African Expressive Cultures : African Appropriations : Cultural Difference, Mimesis, and Media

222 african appropriations

the so called Industrialised Nations to accept debt repayments instead of

insisting on debt servicing? W hat do you call this? A scam of international

scale or is it international politricks? (quoted in Edelson 2006: 51)

“Now it’s payback time” is the general shorthand for this argument. This
justification for scamming also appears in The Master, when Denis, the ar-
rested 419 scammer, in his closing monologue, takes his leave of the jour-
nalists in the film and, hence the audience, with the following statement:

W hat do you call 419, you journalists? They came here, the white man

came here long-long time ago. Our great grandfathers.... They parceled

them, they put them into a chamber, they sent them across as slaves, they

sent them to go there at a two million level; what do you call that? Is that

not 419 on a superlative order? And you don’t write about it, and you don’t

ask questions about it!

The monologue is cut with images of journalists nodding in agreement
with Denis’s argument, thereby suggesting the public’s consensus. Indeed,
the so-called Yahoo Boys, who take pride in their dubious success and
boast publicly about their ill-gotten wealth, have become a role model of
sorts. Nigerian musicians indicate their admiration in public. In his hit
song “ Ya hoozee” (2 003), si nger Olu M a i nta i n celebrates t he good l i fe w it h
references to luxury cars, champagne, and easy women:

If I hammer If I strike a fortune

First thing na Hummer I will buy a Hummer

One million dollars One million dollars

Elo lo ma je ti n ba se si daira I have made enough naira

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,

boys dey hustle

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,

boys are hustling

Friday, Saturday, Sunday, gbogbo

aye

Friday, Saturday, Sunday,

everybody

Champagne, Hennessy, Moet

for everybody

Champagne, Hennessy, Moët

for everybody

Ewo awon omoge,

dem dey shake their body

Look at the girls,

they are shaking their bodies^9

Although the singer takes care not to directly reference cybercrime as the
source of the “One million Dollars” he sings about, his lyrics—and more
so the accompanying video clip—have been interpreted as rather direct