Word: nigerias
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...real mystery about this tragedy is why the pageant’s organizers were so committed to imposing the contest on Nigeria in the first place. Of all the times and places to hold the Miss World competition, Nigeria during Ramadan must be the worst combination. With a recent history of religious violence, Nigeria is an odd country to host the Miss World pageant. Its large and influential Islamic population, much of which lives under Islamic Law, considers the public exhibition of women to be an obscenity. But despite the offensive and insulting effects of the pageant, the Miss World...
...contest before last year, and never mind that only one of the nine judges—the one from India—hailed from a country other than Britain and its white settler colonies. The contest supposedly demonstrated its impartiality last year by selecting Agbani Darego, Miss Nigeria, to be the first black African Miss World in the contest’s 50-year history. (Two previous African winners had been white South Africans, and one other had been an Arab Egyptian...
With Darego selected, the organizers followed the contest’s tradition of holding the next year’s finals in the winner’s home country. On some level it was a noble decision to pretend that Nigeria was capable of hosting a beauty pageant just like any other stable country. But there was also a very selfish aspect to this choice. The organizers were so determined to improve the pageant’s reputation that they were willing to endanger the safety of the contestants and the Nigerian people...
...organizers’ irresponsible decision to hold this contest in Nigeria, a country already tense with conflict between Muslims and Christians, probably would not have gone forward if the Nigerian federal government hadn’t also been so bent on proving itself in the eyes of the world. Africa’s most populous country, Nigeria sees itself as the preeminent power in Africa, which is an accurate appraisal as long as we ignore South Africa. In only its third year of democracy, however, the country still has a lot to prove before it is ready to take...
...have recently adopted Sharia Law—the traditional Islamic law, which prescribes harsh punishments for adultery and non-marital sex; these laws have created serious problems for non-Muslim Nigerians who happen to live within the jurisdiction of Sharia. But instead of resolving the complicated question about whether Nigeria will be ruled by religious or secular law, the Nigerian federal government has decided to sidestep the problem...