The recently ended Calabar Carnival which has been dubbed Africa’s largest street carnival, has generated mixed reaction from cross section of participants and observers with some of them expressing displeasure with the unclad display by ladies during the event which came to a climax on December 27th.
Mr Ikpafak Udofia, a US-based Nigerian, flayed the costumes and dress code of the girls on parade, asking “is it modernization or madness? I love my culture and I love my people but such indecency in the name of cultural exposition or whatever they called it is ridiculous.
“For women to walk on the streets almost unclad in the name of carnival, is dishonourable to me, to my mother and wife and I wonder what the designers of those costumes were thinking,” he said.
Expressing a different view, another US-based Nigerian, Miss Gloria Ekong, called for caution in the outright condemnation of the carnival attires. She said: “whether these girls have a secret agenda or not; their intention is to have fun with creative costumes. Trust me they don’t have to be in that attire to carry out their ‘secret agenda’. I personally wish that l have a killer body like that. We can be too judgmental under the guise of religion.”
Another Nigerian in the Diaspora, Mrs Rosie Udo, said that there was nothing wrong in the appearance of the maidens’ attires. “If these were men with extended belly, skinning legs, flat b*tt with skimpy wrappers, will that be honourable? Today’s African men are so disgusted with women and their bodies” she noted with dismay.
Taking a more tougher stance on the dressing of ladies at the event, a Nigerian, Mr Chris Udoh, who is based in Port Harcourt said: “as a man, I will not lose sleep if a woman decides on her own to walk unclad in the streets. It is a good saving for a man because what he would have paid money or begged to view is given out by the owner free-of-charge. Walking unclad is part of ‘uncommon transformation’ of the African women to their ancestral days when men used to live in caves.
“The truth is that African women who walk unclad on the streets are cheapening their natural worth and beauties. Though it can buy short term attention but what happens thereafter becomes a burden to the seller only,” he said.
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