And whilst we are still on the issue of how the unforeseen often collide with the avoidable in determining the course of human history, it is meet to report on certain developments amidst the deteriorating political and economic circumstances of the nation. Thunder has struck so many times in the same place that one has lost respect for that age-old aphorism.
Last week as the price of diesel oil skyrocketed beyond the six hundred naira per litre threshold, among other indications of tearaway inflation, it was a seething and bleary-eyed snooper that took an early morning call from an august personage.
It was Niyi Osundare, notable poet, columnist and public intellectual per excellence. What irks the literary cognoscenti so early in the morning? Surely it cannot be the escalating price of bread. At least breadfruit cake and cassava bread are plentiful in the interior. And fat snails are crawling all over the place.
After bemoaning the terrible state of the country and the dire circumstances in which we have found ourselves, the conversation drifted to the Russian/Ukrainian conflict and the magnitude of western hypocrisy and double standards. What is interesting about it all is the rise of counterhegemonic knowledge production which will eventually swamp the authoritarian master-voice of the west in a plethora and plurality of countervailing voices.
Not done with Nigeria yet, Osundare rounded on yours sincerely.
“By the way where is Okon in all this?” the famed poet demanded.
“He is on paternity leave, awaiting DNA test to determine his own paternity”, snooper responded tersely.
“And what of Baba Lekki?” the poet crowed.
“Ha, the last time that one was sighted, he was conducting a Beauty Pageant inside Kirikiri prison for inmates awaiting trial”, yours sincerely replied.
“Ha, I see”, the poet responded in a voice tinged with heavy irony and sarcasm.
That is the problem when colourful and unimaginable reality begins to trump outlandish fiction. There is no need to write fiction anymore because it is there with you in all its lived and living experience. When people can no longer separate fiction from reality, it is the people of imagination who are often among the worst casualty.
This anecdote bears retelling. Honore de Balzac was a distinguished French novelist of the mid-nineteenth century. But he was also a consummate socialite and man about town. So colourful was the French society of his time that he believed there was no point in embellishing reality. Just put it down as it is. The writer is just a social secretary of his time. But the total immersion in literature and life can be a double-edged sword.
On his deathbed when all attempts to save him proved abortive, Balzac began screaming for a particular doctor to come and rescue him. “Call me Banchioc. Only Banchioc can save me now!!”, he screamed. But there was a snag. Banchioc was a doctor alright, but he was not a living doctor. He was one of Balzac’s greatest fictional characters. In the end the great author was a victim of his own fictional fantasy. As we write this, the magical Okon Alapandede appears on a local television chairing the NEC of his own version and faction of APC. Please pass the palm wine.