INTERVIEW: I wrote My First Novel In Primary School

BY HENRY AKUBUIRO

A lecturer in the Department of Psychology, University of Jos, Plateau State, Obu Udeozo is the winner of 2006 Pat Utomi Award for Poetry. He is the author of 10 books of literary criticism in the historic Gardeners of Dreams Series on “The Third Wave of Nigerian Poets”. He has taught in the Department of English, University of Jos. Also a professional painter, he completed the acclaimed Portraits of all Nigerian Heads of State and Presidents in 1996, special commission by the Federal Government of Nigeria. He has published many poetry volumes. Living Dreams is his first published novel. In this interview with HENRY AKUBUIRO, Obu Udeozo, who is better known as a poet, responds to questions on his new work of fiction.
You completed your first novel as a primary 6 student in 1970, and, five decades later, you have published Living Dreams. At what point did you veer off from fiction, and why did it take you so long to return to prose?

Ronald Reagan, the American Presidential candidate in 1980 elections, said, “It is my Democratic Party that left me, and not the other way round.” Reagan actually won the United States election to The White House on the ticket of the Republican Party. So he was explaining what Nigerians may consider his “carpet crossing adventures …” I bring it up here because of your question. You said, “At what point did you veer off from fiction and why did it take you so long to return.”? I have never ever really left fiction in all my waking days in life. My mum, dad and siblings can testify that every daybreak, in one way or the other, they will hear me talk about “The Novel, The Novel …” The novel is a concept that comes within my wakeful speech and conversation – all the days of my life –as long as I can remember. So there was actually, no veering off, or leaving fiction as people may suppose.

What really happened is that other genres you mentioned also occurred simultaneously. I wrote my first novel in 1970; my first accurate poems, which were published in the Nile House Sphinx Magazine, in December, 1972. And my first splendid portrait of Reverend Robert Fisher, the first Principal and Founder of Government College, Umuahia, was done as a Class 2 student, also in 1972. The portrait fetched the attention of the College Principal, Mr.S.O. Ogazi. He made me stand up, in the college morning assembly, and was given an ovation for that work of art. It was eerie. A great motivation and reinforcement within that kind of environment and academic heritage! So, there was every reason, for me to take myself seriously – on all those frontiers –the novel, poetry and painting.

You are widely known as a lyrical bard with imagistic bent which is also evident in Living Dreams. Do you think prose demands similar diction as poetry?

Across the centuries, experts agree that verse is the highest form of language. From Homer, Virgil, Lucien, Rabelais, through Gustave Flaubert to T.S. Eliot. In time, I shall fully disclose why Shakespeare’s near ontological dominance over the province of drama is an attribute of his lyrical profundity. In my forthcoming text, Looking at Shakespeare, my incursion into theatre as a comparative discourse of the major dramatists of the world, these issues will be more fully enunciated. But let’s return to the point. Poetry is the highest expression of the sublime as far as language resources are concerned. And I believe that it is a profit in the service of any medium to make use of their most exalted resources. I have taken time to horn my expressions in that realm. And I therefore, freely let it rain in my communication. Note the word rain, not reign.

But I admit that there are problems. Certain persons prefer to keep their communication uncluttered and simple. They do not fancy any mix up, or pretenses, between poetry and prose. In fact, a friend of mine is extremely vexed whenever, he has to deal with passages in novels that dare to aspire to poetry or the lyric tone. Ismaila Abdulkassim, a writer of The Third Wave of Nigeria Poets in The Gardeners of Dreams Series, said: “However, bad a poem may be, you do not have to shoot it with a gun …” But this friend of mine is different. He can be so angry that he could have tossed a bomb on Living Dreams if he had the window to do so!

But something of a serious irony or paradox sneaked into the situation. The passages where my friend highlighted that gave him the greatest irritation and displeasure in the novel happen to be the very sites and zones that I will always return to read and read, and re-read, because they offer me improbable delight. When Chinua Achebe was asked which book of his he admired the most? After obvious reservations, he stated that: “… if you ever have to catch me reading any of my novels (which I seldom do), it will be The Arrow of God.”

So, my friend was actually quarrelling with my own Joseph as The Prime Minister in Egypt. Odia Ofeimun says that it is “insulting and a letdown for poetry to speak in pedestrian language. “ We have to allow people their own choices and predilections. But such individuals will actually miss out when they do not completely welcome what T.S. Eliot calls “The superior amusement …”, which is what poetry is. And the very office, creed, objective, and constitution of poetry; is to refresh the language of the society and civilisation.

How did the idea of Living Dreams come to you, and why did you wish to make it a work of fiction?
As I said earlier, I have always nourished the idea of the novel in my head, as far as I can remember, and have always marvelled at the extreme efforts, and even desperation, which certain human beings make towards wealth and comfort. However, there are persons whose very lives are ingredients of Dreams: Living Dreams! It has always amazed and fascinated me.

But, at a point in 2015, propitious circumstances came together “working for good for me …” No single individual can be an all sufficient model or paragon for a character in a novel, at least in my own experience and judgment. In fact, after the novel, Madam Bovary, was published in 1857 in France, more than 20 women across villages and cities in Paris claimed that Gustave Flaubert, based his heroine, Emma Bovary, on their specific lives and circumstances. These women were so convinced over their claims that some of them contemplated law suits against the author. My point is that a good work of art must transcend ordinary life, however exalted the living personality is.

Yet, in March of 2015, favourable circumstances conduced to offer me the entry point into Her Majesty, Lady Nkiruka Abigail Offodile, the ambassador plenipotentiary and senior special assistant to The President and Commander-in –Chief, in The Federal Republic of Bozrah. After that encounter, the moment clicked, and it became a sort of “you go kill me today …” experience. I could not leave the novel, and the novel could not leave me, and it got written.

On the aspect of making it a work of fiction, only that genre of literature could handle the heavy freight of the themes involved in the Kingdom of Bozrah. I enjoyed the same familiarity which The Nobel Laureate, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, expressed in writing A Hundred Years of Solitude. Marquez admitted that, though people considered the events and characters in that novel surreal and almost unbelievable, that several incidents and personae in the book were so real that they appeared like pebbles in the landscapes of Argentina; and that all he had to do was picking them, as he fancied, while working on his book. It was so for me in writing Living Dreams. I was dealing with decades of lived and deep experiences.

Corruption, coups, misrule and many woes are emblematic of Bozrah. How close to reality is Bozrah vis-à-vis today’s Africa? It is there any verisimilitude?
I simply recall Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu’s usual refrain when asked when he will complete his autobiography on the Nigeria-Biafra Civil War. He would respond: “I still love where my head is located on my body. I cherish my head above my neck and my shoulder …” And after the usual banters, he would offer an extended period when his book will be completed and published. Living Dreams in relation to countries in Africa? I believe that’s an unfair question for the author to answer (laughs). But I know that I have become a citizen of Bozrah since writing that novel. I understand her citizens completely. I am baffled by their egregious excesses. I am shocked by their flagitious greed. I am bewildered by their psychiatric corruption and the speed of their official convoys and drivers. I am amazed by the humongous statistics of kidnapping, robbery and rape that flourish in that African nation South of The Sahara Desert, and I am relieved and glad about final outcome of the global intervention, leading to their ultimate redemption in the novel. So, you can see that it is The Kingdom of Bozrah that I know very well. The rest of your questions belong to comparative literature and cultural studies.

The youths of Bozrah are given contrasting depictions in the novel as both agents of despair and agents of redemption. What point are you making here?
I did a long work of literary criticism which took 16 years to complete. It is entitled Gardeners of Dreams – The Third Wave of Nigeria Poets. So, I think that I am very intimate with the topic of youth despair –the bewilderment and world weariness of young people in general. I have studied and empathised with their frustrations, anxieties and hopelessness. I am a witness to their incomprehensible, if not inconsolable pain. I am aware of their sense of loss and waste. I am completely familiar with the suicidal mindset of the present age. It is a horrendous script. Yet the youths of Bozrah are on another scale of the bizarre. As for their also being agents of change, it must be noted that, before the military intervention, by The 4 Elite Governments of The Globe (EGG), the youths of Bozrah underwent 4 years of re-orientation and military training. These were all inspired by America’s National Security Adviser, Mr. Leonard Chukwudebelu. That successful mission in Bozrah only proves that any mass of humanity can swing either East or West, depending on their ethos, value-system and mindset.

Professor Charles Nnolim once said that “your global knowledge of contemporary art is intimidating.” In this fiction, there are copious references to artists and intellectuals. Does your fiction go beyond telling a story?”

I feel lucky to answer this question. We have a problem at the moment in our general conception and understanding of the term novel. I believe it means freshness and entertainment, more than anything else, and it does not promote or celebrate ignorance! The novelists of the past ages were masters, not only in their crafts, but in their knowledge of the world of men, and their various trades and occupations. They were “rounded” artists communicating to the world, and delivering freshness and relief to various communities –when there were no radios, cinemas, televisions, YouTube, Instagrams or whatsapp. In those days, when one read a novel, he or she was at once at grip and par with what were the freshest trends in the circumstances and vocations of that age.

The Igbo used to have that kind of fanfare, in the Mbari art festivals whereby every form or motif of the people’s sociology of knowledge is depicted in artistic media like paintings, wood carvings, and sculptures in order to document the total received culture of the people at that specific season. We may need an extended discourse on this. But that is the main thrust.

Today, it is no longer so. The novel appears to be retreating to be surrendering her primary office and tools of investigation. The novel is sacrificing her services and engagements to the streets. The novel appears afraid and intimidated from beholding newness, innovations and explorations. All the breakthroughs in the frontiers of postmodern scientific research appear to be out of bounds to the literary imagination. It looks as if writers have censored themselves away from and against treating challenging topics or ideas, and it has not always been so.

My favourite writer among the ancients is Virgil. That man was a total artist and voice in whatever form or experience that he wanted to communicate. If he spoke on ship building, he discussed like a craftsman and an engineer. If he wrote on wrestling, he mirrored the intrigues and morbedezzia in athletics and sports. Essentially, my aim is to communicate the total experience of what is available to the mind of and curiosity of the adventurous reader in our 21st century global society.

At the end of the fiction, the golden LIONS of Bozrah got a Guantanamo Bay treatment reserved for hardened criminals. Why did the citizens of Bozrah see this as a welcome development rather than resorting to a home grown solution?

That solution was not an easy or straight forward decision. In the novel, you will notice that the foreign military coalition, led by America’s Navy Seals, considered several options. Among which are The China Card, which would have involved executing every ruling politician or soldier in Bozrah found guilty of stealing or corruption on the spot. At all times, and in all places, as happens in The Peoples Republic of China. The Rajiv Gandhi solution of castrating the treasure looters of Bozrah was also contemplated. The Jerry Rawlings’ treatment of terminating all offenders in Bozrah was also mooted, but dropped. The one which drew laughter and lightness was the suggestion to drop all leaders, and treasure looters of Bozrah into the boiling Atlantic Ocean!

As for welcoming foreign intervention, we learn from the wisdom of our folk culture, imagination and language. Our people have a proverb that says “Ife ka nte, ba kwu ta nte na onu!”, which means that the harmless termite is beholding a yellow monster at the gate of his ant hole …” So, the Africa Regime Transfer Operations (ARTs) against Bozrah, launched by the combined aircraft carriers from France, Charles de Gaulle, which conducts over 30 navalized Rafale multi-role fighters, plus the E-2C Hawkeye airborne early warning aircrafts; China’s loaning of her most advanced warship Liaoning; Russia’s Kuznetsov, and America’s USS Gerald Ford, for the final onslaught against The Federal Republic of Bozrah was not merely welcome, but a divine remedy.

This novel runs in an 8-book, 2-part format. Why did you choose that structure?

I have spent over 5 decades meditating the novel, and, of course, I have resorted to the algorithm that can convey my message. The cauldron of ideas, which were issuing over the subject, could only have been managed with the format I chose. Therefore, I opted for that structure, and it has served me well.

What is the reception like for Living Dreams, especially for readers who know you as a poet?

The reception and experience over Living Dreams is equivalent to what they call Divine breakthrough in Christian circles. Within just one month of the first publication of the novel, the books have sold out completely, and we are in the process of ordering reprints for the 2nd edition. I shall give details of a few feedbacks because there are so many. From Abuja, a former manager in Diamond Bank, Pastor Kezie Onuorah and current Chancellor and Founder of JC Best College, FCT, phoned in with updates on the text. He related the exaltation with which their students were relishing the novel, with lots of assignments. After handing over to the classroom teacher, Lynda Okagbue, I said to myself that any set of students in Africa, that are set upon digesting Living Dreams, with their current prepossession can only become like the World Chess Champion, Bobby Fisher, to their contemporaries in the time ahead.

On an ultra private level, when Chike Uwechia called me up, to give his opinions after reading Living Dreams in Jos, he could hardly contain himself at the other end of the line. He kept saying, “Obu Udeozo, e gbue nmadu na oyibo” (Obu Udeozo’s mastery of English is phenomenal). All my efforts to calm him down, and hear my gratitude and opinion were like waving to a trailer, speeding on a one-way express road. I had to give up, with solemnity and gratitude, to GOD.

Are we expecting new works of fiction from you, or is this just a one-off thing?
At the moment, I am focused on Government College Umuahia, a personal biography from me as a solemn reverence and gratitude for what that great institution has done for Africa and for mankind. We are having the 100th anniversary of the college on the 29 July, 2021; and I am prepared to sacrifice all in my power to see that the college would put in a noble narrative when that day comes. So, this non-fiction series of works have pushed my immediate titles of the novel a bit further in time. After the Umuahia Biography is delivered –because I have had it on my head and table for several years now –I shall return to fiction. As they say, if Christ tarries, you will be reading afriCAN gods, a novel, by Obu Udeozo; you will read a children’s novel with an incredibly delicious title from me.

I hope and pray to complete my epic work in Drama –Looking at Shakespeare –which was mentioned earlier. This will be before releasing my two works in theatre – The Birthday of the EARTH and Affia Attack. I do not say what I cannot do. But I am very much aware of the bible injunction that we must never boast about tomorrow. I have decided to just intimate you with these propositions so that they can be a kind of cybernetic loop in my creative process. So, it is ultimately, a continual prayer request made public.

SOURCE: SUN NEWS

INTERVIEW: Kate Omenugha: I Used To Read In Toilet

Anambra State Commissioner for Education Prof. Kate Omenugha

Prof Kate Omenugha is the Commissioner for Education, Anambra State. A self-confessed feminist, committed to the cause of the marginalised in society, she is also a bibliophile who regaleS you with books read as a schoolgirl. The former Head, Department of Mass Communication, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, spoke to HENRY AKUBUIRO in the state capital, Awka, on a myriad of issues, including her attempt at encouraging reading culture among students, the giant strides she has made on education and what informed her feminist persuasion. 

A photo went viral last year of you dressed in a student’s uniform to office. What statement were you trying to make?
(laughs) I had to identify with the students who went to the Silicon Valley and won World Technovation Challenge gold medal. I told them, since they did us proud, I was going to wear their uniform. So I dressed like that to the Anambra State Government Exco meeting to identify with my students. I could be the senior prefect of Regina Pacis Model Secondary School, Onitsha. Sometime this year, St. John’s Science and Technical College, Alor, went to Tunisia and won bronze at the Festival of Engineering, Science and Technology (I-FEST). In 2016, Anambra schools performed well in competitions in Singapore and Indonesia. To me, it was an indication that the global competitiveness promised by Governor to umu akwukwo (students of) Anambra is coming to pass. We are trying to raise children who are confident, who can face the world.

Much is being said of dwindling reading culture in Nigeria. Are you not worried about this development?

What we have done in Anambra is to use the idea of role modelling. When Prof. Chukwuemeka Ike celebrated his 50th anniversary as a writer, we used that to showcase our students; show them what they can be if they work hard. We presented that opportunity for them to write stuffs, which we published as Echoes of Tomorrow. I got students from village schools, trained and made them read his citation; they also dramatised it.

Again, when the wife of the state governor wrote the biography of her husband, Willie: An Intimate Encounter, we used that, once more, to engage the students. The governor was there, together with his wife. Students turned the book into poetry, story and drama. We did recitation from the book, in partnership with Read Association of Nigeria.

Now, in our schools, every Tuesday, we have what call an uninterrupted, sustained silent reading. At a particular time of the day, everywhere will be shut down; everybody must hold a book to read for 20-30 minutes, including the gateman. When we started that project, we saw that many of our students were reading at frustration level.

What do you mean by that?

They can’t read as expected they would read. We call it frustration level. Since we started that, their reading ability has improved; they could write stories, which we have published for them. So we do a lot of capacity building for both students and teachers. We encourage the students to write through many means. We encourage them to tell their stories. We encourage them to form reading hubs.

Some states donate books to schools outside of what is on their reading lists as a way of encouraging reading culture among students. Are you thinking in that direction?’

With the Ihezie Foundation, we have got over 1 million books, which we have given to our schools. The Read Association has also brought four containers of books, which we are going to give out next year. We have formed reading hubs, and we have reading ambassadors for most communities where they encourage students to come together in clusters and read. We do book donations. We have given out a whole lot of books to schools. However, giving books does not translate to reading; that’s why we created reading ambassadors and reading hubs. In one or two communities that have worked well for us, we got volunteers passionate about that, forming clusters and getting the students to sit together and read. The advent of new media has not helped matters, but we are making progress.

Don’t you think parents have a big role to play in making their children develop reading culture early in life, for old habits, they say, die hard?

Parents have a lot of role to play here. I was still in primary school when I read all the classics, including King Solomon’s Mines. My father gave me all the books, and I used to read in the toilet. Some of our teachers who were my contemporary say they knew I would get to this level; they will tell you how they would be busy washing clothes and I would be busy reciting poems and dramatising things. So I agree with you. My parents taught me to read. My father taught me poetry as early as primary 2.

Do you believe in feminism?

I am a feminist. I like that word “feminist”. It is in my PhD dissertation. Throughout my childhood, I felt trapped by two things: my sex and colour. Feminism means change, creating and making an attempt to change, no matter the gender that is oppressed. There are no fast and hard rules about it. The point is that there is a patriarchal society that, most times, leaves the woman at a great disadvantage. If talking about it and trying to change the society to begin to recognize that we may not be equal but equally human beings, then I am a feminist. Are you a feminist?

Not entirely sure, madam (laughs).
Feminism is not all about women. That’s what some people don’t understand. But because women’s animosity is at the receiving end, people tend to associate it with women.

From the academia to managing education for Anambra State Government, how was the transition?
It was a little bit of shock when I first came here. In the university, we have our way of doing things. I was Head of Department of Mass Communications for 6 years. I was the Director of Unizik FM. But, to me, the university is a more structured place kind of place where you probably would know what comes up next. Here, you don’t know what is going to come next. You have to contend with the bureaucracy in the service and its channels of communication. You have to contend with a little bit of politics within the ministry and the main politics within the structure. You have to learn how to combine your administrative duties and your political duties.

Left to me –I call myself a technocrat –I could just down and be working; but you find out you can’t do it that way. You have to do the politicking that goes with the position. Sometimes you may go round and round and won’t even come to the office in a week. I have to device a means to attend which particular functions. Education is such a robust ministry. If you keep moving about all the time, you find out that the students will suffer. Thank God, we have a governor who also understands that, so it has helped in the long run.

You are regarded by stake holders as one of the best education commissioners Anambra State has ever produced. Coming into your office, I can see dozens of awards dotting your table. What differences have you made since you came onboard?
His Excellency, Chief Willie Obiano, made my job easy. When we came in 2014, he already had a blueprint on education. What I did was to internalise the blueprint, and work with it. It has a strategic objective that the learning needs of all must be met through equitable distribution of resources and learning of lifelong skills and ensure we are one of the three states in the lowest illiteracy rate in Nigeria. The governor said no child should be left behind. Then he said, “We want to give umu akwukwo ndi Anambra education that is globally competitive.”

To be able to do that, we looked at education from three-pronged areas: infrastructure –which does not only mean the building; it means state-of-the-art equipment in those areas; teachers’ welfare, which includes capacity building for teachers, prompt payment of salaries, exposing our teachers to competitions. And we have the students’ welfare, which include giving them good environment, ensuring they are exposed to global competiveness and participating in competitions.

For the governor, education is about ideology; it is what you believe that you profess, and what you profess that you do. So it was easy for me. For I knew what His Excellency wanted me to achieve. If you talk about some of the feats we have achieved, it has helped us really to ensure that no child will be behind.

In practice, is it working?

It is working, because, when we came in, an area that was highly neglected was the physically challenged. The first thing His Excellency did was to give free tuition for the physically challenged in the state; those in public schools don’t pay a kobo. If you go to Basden Memorial Special Education Centre, Isulo. When we came in, that place was a dungeon. You would never believe anybody lived there. The wife of the governor (Mrs E.V. Obiano) was the first person to go there. She cried and drew my attention to it. So we put a secondary school there, which is already in the sixth year now. It’s amazing how time flies. The other day, the governor gave them a bus, together with nine other schools. We renovated that place, built teachers’ quarters there, and made the place look like where somebody was living. Whether gifted child or physically challenged, we said nobody should be left behind.

We also started the revamping of our technical colleges. We used to have 11; now, we have 12 technical colleges. We are building 700 capacity hostels for all the technical colleges. We believe technical colleges are where to go, because we believe they solve the problem of unemployment, for we produce the middle level manpower that will help us in that regard. We want in this state what we call Education for Employment, and what we are trying to do is to run a bridge programme, bridging the gap between education and industry. We recently finished the Entrepreneurship Fair for students, to mention a few.

Do you have legacy projects to be proud of?

We are doing the fencing of about 43 boarding schools. We have completed 10 already of the girl’s boarding schools. We started with those ones first. Here, we don’t do anything half haphazardly. Now we are doing 43, and these 43 also include the technical colleges. We have also, through the Anambra Universal Education Board, renovating a lot of schools. He have retooled about 60 science laboratories out of the 256 schools that we have. There is a possibility of an upscale. We have also ensured the upgrade of our schools, with majority of them using whiteboards due to the health hazards of using blackboards.

We have also grown the capacity of our teachers, because we believe that quality teachers will make quality education. For example, we took our teachers to Singapore on a study tour, about 25 of them, to learn the Singaporean model of technical education. Just last month, we took two sets of our teachers and education officers to Dubai for some study tour, too. Some of them were people who we had to find a way to reward. This year’s Teachers Day Celebration, held at Eagle Square, Abuja, saw Anambra State wining four out of the 25 awards nationwide. In 2017, we won the Overall Best Teacher in Nigeria (Clement Okodo) and, in 2019 ,we won the Overall Best Administrator in Nigeria (Ezenwa Amara). So we build the capacity of the teachers all the time. We have done the one for Mathematic, English, History and Sciences. We have also done the one for literature in English. We found out that literature-in-English was our greatest downfall. So we gave the teachers some tests, and many of them didn’t do well.

And they were teaching literature-in-English schools?
Yes. We did our WAEC segregation, and we found out that literature was our greatest dampener. So we decided to boost the capacity. We gave them a test, and many didn’t do well. For the lady who scored 82 percent, her name was included among the teachers we took to Dubai for capacity building. Those things are not just what you just choose anybody. It is no longer a story that we do well with our students.

AHIAJOKU: Wise Men From East Brainstorm On Igbo Culture, Development

Imo State Governor Emeka Ihedioha welcoming guests to the Ahiajoku Lecture. Image: PM Express

BY HENRY AKUBUIRO

OWERRI (SUN NEWS)--The enthusiasm that permeated New Concorde Hotel, Owerri, last Friday, was apparent: truncated dream suddenly rose from the depth of abeyance to embrace a new vista. Amid an art exhibition, the 2018 Ahiajoku Festival, the Igbo cultural and intellectual harvest, made a comeback since 2010. Love and respect for the Igbo man were rekindled.

The roadmap for the colloquium on Day 1 was given by Dr. Amanze Obi, the Director, Ahiajoku Institute, who informed the three presenters that their presentations would focus on the overall theme of the festival – “The Challenge of Leadership in Contemporary Igbo Society”.

Senator Ben Obi, who introduced the Chairman of the day, Professor ABC Nwosu, former Nigeria’s Minister of Health, thanked the Imo State Governor, Rt. Hon. Emeka Ihedioha. for drawing a rich audience from the Igbo speaking states of Abia, Anambra, Enugu, Imo, Ebonyi, Rivers and Delta, and beyond, to partake in the festival. “That’s a sign of many things to come,” he declared.

Nwosu was humbled to chair the colloquium, for he never lobbied for it. “But I would have lobbied for this one, because Igbo land has lost direction,” he said. He was satisfied, however, with the mantra the state governor had chosen for himself, praying God to guide him.

He added, “You have begun from the right place. You can only rebuild humans that will build society from the mind.” Ahiajoku, he echoed, “represents the potentials of the Igbo man. I salute you for what you have done by resuscitating Ahiajoku.”

He celebrated the ingenuity and industry of the Igbo in surviving against all odds, including pogrom, genocide and unfriendly, post-civil war economic policy by the Federal Government of seizing their money in the bank and handing each depositor a paltry 20 pounds, no matter the savings.

Mazi Sam Ohuabunwa was the first of the three presenters to speak. He spoke on “Aku ruo Ulo: Inventing Political and Communal Leadership in Alaigbo”. For long, he said, Igbo people had bemoaned the rising spate of foreign adventures, developing areas outside Igbo land, yet earning undeserved threats to their lives, and, in many cases, deaths and loss of properties.

He lamented that the entire Southeast, at the moment, had the lowest GDP growth of all the regions in Nigeria due to low investment in the region, submitting that the threat by the Oba of Lagos in 2015 to throw Igbo indigenes into the Atlantic Ocean during the 2015 elections and subsequent and subsisting notices by the Arewa Youths for Igbo settlers to leave the region had been major wakeup calls for Ndigbo to look homewards.

Furthermore, he said the obvious discrimination by this present Federal Government “has added impetus for the need for us to think home and invest home.” Even beyond the borders of Nigeria, “the same message,” he said, “is being sent”, for recent xenophobia attacks in South Africa seem to have affected Ndigbo more than any other Nigerian group.”

The Igbo economy before the civil war, he informed, was the fastest growing, built on agriculture and manufacturing. “We built an industry around coal in Enugu and developed big commercial centres in Aba and Onitsha that distributed the agricultural and manufactured goods from our industries,” he said.

Mazi Ohuabanwa’s speech wasn’t all about painting sad pictures and creating a hangdog air. The pharmacist also proffered solutions. He advised every Igbo businessman outside Igboland, to, within one year, set up an office, a branch, a shop or depot in Igboland to increase employment possibilities in the region.

He, besides, urged Igbo businessmen to give priority to investing in Igboland before putting any investment elsewhere in Nigeria. Over the next three years, he advised Igbo businessmen to transfer the headquarters of their businesses to Igboland while maintaining braches outside Igboland, as ABC Transport, Innoson, Chikason, Ibeto had done.

Responding to the issues raised by the first speaker, Rev. Fr. Chris Ogbonna, said Mazi Ohuabunwa had given all food for thought. For him, the theme of “Aku ruo Ulo” was thought-provoking, nay, “the greatest Aku (wealth) we have in us is human capital.” He moved for leaders who could harness the abundant human capital.

The second speaker, Professor Christian Onyeji, spoke on “Humanity, Sensed Leadership in Contemporary Igbo Politics: Tackling the Challenges.” On one hand, the theme, he said, raised a critical issue of relevance questioning the outcomes, hegemony and direction of existing Igbo leadership methods and their outcomes.” He, therefore, lent support to having Igbo leaders who have the people in mind.

Dr. John Otu, who responded to Professor Onyeji’s presentation as one of the four discussants, said “a time would come in Nigeria when they invite you to be a governor, you will say, ‘No, I am don’t want to be; I am not qualified for that office’; and the time is now.” His position was premised on the fact that oil earnings would soon dwindle and looters would found government positions unattractive, thereby paving way for those with ideas to take the challenge of leadership.”

The third speaker, Chief Osita Chidoka, former Minister of Aviation, focused on “Leadership in Igboland”. He noted that “Igbo people are successful in today’s Nigeria but Igboland is not successful.” He lamented that “our dreams and aspirations have gone low,” compared to the achievements of the Okparas and Azikiwes in the First Republic.

He lampooned Igbo traditional rulers for endorsing bad political leadership for lucre. “I want to assure you that the Igbo man is the future of Nigeria,” he said, nevertheless. Among others, “we are the most socially inclusive in Nigeria.”

The first day ended with a cultural night at Mbari Cultural Centre, Owerri, attended with traditional Igbo performances led by Omenimo and the Saro Wiwa band. But the glow of Ahiajoku thrills wasn’t about to fade yet. Dr. Amanze Obi set the ball rolling the second day at the Ahiajoku Convention, New Owerri, as the Ahiajoku Lecture itself took centre stage, chaired by the Obi of Onitsha, Agbogidi Alfred Nnaemeka Achebe.

“I have a passion for what we are doing today,” said Amanze Obi, former Imo State Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, who lamented that the Ahiajoku Lecture series was abandoned by the immediate past administration of Rochas Okorocha for selfish reasons. “Our job is not just the Ahiajoku series; we have a lot of programmes we will run,” he hinted on the enlarged scope of the institute he heads.

Chief Ikedi Ohakim, who chaired the LOC, called on Igbo nation, whether in southeast or in Rivers or Benue to unite. Unlike the former Imo State Governor, Okorocha, who was described by Femi Fani Kayode as an “intellectual barbarian”, the incumbent Imo State Governor, Ihedioha, was lionised for his intellectual bent and visionary leadership by the Obi of Onitsha, in his remarks.

Governor Ihedioha lamented, in his adress, that the last eight years were the beginning of dismantling efforts by the Okorocha administration, and it was incumbent on him to begin a rebuilding process in Imo. He welcomed all to the festival, describing Ahiajoku as “the most cherished Igbo cultural and intellectual summit”, returning “after nearly a decade of abeyance”.

He added, “The 2019 Ahiajoku Lecture certainly marks another milestone in the rebuilding agenda in the present Imo State Government.” He also noted that, “Ahiajoku has remained a unifying essence among Igbo”, with its cultural and intellectual potpourri.

Emeritus Professor Michael Echeruo, who was the inaugural Ahiajoku lecturer in 1979, make history, once again, as he presented the 2019 Ahiajoku Lecture entitled “Ogu Eri Mba: We Shall Survive”, which unearthed, among others, pre-colonial Igbo practices and politics, dispelling spurious Igbo-Jewish connection and x-raying the historical and Achebean explanations of contemporary socio-political convulsions vis-à-vis Ndigbo.

Aside Governor Ihedioha, the 2019 Ahiajoku Lecture was attended by the Governor of Abia State, Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu; Akwa Ibom State Governor, Emmanuel Udom; plus representatives of governors of Enugu, Anambra, Enugu, Rivers and Cross River states.

Others were Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, Achike Udenwa, Prof I.D. Nwoga. Chief Nnia Nwodo (President, Ohaneze Ndigbo) and Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe (former Chief of General Staff under IBB). Also present were royal fathers, including but not limited to the Amanyanabo of Opobo and Eze Samuel Ohiri, Chairman, Imo State Council of Traditional Rulers.

The Sullivan Chime Era

Sullivan Chime. 

Title: An Honour to Serve: Enugu State in the Sullivan Years
Publisher: Bookcraft, Ibadan
Editor: Tony Onyima
Year of Publication: 2018
Pagination: 456

REVIEWED BY HENRY AKUBUIRO

Comely, humane, urbane and self-effacing: such qualities are usually associated with the make-believe world where the artist has the latitude to delineate an ideal hero without hubris. Among the Nigerian political class, it is almost a wishful thinking to find such real-life archetype to lionise, for our politicians, going by recent precedents, tend more towards the nondescript character whose dispositions and actions elicit odium and ridicules.

However, Barrister Sullivan Iheanacho Chime, former Enugu State Governor, is one of the few exceptions. “I saw a beautiful Enugu as a child and I later saw it go down. I knew we had the capacity to rebuild Enugu. That was the passion that drove my government,” the ex-governor admits on page 29 of a new book documenting his eight years in the Lion Building, Enugu State (May 29, 2007 – May 29, 2015), edited by Tony Onyima, an accomplished media practitioner.

In a 456-page and 14-chapter glossy package, the book recounts that the Sullivan Chime administration was predicated on a Four-Point Agenda, the details of which are fleshed out in the fourth chapter of the book –“The Promise”. They include Physical Infrastructure (comprising road, housing, water and electricity), Economic Expansion and Employment, Rural Development, and Service Delivery. From the fifth to the thirteenth chapter, the reader is regaled with giant strides of the highflyer with accompanying pictorial evidences.

By 2015, when he left office, the promise had been fulfilled to a very large extent, according to the book. Chime, working in concert with a team of committed commissioners and aides, left indelible footprints to serve as a model in modern-day statecraft. Chime easily stands out in the class of 2007-2015 governors with his many innovative and groundbreaking initiatives. Some of these outstanding achievements can be highlighted under his Four-Point agenda.

His Enugu urban renewal under the Physical Infrastructure agenda still attracts accolades even years after leaving office. From its previous colonial outlook, Chime gave Enugu metropolis a total makeover in terms of look and feel. Most of the major roads in the metropolis were expanded and re-developed. The massive road construction and re-development was complemented with construction of modern bridges, such as Nyama Bridge, Zik Avenue Twin Bridge, and underpass at Enugu-Abakiliki Road. Akwata, a challenging terrain in Enugu metropolis, was transformed, against all expectations.

The book recounts that all the roads constructed were also fitted with modern road furniture such as signs, markings, drainages, reflective road guards, bus shelters, etc. The success of the accompanying “Light Up Enugu” was so groundbreaking that it led to Enugu being recognised as the city in the country with the highest number of streetlights. At the end of his eight-year tenure, Chime’s administration constructed over 1,159 kilometers of urban and rural roads. Out of this figure, the different local governments collectively constructed and asphalted 232.596 kilometers of roads while the state government collaborated with the local councils to construct 299.4 kilometers of roads. The state government alone constructed 295 kilometers of urban roads and 332 kilometers of rural roads.

Chime’s physical infrastructural revolution, details the book, also touched the housing sector tremendously. He initiated and supervised the building of twenty-four housing estates in the state, the first of its kind in the history of Enugu State. In most of these estates, his government provided sites and services like roads (59 kilometers of asphalted), drainages (111 kilometers), streetlights, walkways, electricity (38 transformers), water reticulation, etcetera. Some of the estates include Coal City Gardens, Liberty Estates (Phases 1 and 2), Greenland Estate, Maryland Estate, Palm Beach Estate, Sunrise Estate, Ekulu East and the Centenary City. Just as he was developing housing estates in Enugu city and across the state, he didn’t leave public buildings behind.

Also, a new state-of-the art State Secretariat with thirteen complex structures housing all the ministries was built. He not only constructed a new Governor’s Office (The Lion Building) in Enugu but also constructed a Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro, Abuja. Today, when you navigate the major streets of Enugu on Google, it is thanks to the “Enugu Virtual Streets” project embarked by his administration, working in tandem with Google.

In implementing his Four-Point Agenda, the Sullivan Chime administration, chronicles the book, brought many innovations to bear on governance. His government carried out a comprehensive reform of land administration by digitally archiving every single file. The Ministry of Lands was repositioned for increased efficiency; the process of transfer of titles and mortgages was enhanced; while all land titles in the state were revalidated. Needless to say, he ensured that the foundation for Enugu State Geoid was laid by establishing Geodetic Controls.

Under the title of “Service to the People”, chapter six of the book details Chime administration’s strides in transportation, health, waste management, education and security. With a revamped road infrastructure, the administration introduced the Enugu Taxi Scheme, which was popularly called “Sullivan Taxi”. All the 720 vehicles in the scheme were given out to unemployed youths under an incentivized repayment arrangement. A color scheme and numbering system was initiated for the taxi scheme, while the state-owned transport company, ENTRACO, was revamped.

Likewise, the Coal City Transport Services was given a massive boost with 50 air-conditioned buses. Under its Strategic Health Development plan, government paid for all expenses for care of the pregnant woman, child delivery and the child till age of five. As a consequence, there was a surge in maternal care attendance in the state. This maternal and child care scheme was unique to Enugu State, because, in other states, only child delivery was free, families paid for antenatal and child immunization. The state also established the Enugu State Medical Emergency Response Team (ESMERT). Equipped with 25 state-of-the-art Advanced Life Support (ALS) ambulances, ESMERT was used to respond to road traffic and home medical emergencies.

As part of its Strategic Health Development Plan, the Chime administration, in 2009, started the construction of an ultra-modern diagnostic center in Enugu, named after Dr. Simon Ezevue Onwu, an Enugu native and the first person of Igbo extraction to be qualified as a medical doctor. The administration also upgraded the Enugu State University of Science and Technology Teaching Hospital, Park Lane, which went on to graduate its first set of medical doctors after many years of being in the limbo. In addition, he implemented the district health system as adopted by the National Council of Health, dividing the state into seven health districts for efficiency. His administration engaged 1,000 health officers, renovated old and built new heath centers across the state.

The Chime administration, according to the book, re-organised the state’s waste management authority to sanitise and enforce cleanliness in the state. The state purchased a total of 37 quality heavy-duty compactors used in ridding the streets of filth of all sorts, such as household refuse, abandoned vehicles, industrial and drainage wastes, etc. The state acquired three heavy-duty road sweepers and thus became the first state in Nigeria to use street sweepers to improve efficiency and make street cleaning work easier.

The chroniclers of An Honour to Serve: Enugu State in the Sullivan Years do not leave anybody in doubt about the giant strides recorded in education. Chime’s administration, we learn, initiated the Volunteer Teachers’ Scheme in which retired school teachers were recruited to teach in underserved communities, as well as the School Linkage Programme, which partnered schools in the UK with a select number of schools in Enugu. Thirty thousand new primary and secondary school teachers were recruited, while over 10,000 teachers in all the 1,223 public primary schools received one-year training. Under his watch, still, Enugu State became the first state to carry out a statewide school-based deworming exercise for its public school pupils.

In addition, the Enugu State Universal Basic Education Board (ENSUBEB) made it a priority to distribute textbooks and other teaching materials to schools. The book informs us that he made education free from primary to junior secondary in the state. It also recounts that the state tertiary institutions were repositioned, with Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) and Institute of Management and Technology (IMT) as major beneficiaries. In the same vein, he established the College of Education Technical, Enugu State, which is now fully accredited. College of Agriculture, Iwollo was also set up.

In designing its development agenda, the Sullivan Chime administration was guided by international best practices. One of its 4-point agenda, service delivery and good governance forms the thrust of chapter seven of the book. Specifically, the administration set out to revamp law and order, general security, public service empowerment, citizens’ participation in governance, promotion of transparency in fiscal management and institutional reforms. In securing the state, the administration built strong partnerships with security agencies such as the police, army, air force and the Department of State Security.

The most important outcome of this partnership was that Enugu State was adjudged the state with the least crime rate in the country in 2013 by Alhaji M. D. Abubakar, the then Inspector-General of Police. Also Security Watch Africa, a non-governmental organisation, at her annual awards held in Dubai on November 14, 2014, picked Enugu State’s Neighborhood Watch as the “most outstanding community policing in West Africa”. It is on record that Enugu State, during Chime’s tenure, was the first state in Nigeria to make kidnapping a capital offence. With the support of Justice for All (J4A), an intervention program run by DfID, Enugu State became the first state to establish a Witness Support Unit. The Sexual Assault Referral Centre was also established.

Perhaps his background as a lawyer helped much, as Enugu State became the first to establish the Bail Information Center. Under Chime’s watch as the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, the state’s laws were revised. This chapter also details citizens’ inclusion initiative of Chime administration such as the unique Visit Every Community aimed at ascertaining the immediate needs of communities; involvement of town unions in governance process and recognition of traditional rulers as central pillars in societal engineering. He also constituted the Council of Elders, comprising of eminent citizens from the state, who met periodically to rub minds and offer ideas to the governor.

One of the sore points of governance in Nigeria today is consistent inability of most state governments to regularly conduct elections into local government administrations. Enugu State under Chime was perhaps the only outstanding exception, as we find discover here. “We conducted the first local government election few months after my inauguration in 2007. We conducted four of such elections every two years before we left office – 2007, 2009, 2011 and 2013. It was also a way of ensuring citizens’ inclusion; of ensuring that the people were allowed to have their real representatives at the local government level,” Chime is quoted as saying in the book.

In contrast to what is happening in most of the states, Chime ensured the autonomy of local governments in Enugu State as prescribed by the constitution and the state law, which enabled the LGAs to embark on accelerated provision of infrastructure, using the state’s Economic Planning Commission as an interface to approve projects jointly executed by the state and the third tier of government. The Enugu Capital Territory Development Authority (ECTDA) was established by law by the Chime administration to be the implementation and regulatory arm of all the agencies that had anything to do with urban development.

ECTDA’s achievements under Chime include the following: Enugu pay-and-display project for state traffic management system; special development control team on illegal buildings, buildings on water ways and street trading; and automation of the building plan approval process by capturing of all building plans in the system. Others include data gathering on the number of communication masts, petrol filling stations, and the number of banks and hotels. The high point was the enlistment of Enugu as one of the 100 Resilient Cities in the world by Rockefeller Foundation in 2014 out of the 331 cities applicants in the world.

Passionate about an Enugu State that worked, and determined to return her pride, Sullivan, with the benefit of experience both in life and in government, resolved to expand the state’s economy through serious planning, improving on her agriculture, tapping the cultural and tourism potentials, and industrialisation. Chime’s economic expansion agenda is aptly captured in chapter eight. The economy also boomed as the ex-governor created an avenue for private and public enterprises to thrive. State owned industries, like Sunrise Flour Mills, Niger Gas, the Presidential Hotel and Ikenga Hotels, were privatised.

The state, in addition, witnessed a micro, small and medium enterprises revolution during his tenure. According to the book, the Sullivan Chime administration, joining forces with local governments and the Central Bank of Nigeria, raised billions of naira to fund MSMEs in Enugu State, with a sizeable number of them going into packaging and value addition of products, which guaranteed exportability. The Enugu State Industrial Park, Emene and Enugu State Trade Free Zone came into existence, in partnership with a Chinese company, Golmark. With the commissioning of the Polo Park Mall in 2013 by the Sullivan Chime administration, it became the biggest mall in Nigeria, and the Enugu Power and Energy Industrial Zone around 9th Mile teed off, too

In this well researched publication, you will find everything you need to know about the Enugu commercial agriculture success story. Large scale agriculture got a fillip under his watch as the state governor. Thus, the Enugu San Carlos Farms, a large-scale pineapple grower meant to make the state a major exporter, stretching from Ihe through Amoli in Awgu LGA, Umuabi and Umuaga in Udi LGA to Achi in Oji River LGA, began to thrive. Also was the Songhai Agriculture initiative at Heneke, Ibinofia Ndi Uno in Ezeagu LGA. His era, in addition, witnessed the massive expansion and renovation of Adani Farm Settlement in Uzo Uwani LGA, with the establishment of a new rice mill there, together with a new road linking it, which resulted in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture designating Adani a staple crop-processing zone. Also, his government’s establishment of the College of Agriculture and Entrepreneurship in the state was recorded to be the first of its kind in Nigeria.

Reading this book, you will also be fascinated by the role the ex-governor played in upgrading the Akanu Ibiam Airport to an international airport. In 2009, he secured the approval of the extension of the runway from 2,400 to 3000 meters, and the width from 45 to 60 meters to accommodate wide-body aircraft, while re-asphalting the runway. A brand new terminal was also built in keeping with international standard. By August 23, 2013, an excited Chime witnessed the arrival of an Ethiopian Airlines flight at the airport, thus, crystallising to reality a struggle that began over five decades ago.

While he was in office, the former governor, the book tells us, ensured that civil servants were paid salaries on the 25th of every month as a way of strengthening the public service, and pension arrears owed to civil servants were cleared. His administration equally recalled 5,000 civil servants disengaged from service by the previous administration in the state. Civil servants deserving of promotions got just that in the course of regular promotion exercises. The Office of the Head of Service ensured that continuous training exercises were affected. A total of 524 housing units were provided for different cadres of civil servants. Above all, the state became the first in the country to pay the new minimum wage.

Prudence and strict fiscal management became his watchword, cognizant of the fact that the Enugu State monthly allocation was not comparable to Lagos, Port Harcourt or Rivers State. With Enugu State Pay-Direct Account System, he was able to block revenue leakages, hence, generating billions of naira within a short time of its implementation. In fact, many projects executed by his government, like the new Enugu State Secretariat, were funded with internally generated revenue account.

Under his tenure, Enugu also became a tourist destination. Nollywood harnessed the potentials of the state as an ideal location for shooting movies, the government having made it a secure and conducive place to inhabit and explore. Part of his vision to make Enugu an ideal destination for tourism was the creation of Ministry of Culture and Tourism out of the Ministry of Information. Thus, the Enugu Road Block, an annual event that showcased the best Nigerian talents in music and comedy, became a new national rave.

In the judicial sector, twenty-five new magistrates were appointed during his tenure in each of the 17 LGAs in the state as the customary courts in the state increased from under 60 to 150. Also, his administration established the Customary Court of Appeal and appointed a President and seven judges. Among others, it built a befitting edifice for the Judicial Service Commission and a massive auditorium within the High Court premises.

These achievements are just a tip of the iceberg. His tenure, from facts on ground, was nothing short of an Olympian spell. With the passage of time, memories can fade. But a well-documented vista lives with us and with generations unborn. This is what An Honour to Serve: Enugu State in the Sullivan Years, a book that chronicles a storied renaissance, intends to achieve.

Placed on the table of any aspiring Nigerian or African leader, it can get him cracking, for, as the former Vice Chancellor of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Professor Chinedu Nebo, pens in “The Renaissance of the Coal City”, a poem in the book: Coal City damsel… you now awake, groggy eyed, though/ Alluring looks, mimicking the famed portrait/ Of Mona Lisa legend.

SOURCE: SUN NEWS

Return Of Ahiajoku Lecture 9 Years After

Imo Governor Emeka Ihedioh unveils logo for the 2019 Ahiajoku Lecture' Image via Anaedo

BY HENRY AKUBUIRO

After a nine-year lull for the exciting forum for Igbo intellectual harvest and cultural renaissance founded by the government of Sam Mbakwe in 1979 of Imo State, the Ahiajoku Lecture series is staging a comeback.

The 2019 edition is significant in many ways. For one, it marks the fortieth anniversary of the pan Igbo cultural assembly. Again, forty years after he presented the inaugural lecture, “A Matter of Identity”, the Emeritus Professor of English, M.J.C. Echeruo, will, for the second time, mount the rostrum in the Imo State capital, Owerri, on Saturday, November 30, as he headlines this year’s lecture.

He will be reflecting on the journey so far with an offering “which promises to be a brilliant and unique synthesis of the lecture series in its four decades-long journey,” informed Dr. Amanze Obi, the Director General of the Ahiajoku Institute, Owerri.

While Professor Bede Okigbo presented the 1980 lecture series on “Plants and Food in Igbo Culture”, Adiele Afigbo, in 1981, spoke on “The Age of Innocence: The Igbo and their Neighbours in Pre-colonial times”.

Other eminent Igbo scholar who have presented the lecture series included Prof Donatus Nwoga, Prof Ben Nwabueze, Professor Pius Okigbo, Professor Emmanuel Obiechina, M.A. Onwuejiogu, V.C. Uchendu, Professor Chinua Achebe, Professor Chinedu Nebo, among others.

The Lecture Series, explained Obi, was initiated as an intellectual festival which celebrates Igbo civilisation, culture and worldview in the context of world affairs. The current Imo State Governor, Rt. Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, has taken it upon himself to revive the almost moribund lecture series as part of his intervention in culture and tourism in the state.

“Significantly, Governor Ihedioha who has undertaken the onerous task of rebuilding Imo after the years of the locust, is also seeing to the rebirth of Ahiajoku after its regrettable abandonment eight years ago. The revival of the festival is in line with the determination of the present administration in Imo state to reposition the state’s cultural and tourism subsector,” said Obi.

This year’s lecture will hold at the Ahiajoku Convention Centre, New Owerri, on Saturday, November 30th. A day before, on Friday, November 29, there will be preliminary activities that make the festival a unique whole, including the Ahiajoku colloquium, where a college of intellectuals and researchers will gather to ex-ray the leadership challenges facing Nigeria with particular reference to the Igbo nation, and a cultural night, where the rich Igbo culture and heritage will be given a fillip.

Explaining the significance of the lecture series, the DG of the Ahiajoku Institute told Daily Sun, “The series takes its roots from the goddess of Ahiajoku which, in Igbo cosmogony, relates to cultivation, fertility and harvesting.

“The Igbo belong to a dietary group normally referred to as the yam culture which extends from Ivory Coast to the eastern boundary of the Cameroon mountains. It is entrenched in the forest areas of the guinea savannah and has defined the political economy of the Igbo ever since.

“But the lecture series, strictly speaking, is not about cultivation or fertility. Rather, it is an intellectual harvest of sorts which seeks to underpin the contributions the Igbo have made and are still making to culture, civilisation and humanity.

“To underline the preeminent position of the Igbo in this regard, we must re-establish our identity as a people. This involves a dynamic interaction with our environment and our neighbours. It compels us to understand that we do not live in an isolated world. We live in a human community where our identity must be forged and made to stand shoulder to shoulder with those of other groups and civilisations,” he added.

Speaking on the Ahiajoku Instuute, which he heads, Obi said it was conceived “as an extra-ministerial department established by the Government of Imo State for the purposes of harnessing all the cultural activities of the state,” fashioned like the Goethe Institut –the German cultural association, and Instituto Italiano De Cultura –the Italian cultural institute.

“The institute,” he hinted, “when set up, will be the first of its kind in Nigeria. With it in place, Imo will become a cultural hub. Its activities and programmes will make Imo the cultural epicentre of Nigeria to which Igbos and, indeed, other Nigerians as well, as foreigners will converge periodically for epochal cultural events.”

Besides, it will take Ahiajoku out of mere talk shows and make it more celebratory. “It is envisioned that Ahiajoku will become a cultural carnival with various strands that will make it more engaging,” he echoed.

Among others, the institute will engage in cultural diplomacy by promoting the study of Igbo language and culture abroad, as well as encouraging international cultural exchanges and relations; serve as storehouse for providing information about Igbo civilisation, culture and society and will also function as a centre for the exchange of films, music, theatre and literature, etcetera.

For now, denizens of arts and culture cannot but wait with bated breath for the Ikolo to beat, once again, in the Imo State capital, Owerri, to summon the entire Igboland to the shrine of knowledge and cultural rebirth which the long awaited Ahiajoku Lecture series represents.

SOURCE: SUN NEWS