A Large Chair Does Not Make a King

With a change in attitude, work can now commence. Having determined site boundaries and ownership, the garden in question shall require a detailed site survey and analysis. This must be done by someone who thoroughly understands the rational landscape design/planning process and is able to follow it through its various inter-related stages to a successful conclusion. Therefore you must Use a Design Professional to Create a Garden that falls reasonably within your Budget.

The old adage warns us not to be “penny wise and pound foolish.” Using a landscape design professional ultimately saves you money. How? Well, you avoid the risk of making regrettable, uninformed decisions that could cost you. Making the best, highest quality decisions for a garden landscape is a great cost saver and by engaging a professional, you make the most of your budget. An expert will explore all the possibilities available in order to achieve the design brief within your budget, making the most of it.

This crucial preliminary stage ensures each step is spelt out to specifications facilitating a more efficient installation of the landscape. Increased efficiency immediately translates to lower overall costs. In the words of Paul "Red" Adair, “If you think a professional is expensive, wait 'til you try an amateur.”

A casual drive through any highbrow neighborhood will reveal row after row of stately homes with horrendous landscapes or, at best, second or third-rate attempts at greening. As a landscape specialist, I am confounded at how a homeowner can purchase or erect a magnificent million dollar edifice and then subsequently pick a ham-fisted roadside plant nursery vendor to establish its landscape. It’s as ludicrous as handing the Presidential limousine over to a roadside mechanic for a comprehensive overhaul!

I must offer a word of caution here, though. In Warri-speak, “Shine your eye!” Your quest for a landscape specialist will bring you into contact with all sorts of charlatans making stupendous claims. You will meet the certified, qualified, registered, card carrying “expert” who knows everything there is to know about agriculture, botany, geology and horticulture. Heck, he’s even mastered entomology. He leaves you with an incredible pumpkin-sized headache, distinctly more aware of the sorry state of your landscape than ever before. There’s just one niggling problem, however. By the time the job is completed and your savings account significantly depleted, your “consultant” may leave you with a most comprehensive didactic analysis of why your garden landscape somehow still doesn’t look or feel the way it should … even though you have just spent a fortune on it.

So how do you avoid falling prey to the green opportunist? First, you must always insist on a list of verifiable previous projects and clientele whom you can contact. Should your “expert” begin to proffer deeply multifarious explanations as to why he cannot possibly divulge the names of any of his previous clients to you…run like crazy! Secondly, don’t even consider engaging the services of anyone who is unwilling to provide post-establishment maintenance services. After all, is that not what the entire after sales warranty/guarantee business is about?

Apply fitting ability in the fitting place

Nigeria needs a more hands on approach by those who truly can. Enough with the committees and hot air and cliché-riddled speeches and seminars and even more committees and symposia! We need much more involvement from self-motivated men and women known for practical performance and with confirmed capacity. Such people must have enjoyed some quantifiable success (however modest) and possess impressive established records not only due to their aptitude in their respective fields, but also as a result of their meticulous application of fundamentally sound human resource, business and/or management principles.

I am not here refering to those cerebrally infertile misfits whose only claim to fame and fortune is contaminated wealth garnered through the reprehensible art of dipping into the till. That, for me, is far more illogical than intelligent since we all know that one day “the chickens will come home to roost.” Inversely, I am talking about efficient executors and practical performers; trail-blazers and game-changers. It has been wisely noted that those who can, perform. Those who can’t…well, they will pose, prop, prance, pontificate and, if given the chance, plunder and, as a result, be eventually  purged from our dear society.

The late, great Prof. Dora Akunyili (14 July 1954 – 7 June 2014) as Director General, National Agency for Food Drugs Administration and Control along with her colleague, Mallam Nasir Ahmad El-Rufai - Minister, Federal Capital Territory were both doers of deeds. Love them or loathe them, they were master executors who not only talked the talk, but certainly also walked the walk.

 Although I never much cared for Mallam El-Rufai’s intellectual arrogance, it was always refreshingly amusing to observe him constantly running rings around a giddy legislature before leaving them trailing in his wake. During his environmental blitzkrieg in November of 2003, I personally lost over N6,850,000.00 in direct legitimate environmental investments as a “collateral victim,” and was left with a brusque, meaningless apology. I shudder to imagine the amplitude of losses I might have sustained if I was the primary target of “Hurricane Rufai!” In retrospect, however, I realise it wasn’t entirely a loss as I acquired a great deal of experience through the highly convoluted processes of collaborating with the then Task Force on Greening, after which I garnered some goodwill from the Department of Parks and Recreation, Federal Capital Territory Administration. Win some, lose some, I guess.

In view of the raw deal I got during Mallam Nasir El-Rufai’s stint as FCT Minister, I should be the least likely person to have anything positive to say concerning the man. This much, however, I must concede. However flawed he might have been, El-Rufai had a clear purpose, he laid out a lucid plan, he had a procedure, and we saw the product. The only thing lacking, for me, was the final P… preservation. So much of what he accomplished has been either reversed or entirely obliterated. I believe this is partly due to his inability (or was it just stubborn refusal?) to endorse the much touted green manual which was to be some sort of regulatory policy framework, produced through a collaboration of stakeholders and government in order to significantly improve on the Abuja Environmental Protection Decree of 1997. Without a well-defined, comprehensive structure, little can be preserved. But that’s another story.

Isn’t it about time that we insist that holders of public trust be proven performers in previous projects and/or programs? I’m about to wade into murky waters here, but I’ve just about had enough of these Fellows of Institutes of Management who have never successfully managed even a small-scale business and Fellows of Institutes of Personnel Management who are unable to manage their domestic staff! Maybe this will drive the point home; while we’re at it, why not appoint an “Honorary General” as Chief of Army or Defence Staff, an “Honorary Judge” to the Supreme Court and an “Honorary Inspector General” to command the Nigeria Police Force?

We are unfortunately stuck, as a nation, in a rut today due to our foolish, fruitless fixation on flair and flamboyance and our unreasonable, unrealistic overemphasis on paper qualifications, many of which are not even worth the paper that they’re printed on. True to form, desperate and dubious Nigerians now use every means concievable, legal or not, to obtain these precious “tickets” to a better job, promotion or appointment. And where does that leave us? In “Toronto,” with a potpourri of policy makers and public officials who somehow mysteriously happened to “qualify” for the positions they occupy.

Inevitably, such people turn out to be not only thin-skinned, but highly intolerrant of any form of criticism, even if it be constructive. They are totally averse to change simply because it unsettles them and threatens their comfortable papier-mache thrones. In order to preserve the lie, these tingods will surround themselves with an unpolished horde of equally clueless and infinitely dimwitted acolytes who will stop at nothing to protect and sustain the jamboree.

In 1999, shortly after a young man named Salisu Buhari was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives, The News magazine broke the scandalous story that he had won the elections using forged University degrees purportedly obtained from the University of Toronto, Canada, and had also lied about his age, increasing it by 7 years. The magazine report stated that he had never attended the University of Toronto as he had claimed. Since then, in Nigeria, any snide reference to “Toronto” is considered a reference to certificate fraud.

On Thursday, July 23, 1999 a bewildered nation watched in utter shock and incredulity as The Speaker of the House of Representatives, on the exalted seat in the hallowed chambers, addressed his colleagues in tears. “I apologize to you. I apologize to the nation. I apologize to my family and friends for all the distress I have caused them. I was misled in error by zeal to serve the nation. I hope the nation will forgive me and give me the opportunity to serve again.”

Well, this nation has not only already forgiven him, but has given him the opportunity to serve again because on April 3, 2013, the Federal Government, in exercise of its executive powers, reconstituted the governing councils of federal universities and made elaborate appointments therein, including the appointment of Salisu Buhari into the Governing Council of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. The morality, or otherwise, of this appointment is left for the critics to judge, but the salient issue, for me, is that going by the assessment of the majority of his learned colleagues, Alh. Salisu Buhari surpassed all other contenders for the coveted seat. Even more intriguing is the undeniable probability that if the whistle had not been blown concerning his doctored certificate, Alh. Salisu Buhari, already extremely popular amongst his colleagues, may well have turned out to be a most dynamic, and possibly effective, Speaker of the House of Representatives. Crazy, isn’t it?

The private sector is by no means immune to this ‘certification cancer.’ In order to win this contract, or pass that job interview, dud qualifications are obtained. Bigger, of course, is always better since the aim is to blow away any form of reasonable competition. This oftentimes results in near-comical situations at the work place, like where you have a “doctorate degree” holder thoroughly rattled (with good reason!) by a simple yet germane, intellectual inquiry posed by a well educated undergraduate trainee. The former, having simply purchased a paper qualification which resulted in a plum executive position, is intimidated and threatened by the latter who is simply in the legitimate process of acquiring a decent applicable education.

Now, the presence of a counterfeit is positive proof that the original exists somewhere, and it is indeed heartwarming to note that truly competent men and women abound all over Nigeria who somehow, somewhere have aquired an applicable education. You will find them in the Nigerian Armed Forces, the Civil Service (federal and state), the Nigeria Police Force, Federal Road Safety Commission, the Customs and Immigration Services, Civil Defense Commission and, of course, in the private sector. These are the percieved sidekicks who in essence are Nigeria’s superheroes. Although they are the ones actually keeping the ships of industry and state afloat, they just don’t realise it yet and most probably never will. This grossly undervalued, proficient assemblage continue to give us hope that maybe, just maybe, “when lovers of wisdom become holders of political power…” somebody, please slap me awake!

In 2003 in Brazil, President Lula came to power on the wings of personal integrity and an established, recognizable track record. No pontifications here! His lack of formal education had not precluded his acquisition of necessary applicable education and hence did not impede his progress and performance in public life. Today he holds that most enviable distinction of being the key inspiration behind the metamorphosis of Brazil into the undeniably veritable economic force it has become today.

 

Okay, that’s one extreme, you might say. Let’s look at burgeoning trends in Europe. In both Greece and Italy, serving Prime Ministers who were veteran politicians were replaced by seasoned technocrats in 2012. The people chose to place their trust in only those whom they believed possessed both the capacity and inclination to deliver. In these two countries, affairs had gotten to a state where the populace would no longer condone tomfoolery and gerrymandering.

I believe Nigeria is somewhere around that point. The difference between us and our European cousins is that even with significantly heightened citizen awareness, we still appear not yet to have acquired the political sophistication to procedurally lay petitions or organise peaceful protests and effect or influence change. Somehow, ours almost always eventually tend to violence. Our security forces fare no better, as the majority of the lower-ranked personnel percieve society as being divided into two rival assemblages - us versus them. Too frequently, their primary response towards civilians is fiercely aggressive. All that remains to tip the scale right now is that final straw.

In Tunisia, it was a single act of insensitivity and injustice of the authorities towards a “common” fruit seller that sparked an uncommon revolution. The spillover effect challenged the calculations and predictions of the world’s foremost sociopolitical experts, sweeping away some of Africa’s most powerful leaders, and rattling global sociopolitical foundations. Europe was not spared. Neither was America. Till today, the embers of ‘people power’ are still smoldering all over the globe.

 

When I consider the trigger to the Tunisian uprising, and I observe similar or worse situations on a daily basis here in Nigeria, I fear that we are closer to boiling point than we even realize. What makes Nigeria’s situation even more worrisome is that already, we have a detritus of years of unresolved conflicts, distrust and tensions due to ethnic, religious, and regional disharmony. Now, factor in the endangered, debilitated, disgruntled middleclass, and class warfare is immediately  added to an already lethal cocktail.

Further delay in applying sensible redemptive measures in Nigeria will stimulate additional deterioration which can ultimately culminate in an inevitable societal upheaval of cataclysmic proportions. The sooner we get up out of our comfort zones and ‘snap to it,’ the better for us all. The traditional African adage advises us to quickly deal with anything that looks like a snake, instead of speculating on whether or not it is an earthworm as the “earthworm” may eventually grow to become a python one day … just like the Boko Haram sect. 

More models, less critics

We are all so quick to nitpick about everything that doesn't work in Nigeria, and yet are either hesitant or just too unwilling to volunteer solutions towards correcting anything. We must change this attitude. “Never complain about what you permit!” says Dr. Mike Murdock.

This country is certainly in no short supply of armchair critics and backseat drivers. You can easily spot them in barbershops and beer parlors, comfortably seated in the easy chairs, providing an unsolicited running commentary on the state of the nation and the global economy. Seemingly versatile, these ‘specialists’ know exactly how Nigeria can win the FIFA World Cup, yet they haven’t kicked a football in ten years, have never played the game competitively, and get all their knowledge from the six-month old issues of ‘Kickoff’ and ‘Complete Sports’  magazines that they find on the coffee tables. They have highfalutin' ideas on corporate finance and international trade, can manage the Nigerian economy much better than the Coordinating Minister, and yet are still unable to figure out a way to make the sort of decent, honest living that those working in the barbershop have somehow managed to do. In the words of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “A long tongue generally goes with a short hand, and we are most of us better at saying than doing.”

  

“The proof of desire is pursuit,” says Wisdom teacher, Dr. Mike Murdock. He gives this interesting account of a lady who, in conversation, mentions how she would love to play the piano, to which he replies nothing.

The next time they meet, she states again, “Oh, how I’d just love to play the piano!”  He still says nothing.

The third time, however, when she begins her speech, he cuts her short with a crisp query.

 “Do you own a piano?”

“Nope,” she replies.

“Well, do you plan on buying a piano?” he further asks.

“Nope, can’t afford it,” is her response.

He prods further, “Are you taking lessons, then?” to which she shakes her head.

“Then, shut up!” is Dr. Murdock’s final retort.

We must begin to act. The fact is that if we don’t, then others who are far less capable, will. Then we will find ourselves as the armchair critics, endlessly nitpicking and complaining about how much better it could have, or should have been done.

This composition is a speculative effort in abandoning the apathetic attitude with which I have customarily approached socio-economic and sociopolitical matters which directly affect me. It is dawning on me with increasing lucidity that sulking passivity by the sentient, yet imperturbable folks is what enables mediocrity to entrench itself and even burgeon.

Just take a look at the power sector. What hitherto had prompted the occasional giggle or a good party joke gradually metamorphosed into a positively horrific nightmare…and nobody’s laughing now! In light of this (no pun intended!), I hereby commit to enthusiastically exercise my right to freedom of expression by making my speculative and practical input, however modest, towards making a difference. This piece is intended, for me, to be archetypical of such efforts.

Attitudinal change precipitates focused effort. Once we realize that indeed we can, and should, positively influence change by whatever degree or scale we can, then we must immediately proceed to act upon our convictions. I am in total agreement with Mohandas Gandhi’s assertion that, “Action expresses priorities.” After all, faith without works is dead.

Seizing every opportunity that presents itself to live unabashedly by the life codes that I have chosen, I hereby venture to make a difference. As a firm believer in the power of suggestive influence, I will embark on a noiseless campaign of change by positive influence, regardless of by whatever infinitesimal degree or measure. One can only imagine the positive impact on our society if we all decided to bloom wherever we are planted!

“Should every man defend his house,

Then all would be defended;

If every man would mend a man,

Then all mankind were mended.”

Attitude…little thing, big difference

Very few prospective homeowners will actually factor a proper landscape into their plans. It is an established fact, however, that a good landscape is one of the few home improvements you can make that not only adds immediate value to your house, but also increases in value as the years go by. In the words of Lew Sichelman, although mechanical systems sooner or later wear down, interior decor and design concepts frequently go out of style, plants, on the other hand, will continue to grow fuller and more robust as the years go by.  "In fact, done correctly, the addition of trees, shrubs, plants, walks, lighting and patios can increase the value of your property by as much as 20 percent — almost instantaneously."

The first step in establishing a vibrant garden is attitudinal change. Garden landscapes are usually taken for granted and subsequently treated with far too much nonchalance. As a result of this lackadaisical attitude, the lawn is seldom, if ever, fertilized properly and mown very irregularly. After all, it is just grass, isn’t it?

Yet your eyes continue to wander across the fence to gaze wistfully at that beautiful lush lawn on the other side. You admire the well-manicured and edged groundcover and the beautifully honed hedges and trained topiaries. As your gaze grudgingly shifts back to the environmental chaos around you, you blame your underpaid, overworked, under skilled and overwhelmed gardener. You blame the kids. You blame the missus. You blame the dog. And yet the groundcover is left to its own devices and the trees and shrubbery grow wantonly.

This delinquent mind-set precipitates the neglect of basic yet crucial establishment and maintenance procedures such as soil conditioning, aeration, pruning, grooming, edging and trimming. How hard can it be? After all, they’re getting it right next door, aren’t they?

If stark envy and self-worth aren’t enough to get you to change your general attitude towards landscaping, maybe you need to consider a few words from Dr. N. M. David, as he elucidates six further reasons for landscaping your home or office.

1.       Trees are nature’s air conditioners. A single isolated tree may transpire approximately 88 gallons (400 liters) of water per day. This is comparable to five average room air conditioners, each with a capacity of 2500 kcal/hr, running 20 hours a day. Trees casting their shade on the walls and roof of a building can greatly reduce the heat transmission caused by solar radiation. Even on a hot day, temperatures can drop by 10 degrees Celsius under trees due to cooling breezes produced by convective air currents and shading from direct sunlight.

2.       Soft ground surfaces (groundcover or lawn) around a building can reduce heat reradiated from the ground. During the dry season, ground re-radiation, normally reflected towards the windows, is significantly reduced by green groundcover that absorbs solar radiation. On the contrary, hard ground surfaces reflect as well as absorb heat and radiate it back into the atmosphere, increasing outdoor temperature.

3.       For indoor landscaping, potted shade loving plants are ideal as absorbents for indoor pollutants like cigarette smoke and odors. They control dust levels and effectively counter the harmful effects of toxic vapors from new paint, polish and upholstery.

4.       Water bodies adjacent to a building cool the air passing over it, thus improving the microclimate and significantly improving human thermal comfort.

5.       Tall trees used as windbreakers can serve either of two functions. The universal use of such plantings is as a barrier, reducing wind pressure around a house. Another less popular, but no less effective, function is to serve as a funnel increasing wind pressure and improving ventilation through a house.

6.       In the Middle East, two courtyards – one with soft and the other with hard landscape – are used to induce air current in the adjoining rooms. The courtyard with soft landscape tends to be cooler than the one with the hard landscape. As temperature and pressure are inversely proportionate, the cooler courtyard attains greater air pressure and moves towards the courtyard with lower air pressure, thus inducing air movement where there was none.

These scientific facts, for me, make home and office landscaping an absolute must in Nigeria where the weather tends to be almost unbearably hot for most of the year.

          

            

Green Musings - A View from the Gazebo

Nigeria could be steadily gravitating towards the most monumental societal upheaval ever before witnessed this side of the equator. Mark my words; this is no mindless repetition of the predominant news theme of the hour vis-a-vis the more recent Arab and African uprisings.

 

 A casual drive through any given Nigerian city at any time of day will reveal the tell-tale signs of societal atrophy that eventually give rise to anarchism. Scores of youths can be seen ambling about the streets and byways with apparently nothing better to do. The majority of these layabouts, quite devoid of erudition and bereft of basic vocational skills, label themselves ‘hustlers’ (a questionably hazy taxonomy sometimes sinister in implication). For them, almost any job is good enough. Scary, eh? Those amongst them who will readily claim, and indeed produce, one academic certificate or the other, make up the rank and file of the ingloriously branded ‘unemployable graduates’ -unemployable for the most embarrassing reasons such as ill-equipped, underfunded and unaccredited primary, secondary and tertiary institutions which consequently disempower rather than empower. There is also the disturbing fact that some certificates are either simply purchased a’ la black market or, even worse, printed illegally. 

How about the scores of brilliant minds, respected at home and abroad, that this nation has produced, you may ask? I’ll give that back to you. How about them? Look around you and tell me what appreciable difference they have been able to make. Their success in this hostile, unyielding, and complex-riddled “mediocretacy” is nothing short of miraculous! This fortunate minority has flourished in spite of the system, not because of it, and is essentially but a drop in the ocean of the perpetually unemployable throng that is mass-produced by our tertiary institutions and disgorged onto the Nigerian society year after year.

Why still, you may further query, must so grim a stance be taken on so potentially great a nation? After all, the mantra has been “good people, great nation.” I will respond with another question. Pray tell, what use is potential which perpetually lingers, for the most part, constricted, stunted and/or undeveloped? Langston Hughes captures this condition in his poem, ‘Montage of a Dream Deferred.’

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a

sore - and then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over-

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Let’s compare Nigeria to a poorly tended garden where glimpses of beauty and intelligent design can still be seen in the main garden entrance and other select areas where the gardeners have concentrated most of their efforts. The greater part of the garden, however, has become hideously overgrown with dense brushwood and wild foliage. Carefully developed, it would amount to something beautiful like a theme park, leisure garden or a children’s playground. Doing this would, however, entail development of a well thought-out design and its subsequent implementation, followed by a sustained, well-structured maintenance schedule. Purpose, Plan, Procedure, Product and, of course …Preservation.

As an indigenous business owner with an unequivocally apolitical worldview, I venture to offer but a straightforward, working man’s perspective. I will steer clear of any form of intellectualization because I choose not to be in denial. Instead of posing unanswerable questions, I prefer to lean more towards exploring practicable solutions. Janis Joplin posits that, “Being an intellectual creates a lot of questions and no answers.” As a seasoned landscape specialist I will guarantee that I obviate any form of ultracrepidarianism (“the cobbler should not criticize a work of art above the sandal”) by keeping these musings strictly within my professional purview. It is for this reason that I intend to depict Nigeria as a poorly tended garden in dire need of rejuvenation and comprehensive upgrade. Pardon me as I adopt a simplistic matter-of-fact approach. It has served me quite well thus far and I make bold to say that I have a bevy of very satisfied high-profile clients to show for it.

  

You may not particularly share some of my opinions and may even consider my approach too green. Well, for me, if it’s green it’s good so I’ll take that as a compliment. I proffer no quick-fix solutions because there aren’t any. The most profound thing Mother Nature has taught me is that she operates at her own terms. Understand her, respect her, nourish her, love her… and she will readily conform to your will. Push her, and she will just as readily demonstrate her considerable power to ultimately subdue. 

This is no academic treatise. Seriously, I’m just too decidedly non-conformist to take that approach. More importantly, however, I consider it more sapient to leave the didactics of academics to the academicians. I will stay strictly and safely within the bounds of my proficiency, prudently eschewing the illusive, provocative allure of pseudo-academics.

You can have this assurance, nevertheless. The least you will come away with is a relatively inexpensive foundation course on the basic principles of landscape design, establishment and maintenance.  

I have been compiling Green Musings for a number of years now. They are basically a collection of random reflections on my profession juxtaposed with sociopolitical considerations in my beloved country, Nigeria. My method is highly unorthodox, to say the least. That is intentional. I have always chosen, in line with Ralph Waldo Emerson’s suggestion, not to go where the path may lead, but to “go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”