Tag: teargas

Hip hip hip hurray” came shouts to the “birthday boy” whose passport once bore the sticker: “he claim to be to be a writer”. Over three decades on, his pen has continued to etch his name on the world’s literary scene as one of Nigeria’s celebrated revolutionary poets. Odia Ofeimun is 65. To mark the anniversary, friends, students, scholars and writers thronged the University of Lagos, Arts Theatre to celebrate the man and his passion, writes Evelyn Osagie.

You could call it a birthday party without a party… where music, food or exotic drinks are missing. Welcome to the celebration of the man, his life, his passion… ace poet and public commentator Odia Ofeimun.  Born in Iruekpen in Bendel State, the present day Edo state, he turned 65 on March 16.

In the last three years, Ofeimun had marked the day by staging one of his plays. This year was different. It was “no play” for the poet, but one of reflection.

“It was one of those things I wanted to avoid at 65,” he began, “From my 40th birthday; I’ve had a plan for my life. Every five years, I reflect and change some things about my life. I want to thank ANA for imagining this, this year.” But what seemed lacking in your regular bash was sufficiently replaced with carnival of poetic renditions, performances, tributes and discourses the day students, scholars and writers, under auspices of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Lagos branch, felicitated him.

Tributes to the poet

The high point was not the cutting of the cake with the icing inscription, The Poet Lied, alluding to his famed piece. It was not the discourses, examining the place of the poet in today’s world and the celebrator’s achievements. The brilliant poetic renditions by 15 100-level students of the University of Lagos (UNILAG) who took turns to recite Ofeimun’s poems on stage did not draw applause like the presentation of large size customised greeting card and 19 by 14 inches pencil portrait of the celebrator by 12-year-old poet, Oyinkansola Adesewa to Ofeimun did. “Uncle Odia has been an inspiration and strong supporter of my dreams. This is a token of my appreciation for all you have been doing for us,” she said as she presented her gift to the happy-faced “Uncle Odia”.

His protégé, Ogaga Ofowodo, recited From Boma to Boza, to Ofeimun, while observing: “I turned my back on Law and Odia has something to do with it”.

The event, which had as chairman, former Nigerian Ambassador to Sudan and Mozambique, Ambassador Albert Omotayo, Mfr, was also planned as a parley with the two gubernatorial aspirants in Lagos, Akinwunmi Ambode and Jimi Agbaje. But due to their demanding schedules, both did not make it, it was said. In February, the association celebrated award-winning novelist, Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo. But the renditions and scholarly deliveries, most especially the reminiscences of the celebrator, guests said, added more intellectual depth to the Ofeimun’s literary feast.

Like Oyinkansola and Ofowodo, guests had nothing but kind words for the “birthday boy”.

“My dear brother, Odia Ofeimun, I congratulate you, on this 65th anniversary of your birthday,” began the Ambassador, who praised the celebrator for his dogged pursuit of to keep his talent alive which has brought recognition across the world.

“The joy that I feel, makes the blood and water in my body bubble and the rest of my body, clap, just for you, dear brother. Odia, may you be yet stronger every day, to bring more honour to yourself, your family, our great nation, Nigeria, Africa and the world.”

For the diplomat, who is also poet performer, the fate of any nation rests largely on its writers because they are the thinkers. While citing Ofeimun as Nigeria’s rich human resources, Omotayo urged the authorities to give the Arts and Literature its right of place by creating the right environment where writing can thrive.

He observed: “A world of Science and Technology, without Arts and Literature will be worse than the jungle. We must quickly devise a strategy that will revive and restore the Arts and Literature, and indeed, the Humanities, to its exalted position, in our Learning Institutions. Let us use our writing talents to engineer positive social change in our country.”

On the part of Dr Charles Terseer Akwen of the Department of English, the UNILAG, where the event held, Ofeimun is a confident and inspiring voice, who is using his art as a weapon in revolutionary struggle while confronting social issues with “rare single-mindedness”. In his words: “As a poet, he feels that he must observe the horrors and ailments of society, as grim as they may be, in order to accurately comment and critique social and political issues. Ofeimun poems are famous for their caustic attack on anti-democratic elements, oppression and corruption among other social vices”

The pen, ANA General Secretary, Tanko Mature, said has always been Ofeimun’s weapon. He dedicated his poem, A visit from the Minstrel to the celebrator, adding that: “There is this belief that poet’s die young. We thank God Odia lived to be 65. Odia will live to continue to write. On behalf of national executives, I wish you good health”.

Ofeimun’s reminiscences

If Ofeimun’s face were a painting, his smile would be likened to a line on the map of Lagos, drawn from Badagry through Mile Two to Lagos Island. There is something about the man and Lagos, it was said. Besides being a rallying voice for authors in the state, according to ANA Lagos Chair, Femi Onilagbon, Odia dedicated an anthology, Lagos of the Poets (2005) to the city, and is often seen speaking so passionately of his love for Lagos with such nostalgia. “I helped build this city,” he said. “I have done this city a singular honour. When I got to Lagos, this city arrested me.”

Watching the UNILAG students recite his poems, the poet said, brought back memories of his youth. “Incidentally, the poems you read, I wrote when I was your age  between 17 and 24. Most of the poems you read were written when I was working in the factory in Lagos at 17. I remember trekking from Apapa to Palmgroove,” he recounted.

Like many young ones who were arriving Lagos for the first time, the “boy Odia” came to the city with a bag of dreams over 40 years ago. He worked as a news reporter, factory labourer and civil servant before studying Political Science at the University of Ibadan, where his poetry won first prize in the University Competition of 1975.

The angry stone of a poet

The “boy Odia” grew to become administrative officer in the Federal Public Service Commission and Private (Political) Secretary to Chief Obafemi Awolowo, leader of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) and a member of the editorial board of The Guardian Newspapers in Lagos.

Like an angry god, armed with stones, sticks, teargas, gunsmoke, screaming, “Clear jagga-jagga commot for road”, Ofeimun has become a voice against injustice. Many years on after he first scribble his first poetic line, he has remained dedicated the pen; his achievements are testaments to his greatness. He became ANA Publicity Secretary between 1982 and 1984; ANA General Secretary from 1984 to 1988 and ANA President from 1993 to 1997. He is presently a member of the Board of Trustees of the association. After a stint at Oxford on a Commonwealth fellowship, he returned to Nigeria at the annulment of the 1993 election, wrote columns for The Guardian On Sunday, The Nigerian Tribune while contributing to other newspapers. He was chairman of the editorial board of the defunct daily, A.M. News, The News and Tempo magazines, exponents of guerrilla journalism, during the locust years of General Sani Abacha’s regime.

The poet has since moved from breathing fire and brimstones against oppression to preaching unity and commitment to a common morality where “Nigerians don’t have to belong to any ethnic group to work together” as seen in dance drama, Nigeria the Beautiful (2012), which has been staged across the country.

As the elections draw near, he has urged the young to be alive to happenings around them. At 65, the man is determined to remain a beacon of change to the young, admonishing Nigerians to commit themselves “to a common morality where you don’t have to belong to any ethnic group to work together”.

In his words: “You must pay attention to what is happening around you. The knowledge that you give to yourself at this age goes with you wherever you go. I take the poems as a challenge to every young kid at that age because I believe in the future; and that the future belongs to them.

“At 65, it is my period to fight with and for the young. Never forget the injunction: ‘Do unto others what you would have do to you’. And I would add: ‘

Don’t do unto others even the evil, you would do to for yourself’.”

He called for the establishment of a writers’ village and libraries across the state, while urging politicians not to shut their eyes to the development of the humanities. “I have one advice to a would-be governor of Lagos state to build Lagos of our dreams. Tell the electorate how much of what you consume in your community, you are going to produce. We need to build farms and factories. South Africa are teaching us how to build shopping mall…it is good, if the goods sold there are locally-produced. If not, you are teaching your people to be slaves,” he said.

Ofeimun pen has not only etched his name in the world’s literary scene, he is being celebrated for forceful and robust lines as found in his books, such as The Poet Lied (1980), A Handle for the Flurist (1986), Under African Skies (1990), A Feast of Return (1992), Go Tell the Generals (2008) I will ask Questions with Stones if they take my voice (2008). Itoya: A Dance for Africa (2012); This Conference must be Different (2014), and Onomoresoa: an anthology of Nigerian Poets on Mothers and Motherhood (2014).