Stella Damasus

I must tell you that what I saw was so heart wrenching that I broke down. The girls in the ward were between 10 and 14 and they were all mothers. Their kids had HIV, some of them had Vesico Vagina Fistula, VVF, and some had surgery to repair the effects of the abortions that had been done.

I came back to my own country and then felt like wool had been removed from my eyes because I started to meet little girls who were in so much trouble.

We are worrying about oil, business, aviation, power, government etc; meanwhile our future is fast going down the drain.

After I wrote down the idea, I left it and moved on to do other things but my spirit kept troubling me and my conscience would not stop pricking me. And so one day I decided to revisit the idea. Coincidentally, I met with the founder of Project Alert, Mrs Josephine Effah Chukwumah, who decided to make me an ambassador. Through this I was exposed to a lot of things happening to women that no one wanted to talk about. I was so moved and inspired that I decided to help fight the injustice.

In the course of all this, I also discovered that young girls have issues but they have no one to talk to, most cannot talk to their mothers, sisters or friends for fear of gossip. They can’t even talk to guidance counsellors because they believe counsellors are answerable to the head of school who will in turn tell their parents. Pastors are totally out of it.
At the end of the day, it turned out that they were going through a lot within their environment from their fathers, brothers, neighbours, teachers and house helps but can’t cry out.

Women who were also going through domestic violence did not even know they can be protected by the law, young girls in unhealthy relationships because of the promise of education don’t know they can get help and stand strong.
A lot of young women don’t know that they can learn and train to do any kind of work that they have the passion for without thinking it’s for the opposite sex only.

Most Teenagers don’t have parents who are bold enough to talk to them about sex before they hear it in school. When schools teach sex education, they talk about the parts of the body, what it can do and the fact that it will lead to pregnancy. They don’t tell them the psychological and emotional part of it, they don’t explain to the girls that they can say no and mean no, they don’t make them realise how important their bodies are. As the school depends on their parents to do the dirty job, the parents are too embarrassed to discuss it, so they wait for the school to do it. At the end of the day who is losing?

I finally gathered the courage to set up ADIVA which is a mentorship programme that helps women and young girls to rediscover themselves, unlock their potential, find their inner strength and become the best they can, also using God’s word.

I have seen different sides of life, from being married to being a mother and then a widow, a star, being judged and castigated, divorced, losing everything and starting all over again, running away from God out of anger and finding him again, from doubting myself to finding myself again and experiencing restoration.

It is tagged “Real Talk”. Let’s talk about God, men, sex, money and everything between. Admission is free and it is strictly for female folks who are 15 years and above.

Let us join hands and raise a generation of strong, beautiful, intelligent, decent, bold, industrious and courageous women.

A friend sent me a link and when I opened it, I was so touched by the story that i decided to share it with you all.

Really heart touching.........

I was walking around in a Big Bazar store making shopping, when I saw a Cashier talking to a boy couldn't have been more than 5 or 6 years old..

The Cashier said, 'I'm sorry, but you don't have enough money to buy this doll. Then the little boy turned to me and asked: ''Uncle, are you sure I don't have enough money?''

I counted his cash and replied: ''You know that you don't have enough money to buy the doll, my dear.'' The little boy was still holding the doll in his hand.

Finally, I walked toward him and I asked him who he wished to give this doll to. 'It's the doll that my sister loved most and wanted so much . I wanted to Gift her for her BIRTHDAY.

I have to give the doll to my mommy so that she can give it to my sister when she goes there.' His eyes were so sad while saying this. 'My Sister has gone to be with God.. Daddy says that Mommy is going to see God very soon too, so I thought that she could take the doll with her to give it to my sister...''

My heart nearly stopped. The little boy looked up at me and said: 'I told daddy to tell mommy not to go yet. I need her to wait until I come back from the mall.' Then he showed me a very nice photo of him where he was laughing. He then told me 'I want mommy to take my picture with her so my sister won't forget me.' 'I love my mommy and I wish she doesn't have to leave me, but daddy says that she has to go to be with my little sister.' Then he looked again at the doll with sad eyes, very quietly..

I quickly reached for my wallet and said to the boy. 'Suppose we check again, just in case you do have enough money for the doll?''

'OK' he said, 'I hope I do have enough.' I added some of my money to his with out him seeing and we started to count it. There was enough for the doll and even some spare money.

The little boy said: 'Thank you God for giving me enough money!'

Then he looked at me and added, 'I asked last night before I went to sleep for God to make sure I had enough money to buy this doll, so that mommy could give It to my sister. He heard me!'' 'I also wanted to have enough money to buy a white rose for my mommy, but I didn't dare to ask God for too much. But He gave me enough to buy the doll and a white rose. My mommy loves white roses.'

I finished my shopping in a totally different state from when I started. I couldn't get the little boy out of my mind. Then I remembered a local news paper article two days ago, which mentioned a drunk man in a truck, who hit a car occupied by a young woman and a little girl. The little girl died right away, and the mother was left in a critical state. The family had to decide whether to pull the plug on the life-sustaining machine, because the young woman would not be able to recover from the coma. Was this the family of the little boy?

Two days after this encounter with the little boy, I read in the news paper that the young woman had passed away.. I couldn't stop myself as I bought a bunch of white roses and I went to the funeral home where the body of the young woman was exposed for people to see and make last wishes before her burial. She was there, in her coffin, holding a beautiful white rose in her hand with the photo of the little boy and the doll placed over her chest. I left the place, teary-eyed, feeling that my life had been changed for ever...

The love that the little boy had for his mother and sister still, to this day, hard to imagine. Ansd in a frection of a second, a drunk driver had taken all this away from him.

 

PLEASE DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE

 

Now you have 2 choices:

 

1) Forward this message or

 

2) Ignore it as if it never touched your heart

 

For those who prefer to think that God is not watching over us... gop ahead and delete this. For the rest of us .... pass this on. 

 

The value of a man or woman resides in what he or she gives, not in what they are capable of receiving.

It is with great pleasure that I introduce to you ADIVA. This is the initiative of Nigerian movie icon STELLA DAMASUS. ADIVA is a mentorship program that helps women and young girls unlock their potentials using God’s word and principles, thus becoming the best they can ever be.

Stella Damasus is a household name in the African entertainment industry but beyond that, she is an accomplished teacher, singer, philanthropist, woman rights activist, mother and an intense lover of God.

Having worked with several organisations around the world in the fight against domestic violence, child enslavement, prostitution and campaign for female empowerment, Stella Damasus has seen the need to re-orientate and mentor young women. Having gone through personal struggles herself and still attained the height of international stardom, her mission is to make sure the average Nigerian woman can attain her full potential.

This is why she has organized the first ADIVA session in Abuja tagged REAL TALK. She intends to teach young ladies the need to run from every temptation of running after men and money, the dangers of pre-marital sex and how to value their bodies as the temple of God. These are issues that some parents are too afraid to discuss with their daughters.

Date: Friday 28th September, 2012
Venue: Savannah Suites, 8 Faskari Street, Garki, Area 3.
Time: 10am - 2pm prompt.


Please call LILIAN on 08067963535 for further enquiries. We await a positive response from you. God bless you.

This event is strictly for women and young ladies ONLY. No men are allowed. You must be 15 years old and above to attend. Admission is free.

There is a quote in the book that touches me every time I read it so I have decided to share it with you.

“Happiness is never something you get from other people. The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.”

For every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction. In THE COLOR PURPLE, the character Celie explained it to Mister: “Everything you try to do to me, already done to you.”

Today I try to do well and be well with everyone I reach or encounter. I make sure I use my life for that which can be goodwill. Yeah, this has brought me great wealth. More importantly, it has fortified me spiritually and emotionally.

I’ll never forget this couple who appeared on my show. The wife couldn’t understand why their relationship had broken down. She kept saying, “He used to make me so happy, He doesn’t make me happy anymore.”

If you think something is missing in your life or you’re not getting what you deserve, remember that there’s no Yellow Brick Road. You lead life; it doesn’t lead you.

This is the part I want you to read and meditate on. Many people blame other people, things or situations for their unhappiness but they don’t realize that the truth of the matter is that they are really unhappy because they have decided to give that problem front seat in their lives.

Love yourself, love others around you and I can bet you that you will be happier with yourself, your life, those around you, the things you do and so much more.





Quote: What you’re thinking, what you’re saying, what you’re doing, is having an impact on you and the people around you right now —Oprah Winfrey.

I had planned to talk about something else this week but something stronger happened and I feel so much pain in my heart that I just felt I should share this with you.

Last week was very interesting and thought provoking, it was for me a learning process. I didn’t even realise that last week’s article would be one of the most controversial that I have ever written but it’s a good thing because I like to do things that would make people think, that would provoke people to share their knowledge. It’s just a matter of touching people’s emotions and getting them to air their views.

However, we all have to be careful how we air our views. It’s okay to be emotional about things but then again people have to learn to criticise constructively. Even when you are against what somebody has said in an article or even when you don’t agree with it, it is advisable to teach the person, it’s advisable to correct the person and not insult him or her.

I went over some of the responses to my last week’s article. I was very impressed with some people who taught me a lot of things that I didn’t know. A lot of people opened my eyes to more things; they directed me to some verses in the Bible to encourage me, teach me and guide me in my quest for knowledge.

If you remember, the article was titled: My Questions About Christianity (which was originally I Have Questions). I know that I never came across as one who claimed to know it all and who was pointing fingers. I was asking why things are the way they are based not only on personal experiences but experiences from people around me, experiences from places that I have been to and reports that I have received and things that I have read from even the newspapers who got direct information.

Those were what formed the questions that I asked and the idea was to put the message out there for people to know that this lady wants to try and find out what should be but a lot of people misunderstood that. A lot of people came at me with name-calling, and all sorts of unthinkable things but through it all I had a blast.

I also want to thank those readers who responded and made me feel that it was a good thing to try to enlighten people on what’s going on so that people can be aware and be careful of what they listen to, who they listen to and where they go.

It was lovely and refreshing to hear from you all but then that also leads me to another issue that I’m going to raise again this week, so if this whole season is going to be filled with controversies then I don’t mind. It means that I am saying things that people are sweeping under the carpet and if it takes me to touch their emotions for them to react and come out of their shells, then so be it.

I feel that if you have anything to say, if you are so educated and a great student of theology as a lot of people have claimed to be, then you should be teaching people and telling them the truth, not waiting for somebody else to bring it up and then incur your to insult.

So, since I know that I am nowhere near being an authority in the things of the Bible or things of life, I have decided to do something different this week.

I read a book called Open Heavens every week written by Pastor Enoch Adeboye who is one of the most respected men of God in the world today and I am sure everybody agrees with me when it comes to our Christian faith.

A lot of people have become victims of lies which is one of the questions I was asked in the last article but , let me read some parts of this article, Victims of Lies, from the book (Monday 20 August’s edition) and then you will understand what I mean.

It reads: “If you enjoy being flattered, you are a lover of lies. Your self deception will soon land you into trouble.” Beyond lying to one another, lying has assumed a frightening dimension. How? Lying is now a common feature in the House of God. In fact, lying has become a big money spinner in the House of God.

“Since people love to hear lies and they flock around those who will tell it to them. If instead of hearing the undiluted word of God you prefer to run from one prophet to another then you are a lover of lies and you may soon be a winning victim of deception.”

It is also explained in the book: “If you are a lover of visions beware or else you would become a victim of lies. Any prophetic declaration that has raised your hope coming from merchandising prophets and pastors will surely disappoint you. In some places, when a lady wants a particular man as her husband, all she needs to do is to bribe the prophet or prophetess and later the leader will go into acrobatics. At some point he will say, “Thus sayest the Lord, Brother so and so, Sister so and so is your wife”.

“Those of you who go to your pastor to pray for you and tell you who to marry, if care is not taken you will become a victim of lies. You are simply lazy, no pastor or prophet should tell you who to marry, they are to pray along with you, counsel and guide you, using the word of God. If you fail to pay the price to hear from God on that matter, you may be deceived. God can use your pastor or a genuine prophet of God to confirm what he had already told you. Many homes have been established on falsehood and that is why things are falling apart and the centre cannot hold. Some pastors are seriously into match-making, they have taken over from the Holy Spirit. Match-making remains God’s prerogative and he has not delegated it to any pastor.”
What I have just written out for you was taken from Open Heavens and I was so blessed and relieved when I read it because at a point, a lot of people made me feel that I was talking out of ignorance but the truth of the matter is that the institution called marriage belongs to God.

I have had my own fair share; I have had my own challenges and my own issues. I am not ashamed to say this. Nobody can judge me because if you judge me you will be judged as well. There is nobody that has not faced one issue or the other in their life, whether it is marriage, work, relationship, career or whatever it is that they are doing. But the truth of the matter is that the day we begin to submit ourselves to false prophets and start asking them questions about things that we should go on our knees and ask God, that is the day that our problems will start.

According to what this book has said, a lot of people go to their pastors and say, “Oh pastor, I need a husband” and the pastor will tell you don’t worry, after praying for you I will tell you who your husband is and they will call a brother’s name and say, “this is the man you are supposed to marry, that’s what God told me.”

I, Stella, still insist that if God can speak to you and tell you, then I can also go down on my knees myself and say “God, please in your own time, according to your will, let me find the person that you have destined for me.” And he will answer me.

A lot of people have married the wrong partners without knowing it. They get stuck in a union and it becomes difficult to come out. When that union starts to face serious challenges then you begin to ask “where you went wrong, not knowing that you have been deceived into getting into the wrong union because you believe that a pastor has every answer in the world and as for me, that is not true.

My pastor should teach, guide and tell me where to read, tell me how to pray when I am not certain about the approach, make me attend bible and wisdom class so I can get to know and understand the Holy Spirit, be my spiritual head and let me know that if I have a problem I should go on my knees and pray to our God. A good pastor should tell you to go and read so and so verses in the bible; he should preach salvation and the need to study the word. He should encourage me to stick to my God and never forget his word which says there is heaven and hell.

A lot of people are in trouble today because they want to hear things that will favour and please them. They will rather spend their life savings on people to pray on their behalf. It’s a different thing when you go to a man of God and say I want you to pray with me in agreement. The Bible says, “Where two or more are gathered I am there in their midst.” There is absolutely nothing wrong in asking your pastor to pray with you. But when you neglect your own responsibilities to go on your knees and pray to God you will be deceived in the hands of false prophets.

You go to a man of God, give him money and ask him to pray for you, then you go to your bed and sleep. When the man of God calls you to say, “It was revealed to me that if you do not bring N10 million and sacrifice five cows in this place to sprinkle the blood around your office you will not get the contract,” of course you will run to and fro, raise the money and do the sacrifice because you believe that your man of God is a powerful man. When God does things for you, he does not get the glory because you now decide that it is the man of God that did it for you.

These are part of the questions that I am asking: why do we depend on pastors for all the answers without searching for God’s word and asking the holy spirit to teach us? When he says you can go on you knees, call on me and by faith, through the name of Jesus Christ,that he will grant your heart desires, he meant it. Why would you pay for somebody to pray for you? Why would you ask a pastor to be the one to decide who your husband is?. According to Pastor Adeboye, match-making and marriage is God’s idea, it’s God’s divine institution but a lot of us have missed it totally and put ourselves in so much confusion. We do things by ourselves, believing that we are wise and intelligent enough to know and we go to people who will deceive us. But the Bible is there for us to get all the answers from.

So, to all those people who said those horrible things to me, I’m a Christian and I love my God without apology, I love him with everything I hold dear, I love him with my body, spirit, mind and soul and that is why I refuse to see people perish for lack of knowledge. I want to acquire as much knowledge as I can so I can also help people to understand some things. I will not sit in my house, fold my arms and watch the children of God perish. I will not sit and watch those people who are supposed to know and love God move around in ignorance. So, no matter what you say to me, no matter how much you insult me or abuse me, I will not stop asking questions, I will not stop looking for the truth, I will not stop reading my Bible and I will not stop saying the truth as I see it, no matter what.

I have often wondered about Christianity and what a lot of people have said about it.
Growing up, I saw Christianity in a different light, as an adult it meant something else to me but now I am very grateful to God that I have started finding out exactly what it is to be called a Christian.
But sadly, I have also discovered how many people have taken it upon themselves to destroy the meaning of that word, how they have turned it into a business venture, how they have turned the minds of the people to what they want it to be, those people that they call ‘False Prophets’ who are all over the place deceiving people, lying to people, creating wrong image of the religion.
It is funny the way people talk about religion because as Christians, we believe that it is our religion that is ‘the’ religion, so also are Muslims, they believe that their religion is ‘the’ religion and the only one.

When I look at our Muslim brothers and sisters in the world today, I see that they take their religion so seriously that they can die for it, I see that their doctrine guides and rules them so much that nothing can change it and I see the love they have for their Quran. When you see the way they handle their Quran, where they put it, how they guard it, you will not even dare touch it.
Let me tell you a true life story about a wealthy businessman man who lives in Lagos State. He is a well respected man and owns a huge estate in the state. But for security reasons I won’t mention his name.
One day, this man was in the car with his driver heading for the airport. Before they drove out of the estate, he checked his time and realised it was time for prayers. It was during their fasting period, so he had to pray to break his fast. He looked around him to see where he could pray but found none. He eventually spotted a place and told his driver to stop. He came out of his car and ran to the quarters, where the security guards of his own estate stay. He saw the security guard there with his mat, washing his hands, getting ready for prayers, the man is a Muslim and obviously the security guard is a Muslim as well.
This wealthy man collected the security guard’s plastic kettle, did ablution and went to pray with the security man on the same mat.
Now, look at the difference between a highly placed man in the society and a security guard, whose duty is just to guard the entrance of the estate. See what brought them together without shame, without judgement, without thoughts like, ‘Oh, this security guard might be smelly, or his clothes are tattered, or how can I, the owner of this estate sit on the mat of a common security guard”. There was no segregation! The one thing that brought them together is their faith, their religion and their belief, because they believe in the same God, they live by the same doctrine, they read the same Quran, everything about their religion is one, they fight for the same cause, they believe in the same things.
If a Nigerian, who is a Muslim,travels outside the country and meets Muslims from different countries, they would pray together, the same way, with the same words to the same God.

But I look at our own faith, we who claim to be Christians, and I see all the deception and lies. How come it is the Christian world that has a million and one different denominations? The same Christianity has denominations that fight among themselves, the same Christianity has one denomination that would tell you, you can only get to God through Jesus Christ; some will tell you, you can only get to God through the Virgin Mary; some will tell you, you can only get to God through a Saint while some will tell you, you can only get to God through a man of God or through a Prophet.
Some will tell you if you don’t cover your hair you are not a Christian, some will say it is okay not to cover your hair, some will tell you it is okay to wear trousers to church and some will say it is not.
Some will say “in our doctrine, we don’t fast,” some will say offering and tithe is every Sunday, some will say no, some will say you cannot marry outside of our church, some will say anybody can ordain you and you can become a pastor over night as long as you can memorise the verses, and some worship, respect and fear their pastors more than they fear God. EVERYTHING IS DIFFERENT!
We do not even have a united front but we all come together and say we are Christians. How many Christians do you know that value their so-called Bibles? I go around a lot, I talk to people a lot, some of their Bibles have been in the same place for ages, some of them treat their Bibles like toilet tissue.
When we want to produce movies, we know that we dare not insinuate some things that have to do with the Muslim faith. They will not accept it, they will fight you, they protect their own to the last, but when it comes to us, we easily allow Christianity to be turned into something I don’t even understand.
We do not support our faith, we do not even believe in it enough to stand by it, stand for it and fight for it, so why pretend? Why do we come off as righteous people but if we look deeper, we are judgmental, we backbite, we find it difficult to see others get ahead? I have a lot of questions to ask Christians.

Some people have turned the Bible upside down, some people have misinterpreted the Bible for selfish purposes and some have turned the church into a business venture.
Well, I’m tired of sitting down and wondering. God did not give us the Bible to confuse us. No he didn’t, he gave everybody a sound mind. So I have a right to ask questions, I have a right to search for the truth. So I have decided to go on this journey to find out the truth about Christianity so that people will get to understand those things that different people have said to them.
If we do not get to the bottom of it, then you know that there is a problem. Join me as I invite as many pastors as I can to a round table discussion, I will sit with them and ask them these questions that have been confusing us for a while.
I’m going to ask different pastors different questions and I will see how many of them will boldly accept my invitation. I’m going to make it a television programme that will be on air nationwide. I hope you’ll be there with me, so that if you have questions, doubts or advice, anything you have to say you can let us know.
We all need to find out the truth about who we truly are as Christians. It is high time we stopped allowing some men to dictate to us how we should live our lives and who we should be when the answers are all there in the Bible.

So when the preachers come we will match them Bible for Bible, verse for verse and we will talk about different things so that the confusion can end. We have to understand our faith so that when they start to change ‘Christianity to Xtianity, we should start being careful, when we are seeing the signs of the end time and people are laughing and saying this one is turning to SU, this one is turning to church girl.

I’m saying this boldly to as many people that care to listen. The end time is now. Honestly, I don’t want to go to hell, I don’t want my family to go to hell and I’m certainly not going to allow false prophets and fake people who want to use us to make money to dictate to me what Christianity is about. So we are going to ask them to prove it and tell us what their doctrines stand for.
If you have any comments, please send them to me on stelladamasus@gmail.com .
 
Stella's Quote of the day : Remember, the Bible says my people perish for the lack of knowledge. Knowledge is power, let us search for the truth once and for all.

I met a young man a few years ago who turned out to be like a brother to me. One would think that music would bring us together because he is a musician, but it was his giving and kind heart that caught my attention and brought us together. I wanted to tell you all about him and all he has been doing but I have decided to let him tell you who he is:


I’m Yinka Lawanson a.k.a Lamboginny,a young Nigerian entertainer. I’ve been in the music industry for about 12 years now and I’ve worked with various top Nigerian entertainers. I have a pet project called Lamboginny Say NO To Crime and it’s set up to fight against crime.
It all started as a dream. I never thought or planned that Lamboginny Say NO To Crime would be where It is today, I just found myself doing it.
The experience fighting against crime has been a lot of hard work but at the end of the day it’s worth the effort. First, as I always say, fighting crime is everybody’s business. When I started the Say No To Crime movement, it was quite difficult. The society did not really believe in it because I wasn’t a security agent and I didn’t have a security background. All I had was the experience I gained from being in showbiz; I knew my fan base and I felt I could use my talent to re-engineer the minds of both the society and prison inmates in Nigeria. I believed I could use music to distract them from criminal activities.

This whole journey started in 2009. I had my first anti- crime campaign concert in Medium Security Prison, Kirikiri, Apapa, Lagos. We had over 16 top Nigerian entertainers who were involved in the project. But it wasn’t so easy to get volunteers because prison is a place no one wants to be.
It is usually difficult to find someone that is not a pastor or an imam that would wake up and wants to visit a prison. In between my research and fight against crime in Nigeria, I have come to realise that those in the security sector just live their lives on a daily basis. They no longer take it as a duty to inform and remind the general society about the rules and laws governing the country.
I started from the prison because it is the end point of any kind of crime committed. When you look at the sector in Nigeria, you would understand what I mean. I met the former Controller General of Nigerian Prisons Service, Mr Olushola Ogundipe, in Abuja few years ago and he endorsed the Say NO to Crime campaign. Since then the prison doors have been left open for our concerts. Between 2009 and 2010, with the assistance of a friend, I was able to produce an all-star song and video that featured celebrities from both the music and movie industries.
I had a total of 32 celebrities and we recorded a song titled: I no go lose my head, which is now the official song for the Say NO To Crime campaign. I did this song because I felt every time this song is played, there is someone out there that would have a rethink about involving himself in criminal activities. By the end of 2010, I was honorarily appointed a Prison Officer because of the good work my little initiative has done for my country.

It became a different ball game in 2011 because I was able to get more ambassadors on my team. Stella Damasus also came on board. I remember that I personally walked up to her and told her about the pet project and she shared the same vision with me.
We started with a concert in the female prison on 7 January, 2011, where so many celebrities in the entertainment industry came to show their love to the female inmates.
We had the likes of Onyeka Onwenu, Shan George, Stella Damasus, Chidinma from Project Fame, AY Dot Com, Sexy Steel, Dekunle Fuji, Jedi, DJRowland and Jafextra. By the time we were done with the female prison I came up with an initiative called “Season in Prison.”
Season in Prison is all about celebrating all the festive seasons we celebrate outside in the prison as well. This helps in the healing of the criminal mind. This is because the more you remind them of all the festivals they have celebrated outside the prison with their families, the more they will have a rethink and want to be better people so that they can be with their families again.
So I did what I call the VIP Concert, called Valentine In Prison. Many celebrities including Midnight Crew, Denrele Edun, TIm Godfrey & the Extreme Crew, AK1, Dr Dele Momodu, Stella Damasus and Shan George came to show their love and the inmates loved every bit of it.
After that I had Fela Durotoye in a session with the female inmates when he came to celebrate Fela Durotoye at 40. Stella Damasus also came to give the female inmates a lecture. I believe it goes a long way when a celebrity has such moment with inmates, it is something they would never forget.
After Stella Damasus’ lecture, we had Christmas in Prison, which was all about celebrating with the inmates during Christmas.

Coming into 2012 with my experience with these inmates I realised that not all the inmates are capital offenders. While some of them are minor offenders, I discovered that many of the inmates have no reason to be there.
Considering the fact the states have not been allowed to build their own prisons, most of the state security agencies end up sending minor offenders to federal prisons if they cannot pay their fine.
So I gathered some of my friends like PSquare, Stella Damasus, Laide Bakare, TillaMan, Jafextra, Skales, Osita Iheme (Pawpaw), Denrele Edun, Karen Igho, Ilami Akio, and we contributed money to get 32 helpless inmates out of the prison. These are inmates that were convicted for minor offences and were just wasting away.

One of my cries to the government is to stop keeping minor offenders in the same prison with those that have committed capital offences.
When security agencies in states arrest people for minor offences, I don’t think it is appropriate that they should be taken to federal prisons. There should be some sort of remand homes for people that commit minor offences in each state of the federation. For example, it is not right to put a young guy arrested for hawking legal products on the street in order to survive (we are not saying that it’s good to disobey the law) into a prison meant for capital offenders.
Most capital offenders engage in criminal activities and it would be easier for them to convince these young boys arrested for minor offences to turn to crime by promising to bail them so that they can go outside and complete their unfinished business.
The young boy in question would likely take the bait because he would get his freedom and gain some extra money, even though he doesn’t know what this job he is asked to do entails.
Say NO To Crime is a platform that brings the security sector, the entertainment world, the general society and offenders together to fight against crime. We need to fight crime. I will give you an analogy. In the 80s, the rate at which HIV/AIDS was killing people across Africa was so high but everybody came together to campaign against it. And today, the number of people dying of HIV/AIDS in Africa has reduced . I’m not saying I can eradicate crime single-handedly because the fight against crime is everybody’s business. If we can come together as one, I believe the campaign against crime would be more effective. Consequently, criminal activities would reduce drastically in the society.

In an interview I had some months ago, when it was raised that this generation is already corrupt and what are our plans to save the generations after us? I identified ignorance as the problem. In Nigeria, we don’t have books that educate children about crime and how to prevent it.
As I write this article, I have published a book titled: Say NO To Crime, which will help educate the younger generation about crime and criminal activities.
Crime has increased to such an alarming rate that we can no longer treat it with levity. We need to hit the nail on the head and find an effective way of addressing the issue.
If you get into a juvenile prison you will understand what I mean. We have young boys and girls that have committed all sorts of crimes that you can’t even imagine or want to think about. So when you examine how crime has eaten deep into our system, you will agree with me that we don’t have a choice but to go back to the drawing board. I believe that with the help of God, we will be able to make a change.
Already, security agencies are partnering with us in the fight against crime. I have the support of the Nigerian Prison Service, Nigerian Immigration, Civil Defence, Nigerian Red Cross Society, Stella Damasus Arts Foundation, Aki and Paw Paw Child Care foundation, Nigerian Prison Officers Wives Association and over 40 top Nigerian celebrities are ambassadors to Say NO To Crime project.
As I said earlier, I believe that fighting crime is everybody’s business and we should all come together to do it.
The security agencies in Nigeria should take it as a duty to inform the general public about the laws and regualtions guiding us as citizens. I have been in the system for a while and I have not even seen adverts informing people about these things.
I believe that with God and the help of others, this campaign would help reduce criminal activities.
Say NO To Crime is not just a concert organised in prison but a global campaign and very soon we’ll be carrying our message to communities, campuses, and different countries.
By the special grace of God, I hope to keep doing this because the society belongs to you and I. You never can tell who the next crime victim will be.

I’m therefore, calling on companies that keep running away because they don’t want to associate their brands with the project, to have a change of mind. What is the assurance that one of their executives or workers would not be a victim of crime someday? Associating your brand with Say NO To Crime might just save you from calamity.

Say NO To Crime and let’s allow peace and tranquillity to reign in Nigeria.
God bless you.

Three missing children have been found by Lamboginny say no to crime search team.
  
The families of these boys do not even know if their sons are alive or dead.

  

Names of missing children are:

Name: Omokhinovo Okwonikoh.
Home town: Kokori, Wori Deltal State.
Age: 20yrs old.
His the first child of two.
Last saw his family in 2011.

Name: Emmanuel Joseph Alabi
Father's Home town: Ilorin
Mother's home town: Anambra
Age: 18yrs old.
His the first child of six.
Last saw his family in 2010.

Name: Emmanuel Benedit
Home town: Oposi, Anambra
Age: 19yrs old.
His the 4th child of seven.
Brothers name: Samuel Emmanuel
Last saw his family in 2009