The Broke Habit

Glory Edozien writes at BellaNaija.com :

Personally, I have learnt the hard way to live within my means. Days of over spending on credit cards only to find that Loui and Gucci cannot pay my food and light bill. So, today, if I see something I cannot afford, I just say to myself “one day, Glory, one day” and move along. But this was not a lesson I learnt easily. Not at all. There was a time when I would spend all my weekly earning in three days and live the remaining four days feeling miserable, vowing to be smarter the following week only to repeat the same mistake in record time!

(Read more more more...)

Another friend of mine recently threw her 30th birthday dinner at a popular location on the Island. Endless bottles of champagne and food for all! She must have had over 30 people present and she kept asking everyone to order as they wished on her. I thought nothing of it at the time, after all not all fingers are equal. Two days after the party, this same friend called and asked for a rather huge loan, which she would payback in monthly installments. I assumed she must have bankrupted herself after her lavish party and willing obliged her without asking many questions. Only to later learn that she had borrowed similar amounts from mutual friends’ months before and was yet to repay.

When I approached her on the issue, she explained that she was trying to gather shopping money for her regular summer trip overseas and would repay all debts on her return. To say I was perplexed, would be an understatement. This is a girl, who has what I imagine to be a well paid job, and constantly has some designer gear straddled on her limbs. I couldn’t understand why she would need to live a life that was clearly well beyond her means.

(Source is BellaNaija.com: Young, Fabulous and FLAT BROKE! )

Analysis: Do I have a broke habit?

African Development Bank wants you!

For the internship programme, an opportunity to acquire professional and practical experience at the African Development Bank, apply here from July 2011.

Older folk should apply for the Ibrahim Foundation Leadership Fellowship position at the bank.

More AfDB jobs.

Africa's trading partners: traditional and emerging

China overtook the United States as Africa’s number one trading partner in 2009. Africa’s trade volumes with its emerging partners have doubled in nominal value over the decade and now amount to 37% of Africa´s total trade. Africa’s top five emerging trade partners are now China (38 percent), India (14 percent), Korea (7.2 percent), Brazil (7.1 percent) and Turkey (6.5 percent). (Source: AfDB)


Europe and North America's trade share has quickly eroded, but they still account for more than half of Africa’s trade and foreign investment stock, and their economic health remains key to Africa’s growth performance.

Nevertheless, Africa’s rebalancing act turns the page on 50 years of over-reliance on the West, a period sometimes dubbed the post-colonial era. Links with the traditional partners face profound changes. (More about Africa's emerging partners in African Economic Outlook 2011)

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Hajiya Murjanatu employs 120 selling kunu and zobo

'I engage 120 northern boys to keep them off the street'

The business she started over eight years ago with little or no capital by making kunu (a special northern drink made from corn) and zobo drink, has turned her to an employer of labour, thus contributing to the growth of the Nigerian economy in her own way.

“I started this business out of frustration when my husband stopped me from working. My husband stopped me from work in order to take care of the children while he goes out to work. I thought of how I would be sitting down without doing nothing and that was how I started making kunu, zobo and frying doughnuts, puff-puff and giving them to the boys to sell for me and gradually I started buying beverages in little quantities and later I graduated into buying from the company and today I am a major distributor for some of these companies" (...Read more at dailytrust.com)

What do you think about this entrepreneurship story? And how about the restriction on her movement?