“I should have known that ambition and success were not to be expected in an African woman. An African woman should be a good African woman whose qualities should be coyness, shyness, submissiveness, incompetence and crippling dependency. A highly educated independent African woman is bound to be dominant, aggressive, uncontrollable, a bad influence.”

                  – Professor Wangari Mathaai (1979) right after the collapse of her marriage with Mwangi Mathai

The month of March has a number of internationally recognized days celebrating women’s accomplishments, achievements and the special place women occupy in society. There is the International Women’s Day (IWD) celebrated globally on March 8th and the forthcoming Mother’s day celebrated between March and April depending on the country. In the case of the former, the IWD, despite (ironically) having its origins in socialist political events and worker’s movements in the early 1900s, by 1975, during International Women’s Year, the United Nations (UN) began celebrating International Women’s Day on 8 March and by 1977, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a UN Day for Women’s Rights and International Peace to be observed by Member States. The official UN theme for International Women’s Day 2012 is “Empower Rural Women — End Hunger and Poverty.” All over the world, women everyday are taking giant strides in breaking free of stereotypes and in improving their lives, those of their families and of their communities. In Sub-Saharan Africa as well, women are doing remarkable things – from Nobel Prize winners recognized by the international community to the ordinary women doing extra-ordinary things every day.

When strong African women are mentioned, heavy weights come to mind such as the late Kenyan activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Professor Wangari Muta Maathai who passed away in September 2011. Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977 which planted over 30 million trees, she was an advocate for better sustainability in the management of natural resources, she worked with women to improve their livelihoods by increasing their access to resources like firewood for cooking and clean water and was a pro-democracy and human rights activist. Others include Liberia’s president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first female elected African Head of State, who won the Nobel peace prize last year for her efforts in rebuilding post-conflict Liberia such as negotiating significant debt relief, anti-corruption efforts, starting the truth and reconciliation commission to address crimes committed during the Liberian civil war and overseeing a rise in school enrolment by 40%. Sirleaf shared the Nobel laurel with fellow Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee who mobilised Christian and Muslim women in Liberia to call for an end to the brutal 14-year civil war by fasting, praying and campaigning for an immediate ceasefire and dialogue between the government and the rebels, and also convincing Charles Taylor to step down. The award-winning documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell  chronicles the incredible efforts of Gbowee and her women’s movement in ending the civil war. Others include internationally renowned Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo, author of Dead Aid: Why Aid is Not Working, Siza Mzimela the CEO of South African Airways, Mariéme Jamme a London-based philanthropist, technologist and social entrepreneur, and so many others.

Chimamanda Adichie

Coming closer home, in Nigeria, we have heavy weights such as Professor Dora Akunyili former Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) who has received international recognition and awards for her work in public health and pharmacology; Dr. Ngozi Okonjo Iweala the Harvard-educated first female Minister of Finance in Nigeria, famous for negotiating the historic debt cancellation of $18 billion (60%) of Nigeria’s external debt with the Paris Club in 2005 and for fostering greater fiscal transparency in government. Though her reputation and popularity in Nigeria slightly plunged due to her prominent role in the Nigerian government’s recent removal of fuel subsidy, she still remains a powerful and brilliant woman who has made an indelible mark in a terrain dominated by men. Okonjo-Iweala is listed on the Forbes list of the World’s Most Powerful Black Women and Forbes Africa’s list of the 20 Most Powerful Women in Africa. There is also Mrs. Obiageli “Oby” Ezekwesili, currently a World Bank Vice President for the Africa Region responsible for projects, economic and sectoral work in 47 Sub-Saharan countries; Mrs. Amina Ibrahim, a Senior Special Assistant to the President of Nigeria on the Millennium Development Goals, described by BBC reporter Mark Doyle as a “frank and intelligent woman”. Also worthy of note is Justice Aloma Mariam Mukhtar (CON) the first female Supreme Court justice in Nigeria, and Mrs. Ifueko Omogui the Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS)responsible for driving institutional changes to reform the tax system in Nigeria.Outside the public sector, we have young up and coming women who are blazing the trail in their various fields of endeavour such as the award winning writer Chimamanda Adichie  listed on the Forbes’ 20 Youngest Power Women of Africa and Nollywood movie stars such as Genevieve Nnaji, who is regarded as “Africa’s most revered actress” and one of the most influential celebrities in Africa. There are many more of such amazing and inspiring women in Nigeria and across Africa.

By far, one of the most remarkable and extraordinary instances of a woman’s resilience in the harsh terrain in Sub Saharan Africa is that of Rabi’atu Abubakar Mashi, the female truck-driver with Dangote Cement company, in the conservative Northern state of Katsina, perhaps the only female truck driver in Northern Nigeria. Hers is a story of courage as she defies stereotypes whilst eking out a living doing something traditionally not associated with women neither in the developed world nor in the developing world. Her interview with the Weekly Trust newspaper HERE reveals that:

As a divorcee with two children it can be inferred that Rabi’atu’s income comes in handy in catering to her basic needs and that of her children, keeping her self sufficient, in an environment where the rate of divorces is reaching alarming proportions and divorced women who are typically without meaningful sources of livelihoods end up as dependents and a liability to themselves and their families. Interestingly, Rabi’atu acknowledges that she is doing something extraordinary and hopes that other women will follow the trail she has blazed. Having successfully trained and mentored another woman, she confirms that her protégé could soon start driving her own truck for the same company. Additionally, Rabi’atu is mindful of her deeply conservative environment built on mostly cultural and Islamic prescriptions which place a high level of importance on marriage. Thus she hopes to be remarry but prays that her husband doesn’t discourage her from the lucrative truck driving business she is very passionate about.

This is an amazing story of strength, courage and resilience. For pursuing her dreams in a tough environment and perhaps inspiring other women to take charge of their destinies and empower themselves, Rabi’atu deserves to be crowned woman of the year. I am probably over-excited and stretching it a bit, but a Nigerian Woman of the Year award would do. The fact that she is from my home state, Katsina is a plus and a feel-good factor for me . There are certainly many more women like Rabi’atu all around the world setting the pace in their own unique way, yet it is their individual efforts which collectively make a difference.

Image via Wikipedia

Want to help Africa? Do business here was the TED rallying cry by former World Bank MD now Nigeria Finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. But, who is going to do business with you if you appeared clueless in the face of the future? Spearheading the controversial plan to scrap fuel subsidies was a mistake as anger sparked unrest forcing banks, petrol stations, manufacturing companies and Nigerian airports to close. President Goodluck Jonathan has gone on national TV to defend the fuel cuts. But words like “I have no intention to inflict pains on Nigerians” and “We must act in the public interest, no matter how tough, for the pains of today cannot be compared to the benefits of tomorrow” missed the point.

Petrol prices in Nigeria are currently very low by international standards at about $0.40 per litre. Many Nigerians regard cheap fuel as the only benefit they get from the nation’s oil wealth. There are compelling arguments for the removal of fuel subsidy, however, the government could have planned it better. The town hall meeting was a disaster of jargon and platitudes. The announcement to remove fuel subsidy was made in a statement from regulators, which said the changes would begin immediately. Petrol prices more than doubled overnight in response and angry street protests followed.

This non-progressive and socially unjust tax has led to chaos in every sector. It was poorly planned and executed hence the angry protests that are threatening other areas like security as we learn that sympathisers of the Islamist Boko Haram group are in government and security agencies. “Downside scenarios included: Nigeria as a failed state, dragging down a large part of the West African region.” Is the game over for Nigeria as people sit at home while their elected representatives take home pay is more than that of US President Obama?

I do not think so. All is not lost in Nigeria, those incompetent lot in the Nigerian government has to do the difficult task of leadership. A U-turn. Admit error and blame God. Rather than tax poor Nigerians. Now, how about taxing those that benefit from Nigeria? A one-off $100Billion 2012 pollution and corruption tax on all multi-nationals will deliver on the economic benefits as we re-plan the removal of petroleum subsidy. Shell, Chevron, P&G, PwC and others have turned around Trillions in US dollars out of Nigeria. Is it wrong to now ask them to share in the benefits of tomorrow?

Those that follow me have probably figured out by now that I spend a lot time in Lagos traffic, constantly hopping from one bus to another. While I would certainly prefer to commute less, there’s an upside, in that it allows me see and ponder all kinds of interesting things. This post is largely inspired by one of such bus rides, where I witnessed a passenger getting told off by fellow passengers for tossing the wrapping of whatever she’d been eating out the window. The lady in question seemed genuinely surprised to have been called out in this manner, “since when did we begin to care if there’s junk on on the road?” , she asked, looking frantically around for a sympathetic opinion. Unfortunately for her, there was none to be found, and judging from the vigorous dissent of almost all the number in the bus , I’m guessing she would have done better to keep her opinion to herself. Okay, I confess, I kind of derived some perverse pleasure from every moment of her discomfiture. At the same time however, I also couldn’t help but marvel at how the catch phrase “Eko o ni baje o”¹ seems to have taken on a life of its own and created a new set of expectations in the hearts and minds of Lagos people.

Now, please forgive any subsequent appearance of grandiloquence, but it is at this juncture that I would like to reveal the first of my “original theories”, conceived in a Molue², and propounded after many hours of grueling mental exertion and acute philosophical soliloquy, I assure you. Following protracted consultations with all my associated alter egos, in the persons of Bankole, Lordbanks and Naijadude, we have unanimously resolved to call it…(drumroll please)…the Law of Expectation.

To state it simply, I posit that:

expectations, positive or negative, which are fulfilled and reinforced by subsequent practice will over time achieve normative status and thereby become default behaviour and the generally accepted state of affairs - Lordbanks

Real corny, huh? Blame it on Law School. I wouldn’t know if this theory exists and is better articulated in some dusty old sociological treatise somewhere, but since I haven’t stumbled upon it yet, I just had to make this up. Anyways, the gist is; if people get away with doing something for long enough without raising a substantial number of eyebrows, it’ll become normal, no matter how weird or counter-intuitive it actually is. What then happens after is that we adjust our default states to anticipate these ‘normal’ behaviours, even if they go against our principles, what we would do in ordinary circumstances. Think about it…how bureaucrats will refuse to do their work, until they’ve been given the obligatory tip. Or how we can never get people to form an orderly queue, even if it were to save their lives. I have no idea how African time came about, but I can safely say that somehow, we’ve taught ourselves to never be on time, because the other person we’re expecting isn’t likely to be punctual either. And save for the white markings, a Nigerian knows that Zebra crossings are no different from any other stretch of road that must be respected by looking left, right and left again before one ventures across. I’m operating on the assumption that we agree that all this isn’t exactly normal behaviour. In the unlikely event that you don’t…but I’m sure you do.

Ironically, refusal to conform to this aberrant form of normal will not only earn you a reputation as an oddball at the least (sanctimonious bastard being the other end of the scale), but also cause you a good deal of inconvenience. The bureaucrats will hate you and delay or even mislay your precious files. Your sense of order and propriety will always ensure that you ‘carry last’ when there’s anything to be distributed. Getting stood up by tardy associates will become a fact of life. And you run the risk of being run over, should you be crazy enough to use the Zebra crossing in the exact manner for which it was intended.

So there you have it, a tale of warped expectations, giving rise to all sorts of social anomalies that this rant can’t even begin to explore. But the good news, however, is that expectations and the behavioural patterns that form as a result aren’t immutable. All that need happen is that the existing expectation be superseded by a superior one. Take Lagos for example. Time was when people had to claw and kick their way aboard Molues and Danfos. Now they line up patiently, waiting for the BRT. Bus conductors now pointedly refuse to open the door before they get to the bus stop, preferring to annoy a few impatient passengers over submitting the day’s earnings to LASTMA officials in fines. Paying tax used to be a joke. Now ordinary Lagosians point at specific infrastructural improvements in defence of it. The quickest way to book an appointment with the psychiatrist might be to drive against traffic. And it would be incredibly remiss of me to list all these developments without a mention of Oshodi, what it was, and what it now is (news clip from Channels TV).What Fashola has done is to create a new set of expectations in place of the old, the assurance of incentives or consequences resulting from specific actions and behaviour. In just over four years, Lagos has become a much saner, cleaner and safer place than it used to be because  its inhabitants have largely subscribed to the Eko o ni baje credo. The effects of this sort of social psyche transformation take a while to be really apparent, but we’ve seen that it can be done.

Satisfied that my fellow passenger had been taught a fine lesson in decent public etiquette, my mind to turned to deeper concerns. Like how she could have easily won the argument if we were in average company (the said event did not transpire in a Molue). And that’s the problem, there are too many people who think it is perfectly fine to throw trash anywhere they please, or expedite their passport processing with bribes, or throw lavish thanksgiving services after serving a jail sentence for looting public coffers. And nothing will change until we tip the scale of public opinion in the opposite direction, substantially so. I can’t say how or when it began, but in my opinion, much of what ails this country can be traced to  a process of gradual conditioning, one that took place on all levels. Like is ongoing in Lagos, the emergence of a new Nigeria will require fundamental changes in the way we think, in our perceptions of the probable consequences of our behaviour. A change in our expectations. How this will come about? A matter for another post perhaps. For now we have come to the end of this Molue meditation.

¹Eko o ni baje o: Lagos state credo, introduced and popularised by the Raji Fashola administration.
²Molue: Huge yellow and black striped Lagos buses.

I wholeheartedly agree with this, and I think that is what is most encouraging: Yes there are issues, but we are able to identify these issues and do something about resolving them. Or are we?

How are we able to deal with these issues if we are not educated? What is education? What are the policies we have in place that tackle the illiteracy problem? What has been implemented? What exactly are we doing? Do we even prioritise education as a key development issue?

There are many statistics on the United Nations and World Bank’s websites that inform on the role of education in development. The focus though is on Basic Education. Yes we have basic education (don’t get me started on the issues with these, issues on quality of education, etc.), but after that, what next? It is like a pyramid, the numbers that pass through to the next upward level taper continuously until the apex is comprised of children of the elite, and some few people that are ‘lucky’.

Surely this is a dire situation. Yes education is important; it can lead to change (the ability to know the issues and the know-how to find where if not how to resolve them). But we cannot get to that point as a continent if 60% of our population is illiterate. 60%! SIXTY PERCENT! This figure is shocking. Scary. Painful.  What are we going to do about it?

May I suggest a few things: creating awareness about the importance of education. Supporting local schools. Starting workshops to educate parents about the need for education. Adult education. Educating domestic helps, their children.  There is so much to write on this topic. I shall continue next time.

World Bank Education For All

http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/TOPICS/EXTEDUCATION/0,,contentMDK:20374062~menuPK:540090~pagePK:148956~piPK:216618~theSitePK:282386,00.html

United Nations Millennium Development Goal 2- Education

http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/education.shtml

Tinsel Cast

In my previous article of the same title, I attempted a backgrounding of the many issues that have made it impossible for quality programming to be the order of the day on Nigerian television. It’s important  we understand where we’re coming from concerning television programming in Nigeria and how we have found ourselves in the mess that we are in right now. But, enough of history. Now, let us crunch numbers, put appropriate figures to what an independent producer must go through to put anything on the airwaves in Nigeria and possibly begin to accept our fate and stop tearing out our hair when next another annoying spectacle is displayed on our local stations.

Where shall we start from? Okay, let us assume an independent producer wants to put a one-hour drama series on air. She gets a story line, gets the screenplay done, goes on location, and gets the shoot done and post-production as well, all for about N250,000 per episode. That comes to N3, 250,000 for a quarter (13 weeks). Please note that N250k per episode is way more than the average cost of what you see on television. To be able to spend N250k per episode in Nigeria, you must truly be one of the BIG independent producers. Now, shooting is done, editing done and we are ready for broadcast.  So our hardworking independent producer approaches one of our television stations and asks for ways to get the series on air. She will be given a couple of options, ranging from: 1. Buy airtime and put your programme on air (their favourite). 2. Put the programme on air for free and we will split the money that comes from adverts with you; you take 50%, we take 50%. (She would have to really beg for this to happen). 3. Give us the series for free, who knows, it may or may not attract adverts but at least you have screened it and when you shoot future episodes and take them to agencies for adverts they won’t say they have never heard of it before… (Read: we are doing you a favour and we will kick you off air as soon as the next paying customer shows up, but for now, since we have nothing else to put on air…) There are many other possible scenarios and most of them are not better than what we have above.

If our independent producer decides to take option 1, here are the realities: If she approaches Silverbird Television, for example, she would be required to pay the following: From 6am – 4pm = N87,500; 4pm -7pm (Showtime) = N94,000; 7pm – 11pm =N300,000; (Primetime) 11pm – 6am = N37,000. And this is not all: she will also be expected to pay 100% surcharge, also known as dislocation fee. This, in English, means that she has to pay double so STV can kick out whatever programme that is already being broadcast on whatever time-belt she wants. If she chooses to go primetime, which is where she will get the largest audience, she must be willing to cough out N600,000 per episode, per quarter, which comes to N7.8M. This is for Lagos alone. Add that to the cost of production and you’ll have about N11m. Now, somehow, our industrious independent producer can actually come up with this money (a huge inheritance, her life’s savings or a wealthy and supportive spouse, perhaps…) and she goes ahead to pay, hoping that the success of the series would bring forth a storm of adverts. This is where a different reality will smack her in the face like a slap from a calloused hand.

I do not know how advertising agencies do business with radio and television stations elsewhere in the world, so I shall not be making global comparisons here. However, I have a strong feeling that you will travel very far before you encounter anything close to what obtains in Nigeria and I make bold to say that advertising agencies are a major part of the reason why there’ll be crap on Nigerian television for a long time. It may interest you to know, for instance, that for each sixty second advert  worth about N8, 000 you hear on radio, the radio station will end up getting just about 55-60% of that figure. Volume discount (about 20%) and agency commission (also about 20%) will be deducted from source. I will say nothing of under-hand dealings that will get you the adverts in the first place, or what you may need to pay some brand managers or other ‘powerful’ people along the way. Yet, this is still not the worst that will happen to our independent producer. She actually will not get a dime from most agencies until at least 90 days after she has run the adverts on her series, sometimes it will be 180 days later. It’s called turnaround time. Some will never pay her. If she decides to sell outright and not go through advertising agencies, the only station that will probably buy her series is MNET, and guess at what price? Between $500-$750 per episode. That is less than half of what she spent in producing an episode; can she even dream of making a profit? $1000 is what MNET pays on the average for the films you see on African Magic.

Some comments on the first part of this article compared Tinsel and Jacob’s Crosswith Nigerian productions and I had a good laugh. I cannot confirm this, but Tinsel is produced for about $900 PER MINUTE ($22, 500 or N3, 375,000.00. PER EPISODE of 25 minutes). What I can authoritatively tell you is that the first three seasons of Jacob’s Cross were produced for about $1800 PER MINUTE. That means that, for a one hour drama series, it cost $81, 000 (You usually produce about 45mins for a 1hr drama series to leave room for adverts), that is N12,150,000.00 PER EPISODE. Remember our independent producer? Yeah, the one who spent N250,000,00 producing each episode of her drama series? The critical difference is that Tinsel and Jacob’s Cross are funded by MNET for Multi-Choice so they will not be buying airtime anywhere to broadcast; you and I pay for those programmes when we pay our monthly subscription. I guess we all can see how ludicrous comparisons between both realities will be.

We pay nothing for watching programmes on our local stations so maybe we should complain less and thank God they can actually broadcast anything at all. Between the irresponsibility of NTA and the NBC‘s refusal to ban the sale of airtime, thereby forcing stations to invest in programming, this is where we have found ourselves. We may have Nollywood, but our broadcast industry is in shambles. It is a shame indeed, especially when you remember that we actually had television long before even many European countries. Don’t get me wrong; I am not holding forth for the many charlatans who masquerade as producers and put programmes on television that make you wonder if they have fried eggs for brains. Personally, I’d love nothing more than to drag some of them through a market place naked, with ash on their pubes and children taunting them with music made with sticks and empty tins. Yes, I find some of them that despicable.

Beyond all that, however, what else should we expect with the kind of environment we have created? How do we truly expect creativity to flourish and engender development? Aren’t we really disillusioned? Let’s face it, with all that has been highlighted above – and this is by no means a full coverage of our sad reality – isn’t it rather preposterous of us to expect anything but crap on Nigerian television?

This article was originally written for Nigeria Entertainment Today

I have cast around for how best to characterize Nigerian literature 50 years after Independence, and I have decided to settle for the Abiku motif. Abiku or Emere is the colleague of Ogbanje, and these are personages that have played central roles in Nigerian lore and literature. They have also enjoyed a respectable filmic presence, at least in recurrence of use if not in potency and beauty of treatment. There was this film titled ‘Abiku’ which was all the rage in the eighties. It won first prize in the Nigerian film festival held in the year it came out, or so I think. I was a little boy then, and was terribly in love with Tara, the Abiku in the film. She was beautiful and fascinating. But I couldn’t sleep at night because Tara and her entire coven always came for my soul at the witching hour. Yet I never tired of viewing the film whenever it was shown on NTA. A couple of years later, I was disappointed by Ogbanje in the TV serialization of Things Fall Apart. Okonkwo’s impatience with his Ogbanje daughter was not what I had expected from reading the book. Again, the damsel was beautiful, and I quickly developed a painful crush on her. But she lacked Tara’s promise of everything evil and forbidden veiled in a façade of sweetness and innocence.

There is always plenty that Ogbanje and Abiku have going for them. To thwart one’s adult minders, to make a mockery of adult games and severity, to bear a secret that torments everybody in the household, nay, the community, to have the power of coming and going as the spirit moves you—what more can a child desire! Abiku’s hold on me became final and unbreakable by the time I had memorized every line of Clark’s cadence and pathos and of Soyinka’s incantation and defiance. With Okri’s donation of that epiphany of his to world literature, Abiku became part of the toolkit for understanding the trouble that is Nigeria.

The claim can now be made that Abiku is not just a motif in our literature; it is not just source material for a good plot or subplot. That motif is also a barometer. One can use it to measure the literary and, indeed, literal temperament of major Nigerian writers and poets, from Tutuola through Achebe, Clark and Soyinka to Emecheta and Okri. These giants have not only used Abiku in their works, but have re-enacted stations of the passion of Abiku in their respective writing careers. You ask for proof? Recently, JP Clark has come to life all over again, taking his literary production from where he left it after the diminuendo of All For Oil. That crowds of the literati in Lagos and Ibadan have found much to enjoy anew in Clark’s oeuvre, which covers more than fifty years, is evidence of the Abiku qualities of both work and author.

Abiku’s logic is the supreme confrontation of life, and of death. It goes beyond what Mark Twain noted: ‘All say, “How hard it is that we have to die” —a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.’ Abiku says that we have to actively engage both life and death, not just accept them as they come to us. Life and death are things we have to do. This is an epic affirmation of Eros and Thanatos in the self-same breath. Nigerian literature in the past 50 years has displayed a wilful and headstrong nature like Abiku and Ogbanje. Part of its stock-in-trade over the five decades has been to wax strong and then feign death, sometimes so convincingly in terms of how corpse-like it would lie in state. But you could depend on it to suddenly resurrect after the criers have expended a deluge of tears and are deservedly expectant of ample helpings from the regulation feast. The funereal mood transmutes into a naming ceremony.

Lately though, with the sanitization of our conscience by certain influences, some of which I will identify below, there has been a waning of the Abiku live-die spirit in Nigerian literature. These days everybody is winning or awarding some writing prize or the other, and everybody out there who updates a blog considers her/himself a literary phenomenon. We now have a live-live situation in which nothing dies. Nobody wants to die and nobody wants to administer death. There is a timidity of approach in many of those who claim a literary vocation; there is a certain Christianly charity that preaches love for and peace with all men when we should be screaming for a frank reckoning, the kind of reckoning that deals death blows to any corpus that deserves to die for something more potent to be born in its place. Literature dies, and dies permanently without the infusion of a frank reckoning into the literary body politic. I need to make my point clearer. What I want to say is that we will be left with an impressive body of verbiage, and that is all we will have to gaze upon as the gatekeepers of the literary directorate in Nigeria disband the department of criticism, setting up in its place a claque of review writers whose job description should shame even Ovation magazine. The trend is there for all to observe. Just look at the review articles published in many Nigerian newspapers if you have that kind of long-suffering. Abiku’s powers of wilful death and wilful rebirth are lost once he is converted to the live-live logic which—and the paradox is indeed painful—results in permanent death for all at the end of the day.

The trouble with Abiku or Nigerian literature seems to have started in those dark days (we are still in the darkness, mind you) when publishing in Nigeria ran aground. The only people who could bring out books on a regular basis were plutocrats with a sense of their abject need to deceive posterity. The book launch became a recurrent potlatch where ‘big’ people gathered to exchange falsehoods about the glories of ‘The Life and Times of Chief or General XYZ’, and to endorse their falsehoods by buying two copies of the book—‘for my wife and my children’—at N500,000 apiece. The charade would not stop there. Some hack, who must have also ghosted the autobiography largely from imaginary materials, could be depended upon to write the required review for publication in the papers. The poor chap would throw all he had into the task, looking at ‘style’ and ‘narrative thrust’, ‘overall literary merit’ and even ‘the place of the work in the curriculum of the future’. It did not take much time for this business model to be adopted by writers who would have us believe that they are self-respecting and serious about their craft. Where is the colobus monkey that blames them too much? Writing had become the job of the mad and the hungry in Nigeria, and as the popular saying goes—‘Man must wack’. Writers with support and connexions in the plutocracy have benefited immensely from this business model. Chief or General XYZ is always there to ‘generously’ buy two copies—for the writer and the writer’s wife. Needless to say, such support does not come gratis. Every plutocrat in the country today has his official ghost, and most ‘big’ men are published writers, many of them filling up weekly columns in the papers with tripe from the overworked guts of their respective ghosts.

Part of the publicity for the work of the ‘serious’ writer who applies the book-launch business model is to have ‘promotional’ reviews written by fellow writers and circulated in the papers. These are often done in friendship, sometimes for a fee, always with the intention to peddle lies about imagined merits and brilliance. In this way the weed of mutualism has been sown and watered on Abiku’s stomping ground. And it has since taken over the entire expanse of territory occupied by the reviewing directorate, and has also spilled into the training grounds. In many a Nigerian secondary school and university, Lit. Crit. is now anathema, unfairly accused of impudence like the clitoris and then excised. Pupils are informed that literature is meant to be appreciated, not criticized. So we now have Literary Appreciation, that euphemism for mutual dependence on the live-live weed.

And the weed is even overgrowing into the expanse of territory occupied by Nigerian literature in the age of the Internet. One would have expected such new media as online publication to give back to Abiku, to Nigerian literature, the power of life and death. But the logic of live-live, the business model of the book launch, has so overwhelmed and tied down Nigerian literature that Abiku finds that its limbs are firmly earthed, even in virtual space. We can find examples of this dependence on the weed in some of the responses to Chris Ihidero’s review of Adaobi Nwaubani’s I Do Not Come to You by Chance. Chris more or less declared that some things must die. Many of the commentators, champions of live-and-let-live, crowed no. Humph! And yet there are much worse examples of what I am talking about. For instance, it is only in this situation of live-live mercantilism that a business-card litterateur like Wole Oguntokun would unashamedly style himself on Facebook as ‘Half-Nigerian; Half-Genius ©’ even though all he has ever brought to the stage is endlessly apish and/or driven by the craze to quickly seize and secure any niche or opening he can ferret out in the marketplace, e.g. his brilliant idea—The Tarzan Monologues. Compare what our writers were doing in the 1960s with much of what is being done today and you will begin to understand why I feel that this impresario needs to be chided. By all accounts, however, Oguntokun is an exemplar, so let me omit him from all of this.

Nothing dies anymore but the paradox, as I have said, is that everything faces certain death in this new eschatology. After 50 years, in which period there has been much to celebrate and regret, we need to realize that death and rebirth enter literature through criticism. Maybe I exaggerate in much of what I have said. But our Abiku is too alive, if I may further exploit the conceit. Abiku is now content with the live-live business model. Abiku is no longer the delinquent looking for things to steal and hearts to break. Abiku is that besuited corporate executive who knows that image is everything; he gives to others so that he can receive from them. Abiku is no longer the errant kid. That kid has been demobilized into adult gentility. No longer capable of going away and then coming back in renewed capacity to fascinate and task the household, this adult has a largeness of heart, an expansive spirit. He has fallen in love with life and earthen encumbrances, and now repudiates death—thereby losing the gift of rebirth. Thus all kinds of works are guaranteed stardom and a stretch of life, even those ones that are actually stillborn. Everything gets numbered in the living canon. This is not magic; it is dormancy, torpor. It is a pretence that some things are living when they are in reality long dead. It is a farcical tragedy of the commons in which many animals that can’t even digest grass are allowed into the grazing field on a daily basis.

There should be some death so that there can be more life. I am tired of hearing variations on Mark Twain’s ‘Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated’ in relation to every work by a Nigerian writer. I don’t know about you but I would love to witness for a change the killing cry at some of those glitzy Lagos venues where much of what passes for Nigerian literature is celebrated. Then and only then will I scream: Happy Independence Abiku! Right now there is just too much dependence on the live-live weed.

Apparently, the President had zeroed in on a comment and arranged for his aides to contact some “visionary” who appeared to have a sort of solution to the power problem.

Power is a tough nut
Whilst some comments on Google Buzz were less than charitable about this crowd-sourcing approach to problem resolution, I felt for the first time we had a leader who was seeking advice, ready to listen and responding positively to suggestions.

More importantly, the power infrastructure problem is really a difficult one for too many reasons to recount here as I threw the idea that if it were easy to solve the least competent leader would have done it and the most political leader would have built on it – The fact is radical ideas are needed on that matter and it would do well that we restrain our criticism and cynicism for an opportunity to listen first and keep our peace for a while.

A new leadership approach
Meanwhile, Goodluck Jonathan as he has plainly identified himself on Facebook has the profession of a politician rather than a zoologist, I suppose, that is what he had become now has 100,335 people who like him since he joined just 11 days ago on the 28th of June 2010.

His first status post was – Today, in fulfillment of the promise I made at the 26th convocation of the University of Port Harcourt on Saturday, 15 May 2010, I have created a facebook fan page to interact with Nigerians. As I said on that day, there is an unchallengeable power of good in the Nigerian nation and her youth and through this medium I want Nigerians to give me the privilege of relating with them without the trappings of office. GEJ

This is a laudable goal, in the main that he first kept the promise and in recognising that the trappings of office might prevent him from getting a feel of the people he leads.

More humility than hubris
For his profile, he writes – My life has always been about service. I am focused on serving my Creator, family and my country to the best of my ability and with your help I aim to be better at doing that.

This probably is something Nigerians can relate to as a very religious country; it does appear to say a lot in terms of his priorities which puts his faith and immediate responsibilities first and then the country for the greater good.

He recognises that his abilities are not omnipotent or omniscient as many African leaders tend to demonstrate by never allowing others in power thinking they only have the wherewithal to rule like emperors whilst failing to mentor suitable successors to their “thrones”, with our help, President Jonathan hopes to improve on what he is doing – for once, a sense of humility rather than hubris is expressed by leadership.

A voice in the wilderness
I cannot help but think after reading many of the postings by the president than they all sound quite professorial almost to the extent that it is impossible to identity the substance of his statements. The voice is too collective sometimes relayed in platitudes that border on the rhetorical, where the 1st person is used there is almost a conflict between the assertive and the acquiescent – it makes you wonder if you are being lead or you are half-persuaded to follow.

I would think that the president does read many of the comments but he would definitely have to engage a Facebook management team that weeds out the chaff and highlights the wheat.

Yes sir, yes sir, 3 bags full sir
The comments are presaged with unnecessary and flowery obsequiousness each one seeming to try to out-praise the other with all the religious padding that detracts from getting straight to the point – verbosity is our undoing in many cases being succinct, concise or precise is too good for our expression.

With an average of over 1,500 comments per status, this a Facebook page I neither want to like or leave a comment on, for this one page the responsible thing would be to switch off all notifications or streamline your settings to take notifications from lists of friends whilst excluding the traffic generated at the President’s page.

There are ways in which this looks like taking suggestions from a crowd at a political rally, the noise, the heckling, the robust supporters who will listen to no one but their patron and much worse – this is for a particular followership and audience that needs to extend their Facebook footprint to include politicians, celebrities and passing fads or trends.

The new talk shop
As a forum for ordinary Nigerians to engage with their president, this a welcome development; as an opportunity to glean new ideas for issues that Nigeria faces, this widens the resource and talent pool beyond the fossils that crowd the political space in Nigeria – it would become the new Nigerian talking shop but for the wise, this is best observed from afar.

You probably need to be a member of Facebook to visit http://www.facebook.com/jonathangoodluck

As the first wired President of Nigeria on a popular social network, all one can say is Goodluck Jonathan – welcome to Facebook.

In May, an Indian trade mission, led by Mr. Ravi Bangar, the deputy permanent representative of India to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), paid a visit to Mr. Jubril Martins-Kuye, Nigeria’s Minister for Commerce and Industry. One of the major issues they discussed was the possibility of India helping Nigeria to revitalise its textile industry. Shortly after the meeting, the minister directed both the National Cotton Association of Nigeria and the Nigeria Textile Manufacturers’ Association to put a paper together, giving specific details on how the government could help the textile industry.

This paper, it is presumed, will form the basis of what the involvement of India in the sector would be. This has not yet been done, but it seems like a good time to pause and examine what led to a situation in which an industry that was the largest employer in the manufacturing sector of the country became one that desperately needs help. It is by doing this exercise that one might begin to think of what could be done to bring it back from the brink.

The not-so-rosy past
The first modern textile mill in Nigeria, Kaduna Textile Mill, was started in 1956 in Kaduna, northern Nigeria. The primary reason for setting up the mill was to process the cotton that was being produced in the northern part of the country. By the 1970s and the 1980s, the Nigerian textile industry had grown to become the third largest in Africa.

A report by the United Nations University (UNU) states that in 1987, there were 37 textile firms in the country, operating 716,000 spindles and 17,541 looms. This was the golden period of Nigeria’s textile industry. Between 1985 and 1991, it recorded an annual growth of 67%, and as at 1991, it employed about 25% of workers in the manufacturing sector. Although all this is good news, it needs to be viewed with the structure of the global textile trade in mind: it was the period of the Multi Fibre Agreement (MFA).

The MFA was a system of quota that could be imposed by developed countries on the amount of textile products developing countries could export to them. This was interpreted largely as a protection of the United States’ textile industry from China. The MFA was replaced by the WTO’s Agreement on Textiles and Clothing (ATC) in 1995. Under these agreements, the textile industry was brought into full compliance with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) rules, and all quota restrictions were rolled back by January 1, 2005. The quota restrictions were not applicable to some countries, one of which was Nigeria.

In the 1980s and early 1990s, Nigeria’s textile industry received a lot of foreign investment. The UNU report for instance notes that in 1991, two companies that its report focused on were either directly owned by Indian investors or were subsidiaries of Indian-owned companies: Aflon Nigeria PLC was owned by Afprint Nigeria Plc, which was in turn part of the Indian Kewalram/Chenrai group. Spintex Mills (Nigeria) Limited was also an Indian company. During the same period, United Nigeria Textile Plc (UNTPLC), a Kaduna-based company that was established in 1964, was bought by CHA Textiles, a Chinese company. It has been suggested that the reason the number of textile companies in Nigeria grew during this period was because Nigeria was not under the MFA quota restrictions.

Decline of the industry
In an interview with Nigeria’s Daily Independent newspaper, the first Nigerian Group Managing Director of Kewalram/Chanrai, Mr. Victor Eburajolo, blamed the decline of the textile industry on the hasty accession of Nigeria to the WTO in 1995. According to him, in accordance with WTO rules, Nigeria had to remove any protection of the local textile industry. He argued that it would have been better for the country to secure special arrangements with the WTO, such that the local textile industry would be protected until it was surer on its feet.

While there is certainly some truth to this, there were other factors that contributed to the decline of the industry. One of these was the ending of the MFA and the accession of China to the WTO, both of which happened within four years of each other.

Until 2005, when the MFA ended, there was a quota on the amount of textile that China could export. A report on a Chinese website, written in November of 2001, a month before China joined the WTO, discussed the benefits of membership for China. It says that Chinese textile manufacturers believed that China’s accession to the WTO would come with opportunities for the industry. One of this would be that China’s membership would encourage foreign companies to set-up shop in China. Through that Chinese companies would be able to learn ‘advanced designing, marketing and management’. This, it was suggested, would be part of the preparation for the removal of the import quota on Chinese textile products, under the MFA.

As we now know, this has proved to be quite an astute observation. Looking back, it would seem that between 2001 (when China became a member of the WTO) and 2005 (when the quota system was removed) Chinese companies were able to hone their skills in textile production and international marketing.

Before the MFA expired, the United States introduced the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), an initiative that opened up the American market to African countries. While there are many things to complain about concerning AGOA, one could observe that before the expiration of the MFA, textile products were one of the fastest growing African exports to the US. However, by the time the quotas were lifted, Chinese exports increased rapidly and proved to be stronger competition than African companies could handle.

According to a presentation made to the US-China Commission by Mr. Princeton Lyman, a former United States ambassador to Nigeria, African countries suffered from the increase in exports from the Chinese textile industry on two fronts. Cheap exports from China were undermining local textile industries. At the same time, the growth of Chinese exports to the United States was making it almost impossible for African countries to compete with China for the US market.

The Nigerian textile industry was one of those that suffered especially because of the first point. When I spoke to traders in the popular Dantokpa Market in Cotonou, they said that Nigeria used to supply them with good quality wax-resist textile, popularly called ankara in Nigeria. However, in the early 2000s, cheap imitations of these products were being produced and exported from China to West Africa. Some would even be slapped with Made-in-Nigeria or Made-as-Nigeria labels and then sold in Nigeria.

These days, although there is a ban on the importation of textile products into Nigeria the products still manage to find their way into the country. They are first imported into Benin or Togo, from where they would either be taken to Niger before being smuggled into Nigeria through its northern borders, or they would simply be smuggled directly into the country through its borders with Benin. Some of the people I talked to in Cotonou say that several containers of Chinese products are regularly smuggled into Nigeria through Benin.

This should not in any way be seen as an indictment of China, but as a failure of policies on the part of the Nigerian government. For instance, part of what this has shown is that a country that cannot police its borders should not rely, almost exclusively, on import prohibition as a trade policy instrument. Apart from this, even in the early 1990s, it had become apparent that there were some problems with the Nigerian textile industry.

The UNU report pointed to the difficulty of access to finance. Many of the companies could not afford to take loans at the very high lending rates (sometimes more than 45%) in the country. It was also difficult to get foreign exchange and deal with inflation problems, in a situation where a lot of the cotton and other raw materials used were imported. There was also the poor state of transportation, power and other infrastructure that were needed by the industry. All these factors contributed to the death of the industry.

Resuscitative measures
Shortly before the end of the term of Nigeria’s former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, there was an initiative by the federal government to raise 70-billion naira through bonds of five-year duration. The money was named the Textile Development Fund, and it was to be lent to cotton growers and textile manufacturers through the Nigerian Export Import Bank (NEXIM). However, in July last year, it was reported that the United Bank of Africa, which was to help the federal government to market the bonds, was unable to do so.

This has been the state of affairs until the flurry of activities and the long list of commentaries that have followed the visit of the Indian trade delegation. First of all, I think it is a good thing that we are now talking about the textile industry again, and with some seriousness. Although nobody yet knows what the involvement of the Indians would be, or the form that it would take, it is clear that the problems that led to the decline of the industry have not suddenly disappeared.

The financing of the industry would clearly have to be taken seriously, if not through the issuance of the kinds of bonds that the government tried to issue through the United Bank for Africa, then through other means. Many industry insiders also complain about the lack of Low Pour Fuel Oil (LPFO or black oil), which is required by the industry. This, to say the least, is scandalous in an oil-producing country. I would imagine that this is one thing that could be taken care of, given some will to do so. It is almost redundant these days to mention power, transportation and other basic infrastructure. But yes, these are going to be crucial to any resuscitative attempts.

I think there is the potential to grow the textile industry, with some government determination and a push by actors in the textile industry. It should not be forgotten that under AGOA, the United States market is open to Nigeria. Therefore, anyone who invests in production for export can take advantage of that. Nigeria is also a large market, and if one is to take any lesson from the patronage of smuggled products, it is that there is a demand for textile products. This would indicate that production for local consumption could be a profitable venture.

All this optimism is hinged on the belief that the Nigerian government and the textile industry in general are willing to work together to produce an environment in which this is possible. The involvement of the Indians might just be the catalyst that is needed.

Today, I will be recalling sections of Karl Maier’s This House Has Fallen: Nigeria in Crisis for the nth time. It always baffles me how it has been successfully seared into the annals that the election of June 12, 1993 is the freest and fairest of them all. I hold up the face of that election, its historical background and vital statistics, I hold it up to my mirror and it shatters in a million pieces. Imagine an election marred by grievous voter apathy, recording a turnout of no more than 35 per cent of the registered electorate, i.e. the Nigerian people, using or not using their legs, passed a vote of no confidence on June 12, 1993 and rejected a transition programme that had lost every iota of credibility owing to the disgraceful manner in which it had been stage-managed by the military puppeteers. Imagine an election the lead-up to which had been marred by the disappearance of the freedom of political association and political thought both for those seeking the vote and, by implicature, for those giving it. The SDP and NRC were the two remaining fingers of a leprosy-ravaged hand, bankrupt manifesto-wise and peopled with all manner of strange bedfellows with an eye for the main chance. Imagine an election in which all the political sluggers that could have matched Abiola blow-for-blow (or is it dough-for-dough?) were disqualified from the fray while an unknown apparition was conjured and superficially propped up for the pretence of a contest with Abiola. This is the election that we hail as Snow White, the freest and fairest of them all. Today many people will beat their breasts in that predictable and silly ritual, and claim they are willing to die in honour of whatever it is Abiola stands for in their imaginings. I, being aware of the iniquity into which I was born and have lived in happily ever since, prefer demonologies to hagiographies. So, drawing from the demonology built up before June 12, 1993 by Nigeria’s progressive bastion, what I prefer to recall of MKO is that he was promoter and financier, a veritable diabolus ex machina, of the NPN, that constellation of the most cussed diehards and dyed-in-the-wool holdouts in the reactionary firmament of Nigerian politics. I also recall that his middle-name used to be military collaborator and his cognomen International Thief Thief.

And each time, before I hold up this construction of his reputation to the mirror, I do not forget to add as addendum to his demonology the fact that he became a ‘progressive democrat’ only after what he expected to receive on a platter, like the head of Saint John the Baptist, began to prove unfortunate for his ambition. I recall the media blitzkrieg of his campaign. I remember the ‘Na for bingo’ TV advert in which it became clear that the NPN’s erstwhile financier had ‘finally’ acquired the knowledge that contrary to the false image of a rich country with a contented citizenry whose high standard of living could underwrite the extravagance of moneybags who owned houses in all the capitals of the West and fornicated in every galaxy in the universe, the vast majority of Nigerians were vying with dogs for bones to crunch. I marvel at the expertise and alacrity with which a completely new image, that of an ‘a luta continua’ fighter, was well-nigh successfully minted for MKO, the hitherto proverb-munching and skirt-chasing Aare Ona Kakanfo—he cut a figure close to Elesin, didn’t he?—as it dawned on him and his fellow progressives that his friend Abacha had not ousted Shonekan from Aso Rock so that Abiola could retrieve his stolen mandate. Abacha, Abiola’s friend, had gothic things in mind for his own kakistocracy, including show trials and kangaroo courts, dungeons, roadside murders, séances with marabouts, and regular soirées featuring nautch dancers from India. ‘A looter continua!’

It is a short distance from the NPN to the SDP. Abiola actually ignored that short distance and took a shortcut made even shorter by the media power, the connections within the military-industrial complex, the philanthropist’s clout and, not least, the vast marital and fornication network he had amassed over the decades. Maybe there was no distance to travel at all, as Atiku’s example now convincingly instructs us. Indeed, under the barefaced puppetry and magomago of the demiurge IBB-Maradona, there was no line, thin or thick, between the NRC and the SDP. Those two parties were tighter than Siamese twins walking a little to the right and a little to the left; they were thick as thieves. The political players of that era, minus, of course, the apparition Bashir Tofa, are still at their nefarious worst, evenly and interchangeably spread over the landscape of party politics, all of them ancient rogues and toughs ruining the ‘nascent democracy’ and kicking the battered ball that is Nigeria here and there and nowhere in particular because the goalposts have long been dismantled. (Aside: FIFA ought not to have fixed a world cup match for Nigeria today June 12 when it is most likely not to score any goal. Tatalo Alamu has written a fine article on this ominous mistake here.)

If Abiola had survived those fateful sips of hemlock… sorry, I’ve just crosschecked that against the official record, it says ordinary tea… but if MKO had survived those trembling mouthfuls he managed to swallow that fateful day in July 1998, he would most likely have signed up as a player on the PDP team like his running mate Babagana Kingibe. I dare anybody to contradict me on this. Africa’s ‘Pillar of Sports’, founder and owner of Abiola Babes FC, would have been a PDP playmaker today. And if he had ended up in the AC or ANPP, what degree of difference would that have signalled? Let’s ask Atiku who’s been there and done that. Or, for that matter, Bola Ige who served as minister in the PDP government of OBJ, that ‘nest of killers’, even though he was chieftain of the AD, a party that was supposed to stand for everything the PDP was the antithesis of. Or prithee let’s ask our ‘new-breed’ political parvenus, from Speaker Bankole to every harried AC rep, all of whom share the same mind, the same ‘long throat’ cloned from an extinct species of giraffe, insofar as the issue is jumbo allowances for the asses at the National Assembly. And what else besides their obese earnings and bulging ‘Ghana-must-go’ booty is always on the agenda of those asses at the Assembly? Eh, what else do they aye and nay and bray about?

I agree that people have the right to construct and recall their history however it pleases them. In the case of Abiola, it is sure that the progressive hagiography has both overtaken and overpowered the progressive demonology. The man is a saint, and the election he won is our Snow White. This is the dominant political history of June 12 in both expert and popular discourse in our land. But I also say that whatever the edifice of historical syllabus people construct, it is susceptible of critical inspection, and when we can, it is our duty to deconstruct every such construction in order to understand it. Brecht wrote the words: ‘Unhappy the land that needs heroes.’ The desperation in our land shows up in the way we have clutched at the straw of MKO. In the absence of Snow White, haunted Prince Charming embosoms the queen. I wonder if the same unhappy desperation does not explain the beatification and eventual deification of Shango the marauding fire-breather. Anyway, I would sooner look to Shango for heroism than join the breast-beaters of the annual June 12 ritual. At least Shango repented of his belligerent ways and regretted that he had got his two strongest generals—IBB and Abacha?—overly accustomed to slaughter and plunder in addition to the worse crime of militarizing the imagination and ethos of his people. Shango ‘Oba Koso’ willingly took his own life. And then the ebullient bata rhythms of Shango worship—where is the colobus monkey that prefers the flying spittle and grating mendacities of the June 12ers to that? In matters heroic I prefer myths because we can always metaphorize them and distil some nuanced essence from their offerings. As Auden warned, ‘Political history is far too criminal and pathological to be a fit subject of study for the young. Children should acquire their heroes and villains from fiction.’ The admonition should be extended to the pedagogy of adults as well. Especially those adults who, when they look in the mirror, find that like Dele Momodu they have regressed into adolescence.

Two recommendations need to be done with utmost care: a book and a spouse. If the wrong recommendations are made, a long hiss may follow your future recommendations. As a rule, I hesitate greatly before recommending either.

A friend of mine certainly does not apply the same rule. With all the enthusiasm she could muster, she recently declared to me that she had just read a certain book and she literally laughed her ass off and she loved the book because the writer was not ‘writerly’ at all and the book was such an easy read blah blah blah. I immediately asked for the author and name of the book as such books appeal to me greatly. I have no patience for authors of books that scream I AM A WRITER at you on every page. I also tend to love books that contain a fair chunk of wit. So I rushed to the Silverbird media store and bought Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani’s I Do Not Come to You By Chance.

I began to worry by the 3rd page of the prologue when I encountered this sentence: “He was as handsome as paint.” I paused and looked around my room, seeking the handsomeness of the paint on the wall. I didn’t see it. I stepped outside and sought handsome paint somewhere, anywhere. I asked myself, is there some irony to this statement? But the person being described is actually supposed to be handsome! I am not one to give up easily so I continued, hoping that the statement was an oversight. I encountered flashes of brilliance along the way and was about to dislodge the nagging query about handsome paint when I arrived at page 28 and discovered this statement: “Her voice sounded like a beautiful flower.” I didn’t have a beautiful flower anywhere close so I sat up and thought long and hard of the last time I heard the voice of a beautiful flower? Never! Why these pedestrian similes, I asked loudly.
The novel attempts to chronicle the realities that lead people into a life of crime. Kingsley Ibe, a recent graduate can’t find employment and the love of his life, Ola, leaves him for a man who can buy her Versace bags and Gucci shoes. His father, highly educated, principled and poor dies in penury and his masters degree holder mother’s dying sewing business can’t sustain them. A burdensome sense of responsibility takes hold of Kingsley and he decides to join the 419 business of his Uncle Boniface who has reincarnated as Cash Daddy. The first 144 pages (Part 1) of this novel are therefore dedicated to explaining how Kingsley came to such a decision. I have a few problems with this unnecessarily elongated ‘back-grounding’. This could have been done in a couple of chapters. We knew from very early on that he was going to make that decision. Also, probably because of this elongation, the decision comes across as escapist as he could have chosen otherwise. They lived in a flat; could afford the luxury of two house-helps (though relatives); he was a brilliant student and could have got a job if he looked elsewhere, rather than insisting on oil companies. This early part of the book falls flat loudly on this account, especially since it wasn’t as if they were so poor that they were munching sand and sipping gutter water.

We finally arrived at the novel’s thrust in Part Two and something becomes obvious immediately: this actually is where the story starts. This probably is the story the writer wanted to write all along. Her words began to come together beautifully and I actually laughed out loud at some lines: “He stepped out of the shower and yanked a large towel to start drying his body. Once again I wondered how the scrawny urchin, who lived with my family all those years ago, had metamorphosed into this fleshy edifice…I half expected his bloated belly to wriggle free of his body and start break-dancing on the tiled floor in front of me. It seemed to have a life of its own.” Over the next 186 pages, we are taken through the modus operandi of 419 and the accompanying lifestyle. Kingsley moves up in society, amasses wealth, globe-trots, frolics with girls and becomes the bread-winner of his family. Meanwhile, Cash Daddy, tired of just making money, dabbles into politics and gets himself killed. Kingsley refuses to take over the reins of leadership of the organisation and, basically the story ends. Because such an ending is untidy, an 8page epilogue follows and we see that Kingsley has set up his own organisation where his ever-admonishing mother pays him a visit, showing her acceptance of his new, seemingly legit, status. In reality, it’s a cover up as we see him take a call from a former mugu and it’s business as usual.

A couple of friends have whispered to me that the only reason this book won the Commonwealth Prize for Best First Book (African region) was because of the issue it deals with, Advance Fee Fraud, 419 and aggressive campaign by Cassava Republic, the Nigerian publishers. This, they say, is the kind of ‘agenda writing’ that the West is always quick to celebrate (the book was first published in the US) to satisfy their conditioned imagination concerning Africa and its people. Seriously, I don’t care. I don’t mind any author playing the politics of writing, as long as the writing is good. What writing isn’t political, really? I have also given up on questioning why a certain book wins any award. Some of the best books in literary history never won awards and sometimes those who give out these awards actually breathe something other than air. My worry is that (with aggressive PR, hype and the award), this novel could become representative of new voices, new writing. It could suggest to young writers that this is all you need to do to get all the hype and awards.

To sum up, this is a book that tells a familiar story in no new manner; it has a faulty beginning, a fair midsection and a rushed ending. Also, at 339 pages, it is unnecessarily long for the issues it addresses without new perspectives. I do not doubt Adaobi Nwaubani’s talent and this isn’t a terribly bad first novel; it is also not one I’ll rush to read again.

Cross-posted.