Indigene, non-indigene in Igbo land? Tufiakwa!

By Pini Jason, Vanguard

LAST August the Governor of Abia State, Chief Theodore Ahamefula Orji issued an order sacking so-called non-indigenes from the public service of Abia State.

In a directive dated August 25, 2011 entitled: “Backloading on Transfer of non-indigene in Abia State Public service to their state of origin,” the Governor directed that all non-indigenes working in the public service of Abia State (including Local Government) be transferred to their states of origin effective from October 1, 2011. To be excluded from this purge are non-indigenes in the tertiary institutions in the state.

Question mark on Igbo politicians

This policy has expectedly drawn appropriate flaks from Igbo nation for those affected by this purge are mostly fellow Igbo. There have also been some sympathisers who have tried to rationalise Governor Orji’s action. The main plank of Orji’s defence rests on the need to pay the newly enacted minimum wage of N18,000.

My view is that the purge is unnecessary, inexcusable and puts a sharp knife through the thin ligature of Igbo unity. It puts a question mark on the penchant of Igbo politicians to cry about marginalization and injustice in the Nigerian nation. I have always suspected such cries as self-serving. Orji’s action proves me right.

For a gregarious people who have been at the forefront of the advocacy for Nigerians who have lived almost all their lives in any part of this country to be accorded citizenship rights, I think this purge is not a very thoughtful one. It has a tendency to backfire as I have read somewhere that Anambra State is retaliating Orji’s action! I hope to God that it is not true.

Another Crises Nd'Igbo Must Address

By Godson Offoaro/Sun News Publishing

The gold-rimmed invitation card said it all. It is the announcement of the traditional marriage taking place somewhere in Isiala-Mbano. It read in part. “The families of Chikezie Okonkwo of Umukalla in Isiala-Mbano LGA Imo State and Chief Olabode Ibironke of Surulere in the Akoko South LGA, Ondo State, cordially invite you to the traditional wedding of their daughter, Chika Magdalene Okonkwo and Adeyinka Ibironke.

It went on and on to supply the names of the RSVPs and other little information a proud holder of such an expensive piece of invitation would need. If you looked closer, you would notice that there were something unique about the invitation. Yes, its uniqueness lay in the tribal differences aplenty in the card. Chika, female is Igbo. Yinka, male is Yoruba. They soon would be getting married. This type of invitation is now common in Igboland. Hardly any weekend passes in Igboland without a segment of its population giving away one daughter or the other's hand to marriage, to usually a “stranger” - a non-Igbo.

Igbo girls are deserting their homelands - in droves. They are going to other parts of Nigeria particularly, the North and the South west in search of better halves. It never used to be so. We are not talking about a millennium gone by. We are talking about say, last year's Xmas period and the following Easter. Keeping it in sharper perspective, Igbo women marrying men from other tribes gained a dramatic upsurge immediately after the Nigerian Civil War. Then desolate and desperate Igbo girls of marriage age, married whomever there was, that was available largely because their Igbo male marriageable counterparts had been decimated - in their hundreds of thousands by the war.

Now, there is a new upsurge. Why are Igbo girls deserting Igbo men of marriageable age in their thousands? The answer is multifaceted. The most obvious, Ngozi told this writer is the shortage of Igbo men of marriageable age. Reader, do not panic yet. Igbo boys have not been decimated in war as was the case between 1967 and 1970. The latest brand of shortage of marriageable Igbo male has a lot to do with economics of numbers.

There are many marriageable men around but not enough to get married to the girls - thus the upsurge in the number of Igbo girls to other lands, in search of husbands. In awe I had asked her to explain. “Uncle”, she began in obvious resigned mood. “The reason is simple. Our men of marriage age have no jobs. The unemployment palaver is hitting the marriage industry hardest in Igbo land. I had a fiancé while I was in school.

We agreed to get married some day. But can you believe that, ten solid years after graduation, he has no job. I am marrying Aminu from Zonkwa, who is a Muslim and 20 years older than me out of desperation. Aminu, you may not believe it, Aminu already has a wife. I am going to be his wife number two. Age is not on my side. At 32, biological time for me is ticking away fast - if you know what I mean. I need to have a life. I need to settle down, bear children and begin to raise them.

There are no Igbo men who are ready to marry me. I would have even married any Igbo man, even as a second, third wife, but most Igbo men who are married are tied down by the dictates of their Christian faith which preaches one man one wife. It is not so in the northern and western parts of the country. That's why I am going up north to find a life partner. It is not the best for me. Desperate situations call for desperate solutions.”

When I spoke with Chika, whom I attended her colorful wedding (to Yinka) at one of the Pentecostal Churches in Owerri, recently she was even blunter. “I'll rather marry anyone other than Igbo, than get into prostitution. I am 34. I have no hope. My childhood boyfriend has left the country to Ghana. He keeps making promises that I should wait for him to make it, no matter how little. But you know a woman's biological clock ticks faster than that of the man. I do not know how long I would wait. I am a born again Christian.

I am not given to wayward type of life. I want to marry and settle down and begin to rear children. Unfortunately, I could not marry myself. So when Yinka showed up, I did not have to think of his tribe. All I needed was a husband. And that's why I am where I am now. I do not know what would have happened if I married any other person, but I am married and I will try to live with it. It is the best I can do for now.”

It was not fashionable to find Igbo girls marrying across the Niger River. If anything, the reverse used to be the case. It was the days gone by when men such as Nze Akanu Ibiam, Emeka Anyaoku, Nze Nwachukwu (Ike Nwachukwu's father) Chief Gideon Atuloma, former Speaker old Imo House of Assembly and other prominent Igbo personalities including this writer, went across the Niger or up north to go get married.

To put this record straight. It was after the Nigerian Civil War that there was a surge in mass marriage of Igbo ladies to men from other parts of the country. It was part of the war booty, the girls having lost everything including their men and pride. It was in fact, then, a favor unto them done, that the surplus Igbo girls of marriageable age who could not be married were taken away by the all conquering members of the Nigerian armed forces. That was when Nigerian gallant soldiers like Olusegun Obasanjo married an Igbo lady and IBB married yet another.
It was not so, on the Nigerian side.

There, what happened was typical. After every war, there usually is a marriage boom, particularly on the side of the victorious. It happened at a lower scale, after World War I but happened more rapidly and very pronounced after World War II when the Allied forces of Europe with the aid of the United States, vanquished Hitler and his collaborators. The marriage boom of the years following the end of World II produced children known in American parlance as the baby boom generation. Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and even Obama were products of the baby boom generation 1945 to 1960.

We can say without contradiction then, that Nigeria's baby boom years occurred soon after the civil war. With the no victor and no vanquished stance of General Yakubu Gowon, the defeated Biafra, which largely comprised of the Igbo race, rose to the occasion taking advantage of the three “Rs” of reconciliation, reconstruction and rehabilitation, thus a delayed but sure case of baby boom occurred. The Udorji awards of 1974 helped too.
While the American government took a preemptive measure to prepare for the upsurge in the baby boom era, including what to do with their kids, education, employment, their welfare and retirement age, the Nigerian government it seemed never took any steps to address the expected upsurge that always came along with the successful prosecution of a war.

The effect, as events are now turning out, are being felt in the east, particularly, in Igboland, where women of marriageable age stayed at home without husbands and the attendant frustration that inevitably followed. Coupled with the twin evil of unemployment and global economic meltdown which began about a decade ago, the Nigerian marriage sector has also been affected.

Fortunately for other parts of Nigeria, social behaviors tied to cultural values have in one way or the other helped to lessen the burden of the inability of young adults to get married as at when due. It's not that there is anything intrinsically wrong with Igbo girls wedding young men from other tribes of Nigeria. The one thing that is wrong is the alarming growing number of these marriages without a reciprocal equivalent in the number of Igbo men marrying from other tribes. As the girls go so they go with Igbo culture.

As the girls, most of them highly educated leave, so do they drain Igbo brain. As the girls leave in droves so they leave with a big hole in Igbo economy. Ohanaze Ndiigbo should step in. The governors of all the Igbo speaking areas of Nigeria should see this as a crisis and address it accordingly. It is as important as having a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction.

OBI NWAKANMA'S VISION OF A RENASCENT ONITSHA CITY

By Okenwa Nwosu, MD, Igbo Forum

“It was the city that drew the great generation of Igbo, and indeed Southern Nigerian modernists. The city of the great Zik, whose statue still adorns an important historical site of the city; the city of Denis Osadebe, Mbonu Ojike, Nwafor Orizu, Ikejiani, Raymond Amanze Njoku, Pius Okigbo, Chike Obi, Sylvanus Cookey, Birabi, Ben Enwonwu, Cyprian Ekwensi, and too many others too numerous to mention.
It was the city, whose centrality in the evolution of modern Nigerian culture has been recorded permanently in Emmanuel Obiechina’s canonical study of the literature now called, “Onitsha Market Literature,” produced in the great forges of its little presses, much like the grub street, which basically disseminated the most significant tradition of city penny literature in that march towards the modern. Onitsha once had a great newspaper too: the Nigerian Spokesman, which gave this city its certain flavor.

The city exhibits the marks of dystopia. Yet it is a city of possibilities, if only the Anambra state government, can think slightly out of the box and commence an ambitious City redevelopment plan, by bringing a number of things to bear: the reconstitution of Onitsha as a Metropolitan district with its own city government, and execution of a plan that would integrate Ogidi, Obosi, Nnewi, Oba, and the surrounding districts, as part of the conurbation of a new Onitsha Metropolitan District.

This metropolitan authority should then think about raising property and other municipal taxes and begin the very clear process of redesigning and rebuilding Onitsha as a modern, 21st century city that should integrate the grandeur of its own history as the first epicenter of Igbo modernity, and promote that history as part of its culture and image, and its new offering.

This is what great cities do. It should also work inexorably towards the development of its valuable water front into a great residential, business and culture district, with splendid private and public residential facilities, fine offices, great restaurants, galleries, theatres, well designed public parks, and such a place that would draw people to its profitable use, and that would enrich the city significantly; and in some ways, connect it to its twin city across the river, Asaba, for the benefit of all.”

Obi Nwakanma


IF you asked most people today to go to Aba or Onitsha to settle and live, the first impulse would be to think that you are placing a curse on them. And I am totally serious. Young men and women, the most productive and active catalysts of city life, do not find any incentives to go to these once thriving cities of the East to settle, and live a full life.

I once asked a friend of mine who grew up in Onitsha, and who now teaches at the University of Denver, Colorado, if he could ever think about living in Onitsha or raising his children in Onitsha, and his response to me was quite frank: “there is nothing for me in Onitsha!” he said.

It was no longer even the city in which he grew up. The decay of a city like Onitsha is so terrifying that an encounter with both the image and reality of the city is nightmarish - a true ghostly miasma that is.

Until you have felt and seen it, it is quite unimaginable. The sludge of human and industrial waste that runs on the public and private spaces; the sense of the brokenness of everything; the disorder in city planning; in code enforcement; in street planning; in the general ordering and layout of the city makes Onitsha today, one of the most polluted and certainly one of the most ungainly sites of human habitation anywhere on God’s earth.

Yet encrusted in that pod of waste is a possible gem; a once well planned city which becomes only clear from the air, which has only been distorted by the barbarous rage of a most philistine generation for whom beauty and civility are alien values.

Onitsha still has some of the finest colonial architecture which are indeed great set pieces and which could just be rehabbed with a little imagination, care, and some respect for heritage. Yet also, Onitsha is dotted with some of the most monstrous forms of architecture, a pretence at the high-rise apartments, which give little room for aesthetics. The buildings are often largely utilitarian.

They are most times constructed with little rhyme or reason, possibly inspired by the competitiveness of the Onitsha landlord who draws the design on the sand, and builds just to prove to everyone else that his “four decking is higher than yours.”

The result in Onitsha, as one drives in, is a sense or an impression of a vast project – those low income, box-like constructions of high-rise apartments that dot the landscape of American urban ghettoes that are infested with drugs, prostitution and poverty. I have nothing, of course, against urban housing, but let it be built with respect for the people, with a sense of spatiality, with some aesthetic purpose.

Onitsha’s image suffers from its certain lack of awareness of its own history or importance. My early vision of Onitsha was shaped by an early encounter with Chinua Achebe’s novella, Chike and the River, a book I read in primary five.

I also associated Onitsha with what one imagined to be the magnificent bridge across the Niger at Onitsha, which even now, remains as powerful as New York’s Brooklyn Bridge, as an authentic symbol of Nigeria’s entry into high technological modernity.

The Brooklyn Bridge has been celebrated in the epic poetry of great American Romantic and modernist poets like Walt Whitman and Hart Crane, but not the bridge across the lordly Niger in Onitsha. Onitsha was for many years the cultural and commercial center of the East – something of the Boston of Southern Nigeria – with its place as the epicentre of Christian missionary movement into the Igbo heartland.

For many years, it was the headquarters of the Church of the Niger. It was the city of Basden and the Archbishop Denis, as well as the Joseph Shanahans. Those icons of the Roman and the Anglican churches, who ironically were also figures of early Igbo modernity of the late 19th century.

Onitsha was the intellectual capital of Southern Nigeria, with its famous parochial schools, like the Christ the Kings College, the Catholic boarding school for boys, or the Denis Memorial Grammar School, the Anglican equivalent, or the Queen of the Rosary School, the Catholic boarding school for girls, or the famous St. Charles Teachers College, and so many pioneer schools that made Onitsha the gathering of the early Igbo towards cultural modernity.

It was the city that drew the great generation of Igbo, and indeed Southern Nigerian modernists. The city of the great Zik, whose statue still adorns an important historical site of the city; the city of Denis Osadebe, Mbonu Ojike, Nwafor Orizu, Ikejiani, Raymond Amanze Njoku, Pius Okigbo, Chike Obi, Sylvanus Cookey, Birabi, Ben Enwonwu, Cyprian Ekwensi, and too many others too numerous to mention.

It was the city, whose centrality in the evolution of modern Nigerian culture has been recorded permanently in Emmanuel Obiechina’s canonical study of the literature now called, “Onitsha Market Literature,” produced in the great forges of its little presses, much like the grub street, which basically disseminated the most significant tradition of city penny literature in that march towards the modern. Onitsha once had a great newspaper too: the Nigerian Spokesman, which gave this city its certain flavor.

I could go on and on, but I hope the picture is clear, that from the time of the Saro and Caribbean middle class of lawyers, doctors, teachers, and so on, who first constituted the society and culture of Onitsha, of the Onitsha Literary Society, funded by a remarkable whiteman whose grave is still marked in one silent corner of the of the Onitsha city cemetery, to today, a city like Onitsha has undergone radical transformation. A cultured middle class seems absent.

The city exhibits the marks of dystopia. Yet it is a city of possibilities, if only the Anambra state government, can think slightly out of the box and commence an ambitious City redevelopment plan, by bringing a number of things to bear: the reconstitution of Onitsha as a Metropolitan district with its own city government, and execution of a plan that would integrate Ogidi, Obosi, Nnewi, Oba, and the surrounding districts, as part of the conurbation of a new Onitsha Metropolitan District.

This metropolitan authority should then think about raising property and other municipal taxes and begin the very clear process of redesigning and rebuilding Onitsha as a modern, 21st century city that should integrate the grandeur of its own history as the first epicenter of Igbo modernity, and promote that history as part of its culture and image, and its new offering.

This is what great cities do. It should also work inexorably towards the development of its valuable water front into a great residential, business and culture district, with splendid private and public residential facilities, fine offices, great restaurants, galleries, theatres, well designed public parks, and such a place that would draw people to its profitable use, and that would enrich the city significantly; and in some ways, connect it to its twin city across the river, Asaba, for the benefit of all.

This is the only way to stimulate growth and economic development on a scale that is purposive and significant. I have used Onitsha clearly as a foil even in my description of the other city, Aba. I have always said that one of the most important reflections of the kind of mindset that have destroyed once well-made cities like Aba, designed by Pius Okigbo as Development Officer in 1947, is in the destruction of the Aba golf course and its parceling off to speculators who quickly turned this once beautiful place into a monstrous space.

Aba and Port-Harcourt are also inevitably bound to shake hands and rejoin themselves at the hip, as it was once conceived, sooner than later.

And so it is important for the authorities in those two cities to begin the process of joint planning and remodeling, including creating joint sewer districts, protected forest areas, river and lake recreation areas, that would link the triad development from Owerri, Aba and Port-Harcourt, starting at the Owerrinta Port, near Okpala.

But as it is, it seems like very little thinking is going on at a grand scale in government. These cities cannot recover their economic powers, if they do not attract the right kind of human energy. It is imperative therefore, to draw people back, with great schools, great city hospitals, great museums and galleries, and generally, great environments to live and nurture families in a healthy and sustainable way.

A governor, clapping with one hand

By Obi Nwakanma, The Orbit/Vanguard

A reader of this column sent me a note last week thanking me for bringing the situation in Imo state to light, and for being in what he calls “informed opposition.” I did thank him, but I made it clear that I’m not in opposition to Ohakim. I am a critic of the government that he leads.

An opposition is an organized platform – a sort of government in waiting – with its alternative programs and ideas in clear distinction from the government of the day in a democracy. Sometimes they draw critical insights from informed sources to canvas their position among the electorate. But there is no opposition in Imo state. There is political opportunism. That is why the Imo state government is looking, and increasingly sounding surreal and weird.

We grew up in the East as the inheritors of fine examples of robust and dynamic leadership that saw Nnamdi Azikiwe straddling the African imagination like a force of nature, or men like Michael Iheonukara Okpara, whose leadership of the East remains without compare. While the Igbo was riding the crest of development and progress from 1957 to 1967, it felt like the rest of Nigeria could not touch its political helms, what with such colorful and eponymous names among its leaders: Akanu Ibiam, educator and missionary doctor, who approached public service with the instincts of a missionary.

Denis Osadebe – poet and brilliant legal mind, whose parliamentary skills were legendary. K.O. Mbadiwe – man of timbre and caterpillar, not only full of rhetoric and bombast, but also full of purpose. A first class political strategist and negotiator who knew his personal interest alright, but never messed with the group interest, for always, the group was the basis of their politics. There was Mbonu Ojike, brilliant economic thinker of his generation, whose early death robbed the Igbo and Nigeria greatly.

There was Nwafor Orizu; there was Jaja Wachukwu, there was Eni Njoku, there was Nwapa, there was Reuben Uzoma; there was Raymond Amanze Njoku, and there were numerous others, any of whom could have, were they born in any other clime, led any nation politically. I have said that perhaps the divine author of things played a terrible joke on the East and the Igbo particularly: he sent them a glut of first class men in one generation, and in a later generation gave them only burnt offering – political lilliputs whose conduct of politics insults the illustrious past of our 20th century political ancestors. Today, there is no memorable Igbo politician.

At the eventual passing of the great Dim Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the last of the relay of great Igbo leaders of the 20th century, the Igbo of Nigeria will not have a single memorable political figure who could rally them to great political purpose. For a people whose leaders were at the fore of the independence movement, this would be a great lesson in irony. The irony was made most poignant in the ring-kissing visit of Ikedi Ohakim, governor of Imo state, last week to Raji Fashola, governor of Lagos state.

The highlights of that visit mark Mr. Ohakim, not only as a second fiddler, but also as a governor without a clear social or economic program, who does not deserve to be re-elected in the forthcoming elections as the governor over a great state like Imo. We must help him return him quickly to his personal business in Lagos, where he says Governor Raji Fashola has made the lives of the Igbo residents worth living and Igbo businesses secure. “I have come to greet a great man, so that I too will be great” said Ikedi Ohakim to Raji Fashola in Lagos.

It sounds cute and gracious. But it also sounds like the servile declaration of a hopeful almajirin to his lordly benefactor. Ohakim was recently paid the left-handed compliment of the Sarduana Award for leadership. It is therefore not surprising from where Ikedi Ohakim draws his inspirations and examples: not from the great Zik or Okpara or Mbakwe. The trouble is that he is on his way to leading Imo state to beggarly ruin.

True, Fashola stays in Lagos and directs its transmutation from a vast slum, while Ohakim gallivants, paying courtesy visits, and spouting strange excuses for his lack of achievement. Once, his excuse was that his opponents had stymied his mandate in court with litigation, and his hands were tied. Now, the Supreme Court has declared him governor, no such excuse is valid any longer.

Now it is revenue: while Lagos has all the revenue, Ohakim says, Imo has all the ideas. This is poppycock of course. Across the fence in Enugu, we see slow but apparent change. Imo is richer in revenue and resources than Enugu. But Enugu has greater purpose. Governor Ohakim needs now to account for the revenue accruing to Imo state in the last three years-plus of his administration. There is no evidence of infrastructural investment. There is, of course, a lot of hot talk about really hot plans to build Oguta and Nworie into tourist utopia.

There is nothing on the ground. There is much talk about rural roads. I went round Imo state last year, I saw only signposts proposing IRROMA. The road from Owerri to Umuahia, much touted as dualized, and commissioned by the late president Yar Adua, is in fact a glorified dirt road, not expanded, but divided with concrete barriers into a narrow two way macadam. Every school and hospital I visited in Imo state was in profound stages of decay. The main city, Owerri, is overcrowded and has lost the serenity of which Owerri was once known because of serious code violations.

There is no evidence of new plans to recreate the city, or build new well developed counties and satellites, or even invest in new urban centers like Orlu, Okigwe, Oguta or the Ahiara-Aboh conurbation. At the office of the Owerri Capital Development Authority, there was nothing left but two old earth-movers, and a huge sign. There was an overwhelming sense of insecurity in Imo State – I had never felt more unsafe in my life.

The greatest development in Owerri is “Keke Napep” and the vast number of posters advertising Governor Ohakim colourfully. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind that Ikedi Ohakim was playing hoochie with Imo state. It has possibly to do with the party – the PPA with which he came to power in Imo state – which was some sort of ersatz arrangement foisted between Olusegun Obasanjo and Orji Uzor-Kalu on the East. It had no ideas.

But it also seems to me that much has to do with Mr. Ohakim’s own limitations: his servility to the golden calf of self-imagery for instance. I take again from Ohakim’s statement to Raji Fashola to highlight my concern: “people came from the Lagos” Ohakim said, and asked the Igbo to invest in the stock market. The crash of the stock market, he claims is the cause of the kidnapping in the South-East because Igbo lost their investment.

Ohakim is wrong on several fronts, but let me quickly say that the crime situation in the South-East is connected to the rapid impoverishment and alienation of a critical segment of the population as a result of the inability of government to provide social programs that would cushion the harsh economic environment, stimulate re-investment, create opportunities for young entrepreneurs and expand the growth of the job market both at the public and private sectors.

What does Imo do with its federal allocations? What is its exact tax base? Perhaps it is time the people themselves – long used to indolence and quiet desperation -get some backbone, and demand for accounting for the use of public funds, through either establishing an independent citizens auditing of the state’s finances or through the auditing oversight of its House of Assembly – which seems consistently complicit with the executive arm.

It is time to stop our governor panhandling from Lagos; time to plug all the leaks through which public funds disappear. In short, it is time to get the priorities right in Imo state. It is time for this governor to stop clapping with one hand and get some serious work done.

The War In Igboland

By Okey Ndibe, Sahara Reporters

The June 15, 2010 edition of NEXT reported that a coalition of groups in Abia State had asked Governor Theodore Orji to resign on account of the level of insecurity in the state. It was not the usual partisan fare, with a number of opposition parties banding together to hound a state governor. Instead, the call for Orji’s resignation came from seven human rights and pro-democracy organizations. There was no doubt that the groups – the Human Rights, Justice and Peace Foundation (HRJPF), Abia Peoples Forum (APF), Centre for Reform and Public Advocacy (CRPA), Popular Participation Front (PPF), Campaign for Democracy (CD), Centre for the Advancement of Children's and Women's Right (CACWR) and Centre for Human Empowerment, Advancement and Development (CHEAD) – were in deadly earnest. They set a deadline of June 30 for Mr. Orji’s resignation. And they promised to commence non-violent civil disobedience should he ignore their call.

My bet is that Governor Orji would not hearken to the ultimatum to resign. Nigerian politicians are not in the habit of giving up power, even when they have no idea how to deploy the resources of their office to solve problems.

The first duty of any government is to guarantee the security of the lives and property of its people. By this measure, Governor Orji has failed the people of Abia.

The groups demanding his resignation took care to offer a convincing narrative of Abia as “a failed state.” The dossier included a “spate of armed robbery, kidnapping for ransom, ritual killings and rape in Abia State, particularly Aba.” The groups decried “the spiraling wave of insecurity in the state.” They instantiated with gory, shocking details: “Between 14 May and 8 June, several banks have been robbed, security personnel brutally killed, trouser-wearing ladies raped, and innocent persons kidnapped for rituals and/or ransom under the nose of heavily armed security men, including the blood-thirsty Abia State Vigilante Services (Bakassi boys).”

Then there was this unanswerable indictment: “Armed robbers and kidnappers now give notice before they strike, as vividly shown by the invasion of First Bank Plc and Fidelity Bank Plc, both in Port Harcourt Road, Aba on Wednesday, 2 June. Recall that they had written to inform [the banks] of their intention to rob them and eventually did, to [the] chagrin of all.”

It’s a sweeping, bleak panorama of the state of insecurity in Abia. But the stigma of failure is not Theodore Orji’s alone. It is a humiliating admission to make, but sadly true: a cadre of greedy, visionless leaders has for too held sway in the Igbo-speaking southeastern states. Other past and current governors of these states have – by their corruption, lack of vision and absence of strategic intelligence – condemned Igboland to economic doldrums and moral degradation.

On June 5, I was in Toronto to give the keynote address at the annual Biafran War Memorial celebration. My talk harped on the current war in Igboland, a war characterized, above all, by a crisis of values. I tried to persuade my audience that, in sheer enormity and direness, the ongoing war dwarfs the effects of the Biafran war that claimed more than a million lives.

Let’s be clear: the triumph and veneration of morally virulent values is not an exclusively Igbo malaise. Nigeria as a whole has long been in the grips of a deformed ethos, the reign of a disorder in which absurdity is held to be sensible, impunity is exalted, and honor is mocked.

In my view, however, the Igbo have paid the steepest price for permitting these misshapen values to gain traction – and then to be embedded as the norm. The moral cancer metastasizing through Igboland is best detected in the music as well as social language.

For years, the fiercely republican Igbo carelessly allowed themselves to dance to lyrics that proclaimed “ana enwe obodo enwe” – roughly translated as “a community is owned.” At first glance, that lyrical claim would appear innocuous, even persuasive. Another lyric set out to name the Igbo’s “nnukwu mmanwu” – big masquerades. Any discerning person would be shocked by the questionable pedigree of some of the men advertised either as the “owners” of their community or big masquerades.

Wealth, whatever the mode and means of its accumulation, was the unmistakable criterion for “owning” one’s community or receiving recognition as a big masquerade. Bowing to wealth, some Igbo musicians shamelessly trumpeted scallywags, scoundrels, and charlatans. It seemed anathema to credit anybody for the quality of his or her public service, for exemplary moral conduct, or for proven distinction of mind. I have never heard any musician invite Chinua Achebe, the most globally well-known and revered Igbo man – a man of stellar intellectual achievement and stupendous ethical funds – to take a seat among the masquerades. Nor have I heard any musician suggest, in a lyric, that the outstanding novelist has a say in the ownership of his community. No pride of place was reserved for women and men whose stock came in the form of dedication to service, whether in the private or public sector, or self-sacrifice in the cause of advancing the common good.

It was inevitable that the habit of worshiping material possession would bring Nigeria to its present troubling pass. In Igboland, the consequence has been nothing short of tragic. One of the popular phrases in Igbo public speech is, “onye bu igu ka ewu n’eso” – or, the goat follows the man with the palm fronds. It is a disturbing statement in every particular. It reduces humans to the level and ethic of a goat. It dictates that every goat/human must follow the man with food, even where the food is stolen.

Such scant regard for sound moral values has had devastating effect. It has fed an anything-goes culture. It has enabled shady characters to sink roots in Igboland and criminals to make a cottage industry out of kidnapping their fellows. There are whispers that some traditional rulers, unscrupulous police officers, shady businessmen as well as “prominent” politicians – the kind often dubbed big masquerades – now organize, sponsor or run their own kidnapping cells.

The Igbo have never faced a more serious challenge than the current blight of kidnappers. We can no longer afford to dress up the ugly truth in fine garbs: the Igbo people are engulfed in a war for survival akin to Biafra, but more desperate, if you ask me. The only difference is that, in this case, the enemy is within.

The casualty is extremely high. Fewer and fewer Igbos resident in such places as Abuja, Lagos or Port Harcourt look forward to traveling to their home states. And when they go, they must arrange to hire several police officers to guard them. The prospects are even grimmer for Igbos who live abroad. For fear of kidnappers, many – perhaps most – traditional marriage ceremonies are now held in Nigerian cities far from Igboland. Imagine the economic and social costs of the flight of such ceremonies. How about investment in new businesses? They have virtually dried up.

Igboland is beleaguered, dangerously close to becoming a no-go area. Yet, the Igbo governors have disconcertingly shown little inclination to weigh any serious measures to remediate the situation. Is it that they fail to recognize the scale of the threat, that they are bereft of ideas for tackling the monster, or – as many people speculate – that some of them are profiteers from the crisis?

Equally indicted are those men and women who run around Abuja and Lagos, styling themselves Igbo leaders. Their pretension to the role of leaders is rebuked by the fact that they have not seen fit to confer and focus on strategies for winning the deadliest, costliest war facing their people. The Igbo’s cultural and moral crisis is exacerbated by a crisis of leadership.

There’s no doubt in my mind that the specter of kidnapping was germinated and fertilized by a permissive culture that, over many years, sought to blur the line between “alu” (sacrilege or profanation) and “ife zili ezi” (good conduct). Consequently, if we are to win the war we’re in, we need not just a diligent, sanitized, well equipped and highly trained police (a far cry from the corruption-ridden apparatus that has usurped the name of law enforcement in Nigeria), an attuned political leadership, and a judiciary that is awake to its sacred mandate. Above all, we need a fundamental re-orientation of values. We must reclaim that moral clarity that once enabled the Igbo people to be appalled at execrable conduct and to look at ill-gotten wealth and say, in fierce repudiation, “Tufia!” or “Alu!”

We must seek this moral rebirth, or we’re doomed.

When it's wise to step down

By Ochereome Nnanna, Vanguard Newspapers

THE present crop of governors in charge of the affairs of states of the South East zone has represented the Igbo heartland extremely well. They have demonstrated an admirable degree of collective purpose, which was not there between 1999 and 2007, when each of the previous governors behaved like crazy political buccaneers.
They were never able to speak with one voice and when they did, one or more of them would go behind, in cahoots with Ohanaeze leaders such as Professor Joe Irukwu, to torpedo collective decisions because of some favours or fears from former President Obasanjo.

At a point, all the governors of the zone were of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and yet they were like water and oil that could never mix.

The setting today is different. Only three states: Imo – Enugu and Ebonyi – are under PDP governors. The other two: Abia and Anambra, are now under the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).

It is a pleasant irony that now they are scattered in different political camps they have been able to discover unity of purpose. Perhaps it has to do with the difference between the political atmosphere created by former President Obasanjo and what currently obtains.

It also has something to do with the fact that the gentlemen now in charge are much better adjusted personalities than their predecessors.

When the late President Umaru Yar’ Adua’s ailing body was hidden in Aso Villa and campaigns were on for him to be removed and the then Acting President Goodluck Jonathan sworn-in, the South East governors met and collectively stood against it even though the Ohanaeze supported the push to activate the Constitution.

Many people lampooned them. Even though I also wanted the Constitution to be followed, I knew why the governors took their stand. It had nothing to do with any opposition to the emergence of Jonathan. Far from that. They read the mood of the “cabal” and saw the possible danger our democracy might be faced with if the matter was pushed too far.

But more than that was their personal regard and appreciation of Umaru’s excellent disposition towards addressing some anti-Igbo issues left dangling from the Obasanjo regime.

These included the listing of Imo and Abia states in the Coastal States’ initiative, approval of river ports at Onitsha and Oguta, dredging of the lower Niger River , approval of a Stock Exchange for Onitsha, concrete steps towards commencing the Second Niger Bridge, the restoration of the stolen oil wells to Abia State and many more.

Yar’ Adua had shown himself as a president the governors could work with, as he made promises and kept them without first remembering the fact that the Igbo fought a civil war against the rest of Nigeria .

The decision, last weekend, by the five governors of the South East that the Igbo people will not present a presidential or vice presidential candidate in the 2011 election also got my applause.

Ohanaeze Ndigbo should also meet and formally announce the stepping down of the majority ethnic group of the East from the race. Anybody who goes ahead to contest will be on his own.

It has nothing to do with a “boycott”, as there is no serious matter calling for that. It is a sensible strategy to actively and voluntarily give ground to those who are more favoured by the current equations to contest.

The North is favoured because of the zoning arrangement of the ruling party. The South-South is also favoured in that someone from there is the incumbent President of Nigeria who has a constitutional right to contest.

Any Igbo candidate plunging into the race of 2011 will constitute an obstruction to a South-South candidate, which will serve no useful purpose. Worse, any vice presidential runner will be spoiling the chances of the South-South, and the true Igbo political interest is not cut out to spoil what belongs to others.

In their fight for president with the South-South, the North is very likely to invade the South East for running mates in the hope that they would swing Igbo votes and abort a possible Goodluck Jonathan’s chances of getting elected.

One lesson I have learnt about Nigerian politics is that when the turn of a group to get political favours from Nigeria is ripe, the whole nation usually comes together to grant it. In 1999, we gave it to Yoruba. In 2007 we gave it back to the North.

In both races, all major presidential candidates were from the favoured zones. When Yar’ Adua died we had no problem giving it an Ijaw to whom it was constitutionally due. When the turn of the Igbo truly arises, the major parties will have Igbo aspirants as their presidential candidates. 2011 is not that time.

Rather, as the South East governors have rightly put it, come 2011, the Igbo should give their support only to the candidate of the North or South-South who has a more attractive package of redressing marginalisation and inequity the Igbo people have suffered since the end of the civil war.

Whoever makes it possible for the South East to acquire an equal number of states and equitable number of local councils and electoral constituencies with the other geopolitical zones should be supported. These are more important than an “Igbo president” because they are the necessary stepping stones to a viable Igbo aspiration to the presidency.

Sometimes it pays more to voluntarily abstain. In the past, Yorubas gained more from Nigeria when they were in the opposition.

Since they were taken to the “mainstream” of Nigerian politics by Obasanjo in 2003, the fear and respect that the ruling establishment had for South West politics has, obviously, gone down. Temporary voluntary abstention often gives one a greater bargaining muscle.

Kidnapping As Big Business in South-East

BY IYOBOSA UWUGIAREN, LEADERSHIP NIGERIA/ALL AFRICA

Abuja — Historians and archaeologists have it that the Igbo culture - their way of life was in the beginning a culture of life (ndu bu isi) instead of death. According to them, "Life was celebrated while death was despised and feared. The only death celebrated was someone who lived long (usually above 60 years) and had grown up children."

Today, they say the opposite is the case: "Igbo efulefu"-useless, fools, political/economic criminals, are now making Igbo culture a culture of death, killing and kidnapping. True, in the last few months, kidnapping has become a big business in the region that has produced great people - living and the dead. Our Assistant Managing Editor/Chief-of-Reporters, IYOBOSA UWUGIAREN examines the strange phenomenon.

P resident Goodluck Azikiwe Ebele Jonathan is not a poignant person prone to emotion-laden speeches. The few public speeches he has made since he became president can testify to that. But when asked to comment on the state of security situation in the country -especially the increasing rate of kidnapping in the South-east part of the country recently - he was strangely emotional.

"Any responsible leader should be worried about the state of security in the country, especially in the South-east; it is very embarrassing; it is unacceptable to us and we shall do everything within our means to confront the problems", the president stated emotionally while chatting with some media executives on national television.

The President talked about the socio-economic and political implications of the crime situation saying, it was the only reason the nation lost the hosting right of the ongoing soccer World Cup to South Africa. He said from the security report at his disposal, it was obvious that the crime of kidnapping is an organised one involving many persons or groups - the security agents, the judiciary, the banking sector and some lawyers. He asked: "I hope when we start arresting them, some professional bodies will not complain?"

True, like the information available to Jonathan, kidnapping has become a big business in the South-east. The dreadful hallucination-kidnapping which was first carried out in Port-Harcourt on February 18, 2006 by a group of heavily armed militants to draw the government's attention to their demands has now graduated to a frightening fraction in different parts of the nation. Even the peacefulness, serenity and safety of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja is not out of danger. Kidnapping has now become a veritable, real tool in the hands of intelligent but criminally minded persons for making "cool money."

"It is distressing that kidnapping for ransom has become a burgeoning business in many parts of Igboland. Of recent, Anambra, Enugu, Abia and Imo States have been hotbeds of commercially-motivated kidnapping. In a bid to increase the ransom payable after the kidnap, the kidnappers now specialize in kidnapping monarchs, home video actors and actresses, traditional rulers of big towns, high profile business tycoons, politicians, children and relatives of wealthy politicians", an analyst said.

To be sure, a couple was recently kidnapped immediately after their wedding in Anambra State . His Royal Highness, Igwe Mbamalu Okeke of Abagana, Igwe J.C Nkwocha of Alor, Dr. Anayo Edemobi and sibling of Minister of Information and Communications Dora Akunyili, have all been victims of these dreadful criminals in the state.

From the capital of old Eastern Region-Enugu State , Igwe Uche Nwachime in Nkanu, was abducted and later slaughtered because his relations had refused to pay ransom on time as requested by the kidnappers. Report also had it that the proprietor of Gold Riveri Hotel Enugu was kidnapped and later released upon the payment of a N5 million ransom. In Abia State , which is fast becoming the most notorious state where kidnapping business booms, the chairman of Enyimba Football was kidnapped. Justice Awa U. Kalu was shot in a failed kidnapping bid. Some Imo State indigenes had also been kidnapped recently; they include Mr. Celestine Ngaobiwu, a member of the Imo State House of Assembly and two sons of the Speaker of the Imo House of Assembly.

Three persons were killed earlier in the year when unknown gunmen kidnapped a movie star Peter Edochie in Onitsha, the commercial nerve centre of Anambra State . According to reports, the victims were killed to facilitate Edochie's kidnappings. The actor hit the limelight as Okonkwo in the television adaptation of Chinua Achebe's book, "Things fall Apart." He was kidnapped after his bodyguards were overpowered. Few days after the Edochie incident, about six people were killed in Imo State when kidnappers reportedly invaded Orlu and Ikeduru areas of the state. Two kidnapped Indians were reportedly rescued with some of the gang members seriously injured when a team of policemen confronted the gang at Ama Nwozuzu in Ikeduru. The cases are endless.

The wide-ranging state of insecurity in the South east, security experts say, had reached a stage where practically everybody is now worried about the frightening dimension the region is headed. Presently, hardly can people sleep with both eyes closed for fear of being kidnapped. Businessmen, politicians and other wealthy persons have taken voyage as well as with their businesses for fear of being kidnapped. In the last few years, kidnapping and hostage taking have moved from the Niger Delta creeks to Ndi-igboland. The ogre has broadened and taken unfathomable derivation in the land where many able-bodied but unemployed youths proliferate. Within the South-east, Abia State is the epicentre followed by others in the region. Everybody is now concern. It is expected against obtainable verification that the rich government officials, traditional rulers, elected politicians and their immediate families are now the target of the men of evil.

There appears not to be hiding place for the rich, even though some of them have relocated their families outside the South-east geo-political zone or outside the country. Even Lagos that was once regarded as insecure state is now a heaven of choice for many.

Recently, the profit-making activities in Aba, the commercial nerve centre of Abia State, were crippled as banks were forced to close their doors against demanding customers after frequent violent attacks on banks. At a point, the evil men outsmarted all procedures adopted by the banks to avoid them.

"While insecurity disrupts socio-economic and political activities in the country, it also slows down the pace of economic growth and development. Many investors continue to flee the country", an Aba based bank manager who does not want his name mentioned, told LEADERSHIP SUNDAY.

Sadly, the news the international community has about the South east is that it is most unsafe to live and do business. To be sure, the World Bank recently rated Imo State as one of the worst states in the country to do business. "Before any foreigner contemplates of coming to Nigeria, he or she would not only be calculating the high cost of investing in the country, but also the safety of his or her life", the bank manger said.

The National Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA) recently expressed regret over the serious security problems in the South east region. It said that "the security challenges had worsened the already bad and unfriendly business environment that is negatively affecting the growth of businesses and socio-economic activities in the area."

"If industries are closing shops and investors are not forthcoming because of insecurity and other attendant problems faced by businesses, then the future, particularly that of the children should agitate the minds of everybody."

Apart from NACCIMA, the police, states in the south east and other segments of the society are worried. Recently peeved by the state of insecurity- kidnapping in Anambra, the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Ogbonna Onovo, announced the deployment of 16 units of anti-riot policemen to the area to complement the efforts of policemen attached to the state commands. But in spite of this, security experts and monitors say the level of insecurity in the region had heightened.

The chief police officer had partly blamed the high wave of crime in the country, especially in the South-east on materialism and loss of societal values. He noted that people were ready to do anything to get rich and be celebrated in the society. While also blaming the high rate of kidnapping and armed robbery in these areas on unemployment, he however said that most of the graduates of Nigerian universities are half-baked, but carry about certificates they could not even defend.


Perceptibly troubled by the disturbing state of insecurity in the South east in recent times, President Jonathan recently invited governors in the region to Aso Rock for a meeting. Addressing journalists after the meeting, Governor Peter Obi of Anambra State lamented that they were spending huge funds to support the police and other security agencies "but we found out that the hoodlums' firepower is more than the police. The security agencies are trying but they need more support from the Federal Government."

Obi requested for the purchase of two or more helicopters with modern communication equipment and detectors, placed in strategic locations in the south east where it could be called up in a matter of minutes to intervene in any security situation.

According to Obi, "I do not play politics with security. The security situation in the Southeast is pathetic. The militants who were displaced from the core Niger Delta regions have left their creeks, came upland to terrorise us. We must rise to the occasion. And since no state can do it alone, resources must be pooled together to confront this ugly development."

Those who should know said the fear of kidnapping is real in the South east because of lack of effective and reliable security machinery to confront the kidnappers. "Many people in the South east now live in perpetual fear of kidnappers. It has curtailed the freedom of movement of the people. For example, some prominent citizens from the South east now travel to their respective villages with full mobile police escorts. What a miserable life! If living in one's own village can now be classified as dangerous living, then life in itself is not worth living", an Abuja based lawyer, Mr. John kalu said.

The Minister of State for Information and Communication, Mr. Labaran Maku recently said that the Federal Government had taken steps to confront the situation calling on the affected communities to cooperate with security operatives to tackle the problems.

"The Federal Government through Federal Executive Council (FEC) called on all communities in the south-east and in other parts of the country where security has become an issue to cooperate with security agencies that are already undertaking the operation to fish out the criminals wherever they may be hiding and deal with the situation decisively", the minister said

He said kidnapping was disrupting normal life and commercial activities in some states and government could not stay back and watch criminals take over the entire situation.

He added, "So government is undertaking joint security operations to fish out the camps, know where those people are staying and this cannot be done by security agencies alone. The entire communities, especially state government, local government, traditional rulers and community organisations should cooperate."

"The criminals are not ghosts, they come from amongst our communities, they don't come from outside, so if the public can give cooperation and give sensitive information to security agencies, it will help security agencies."

Governor Theodore Orji of Abia State was so overwhelmed with the security situation in his state that he recently granted amnesty to kidnappers and armed robbers who made life in the state terrifying and dreadful. He made the announcement when a delegation of the various groups of kidnappers visited him at the Government House, Umuahia. They were led by the Commandant of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps in the state, Nathaniel Ubong. Mr. Orji told his guests that his government was committed to the success of the programme. The governor said he was surprised that Abia State was not one of the states covered by the presidential amnesty for Niger Delta militants and that he had protested the exclusion to the Minister in charge of the amnesty programme of the Federal Government, who assured him that the programme would be repeated to accommodate Abia State. The governor, who said the Minister's assurance encouraged him to make the offer so that Abia will also benefit, said kidnapping had made Abia State more notorious than the states where it first started. "The disadvantages of kidnapping are massive, because it has driven away contractors and investors from the state and Aba in particular, making development difficult," Mr Orji said. He urged the repentant kidnappers to go and inform others to lay down their arms as the amnesty programme is real.

The governor added, "All the arms you have packed somewhere bring them out for the world to see so that the Federal Government will accept you into the amnesty programme."

"You cannot harbour grievance against your fatherland, it is only in the atmosphere of peace that development can take place."

Mr Ubong, the NSCDC Commandant, was quoted as telling Orji that the kidnappers approached him three times for the peace meeting but he did not think they were serious. "They finally came with a lawyer, who convinced me that they were ready to leave the bush and embrace the offer," he was reported as saying.

Spokesperson of the kidnappers, Stephen John, a native of Ukwa West LGA, said his gang resorted to kidnapping to protest their being excluded from the Federal Government's amnesty offer saying, "As oil producing communities, Owazza and Obokwe in Ukwa West LGA were neglected without hospitals, schools, good roads and other infrastructure."

Chimete Kingsley Onwudara, the groups' lawyer said the delegations were made up of representatives of the kidnappers and the communities who had come to ensure that government was serious with the offer. "In the next week, all the kidnappers will be out with their weapons, making Abia peaceful once again," he said.

Before then, in huge efforts to tackle the situation frontally, some states in the South east have enacted laws with a capital offence punishable by death while two other states: Rivers and Edo imposed life imprisonment on persons convicted for the offence of kidnapping. Other states, apart from Imo that passed into law "Prohibition of Hostage Taking and Related Offences Law" with death penalty as punishment for offenders are Abia, Akwa Ibom, Anambra and Enugu . More states are warming up to join the list.

But can the death penalty stop people from being kidnapped? And how will Nigeria look in the eye of the world legalising what others the world over are proscribing?

Mr. Aster Van Kregfen, Amnesty International's Representative Researcher in Nigeria, said that retention of capital punishment had failed to reduce armed robbery or murder in Nigeria despite the execution of more than 2,600 prisoners since 1970. "Experience has shown that the threat of death penalty is not an effective answer to violent crime. It can actually exacerbate violence in a society", he said.

He said that killing every kidnapper not only flies in the face of global and national trends, but also a violation of Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a United Nations treaty.

Kregfen viewed kidnapping, as "a terrible crime that causes anguish to both the victims and their families".

His solution: "The way to be though on violent crime like kidnapping is to strengthen the police's ability to detect potential crimes before they occur and prevent them. The Federal Government needs to strengthen police training and resources to increase police investigation capacity and effectiveness."

UN views right to life as an inalienable right. This position as adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in1948 sees death penalty as a violation of this essential right. Besides, the world body has always argued that not only did death penalty dehumanise society; it has never been known as an efficient way to stop crime. The worldwide trend is to abolish death penalty for all categories of crime or at least retain it for exceptional crimes committed in exceptional circumstances. African countries such as Algeria , Mozambique , South Africa , Namibia , Tunisia , Angola and Senegal are among over 90 countries in the world that have abolished death penalty for any crime.

Kidnapping is not new in the world. In fact, security experts say Phoenix, Arizona has become the kidnapping capital of America, with more incidents than any other city in the world outside of Mexico City with over 370 cases last year alone.

In fact, kidnappings and other crimes connected to the Mexican drug cartels are quickly spreading across the border, from Texas to California. The majority of the victims are either illegal aliens or connected to the drug trade. Recently, an ABC News' investigation uncovered horrific cases of chopped-off hands, legs and heads when a victim's family doesn't pay up fast enough. But can President Jonathan fix the problems in the South-east as he promised. Ndi-Igbo, the peace-loving people of the south east, are eagerly and earnestly waiting for Jonathan.

I relocated from Lagos because my children were losing touch with tradition –Bright Chimezie

By Nonye Ben-Nwankwo/Punch

Highlife musician Bright Chimezie, a.k.a. Okoro Junior, who used to be quite visible on the Nigerian entertainment scene, speaks with NONYE BEN-NWANKWO about his career and private life. Where have you been all this while? I have been out of Lagos for about seven years. I have been in Abia State; Umuahia to be precise. I lived in Lagos in the 1980s. I even got married here.

Why did you decide to go back home?

It got to a point where my children didn’t know where they came from. My music distracted me. I was more interested in it than anything else. But I later realised that my children couldn’t even speak their language fluently. It used to prick my conscience that my kids couldn’t speak their language.

So you decided to take them home?

Oh, yes. By 2003, when they were old enough to attend secondary school, I decided to take them home. If I hadn’t done so, they would have thought that Lagos was their home. They would have found it difficult to get used to our own culture. I had to relocate to eastern Nigeria in 2003 with my wife, my kids and my band. Since that time, I have been shuttling between Umuahia and other parts of the world.

And have you achieved your aim with your kids?

Yes. I thank God that the kids now understand their language. They know where they come from and they know their environment. They can also come back to Lagos if they wish.

Don’t you think that people should still have known about your activities even in Umuahia?

I still play music. I was just being mindful of the press at the time. I have a 16-piece band. It is live music that has sustained me up until this point. I am not involved in any other kind of business. If I were, the gossip mill would have mentioned it.

We learnt that you have recorded a new album.

Oh, yes. It is titled ‘Because of English’.

Does the title revolve around any true life experience of yours?

Oh yes. Most times, I use personal experience to get my message across to the people. ‘Because of English’ is another story. My teacher in primary school punished me because of English language. The teacher got up one morning and said nobody should speak vernacular on that day. He said he was going to whip us if he caught us speaking vernacular. You know I was born and brought up in the village. It is not easy to divorce vernacular from me. So my classmate, Chinyere, took my pencil. She was always taking my pencil without returning it when I needed it. I told her, ‘Chinyere, nyem pensul mu,’ which means Chinyere, give me my pencil. My teacher heard me and screamed. He shouted, ‘Who said that? Who spoke vernacular in this class?’ The whole class pointed at me. He asked why I disobeyed him. I said, ‘Nna anyi ukwu’ (my boss), I didn’t even realise that by calling him nna anyi ukwu, I was still committing the same offence. Before I could finish explaining to him, he asked me to kneel down and he punished me. Why should my teacher punish me because I didn’t speak English? We should not allow our language to die. Those days, when we were growing up, the Igbo had their own alphabet. The Yorubas have their own as well. But these days, we have defaulted. Kids now find it very difficult to speak their language.

Is that why some of your songs are rendered in Igbo?

Yes. Apart from some songs I recorded in English and Pidgin, the bulk of my songs were recorded in Igbo. I speak the proverb. I thank God for my language. But the younger generation have not inculcated this aspect of our culture. I am afraid that in the next 25 years, many young people will suffer from what I call cultural amputation. I had to come out with this album to get the attention of the people.

One of your songs tells how a white man once said you were commiting suicide because he saw you eating pounded yam. Is that a true story?

People keep asking me if that story is true. That was creativity. I wanted to pass a message across to the people. The best way to do that was to get a story line. To answer your question, part of that song was a true life experience. We have Ogbono soup, Egusi soup and other kinds of soup, and we should wash our hands and eat them with pride. If the Chinese eat with chop-sticks and take pride in that, why shouldn’t we do ours?

We should be proud of who we are and what we stand for.

You are always dressed in traditional clothes. Does it mean you can’t wear English attires?

I am afraid, for the past 30 years, I have worn traditional attires. I am used to them. If I wear a suit now, I may look awkward. This is my style, and it has been so for many years.

What really got you into playing highlife music?

I am a cultural person. Like I said, I grew up in the village. With that kind of background, what do you expect? I was not born in a town. I only started going to town after my secondary school days. My father was a church minister before he passed on. He had a wonderful voice. My mother is still alive and she is a powerful dancer. I have a natural flare for music. I make small moves and people will start clapping for me. That was how it got to this level. I used to sneak out of school and perform at television programmes. I was appearing on NTA, Aba in those days. It was a big deal. People would shout and scream that they saw me on TV. From there, I picked it up and started sharpening my skills until I formed my own brand of music known as Zigima Sound. I have held on to it till date.

If you weren’t born in the rural area, would you have had a different mindset?

I don’t know. God has a way of balancing equations. Any environment you live in influences you. If I was born in Lagos, I don’t think I would have been transmitting on the same wave length.

Some people see your nickname, Okoro, as derogatory. How come you take so much pride in bearing it?

It was quite derogatory. Without sounding immodest, I kind of gave ‘Okoro’ some prestige. When I came into Lagos in the 1970s, people were always calling me Okoro boy. Well, I said there was no problem with that. Okoro is not my name. But because of my afrocentric ideas, because of my trying to protect where I come from, I was dubbed Okoro. I even affixed the name to my real name. I take so much pride in answering it. I don’t see it as being derogatory.

As a young man back then, most people would have expected you to flow with the tide instead of behaving like a traditional man. Weren’t you criticised?

All of us cannot be there. I derive a lot of joy from what I have become. I find it difficult not to be myself. I was born in the village. I cannot push aside that aspect of my life so that women would love me.

So there is nothing Western that you miss?

Like what? Is there anything African that oyinbo man misses? I don’t miss anything! Let me tell you, the fact that I am traditional does not mean that I am archaic. I am a young African man in a modern sense. I still mingle with people. It is just that the uniqueness is there. Once you look at me, it will strike you that I am a serious African man.

Your wife didn’t mind marrying an ‘okoro’ man?

No. She didn’t mind. There are some women who love men that are very deep and men that vibrate. My wife falls into that category. I proposed and she accepted. That was in 1990.

Before you met your wife, would you have been tempted to marry a white woman during one of your trips abroad?

I wouldn’t have done that. It would have been cross breeding. I am not trying to go against people that married white women. Love is a universal thing. But with my kind of philosophy, it would have been difficult for me to marry a foreigner. The white woman can not make Ugba and stockfish for me. Would she have been able to rap with me in Igbo language? One thing that gives me joy is sitting down with my wife and speaking Igbo language without putting a word of English.

Regarding your kids, don’t you think their friends could see them as ‘bush’ people?

No way. Their formative years were superb. They went to the best schools in Lagos before we moved to the East. Even now, their English is impeccable. They speak very well. It was just that I had to balance that. I got married here and I had to take them home when I noticed that something was lacking. I couldn’t allow my wife to go home and do it alone. If I had done so, I’m sure you would have written that Okoro Junior has dumped his wife in the village and is rocking life and frolicking with young girls in Lagos.

How were they able to adapt to the environment at home?

Remember their father is an okoro man. Their papa was there and their mama was there. They were even happy. Kids love nature. They love the natural things in the environment at home. I thank God they were not too old when we moved. They were able to acclimatise very well. I have done my bit. My conscience is now clear.

What if your son wants to become a hip hop artiste?

While I was growing up, we had reggae. James Brown and Tony Wilson’s kind of music was the in thing. Those days, to appear fashionable to pretty young women, we pretended as if we were oyinbo. But after some time, I had to navigate. Coming back to your question, Highlife music, Zigima music, Apala and Fuji belong to us. I will tell him to take these music to another level. The kind of highlife that people before me played was not the same I play. The kids should take what we are doing now to another level. If you check out what these kids sing now, the lyrical content is completely zero. Their attention is on Hummer jeeps. They work with computers and programme their beats and they take it to a DJ to play for them on the radio. We didn’t grow like that.

Is there any chance of leaving your village for the city again?

I wouldn’t say. It depends on the gravitational pull. Right now, I am comfortable. I am focusing on my career. I still maintain my 16-piece band. What would I have used to feed my family? But everywhere is urbanised. There is telephone and there is the Internet. Things are still working well in the village. I have accomplished what I wanted.

Do you still get the attention that you used to enjoy from the public in the past?

It is even higher. Without sounding immodest, I am very unique. I drove into Lagos less than 48 hours ago, I tried walking down the streets, and the people almost mobbed me. The admiration is still there.

Even as traditional as you may be, you still add swag and style, especially in the way you walk and your dance steps...

I am traditional but that does not mean I should behave like an old man. For God’s sake, I am a young man. I am bubbling with life and enthusiasm. I have body movements. I didn’t need to go to any school of dance.

You said you got your royalties from COSON?

I got money! I will not tell you how much they paid me. I was zigimatised! It was in December, 2009. Tony said I should send my bank account number and he wired money into my account, saying it was my royalty. I was dazed. I just decided to identify with them. It has not been happening. I have a lot of CDs in the market. I recorded for Rogers All Stars and I am still recording for him. He still pays me my royalties. I need to identify with bodies that transmit on such wave length so that we go to the next level together.

Mary Slessor and history in Osinaike’s drama

By Akintayo Abodurin/234 Next

The debate about the place of history in literature was rekindled at the 28th play reading session of the National Troupe of Nigeria (NTN) held inside Cinema Hall II, National Theatre, Lagos, on April 22.

How much of historical facts can a writer include in a work? Is a writer free to adapt history? If yes, to what extent? These were some of the issues generated from Muyiwa Osinaike’s ‘Mary Slessor: Abolition of the Killing of Twins in Nigeria’, read at the occasion.

Started 14 years ago as a critique session to help playwrights improve their works-in-progress before publication, Osinaike’s script generated healthy debate at the forum. The fact that his subject is a familiar one did not help matters, as people tore into the playwright for his perceived interference with history during the discussion.

Perhaps judging from the title of the work, people expected Osinaike, founder and Artistic Director of Black Marble Dance Academy, to focus more on the activities of the European missionary. His own ‘Mary Slessor’ instead, centres on the abolition of the killing of twins in Okoyong, a village in Calabar. His plot concentrates on the King of the village who discovers, towards the end of the play, that he has a twin brother. The brother, a missionary, walks into the village at the end of the play and causes an uproar because of his tattered clothes. Villagers think their king has gone mad, and started to look for ways to cure him before they realise it is the twin. Osinaike also portrays Slessor as a crown agent, and not the altruistic missionary of popular belief.

Sustain the suspense

Deputy Director, Dance, of the National Troupe, Arnold Udoka, was the first to comment after the reading. He noted that the playwright did a good job structurally but “didn’t sustain the suspense.” He advised Osinaike to re-examine the play’s ending and how the brothers meet. The choreographer also observed that most of the names in the play are more Akwa Ibom than Okoyong. He gave instances: “The use of crown should be Ntinya. You may have to establish Mary Slessor as a character, because she owns the play. Likewise, twins are called ‘Amananba’ and not ‘Amaniba’, which means ‘mother of twins’,” he added.

This is not history

While Udoka’s issue with the play focused on its structure, typos and interpretation of names, Mike Anyanwu, NTN’s head of Corporate Affairs, was concerned about the accuracy of historical facts presented in it. “This is a beautiful Nigerian comedy of errors, but the play falls far short of a play that should be titled ‘Mary Slessor’. It is not about Mary Slessor and she wasn’t a crown agent. This is falsification of history, it’s not true history. Mary Slessor was purely an evangelising missionary, rather than a political exploiter under the British,” Anyanwu said.

He added, “Apart from Mary Slessor, every other character is not drawn from history, they are fictitious. This is not history, sir!” Anyanwu advised Osinaike to change the title “because it doesn’t reflect the true historical activities carried out by Mary Slessor in that region.”

It is history

Chair of the session, Funmi Domino, would, however, have none of that. He defended the playwright saying, “There is no strict order in a work of imagination. The playwright has the liberty to use history as he pleases. A writer has the creative licence to change the turn of history. He may not chronologically follow events as recorded by history. This is not an anthropology text where historians have to record events as they unfold accurately.” He later disclosed that he was also irked by some parts of the play. Domino said he thought Osinaike was an evangelist himself out to preach, with the way he disparaged traditional religion.

Acting Director General of the National Troupe, Martins Adaji, also appeared to support Osinaike, albeit indirectly. “Don’t let’s mix the freedom of the playwright with historical facts. This is a director’s play; it gives us the liberty to embellish and put what you think is good enough. The play has the potential of blossoming into an epic play. If a play has corrected an historical error, it’s a good play,” he said.

Josephine Igberease, another official of the NTN, advised playwrights to “be definitive. Let’s know if you are being historical”, while writing a script.

Artist and scholar, Sola Fosudo, enjoined Osinaike who will direct ‘We’ , a presentation of the Dance Guild of Nigeria for the country’s Golden Jubilee, to consider the title of the play because an average reader would like to know more about Mary Slessor’s history. “The playwright should put more songs in the play and consider some sub-plots to go with the linear plots,” he added.

Film critic, Shuaibu Husseini, wondered why Osinaike changed the original title of the play from ‘Amaniba’ to ‘Mary Slessor’ when there is no link between the missionary’s activities and her eventual recognition by the Queen of England in the play.

But rather than be discouraged by the comments, Osinaike, who wrote the play in 2001 when he went for a research work in Akwa Ibom, took it all in good spirit. “I will go back to the sites and research again and get Mary Slessor right. I’m not going to change the title. I will research Mary Slessor in Arochukwu and in other areas. By the time I finish, I will have a compendium on Mary Slessor. If it’s going to take me another year, I will go.”

Nigerians take seats in British Parliament

By Tosin Sulaiman/234 Next

Three politicians of Nigerian descent will take their seats in the British House of Commons tomorrow, following hard-fought campaigns in the recent general election.

Helen Grant of the Conservative Party was elected in Maidstone & The Weald in the south east of England; Chi Onwurah of the Labour Party becomes the new MP for Newcastle Central in the north east; and Chuka Umunna, also of Labour, will represent Streatham in south London.

They are the first candidates of Nigerian heritage to be elected to Westminster and will join more than 600 other MPs when the House of Commons formally reconvenes tomorrow. Their presence and that of 24 other minority MPs means Westminster has never been more diverse. In the last Parliament there were only 14 black or Asian MPs.

The new faces include the first three Muslim women to win parliamentary seats, one of whom is also the first Bangladeshi MP. In addition, the Conservative Party has its first two Muslim MPs and its first Asian female MP. The number of women elected to Parliament also increased from 126 to 142, although women now make up only 22 per cent of MPs.

Ms. Onwurah, who was born in Newcastle to a Nigerian father and British mother, polled 15,692 votes, almost twice as many as her Liberal Democrat rival who came second with 8,228 votes. The Conservatives were third with 6,611 votes. The turnout was 56.4 per cent, down slightly from 57.3 per cent in the 2005 general election.

Ms. Onwurah, an engineer by profession, is the first black woman to represent the north east of England, as well as the first female MP of African descent in the House of Commons. Her father is from Awka in Anambra State and served in the Biafran army shortly after she was born.

After the results were announced, she said: “I want to thank, above all, the voters of Newcastle. Tonight they have chosen a message of a positive future.”

Mr. Umunna, an employment law solicitor, received 20,037 votes, with the Liberal Democrats in second place with 16,778 votes and the Conservatives in third place with 8,578 votes. The turnout rose by 22.4 per cent to 62.8 per cent.

Speaking after the results were declared, Mr. Umunna said: “this has been an extraordinary night.” Addressing his opponents, he said the campaign had been tough on all the parties.

“We have really been tested in this campaign, which has been perhaps the toughest for us since 1992,” he said, referring to the year in which his party took the seat from the Conservatives. Since then, it has been a safe Labour seat.

Getting emotional

Mr. Umunna ended by thanking the people of Streatham, saying: “for me, it’s quite an emotional thing I suppose. I was born and bred in this constituency and the fact that so many of my neighbours, my close friends and people that I’ve known in the community for a very long time have chosen to entrust me to represent them is something that makes me deeply humbled.”

Mr. Umunna is of mixed Nigerian, Irish and British descent. He told NEXT before the election that he was inspired by his late father, Ben Osi Umunna, who stood for the governorship of Anambra State in the early 1990s but narrowly missed out.

Mrs. Grant, who is the Conservatives’ first black female MP, helped the party retain Maidstone & The Weald with 23,491 votes, compared to 17,602 for the Lib Dems and 4,769 for Labour. The turnout was 68.9 per cent, up from 65.8 per cent in 2005.

Brought up by a single mother on a council estate, Mrs. Grant, whose father is Nigerian, went on to study law and set up her own firm, Grants Solicitors, in 1996. She joined the Conservative Party in 2006 after what she describes as a “brief flirtation” with Labour. On her website, she attributed her election victory to “two and a half years of good old-fashioned hard work and positive campaigning.”

The Conservatives’ other Nigerian candidate, Kemi Adegoke, failed to capture the safe Labour seat of Dulwich & West Norwood in south London. The seat was held by Tessa Jowell, a former government minister, who polled 22,461 votes, against 13,096 for the Lib Dems and 10,684 for the Conservatives.

Mrs. Grant, Ms. Onwurah and Mr. Umunna will be among 232 new MPs in Westminster following a general election that resulted in Britain’s first hung Parliament since 1974. It forced David Cameron’s Conservative Party, which received the most seats but not enough for an overall majority, into a coalition with the Liberal Democrats, who came third behind Labour.

Esiaba Irobi, the Intellectual terrorist

By Nnorom Azuonye/234 Next


I don’t really feel qualified to write about Esiaba Irobi. I have not met anyone quite qualified enough to write about Esiaba Irobi, The Minstrel. He represented something different to everyone he met. To many, he was the consummate artist and academic. To others, he was a benchmark for hard work and diligence. There were some who saw him as a spirit of anarchy. He was also a rude man who wrote many sexually-explicit poems with insane titles, my favourite being ‘A Short History of my Penis.’

I will attempt to write about the Esiaba Irobi I know. A good man. A laughter factory. A prophetic writer. A man who started out as my teacher, then became my friend, and ended up as my brother.

When I heard that Esiaba passed away via several messages, I stopped functioning. Everyone, all at once asking if I could confirm it, friends like Molara Wood and Toyin Adepoju, among others, wanted to be sure before calling the news by its name. I promised to find out from Esiaba’s wife, Uloaku.

The phone call to Berlin was the most frightening call I have ever made, and in the spirit of The Minstrel, I was optimistic that Uloaku would chuckle and tell me there had been a big mistake. It turned out to be wishful thinking. Esiaba was gone. At first I was very strong. I even tapped into my strong belief in reincarnation and shrugged, “Well, Esiaba, it has been a tough journey for you. Go on, sir, reset your life and start over.” Then I added, as we Igbo say when a person is going to our ancestors, “Esiaba, son of Irobi, your world, seven worlds, you will live your earthly life again. In your next life, you will not fall ill in mid life, you will marry young, and raise your family in joy and good health. Go in peace, my brother.”

It was really going well until I told my wife that Esiaba had died. Amaka had also grown close to Esiaba. When he called our home, they would laugh on the phone as he performed poetry and songs down the line on international phone calls. My wife broke down on me and cried. That’s when they gushed; my first tears for Esiaba. Yes, I am a poet too, and I am not afraid to have a good cry if it will stop my chest from exploding.

Nsukka

Esiaba Irobi was my lecturer in the Department of Dramatic Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, from 1987 to 1989, when he left for the United Kingdom. Esiaba was more than a lecturer to me; he was an inspiration. Every course he taught me - Theatre History, Improvisation, Basic Acting Skills, and Introduction to Playwriting - opened my mind to the possibilities of the theatre.

Esiaba was not just a theorist, he showed us how to do what he taught. His performances were mesmerising, his energy was overwhelming. As an actor, he transformed even the lamest word in a play into a living entity inhabited by a spirit of dance. I had the privilege of understudying Esiaba as Elesin in Wole Soyinka’s ‘Death and The King’s Horseman’, a role he carried with commensurate pomp and passion, under the out-of-this-world direction of Eni Jones Umuko. Esiaba connected, raised and sustained the ritual impetus of that play, helped along with the magnificence of Nwugo Uzoigwe’s Iyaloja. The air in the Arts Theatre at Nsukka was so taut through the performances that it could have strangled people.

The plays

As a playwright, Esiaba wrote some of the angriest, action-packed, issue plays that packed theatres full every night. ‘Nwokedi,’ ‘The Fronded Circle,’ and ‘Hangmen Also Die’ changed the theatre tradition at Nsukka forever. Those of us who dared pick up our pens to write plays were under the heavy influence of Esiaba Irobi. I had small parts in ‘Nwokedi’ as a politician and member of the Ekumeku, but in ‘Hangmen Also Die’, I played the role of Chief Isokipiri Erekosima, who embezzled three million naira compensation meant for ordinary citizens for the destruction of their livelihoods by oil spillage. Erekosima spent half a million of that money on his coronation alone, as the Amatemeso of Izon State, and some on expensive lifestyles and education for his children abroad - because the standards of education in Nigeria had fallen. He was to meet his ancestors when the unemployed graduates-turned-criminals kidnapped, tried, condemned, and hung him from a tree. ‘Hangmen Also Die’ was produced in 1989, directed by Esiaba Irobi himself. Even back then, he foresaw the current crisis that has ravaged Nigeria’s Niger Delta region.

In 2003, I interviewed him; and to the question ‘Who is Esiaba Irobi?’ he replied,

“He is from the Republic of Biafra and has lived all his life in exile in Nigeria, the United Kingdom, and the USA. Everything he wrote in ‘Hangmen Also Die’ has come to pass, including the hanging of the boys, the killing of the chiefs, the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa in a prison in Port Harcourt. The recent revolt by riverine women against foreign oil companies in Nigeria reminds us strongly of Tamara in the play and also resonates with the reason for the iconoclastic philosophy of The Suicide Squad.

“‘Hangmen Also Die’ is the most prophetic of all of Esiaba works. It is a picture of the future. Our future as a country: Area Boys. Bakassi. Armed Robbery. Anarchy! The worst is yet to come. Nigeria will break apart like a loaf of bread in water, it will capsize like a leaking canoe on the River Niger!”

The poetry

I first encountered the power of Esiaba’s poetry at the Anthill, Nsukka, run back in the day by Gbubemi Amas, Big George, and co. He would sing his words and on occasions, break into powerful choruses and dance. He would break sweat performing a poem, and would ensure the poem was etched on the minds of members of the audience.

Following the publication of his seminal poetry collection, ‘Why I Don’t Like Philip Larkin,’ it was my honour to host him in London on April 1, 2006. Other poets that read on the same night were Toni Kan, Obemata, and Molara Wood, their readings punctuated with mine. It was all very good, but when Esiaba, the masquerade of the night, stepped up to the stage, he turned the night on its head, with songs, with calls and responses, and with his lyrical pieces rendered with penetrating, seering conviction. Esiaba wrote about some of his characters as people who used words “like a loaded pistol”, but it was he, The Minstrel, a powerful wordsmith, who used words like a loaded pistol. When mixed together and shaken, his words would produce the effect of an atomic bomb, powerful enough to eradicate Nigeria’s terminal diseases, which populate the country’s past, ruling, or aspiring leadership.

Celebrating Esiaba

In 2009, Esiaba got married to the lovely Uloaku, who joined him in America in the summer. They moved together to Berlin, where he took up position as a Distinguished Research Fellow, Freie University, Berlin, Germany 2009-2010 in the “Interweaving Performance Cultures” programme at the University’s International Research Centre.

The painful thing about Esiaba’s life is that he was a man who had a habit of being happy always, no matter his situation. He worked very hard at his craft, and tried as much as he could to enjoy his life. Every time I was on the phone with Esiaba, or sat across the table for a bite or a drink, he had no idea how to be in somebody’s company and not have a funny story to tell, a poem to read, a song to sing, or a political or philosophical idea to banter over. I was quite aware that he was well-respected in literary and academic circles, and had won some awards here and there, but it always surprised me that somehow, Esiaba had never really been publicly celebrated for all his achievements and vision.

Therefore, I asked myself: should we wait for Esiaba to win at least one of the two Nobel Prizes for Literature he used to tell us he would win, before we celebrate him? Or should be celebrate him anyway? I chose the latter, and in the planning of the first Sentinel Literature Festival - December 1 to 4, 2009 - we set aside the final day as ‘Esiaba Irobi Day.’ The plan was simple: on that day, admirers and some of his former students would read their favourite Esiaba poems, then there would be a musical interval, and then the man himself would incinerate the place with a 60-minute performance.

I have never seen anyone as excited about an event as Esiaba was about the ‘Esiaba Irobi Day’ at our festival. I am sure he won’t mind my sharing some of his thoughts for the evening: “My sisters who live in London and my beautiful and lovely wife will cook/provide the food… I suggest very strongly that you change the picture of mine you have chosen. I will send another more exciting photograph which you can use to create a one-page advert in colour. You can then send it as an attachment - INDIVIDUALLY - to everybody who is interested in poetry in the UK…We can also target some Ngwa people who are not literary sensibilities, but who will be coming for the food and the wine and the photograph-taking and to see their rambunctious brother performing in London with a band called The Republic of Biafra!… A lot of Igbo people - if you can find a listserv containing their names-will also want to come…

“I also suggest that you push the event through Toyin Adepoju’s facebook. And the Wole Soyinka Society… Jackie Mackay knows a lot of people in the literary milieu of London. You should try and befriend her. She can help to swell the AUDIENCE on December 4, 2009. We should also think of special invitations to people like Peter Badejo, Osy Okagbue, Yvonne Brewster, Nigerian actors/ theatre directors, etc. The idea of Special Invitations and a kind of DISTINGUISHED high table and brief speeches about the poet will... make them come as well as bring other people… I am planning to have food - Igbo cuisine on December 4. In addition, we can also have some wine, bread, cheese and charge a sensible gate fee for this huge event. I am planning to put on a really powerful show complete with my band: The Republic of Biafra. My son, Nnamdi, will play his saxophone in the band.”

Published and forthcoming works

Esiaba also copied an e-mail he wrote to Jacqueline Mackay to me, and there, I thought we were about to celebrate Esiaba, only for me to learn he was dedicating the show to Ms Mackay. In this e-mail, he wrote, “I will not be “reading” but actually “performing” in the African oral tradition... excerpts from the following published and forthcoming collections: Frozen Music (1985), Handgrenades (1986), Infloresence (1987), Tenants of the Desert (1988), What is Tender about Ted Hughes? (1989), Is This a God I Smash? (1990), Tell Me I am Lying! (1991), The Kingdom of the Mad (1997), Why I Don’t Like Philip Larkin (2004), A Calendar of Love (forthcoming), A Short History of my Penis (forthcoming), ZEZE and other LOVE poems (forthcoming), The Tree that Weeps (forthcoming)… It will be a great day and I will make it clear to everybody - before I begin my performance - that this event is specially staged for a great woman who has a lot of love for everything African, including our literature, arts, cuisine, and young men with dysfunctional penises!”

He had it all planned in his head, but due to some unforeseen problems with his travel documents, he could not attend the festival and we had to cancel day 4.

In March 2010, I was delighted when Esiaba wrote me a heartwarming e-mail in which he said his health was on the mend, and he and his wife now had 5-year multiple visas in and out of Britain. Then the masterstroke: he informed me that his wedding ceremony had been fixed for the middle of June and that he would very much like me to organise a poetry event to serve as his bachelor’s eve party. Like the festival show, Esiaba had big plans for his wedding poetry event, and after our last exchange on Wednesday, April 28, I started making plans to realise his big show in London, only this time, he did not just pull out due to problems, he actually did a Michael Jackson on me.

The Sentinel Poetry Movement is a part of what has defined my life since 2002, and one thing I have said at every opportunity, is that Esiaba Irobi was the one that suggested that I grow the idea from the small exercise on my website. I am happy that in his lifetime, Sentinel published Esiaba’s own poetry, and essays; and essays on Irobi’s works by others such as Pius Adesanmi and Afam Akeh. I am also proud that although the big event never happened, there was at least that evening in 2006 when he sang and danced as part of a Sentinel Live Event.

Eulogies

On hearing of his death, many have said wonderful things about Esiaba. The poet, Remi Raji, describes him as “one of the finest, but rarely sung writers.” The truth is that we all wait for the West to adopt and celebrate our best. Esiaba was never going to be a darling of the western world. Our people are singing him now that he is dead. I, however, deeply appreciate some comments on my Facebook page from people I knew were genuine Esiaba friends. Osita Okagbue writes, “With Esiaba, some laughter has left; a joy for life and people has gone! I’ll miss your laughter, our friend, colleague, and my academic nephew.” Gbubemi Amas says, “This is very sad news for anyone who loves life.” And among other tributes, Abdul Mahmud, who writes as Obemata, remembers him this way; “Esiaba was such an engaging poet; memories of his performance at the maiden Sentinel Poetry Live years ago in London are as abiding as the fraternal love and respect he showed to some of us who interacted with him that night”. That was Esiaba, a respecter of kindred spirits. A lover of life.

I am as devastated by Esiaba Irobi’s passing as many of my colleagues, and Esiaba’s students are, but nothing we feel today can compare with what Uloaku, his wife of less than one year must feel, or what his Saxophone-playing son, Nnamdi, must feel. I also hope that Uloaku is well in the know about his unpublished works, and will work tirelessly to make sure they see the light of day. These include such books as ‘How to make love to a Negro all Night and Survive it’, ‘A White Man’s Guide to Black Woman’, ‘Theorizing African Cinema: Ontology, Teleology, Semiology and Narratology’ (Routledge, London), ‘Before They Danced in Chains: African Metalanguages in African-American Performance Aesthetics’, and his novel, too long in the making:‘The Intellectual Terrorist.’

Nnorom Azuonye is the Founder/Editor of ‘Sentinel Literary Quarterly’, and publisher of ‘Sentinel Nigeria’ magazines