# Regarding Cecil's column on Potemkin Villages

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/regarding-cecils-column-on-potemkin-villages/216986>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [December 4, 2003, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/regarding-cecils-column-on-potemkin-villages/216986 "2003-12-04T18:28:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![TheSundanceKid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/838e76/32.png) [@TheSundanceKid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheSundanceKid)\
**Post date:** [December 4, 2003, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/regarding-cecils-column-on-potemkin-villages/216986/1 "2003-12-04T18:28:53Z")

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[http://www.straightdope.com/columns/031114.html](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/031114.html)

That stuff’s old hat. Nowadays, we’ve got Obasanjo villages.

[http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/12/04/nigeria.commonwealth.ap/](http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/12/04/nigeria.commonwealth.ap/)

…Of course, the two phenomena aren’t exactly the same, because in the first place Catherine’s false villages apparently didn’t really exist, and in the second, according to the myth she was kept in the dark about the Potemkin villages, whereas Queen Elizabeth knows that this is a mock village. But still. Rather… Odd.