Abimbola Adelakun’s incisive and dispassionate write-up concerning Chinua Achebe’s latest book, “There Was A Country”, at the back page of The PUNCH edition of Thursday, October 18, 2012, has convinced the reading public (inclusive of this writer) that one cannot stand logic on its head. Adelakun demonstrated this by her cogent analysis of Achebe’s ‘impression’ of Chief Obafemi Awolowo because Achebe perceived the sage as an Igbo “hater”, even when all available evidence point to the contrary.
She went ahead to ask probing questions as to why the late elder statesman would hate the Igbo and still begged Ojukwu not to secede? Or, why was Awolowo emphatic about the position of the West, that if the East seceded, the West would follow suit? Or, why again would Awolowo, at the risk of his life, go on a peace mission to the East at the heat of the war to plead with notable Easterners to prevail on Ojukwu to end the fratricidal war? These and many more probing questions asked by Adelakun coupled with Achebe’s account of the Biafra War in his new book, have clearly debunked Achebe’s age-long mindset that Awolowo never liked the Igbo.
Achebe’s latest book is an ill- wind that does nobody any good. All the ethnic groups in Nigeria suffered on account of the civil war albeit in varying degree. Rehashing what happened during the war in acrimony and diatribe against a particular dramatis personae and putting the blame squarely on him as Achebe did, would continue to divide Nigeria along tribal line willy- nilly, and further reinforces the belief that our so called country is illusory! Our leaders should promote unity and refrain from fanning ambers of divisiveness by vitriolic and provocative attack on one another!
Achebe’s latest book is an ill- wind that does nobody any good. All the ethnic groups in Nigeria suffered on account of the civil war albeit in varying degree. Rehashing what happened during the war in acrimony and diatribe against a particular dramatis personae and putting the blame squarely on him as Achebe did, would continue to divide Nigeria along tribal line willy- nilly, and further reinforces the belief that our so called country is illusory! Our leaders should promote unity and refrain from fanning ambers of divisiveness by vitriolic and provocative attack on one another!
Tito Coobman,
12 Lewis Street,
Lagos State.
+23481035010
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Source : punchng[dot]com
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