By Paul Onomuakpokpo
The
world is a theatre of struggle. Every stage one finds oneself at, one should
know that it is a struggle; it is one of the principles of social Darwinism – Sylvester Akhaine
With Donald Trump clinching the
United States’ presidency on the back of the promise to privilege the welfare
of Americans and deport immigrants he considers as parasites, such foreigners
have only the option of making their own countries great to cater for them and
obviate the need of seeking succour overseas. To make their countries to attain
a level where they do not need to be economic refugees in foreign countries
like that of Trump imposes on such citizens the necessity of a struggle to
remove impediments to the development of their societies.
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| *Sylvester Akhaine |
For African states and other
formerly colonised countries of the world, the need for a struggle to attain
their national destinies is very familiar. It was such a struggle that paved
the way for political independence in the 1950s and 1960s in African countries.
Thus for these African states to overcome their new masters, whether internal
or external, there is the need for them to resume the path of struggle. This
validates the intervention of Sylvester Odion Akhaine, through The Case of a
Nursing Father, in the contemporary discourse of resistance by the citizens of
post-colonial states against their economic and political oppressors to create
prosperous societies.
Beneath the veneer of a
preoccupation with existential affairs such as those at the home front as
signified by the title of the book are weightier issues of a people’s struggle
to be free from oppression in its multi-faceted forms. But then, even at the
home turf, a struggle is required for the solidification of humanism. This is
demonstrated by the author’s refusal to align with the members of his elite
class who objectify their fellow human beings by making children from poor
homes as housemaids.
While such housemaids spend their
days in drudgery in the service of oga,
madam and the children, no one spares a thought for their education. The author
resolves the conflict that could ensue from his resistance by becoming a nanny
in order to accommodate the professional demands of his medical doctor wife. By
both husband and wife accepting to take turns to care for their first child,
they avert a feminist war of equality.
Thus, in the African context,
there is the robust possibility of mutual help between a husband and a wife as
counterpointed by a brand of Western feminism that breeds an unnecessary gender
hostility.
