To Kill In The Name Of God Is Outrageous Murder – Archbishop Obinna

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THE CHINUA ACHEBE 

FOUNDATION INTERVIEW SERIES

  April 2006

All Rights Reserved ©

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*Archbishop Obinna during the interview 

Dr. Anthony J.V. Obinna, the Catholic Archbishop of Owerri, is one of Africa’s foremost theologians and scholars. Born on June 26, 1946 in Emekuku (near Owerri), and educated at St. Peter Claver Seminary, Okpala (near Aba), and Bigard Memorial Seminary, he was ordained a Roman Catholic priest on April 19, 1972. Obinna graduated with First Class Honours in Divinity, from the Bigard Memorial Seminary, an affiliate of the Pontifical Urban University, Rome. He left for Rome for a Masters Degree in Theology, and then for the United States for another Masters in Religious Studies, concentrating on Religion and Culture, and then a PhD in Education and Theology.

A former lecturer in the Religious Studies Department of the Alvan Ikoku College of Education, Owerri, Archbishop Obinna is the current Chair of the Education Committee of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Nigeria (CBCN). He was ordained a Bishop on September 4, 1993, and became the first Archbishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Owerri when it was created in 1994.

In this interview with UGOCHUKWU EJINKEONYE, Archbishop Obinna canvasses an attitudinal change, which he hopes will help steer Nigeria out of its present political, moral, and economic descent, and reroute it to the path of progress and lasting development.

Excerpts:

Your Grace, do you think we can in all honesty say that we have freedom of worship in Nigeria today?

Well, constitutionally there is freedom of worship. So, to some extent, it is possible to say: yes, Nigerians worship as they choose. But we have had problems in certain parts of our country, where people were prevented from worshipping, as they desire. There have been attempts to muzzle Christians in some parts of the country, and that goes to show that the freedom of worship enshrined in the constitution is not given its full play. In the more Christian-dominated areas, I believe that there is no prevention of anybody from being a Moslem, from worshipping God. But in some areas of our country, there have been churches that were bulldozed, and land allocations have been refused to Christian worshippers.

Who Is Nigeria’s Conscience?

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Nigerians are very good at crowning false heroes. Just open a Nigerian newspaper you can find near you and see how many people that are recklessly described on its pages as “credible” politicians, “honest and selfless” Nigerians, or worse, the “conscience of the nation.” You would be shocked to see the number of people that carelessly allow themselves to be associated with such superb, ennobling qualities even when they are fully aware that by their personal conducts, it might even appear as a generous compliment to dress them up in the very opposites of those terms.

*Chinua Achebe

Over the years, these words and phrases have been so callously and horribly subjected to the worst kinds of abuses in Nigeria with hardly anyone making any attempt to intervene and seek their redemption. I won’t in the least, therefore, be surprised to wake up tomorrow and hear that decent people in this country have begun to protest and resist any attempt to associate them with such grossly debased terms.

As a people sharing the same country with an ever-growing tribe of shameless, exceptional experts on the egregious art of effective and perpetual devaluation all that ought to inspire awe and noble feelings, it should not come to us as a shock any day to be assaulted by the news that some Nigerians felt grievously insulted that their dogs were, for instance, nominated for “National Honours.” Even the poor dog may bark all day to register its dismay! But do we need to wait for this to happen before we quickly rouse ourselves from our long-lasting moral slumber and hurriedly stop this overly revolting annual charade of “honouring” people whose only contribution to their fatherland may just be their ecstatic participation in the mindless looting of its resources and effective supervision of its wholesale devastation.

TheNiche Lecture: Why Does Nigeria Stride And Slide?

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

On Thursday, October 26, the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, NIIA, Nigeria’s foremost think-tank on foreign affairs, will host the 2023 edition of TheNiche Annual Lecture spearheaded by the TheNiche Foundation for Development Journalism.

The lecture series, TheNiche’s annual corporate social responsibility initiative, is aimed at fostering the much-needed but ever-elusive national renaissance. Nigeria is at a crossroads, no doubt, teetering on the brink, facing the abyss. And this is not about being a prophet of doom. All the indices of human development, without any exception, are not only pointing south but are getting worse by the day. 

'Abandoned Property' Was Coined By Those Intent On Perpetrating Daylight Robbery' – COL. ACHUZIA

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THE CHINUA ACHEBE FOUNDATION INTERVIEW SERIES 
November 2005
All Rights Reserved ©

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Joe Achuzia 

*About Col. Joe Achuzia

Born seventy years ago, in the present day Delta State, Col Joe Achuzia has been involved in the programmes and activities of Ohaneze NdiIgbo, the apex socio-cultural organization in Igboland, for the past fifteen years. Since he assumed office as the Secretary-General of Ohaneze NdiIgbo, he has been distinguished by his frankness in public communications and the passion with which he canvases the Igbo position on matters of national and regional interests. He believes strongly in one, united Nigeria, where equity, justice, fairness and mutual respect for one another are unreservedly operational at all levels of governance and social interactions. He is of the opinion that the deterioration in the country is as old as the country itself and that the only way to ensure harmony and progress in the nation is to convoke a conference of ethnic nationalities where the thorny issues plaguing Nigeria could be properly addressed.

After the Biafra/Nigeria in which he played a prominent role, he was detained by Nigerian authorities. Fearing he might not survive the incarceration, he wrote his book, Requiem Biafra, to articulate his role in the war, and check attempts by later writers to, in his own words, “superimposed falsehood” on him.

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Excerpts:

Does Nigeria Have A Living Conscience?

 By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Nigerians are very good at crowning false heroes. Just open a Nigerian newspaper you can find near you and see how many people that are recklessly described on its pages as “credible” politicians, “honest and selfless” Nigerians, or worse, the “conscience of the nation.” You would be shocked to see the number of people that carelessly allow themselves to be associated with such superb, ennobling qualities even when they are fully aware that by their personal conducts, it might even appear as a generous compliment to dress them up in the very opposites of those terms. 

*Chinua Achebe 

Over the years, these words and phrases have been so callously and horribly subjected to the worst kinds of abuses in Nigeria with hardly anyone making any attempt to intervene and seek their redemption. I won’t in the least, therefore, be surprised to wake up tomorrow and hear that decent people in this country have begun to protest and resist any attempt to associate them with such grossly debased terms.

Col Joe Achuzia in Conversation with Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

THE CHINUA ACHEBE FOUNDATION INTERVIEW SERIES 
November 2005
All Rights Reserved ©

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*Achuzia

*About Col. Joe Achuzia

Born seventy years ago, in the present day Delta State, Col Joe Achuzia has been involved in the programmes and activities of Ohaneze NdiIgbo, the apex socio-cultural organization in Igboland, for the past fifteen years. Since he assumed office as the Secretary-General of Ohaneze NdiIgbo, he has been distinguished by his frankness in public communications and the passion with which he canvases the Igbo position on matters of national and regional interests. He believes strongly in one, united Nigeria, where equity, justice, fairness and mutual respect for one another are unreservedly operational at all levels of governance and social interactions. He is of the opinion that the deterioration in the country is as old as the country itself and that the only way to ensure harmony and progress in the nation is to convoke a conference of ethnic nationalities where the thorny issues plaguing Nigeria could be properly addressed.

After the Biafra/Nigeria in which he played a prominent role, he was detained by Nigerian authorities. Fearing he might not survive the incarceration, he wrote his book, Requiem Biafra, to articulate his role in the war, and check attempts by later writers to, in his own words, “superimposed falsehood” on him.

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Excerpts:

WHERE THE RAIN BEGAN TO BEAT US

Do you think it is possible to identify a particular period in Nigeria’s history when the deterioration commenced, or should we assume the downward slide is, perhaps, as old as the nation itself?

Nigeria, in my opinion, started deteriorating from day one. The gladiators who fought for our independence made all the classical mistakes. They failed to understand that those who pitch themselves in mortal combats to gain independence for the people should quit the stage for peaceful gladiators to take over. You cannot be a warrior and a peacemaker at the same time. No. But, they tried to combine the two, and so failed woefully. And we’ve been going down ever since.

Why then does your generation speak nostalgically about the good old days?

The good old days is a cliché used by people reminiscing about their secure lives as adolescents, and referring to the past as “the good old days...”The bad old days then begins when they have to start taking responsibilities. (Laughter)

So, there have been no good old days in Nigeria?

No, there has been nothing like that.

Our Beloved Country Is Bleeding

 By Sunny Awhefeada

 I do not know why countries or na­tions are thought of in feminine forms (she/her). Perhaps, it is a strategy to endear us to the place of our nativity and create a bond, the kind that exists between a mother and her child. Growing up, we sang songs that endeared Nigeria to us. Our young and impressionable minds glowed with no­ble ideas to which our sonorous voices gave clarion utterances. Men and wom­en who lived generations before this era also thought of their place of birth in endearing terms and they went to war in defence of their homeland.

*President Tinubu and Senate President Akpabio

Empires and kingdoms rose and fell in battles to defend the homeland. Even Nigeria’s national anthem and pledge have mem­orable and endearing words to configure our allegiance and love for “our beloved country”.

NIGERIA: No Doubt, This House Has Collapsed

(First Published Tuesday, February 6, 2007)


By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye


This is an example of a country that has fallen down; it has collapsed. This house has fallen — Prof Chinua Achebe

“Something startles where I thought I was safest” – Walt Whitman
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A couple of months ago, the Minister of Education, Mrs. Obiageli Ezekwesili, came to the Independent to meet with top Editorial staff of the newspaper. The meeting commenced with the normal ritual of introductions, and as my brother, Mr. James Akpandem, the Managing Editor, who introduced the Independent team, got to me and said: “This is Mr. Ugochu—”, the minister cut in: “I kno-ow him! He is the angry man!” And the whole room erupted in loud laughter.   

When later it was my turn to speak, I began by saying that there was somebody else whose column, “Conversations of the Angry Man”, appeared every Monday, that I was not the person, and that the minister was, perhaps, mistaking me for him. This caused another round of loud laughter, with someone raising his voice above the loud mirth: “You are angrier than the Angry Man!”  To make sure she was actually referring to me, each time the minister, in the course of her speech, recalled an incident that offended her, she would say: “When I saw that, I became angry, but not like him!” And she would point at me or use a gesture to indicate she was referring to me. At some point she said: “I am even more angry than you are. That’s why I am doing what I am doing to change the situation. It takes someone who is really angry about the situation of things to do what I am presently doing at the Ministry of Education.” 

Now, I do not think that what I feel about the dilapidated state of Nigeria is anger. I would rather say that I am deeply pained. I am deeply pained that a nation like Nigeria could be practically abandoned to rot away by a gaggle of heartless and conscienceless men who have managed to get themselves into power. Nigeria today presents the perfect picture of how a country could look like in the absence of any form of government. I agree with Prof Chinua Achebe that Nigeria today is too dangerous for silence! In fact, in this country, everyone is on his or her own. Virtually, no one  in Aso Rock today wakes up each day with genuine thoughts about the welfare of the citizenry.


Olusegun Obasanjo: Not A 
Laughing Matter, Please!

Whatever one occasionally sees in form of motions or semblance of actions are mere political stunts enacted solely to give the masses the impression that some form of governance is in place in Nigeria, and to let them know that very soon, elections would hold, and they would be required to come out to vote, so that their turn-out could be used to justify the outcome of the hideous rigging that would surely be perpetrated.  We live in a country where the government has become perennially incapable of causing any form of cheering news to occur. One thing anyone can predict with unfailing accuracy in Nigeria is the failure of this government in virtually every aspect of our national life. My kind prayer for those who think I am exaggerating here is simple: May God help you to survive to tell the story any time you find yourself in any of those very perilous situations that bring home to you the rude reality of the dangerous state of Nigeria.  

On New Year’s eve, my entire family and I would have perished, but for the mercy and intervention of God. We were travelling to the East on the very mischievous and perilous Lagos-Benin Expressway. It should have been a very joyous, pleasant ride by a happy family through the country-side, observing the beautiful forests and enchanting hills, all sandwiched between several villages and towns, under a clear bright sky, but for those cruel potholes, which were purposely left there by those who should eliminate them, to ensure we never for once have any cause to be happy in Nigeria.

As we approached Okada in Edo State, we became captives to a most stressful and terrible traffic hold-up, caused by the horribly bad road which the authorities had deliberately refused to repair, and we were made to crawl in this suffocating trap, amidst curses and over-boiling anger from fellow drivers, and the heart-rending cries of children who could not understand why anyone with blood running in his veins could subject them to such a heartless torture, for about five hours. When it seemed we had escaped this one, we ran into yet another, an even more complicated one that delayed us further. As the sun gradually shed its brightness and receded to its lonely, dark-blue hut, and a canopy of darkness eagerly sought to enfold and blind us, I began to pray that we escape the unyielding trap before it became really dark, because, given the reputation of that area with hoodlums, I could imagine what would happen to those still trapped in the midst of that thick, intimidating forest  when the darkness becomes really thick and murky.  


Obiageli Ezekwesili: Also Angry!


We eventually escaped as it became darker, and into further adventures on that road amidst impatient, angry drivers, many of who were, like us, unduly tasked by the nightmarish, manmade affliction we had just left behind us, and whose tempers had been driven to the edge by the excruciating experience. In short, the road became a mini-battle ground, and to cut a long story short, as we entered Asaba, when it had really become dark, we had an accident that severely damaged my car, knocking it into a very violent and benumbing coma. But thank God who is our only Hope in this unmanned jungle called Nigeria, we all escaped unhurt, including my two-year old son, who was picked up from the floor of the car where he had fallen from the back seat.

My wife who had removed her seat belt at that instance to attend to the kids who were already freezing with cold smashed the windshield with her head. But although her head was decorated with very tiny bits of broken glasses, she sustained no injuries. It was a miracle. As we got out of the vehicle, and discovered that no one was hurt, gratitude to God welled up in my heart. Indeed, we may not have a government, but we have a God! Sympathisers came and helped push the  badly wounded car out of the road. When they saw that no one was hurt, they all dispersed.
Suddenly, we were there, all alone, on that lonely stretch of land, under the freezing cold, abandoned to our fate and ourselves.

I looked this way and that, and it became clearer to me again, that in Nigeria, you are always on your own. Whether you lived or died is entirely your business!  As we waited for the friend I had called up in Asaba to come and “evacuate” us from the accident scene, my four year-old daughter began a lamentation:   “Now, Daddy’s car has spoiled, what are we going to do? We won’t go to the village again. How will my Daddy go to work again? What are we going to do? Daddy’s car has spoiled, what are we going to do?”  She was saying this and crying bitterly.



These were simple lines any child can compose and render, but her very sad, mournful tone that lonely, cold, sad night, and the deeper meanings and disarming imageries her words conveyed broke my heart.  I had never seen her in that mood before then, and even as I write now, I wish with all my heart that nothing would ever happen again to make me see her or anyone in that mood.  Her words appeared like sad poetic lines, written with pale colours on that lonely stretch of dark land. So, if I had died in that accident, that’s how my children would have been mourning me? My thoughts ran really wild. 

Now the question I am forced to ask is: even if there was no road at all on the place we now have the Lagos-Benin Expressway before 1999, is nearly eight years of being in office not enough for any focused, people-oriented and compassionate government to construct a befitting and safe road for the use of Nigerians? There is absolutely no reason that can justify the horrible state of that road,  the callousness and cruelty of those in power.But for the clearly avoidable traffic hold-up that delayed us for several hours, nothing would have made to me embark on such a hazardous night-journey with my family, and be caught up in  the kind of “war” the drivers engaged in on that road that night.

I was even planning to spend the night in Onitsha, because, it was even  more suicidal to enter the more dangerous Onitsha-Owerri Road, still in very bad shape, at night, to compete with the ever furious trailer drivers.Yet, this is the same road President Obasanjo used to flag off his campaign in the East in 2003!

Many have died on these roads and no one, except the countless orphans, widows and widowers they left behind to lick the deep wound of their sudden, violent departure are feeling it. After eight years in office what exactly can the Obasanjo government show for the incredibly huge revenues that have accrued to it since 1999?



 The roads have degenerated to mere stretches of cruel slaughter-slabs; the hospitals have become waiting rooms to cold and lonely graves; indeed, it is a big shame that after eight years of wasting the nation’s resources on frivolities, Alami and Bamaiyi, are receiving court orders to go abroad for medical treatment, just as government officials and their families do; schools have decayed so much that no person who can afford it can risk having his child in a Nigerian school. No, they would rather send them abroad, and that includes Ghana! Very soon, people would start sending their kids to Liberian schools and patronizing Somali  hospitals!  

Also, Nigeria has never been as insecure as it is now!  If you were told some years ago, specifically before 1999, that a time would come when both the police and the people they are hired to protect would all become a mass of helpless, hapless, vulnerable and frightened victims of a growing army of an all-conquering and seemingly invincible hoodlums, would you have believed it?  But that is exactly the case today?

We are the sixth largest producer of petroleum, but what do we have to show for it? No fuel filling at stations, no functioning refineries, nothing. While corruption has been institutionalised, and leaders are building wealthy dynasties with stolen funds, the killing hunger in the land is driving Nigerians to roast themselves alive while scooping fuel from pipelines obviously vandalized by NNNPC staff and their collaborators. 

Nigeria is still trapped in suffocating, blinding, thick darkness, because, the Obasanjo Government, after nearly eight years in power is still talking about 3,000 megawatts, 10,000 megawatts, while industries are closing shop in Nigeria and relocating to better-managed countries like Ghana because of the unending crises in our power sector, thereby compounding the already worsening unemployment situation. Everyday, this government invests energy and resources only to explain away its failure, and declaring phantom achievements. 



Look at the situation in the Niger Delta. For years, the place was neglected, while money realized from there, at the expense of the people’s lives, sources of livelihood (fishing and farming), were squandered on damnable vanities, “woman friends” and building of ungodly  and contaminated dynasties, that will surely meet with calamity in the near future. Now, the nation is paying greatly for that profligacy. The place has become unsafe for oil exploration. The Filipinos have just barred their nationals from coming to work in Nigeria any more. Many more countries may follow suit. The situation will compound further, and those who have accumulated stolen wealth may not have any peace or space to enjoy it. Na so this world be! 

Indeed, this house has collapsed. I do not envy the person who will take over from Obasanjo. The person will inherit an angry, hungry, impoverished and frustrated populace, wilfully plunged into unimaginable hardship by a regime that behaves as if it was  contracted to visit untold punishment on Nigerians.  Indeed, the next president will take over a collapsed country. And the people will pour their impatience and frustrations on him, because the suffering will become worse, as the impact of Obasanjo’s  ”reforms” ( i.e., selling off Nigeria’s prized possessions to self and cronies) begin to be felt. No doubt, what we see now, is but the beginning of protracted nightmare, what with all the talk about continuity. It is that bad.

  scruples2006@yahoo.com 

Obasanjo’s Belated Distaste For Corruption

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

A few hours after the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Attahiru Jega, told Nigerians that General Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressive Congress (APC) has won the March 28, 2015 Presidential Elections, a former head of state, General Olusegun Obasanjo, released his congratulatory letter to Buhari. In it, he told Buhari, among other things, to rid “our land of corruption”  

*Obasanjo

“With so much harm already done to many national institutions including the military, which proudly nurtured you and me, you will have a lot to do on institution reform, education, healthcare, economy, security, infrastructure, power, youth employment, agribusiness, oil and gas, external affairs, cohesiveness of our nation and ridding our land of corruption,” Obasanjo wrote in the six-paragraph letter.

It was the season of victory celebrations and hastening to identify with victors, so, such outpour of sentiments were not unexpected, even from very suspicious and grossly unqualified quarters. We live in a country of pathetic denialists, where the citizens are in such a hurry to forget and the media finds the ennobling task of asking deep questions and reminding us of even our most recent past a very tiresome and undesirable task.

And so, in such a country, persons like Obasanjo who deployed enormous zeal and determination to wreak unqualified damage to their country can afford to rewrite recent history and brazenly crown and advertise themselves as heroes and  patriots. And our largely pathetic media would eagerly join, if not lead, the celebration of this unsightly dance in the slimy pond of egregious hypocrisy and mediocrity.   

Goodbye, Nigeria?

 By Obi Nwakanma

The Federal Republic of Nigeria is now, to all intents and purpose, like a patient etherized on life support in hospice care. It is suffering multiple organ failure. There is just very little hope of a rebound. Anytime soon, it is bound to code. The hawks are circling. The grave diggers are ready. The obituary writers in the world’s great Metropolitan Centers are waiting in the wings. A great elephant is finally about to take its last breath. The thing is, there are no winners in this outcome. Even the separatists will soon discover that this country which we have all managed to kick in the groin was “the black man’s last hope.” 

With the death of Nigeria, much of Africa will be rendered orphans. A light will leave the eyes of this continent. Nigeria, until it began to thaw, held West Africa in its firm grips. Analysts have predicted that the death of Nigeria as a sovereign state (even so, it is that only in name currently) will throw sub-Saharan Africa into 100-year turmoil, and unleash a demographic movement that might disrupt the social fabric of the continent. 

Again, Chinua Achebe Rejects Nigerian National Honour

...President Jonathan Regrets Writer's Decision... Foremost Nigerian writer and author of the classic, Things Fall Apart, Professor Chinua Achebe, has turned down the National Honour awarded him by President Goodluck Jonathan. Achebe who was nominated for Nigeria's third highest Honour -- The Commander of the Federal Republic (CFR) would have been one of the 364 Nigerians to be conferred with various Honours on Monday, November 14, 2011.  Chinua Achebe In statement, Achebe who had rejected the same award given to him by President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004, declared:  "The reasons for rejecting the offer when it was first made have not been addressed let alone solved. It is inappropriate to offer it again to me. I must therefore regretfully decline the offer again." Achebe who will be 81 on November 16 is David and Marianna Fisher University Professor and Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, United States.  In a swift reaction on Sunday, November 13, President Jonathan regretted Achebe's decision to excuse himself from the Honour.   "Coming as it does, against the background of the widely acclaimed electoral reforms undertaken by the Jonathan Administration, the claim by Prof. Achebe clearly flies in the face of the reality of Nigeria’s current political situation,"  a statement from the Presidency said. "Politically," the statement continued,  "Nigeria cannot be said to be where it was in 2004 as the Jonathan Administration has embarked on extensive electoral reforms to institute a regime of electoral integrity that all Nigerians can be proud of, believing that governance will be greatly enhanced in the country if the will of the people prevails at elections. While President Jonathan acknowledges that there are still challenges in the path of Nigeria’s attainment of its full potentials as a nation, he believes that his Administration is moving the country in the right direction and therefore deserves the support, encouragement and cooperation of all citizen." President Goodluck Jonathan and VP Namadi Sambo During The Inauguration Party In Abuja  Concluding, the Presidency stated that despite his rejection of the award, "Prof. Achebe remains, in President Jonathan’s consideration, a national icon, a Nigerian of high attainments, indeed one of the greatest living Africans of our time." While rejecting the National Honour in 2004, Achebe in a letter to President Obasanjo had stated: “I write this letter with a very heavy heart. For some time now I have watched events in Nigeria with alarm and dismay. I have watched particularly the chaos in my own state of Anambra where a small clique of renegades, openly boasting its connections in high places, seems determined to turn my homeland into a bankrupt and lawless fiefdom.  I am appalled by the brazenness of this clique and the silence, if not connivance, of the Presidency. “Forty three years ago, at the first anniversary of Nigeria's independence I was given the first Nigerian National Trophy for Literature. In 1979, I received two further honors – the Nigerian National Order of Merit and the Order of the Federal Republic – and in 1999 the first National Creativity Award. “I accepted all these honors fully aware that Nigeria was not perfect; but I had a strong belief that we would outgrow our shortcomings under leaders committed to uniting our diverse peoples.  Nigeria's condition today under your watch is, however, too dangerous for silence. I must register my disappointment and protest by declining to accept the high honor awarded me in the 2004 Honors List”. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo   A public affairs analyst observed in Lagos today that Nigerian National Honours appear to have been grievously debased and do not seem to represent any more those sterling ideals like distinction in character, industry  and exceptional accomplishment which they were original meant to celebrate, and so a man of impeccable honour like Achebe is perfectly justified to seek to disassociate himself from them. He wondered why Nigeria should be giving out National Honours at a time corruption is so rife in the country, insecurity of lives of property so pronounced, and quality of life badly devalued. "Such a preoccupation does not portray us as serious people before the outside world," he declared.

Soyinka’s Utterance Against Me Is “Aggravated Libel” – Maja-Pearce

Interview With Adewale Maja-Pearce

BY YEMI ADEBISI

Wole Soyinka


How would you describe your experience so far in Nigeria’s book industry?

I’m right now a consultant for Evans. Evans bought over Nelson Publishers and they want to develop together a literary series. I told them we shouldn’t leave the foreign publishers to be publishing Nigerian writers. Some of these old publishing houses publish textbooks for schools. We are ready to publish six papers every year. Instead of waiting for other series, let’s publish the first two so we would generate interest. We would begin to launch our first papers in November at the Lagos Book Fair that is run by Toyin Akinosho. We have to make things happen in Nigeria. Apart from that I have a small publishing company since 2005 called New Gong. So that is really a small fascinating publishing house we have and we don’t physically publish books. We load up a book and then they print, sell it as Print On Demand (POD). We don’t have probably any physical book in Nigeria. If you want to buy it you have to go online to purchase the book. The only problem we have in Nigeria is distribution because in small developed country like South Africa and even in America, the publisher is not involved in selling the book. The publisher goes to train that we have so, so and so copies, bla, bla, bla. So the train has bookshops all over the countries and they will distribute it. So the publisher doesn’t know how they sell the books; we don’t have that in Nigeria.

Adewale Maja-Pearce

Let’s talk about the POD you spoke about. Judging by probably what you have been able to put together, what would you advise an author that wishes to publish through such medium too?

Anybody can do it. If you simply go to our site, there is an icon in the site called ‘create space.’ When the book is ready you upload it, the cover and the inside pages. They will give you a file page so that every of your work will be filed. What you see about a week is your book on our site. We print and sell as requested. And it is a big advantage, a very big one.

There is this rumour that you have some personal grudges with Wole Soyinka over your comments in your review on one of his books. It was even gathered that you were exchanging abusive words publicly. Can you throw more light into this?

Grudge! No! I first met Soyinka shortly after he won the Nobel Prize because I used to work for a magazine in London called Index On Censorship. I was their African editor from 1983 to 1997. So, before I joined, Soyinka had already been published by them and also had written for them. He was familiar with the magazine. So when I joined, I told him, “I am the new African editor. I hope you will continue with us.” We have a means he used to send us materials; we had a good working relationship. The problem came when he published You Must Set Forth At Dawn. I was asked by the London Review of Books to review it. I didn’t like the book so I gave my reasons. So, when it came out people told me that Soyinka didn’t take it kindly with criticism. I was just working for a magazine anyway. 

Nigeria, Going , Going…?

 By Magnus Onyibe

Imagine a man standing at the edge of a cliff and a demon is standing behind him wielding a bazooka firearm menacingly, with the intent to blow the man off the cliff, or simply just give him a kick from behind so that he would fall to his death. That in my estimation,(and l believe in the assessment of most Nigerians)is the dire situation in which our country and indeed our compatriots are currently trapped.

No matter, how government spin doctors try, they can no longer pull-the-wool over-our-eyes with the false claim that since Boko Haram is no more holding swathes of Nigeria’s territory in the north which was the case before 2015,terrorism has not only been highly degraded, but it is in the throes of death and technically defeated.

In my view, Boko Haram and ISWAP are no longer interested in holding territories where they could be engaged in conventional warfare with Nigerian army that has superior fire power with which it could be defeated in direct confrontations or conventional war.

The Allure Of The Humanities

A Lecture by

Chuks Iloegbunam

on the occasion of the 2018 Grand Alumni/Friends Homecoming

of the Faculty of Arts

Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka.

April 26, 2018.

*Iloegbunam

“Our history strongly suggests that we need to moderate strength and power with discretion and diplomacy, not only among our leaders but also among the generality of our people. It is not weakness to recognize the value of discretion. It is foolhardiness to choose death (or something close to it) in place of life.” 
– Michael J. C. Echeruo.

I decided to open today’s discussion with the above quote from Professor Echeruo’s A Matter Of Identity, his November 1979 foundational lecture of the Ahajioku Lecture Series. The reason is that it encapsulates the theme of my presentation, which is that E’kesia n’obi, ekee na mkpuke.

But, first of all, permit me to deliver to protocol its due. I count myself privileged to stand before you today, even if to do a job outside my professional territory of operation. I am a journalist who, by virtue of political appointments, has operated within governmental circles in the last 15 years. I have never been a teacher, not even a nursery school teacher. Yet, I have been pressed into service here, to deliver a disquisition to those whose primary and professional responsibility is the impartation of knowledge. In my view, it is like taking coal to Ngwo, Nigeria’s Newcastle! It has its risks and thrills. Theoretically, I could be ordered at any point of this assignment to return to wherever I came from, my thoughts and pronouncements considered no better than garble to the educated ear. On the other hand, I could be tolerated, in which case my representation could form a pedestal for firing crusts in order to extricate diamond. That would be thrilling.