Oriki'badan

Preface

vi Oriki’badan Many people come into the world, stir up things and depart as heroes, yet far too many come in and leave unsung, in spite of their wonderful services to humankind. In the former case, we have examples of politicians and entertainers, and in the latter group examples of the religious, health workers, and teachers. Alas, how consoling it is that the Master rewards, abundantly, those who merit it, whether the world notices them or not. This is the spirit that bore the poem ‘‘Oriki’badan.’’ My Nigerian sojourn, but especially my on and off experience at the University of Ibadan in the 1980s, left deep impressions on my psyche, and, to a significant degree, remodeled the manner of man I have become. I had waded through a country— Cameroon under Ahidjo—that in spite of all, bathed me in the rivers of patriotic waters, and a foreign university that instilled in me determination and hard work as the twin paths to personal and universal success. When Ibadan finally regurgitated me, I was a new man with a new sense of the world, a burning will to serve, and a re-enforced sense of God, the latter quality having been planted and watered earlier on in life, while a child growing up, by my late father—Pa Philip Doh Awah. And so away from the University of Ibadan (U.I.), out of the city of Ibadan herself, and away from Nigeria, onward I forged. But with time, it dawned on me repeatedly that at every step, virtually, my indebtedness to Nigeria, and U.I. in particular, jiggled before me as I left footprints in the sands of time. And so, every so often, my mind flashes back to Nigeria and the turbulent political climate at the time, but more so to U.I. of those years, the great and devoted professors, like sculptors, bent on polishing and transforming the budding intellectuals in their charge into brilliant authorities and resounding minds in different callings, the turbulent circumstances, socio-politically and otherwise, notwithstanding. I think of the great friends I made whom I can no longer see or hear from—because I know not where they are—yet whose names and our experiences together I continue to see, read, and feel in the pages and breadth of time stored away in my memory and in the resurging activities of younger generations. With every passing year, the tugging at my heart continued growing stronger causing me to wonder how to calm such powerful pangs of nostalgia and the debt of gratitude I Preface vii Emmanuel Fru Doh have come to realize, more convincingly, that I owe. I decided then on re-living those days, even if in their faintest form while also singing about those rarely, if ever, acknowledged heroes who made U.I. the great university it was then, and I pray still is today, knowing Africa and her current leadership, unfortunately. And so how do I say ‘‘thank you’’ to Nigeria, how do I say ‘‘thank you’’ to the city of Ibadan and its citadel of learning, the University of Ibadan, other than by imitating Africa herself, the land of the talking drum, the land of griots, the land of songs and rhythm. This volume contains my song for my unsung heroes: Nigerian authorities that allowed foreign students to benefit from great masters, and a university system distinguished by some of the greatest brains, minds, and spirits that ever walked the earth— eminent faculty and staff alike. The socio-political odds notwithstanding, these were giants that were humble; they fired every soul, directly and indirectly, upon meeting, to strive for the heights, transforming nascent minds—from Calabar to Lagos, from Zaria to Ibadan—into fierce spirits determined to learn and serve. But nobody sings of teachers: their job is ‘‘boring’’, generally speaking, their pay cheque, comparatively speaking, trite. Yet in their hands rests the fate of the world, the future of humankind, given the minds entrusted in their care for them to mould, which towards heaven they could direct, or else into the abyss plunge. I sing of these heroes through the eyes of yesterday, as they came across to us their initiates. My joy is that they are still the same, those that I have run into since those days at U.I., and that has been a great source of happiness to me. I cannot call every name that made my U.I. experience, as I could...