a Gay Porn Star in Nigeria – Vincent Desmond

On most mornings, you’ll find Shaun sat in his car stuck in heavy Lagos traffic trying to make his way to his day job at an HR consultancy firm. “It’s the same routine daily, going to work and heading back,” he says.

At the weekends, he focuses on his side hustle: making amateur sex videos. His weekends typically involve locating a hotel that doesn’t have CCTV cameras, contacting potential partners, recording sex videos on his phone and then editing them before uploading them online. These videos, with their poor sound and basic editing, typically garner thousands of views within an hour of being uploaded and are loved by a relatively small but engaged audience within the Nigerian queer community.

To be Nigerian is to be Cold – Aisha Kabiru Mohammed

Growing up in Nigeria is to face poverty, horrible social amenities if you’re in the middle class, and the problems from unequipped schools and substandard teachers, before we can even deal with our personal problems. Many are depressed without even knowing it and that’s why we do not even care about anything until we can relate to it. Sympathy is something we have abandoned; our resilience has crushed our humanity.

Things Boy Do – Pemi Aguda

The first man stands at the bedside of his sweating wife. He is watching their baby emerge from inside her. What he does not know is that he is watching their son destroy her insides, shredding, making sure there will be no others to follow. This man’s wife is screaming and screaming and the sound gives the man a headache, an electric thing like lightning, striking the middle of his forehead. He reaches to hold her hand, to remind her of his presence. But he is surprised by the power of her latch, this strength born of pain, the way she crushes the bones of his fingers. He has to bite down to prevent himself from crying out.

The Zamfara Girls inspiring their Peers to Choose Education over Marriage – Chinedu Asadu

Poverty, culture and lack of orientation are among the common reasons why parents do not send their children to school in Zamfara, according to some residents and teachers who spoke to TheCable. Though basic education is free in the state, about 27 percent of children in the state have never been to school as of 2017, according to UNICEF. What is more? TheCable found out that a large chunk of those in school are in Gusau, the state capital, while most of those in the rural communities continue to suffer neglect, hence the interventions of development partners such as UNICEF.

Black Women and the Mule Syndrome – Rose Okeke

The Mule Syndrome is really hard to unlearn. Women are conditioned to live by it, so much that it becomes second nature. All over the world, women judge each other and themselves based on how well they can woo their men and keep them satisfied, especially to their own detriment. I’ve seen it happen firsthand a hundred times and, let me tell you something: it NEVER ends well for women. Never.

Meet Kola Tubosun, the Cultural Activist and Linguist Fighting for the Preservation of African Languages – Adaobi Ajebo

When I was way younger, my grandma always loved me more than my cousins because I was the ‘elite’ one who spoke English like the ‘Oyinbo’ people. Growing up, watching western cartoons that spoke only ‘English’ and trying my best to copy each character’s accent.

I was made to feel like speaking my native language was ‘razz’, the environment was set-up in a way that speaking my language made me less in society. I was praised when I spoke the colonial tongue ‘English’, which is Nigeria’s official-unofficial language. If you lived in Nigeria as a 90’s kid these are probably things you can relate to.

 

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