By Denja Abdullahi
If I ever get to write a memoir on my work and time in the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), my relationship with Wale Okediran will occupy a full chapter of its own and some of the other chapters may be interspersed with one thing or the other about him. We have been that close in the Nigerian literary community and I can today claim to be one of his closest literary confidants; the relationship veering beyond that into other personal areas of life.
20 years ago when Wale Okediran clocked 50 years of age, I was at the center of the small group of writers between Abuja and Minna who organised a literary reception for him at Agura Hotel in Abuja with music, drama, poetry rendition and other such literary feasting. Then Okediran was a member of the Nigerian parliament at the Federal House of Representatives and the event pulled bigwigs from the political class. Okediran was yet to become the President of ANA and was then only the immediate past General Secretary , while I was the Assistant General Secretary under the Presidency of Prof. Olu Obafemi. But the Okediran’s contribution to the Association then and the general literary community was already prodigious and far-reaching to warrant me penning a long poetic piece on him entitled “ A Chant for Okediran@50,” delivered at the occasion for me by Omoóba Jerry Adesewo. It beggars reciting here:
Beyond this poetic effulgence, I also wrote a piece to commemorate that occasion which was syndicated across many national newspapers in the country then. In the piece entitled “Periscoping Wale Okediran@50” I recounted his achievements as a writer, calling on literary critics to pay more attention to his many novels beyond the normal call they give to writers of the popular literary genre such as Okediran. Even at that time I had seen the profundity in his many novels which connect to other areas of life such as the environment, medicine, psychiatry, conflict resolution and politics. My believe in his writings at that time made me to write a rejoinder to Prof. Charles Nnolim’s critique of one of his novels (Dreams Die at Twillight)alongside other writers in a popular critical tirade against what he called “writers of the fleshly tradition.” Charles Nnolim saw me years later in Owerri at a literary function and commended me for the spirited defense of Okediran’s works and others in my rejoinder to his piece. In that same piece celebrating Okediran@50 , I examined his work as a literary administrator in ANA, the highest position he had held at that time being ANA’s General Secretary , and my impression then is worth recalling substantially:
I went on to maintain that it was therefore not surprising seeing Okediran transmuting into a politician as he has the spirit of service in him; a spirit in line with the Hippocratic oath he took at the beginning of his medical practice. I noted that in line with his personal disposition as a humanist and being a writer with a compelling obligation towards egalitarianism, he could not but play progressive politics which he did throughout his tenure in the Nigerian parliament. I observed that his foray into politics did not make him forget his primary constituency, which I took to be the literary community, not even medicine, which is his first love. Even as a politician, he was everywhere attending literary events, supporting writers and continued writing. He often says at most public occasions that medicine is his wife and literature is his mistress!
Some of us in the literary community would not want to lose Okediran to the political world, even though the medical world has substantially lost him to us. We made move to drag him back to literary politics while he was still a parliamentarian. I remember me and my literary colleague, Mallam B.M Dzukogi of ANA Niger, friends most times and opposing literary gladiators at a later time, met Dr Wale Okediran in his house at the Apo Legislative Quarters, Abuja, to sell the idea to him to contest for the presidency of ANA as the tenure of the then president, Prof. Olu Obafemi was about coming to an end. Okediran was hesitant, knowing fully well that a perennially insolvent association like ANA with a highly critical membership was a difficult one to run. He had held at that time many national executive and state council positions in the association, culminating in his being national treasurer and general secretary , so he knew that carrying the load of the presidency of ANA was like carrying the head of an elephant! We insisted he was equal to the task with his experience and network of contacts and widespread goodwill. He finally agreed on the condition that I must be ready to work with him as the General Secretary. From then, I took over his campaign for the position and I and others in his team helped to neutralize his main opponent and won many people over to his quest to lead the association. He had the pedigree of service to the association and with his philanthropic disposition, it was easy to get him to a convincing victory at the ANA Convention which held at Kano in 2005. Prof. Jerry Agada who was gunning for the same position withdrew his candidacy to become the vice presidency, leaving only Dr Emma Shehu of ANA Abuja who introduced a stiff political dimension to ANA literary politics, which all the same fell short of giving him victory against a popular candidate as Dr Wale Okediran. I at that same convention won my quest to be the General Secretary of ANA from the assistant position I was holding to the then General Secretary, Nduka Otiono.
Okediran and myself came back to Abuja rearing to go all the way for ANA. For the four years I served under the Dr Wale Okediran presidency as General Secretary, I learned a lot of lessons in service and leadership and also got very close to Okediran as a person. At first, I began operating as ANA’s General Secretary in the laid back, all-knowing impresario manner of my predecessor in office, but I soon got to know that with Okediran, it is the job that matters not the office. I had to increase my pace of work to match his and even overtook him. If Okediran wanted something done and got across to you to do the job, a slight delay on your part would lead to him executing the same job himself without your input. He was averse to official sloth on the job by way of merely exercising the importance of your job description. He hated unnecessary bureaucracy; not in a non-governmental organisation and never when he could do things himself. I got to know that to be powerful as ANA’s General Secretary under Okediran, I had to have a high work rate and develop the ability to attend to multiple issues as they arose. I became a perfect General Secretary to him and the association by ensuring that I was always a step ahead of him in nearly every matter. I scoured through the dailies for literary issues of importance for the Association to react to(those were the days before the effulgence of the digital space) and I raised my radar to pick every possible happenings with our members and within the literary community, so much so that I broke many issues to him and whenever he got to me about something, I already had a response or plan of action for that same thing. It did not take him time to implicitly trust my judgement as I ran the secretariat of ANA more like the way he ran it when he was General Secretary under the Alhaji Abubakar Gimba’s presidency(1997-2001). Okediran as General Secretary of ANA was responsive, cerebral, focussing on objectives, not prejudicial in working with people and very mobile and I strove to be that and more in that position.
Like I wrote before, I learned a lot of leadership lessons from my close work and association with Okediran that I put to use to make my own ANA presidency that came later on equally monumental with land marking achievements. One of the most impactful lessons I learned from Okediran is being able to work with anybody with some value to bring to a particular work; even an enemy. Okediran does not discriminate when it comes to work. He is never prejudicial about sex, religion, ethnic group or ideology when there is work to be done. He stretched his olive hands to even avow enemies when it came to working and achieving for the public good and in nearly every case those enemies became good friends. I also learned from Okediran the benefits on working with institutions, partnering and collaborating with individuals and corporation when working on projects where funds are limited as an initiator. Under him, I saw how mere good ideas with no immediate financial back-ups translated into well executed monumental projects. All it took to do that were sincerity, honesty of intention, partnership, collaboration and mutual respect of the interests of parties to the projects. I also learned how to value relationship from Okediran. He was there for everyone as a leader and would not discountenance anyone, no matter the person’s adverse politics to him, in the person’s hour of need, as he was always ready to assist , emotionally, physically or financially. Okediran spreads his goodwill at will both to the deserving and the undeserving. He was a leader who carried everyone along as the president of ANA and such a leader may be betrayed but it would be difficult to scuttle his achievements. Dr Wale Okediran is a humanist to the core, always looking out for those working with him. He is quick to realise when you are not yourself and sets out to immediately lift your spirit anyway he can. He is very loyal to genuine friendship and working camaraderie. Without prompting, Okediran do offers his friends and followers opportunities and vital linkages, many of such which I have benefitted from in the past and right to this moment of writing this piece. He is a friend and a senior colleague who does not hesitate to confide in you over private matters bothering him; seeking advice and possible emotional support. And when whatever you tell him works, he gets back to relate his appreciation.
Dr Wale Okediran’s service to ANA and the literary community did not end with the completion of his tenure as president of ANA. He is one ANA’s past president out of the lot produced in the history of the association that is always there to assist practically and actively advising successive ANA Presidents. He continued to railroad important and beneficial linkages for the Association long after he had left office as president. A striking case was his networking to get support for ANA from the lawyer of his opponent in an election petition matter, in the midst of the court battles. That supreme humanitarian effort by Okediran and the lawyer became the annual grant of N3 million naira to ANA by Yusuf Ali (SAN) that the association has been enjoying since 2012 till date. Wale Okediran supported behind -the – scene substantially my emergence as the president of ANA in 2015. His house in Apo in Abuja hosted a lot of peace and reconciliation meetings among warring ANA members and chapters before my presidency. He even tried to broker an agreement between me and the other contender for the presidency of ANA in 2015,B.M Dzukogi, by hosting a well –attended parley between both camps in his house. The parley, brokered by Prof Zaynab Alkali, Prof May Nwoye alongside Okediran only succeeded in advising for a fair contest devoid of rancour as the battle line was already well drawn. I later went on to win the contest in Kaduna with a resounding victory and received the support and timely advice of Okediran throughout my tenure. He tried his best to assist in averting the problems that led to the botched elections at the Enugu Convention of ANA in 2019 but for the political daggers that were drawn against him by power mongers who were most afraid of his pacifist spirit.
Okediran, as PAWA’s Secretary-General merely transferred the best practices he has acquired as a veritable literary administrator in ANA to run the continental association. With Okediran at the helms of PAWA these past years at the PAWA House on Roman Ridge Road, Accra -Ghana, the activities of PAWA have opened up to embrace more national writers associations across the continent of Africa. Dr Wale Okediran has democratised the activities of the association; effectively bridging the language divides of the continent. He has been innovative, digitally savvy and prolific in the areas of programmes and projects, even amidst the ever dwindling resources available to the association, which is mainly the payment of national subscription by the governments of member -states national writers’ associations. Like he did in ANA . meagre fund or harrowing lack of funds has not deterred PAWA from posting its relevance to the African literary community. Okediran is one who never fails in any given task , no matter the obstacles and challenges.
With Okediran the success kits are nothing more than hard work, sacrifice, networking, partnership, collaboration and just a little fund to push an idea around. He has deployed all those to great measure in PAWA and has recorded many striking successes; filling the big shoes left by Atukwei Okai and already leaving shoes that may be too big to fill for a future minder of that continental association.
I will like to end this piece with another poem out of the couple I have written in the past to celebrate the humanity of Okediran. I can say Okediran has the highest number of poems I have written for any Nigerian writer, living or dead. Here it goes:
Where is that muse that abandons not its acolytes in mid-sentence?
Where is that guardian of the word
who loans fellow griots matchless metaphors
Where is that peddler of phrases
Whose thesaurus is devoid of delimiting words?
Where is that do-gooder patron
Who races to draw laughter out from ruptured faces?
Where is the master storyteller
Who built a house of words on Ebedi hill?
Wale Okediran is here and everywhere, let us continue to celebrate him
