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Funmi Iyanda
Lagos, Nigeria
Funmi Iyanda is a multi award-winning producer and broadcast journalist. She is the CEO of Ignite Media and Executive Director of Creation Television
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Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Stop, download, grab your favourite drink and read slowly

One of the giants sent me this 46 year old piece by Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

Not a day has passed on the relevance of the issues raised, barring the bit about Russia.

7 comments:

Chxta said...

Interesting read just skimming through it. Will settle to read it better when I get home.

Sherri said...

it seems authentic.
it amazing to see we're still battling the same demons today.

Chxta said...

It's rather interesting that 'important' topics like this one attract so few comments, while 'mundane' issues such as how pretty the new speaker is get a lot of responses...

Someone once said something about the surest way of hiding stuff from black people is to put it in a book...

Anonymous said...

I downloaded and read it at home over my special noodles treat....

Very interesting piece, all what he discussed then is still relevant now from Bribery and corruption to the educationally disadvantaged north- you cannot imagine how low their cut off marks are to enter secondary schools compared to other parts of Nigeria.

Over 40years ago and our problems are still the same...

Chxta said...

The question then should be how do we move forward?

First we have a problem of divided loyalties in Naija. Too many people south of the Niger feel an (all too uncomfortable) affinity to the West, while on the other hand too many people north of the river feel an (all too uncomfortable) affinity to Arabia.

We don't have as many people who are loyal to the concept of Nigeria.

How do we change this?

For me one such answer would be social engineering. But before we can even think of starting that, the educational structure has to be in place. It all boils down to what I have been saying for a long time: the three tiers on which Nigeria can eventually make progress are education, education and education.

P.S: This is so blog worthy...

Funmi Iyanda said...

@chxta, that is why we must find digestible ways o raise important issues but that is not true only of black people but of all people besides we are culturally more oral and informal in our learning process if only we can organize that better we might have more success at enlightening more people.

Chxta said...

Vox audita perit, litera scripta manet

Our people perish because we never take records down. Oral traditions have the weakness that over time they are a lot more easily diluted than written records are.

In the meanwhile, I hate that mentality of everyone else is doing it so why can't we? Reminds me of a certain governor who was asked if he stole money and responded by telling the interviewer that Obasanjo stole as well, forgetting in the process the adage from his part of the country which says that if you point an accusing finger at someone, four are pointing at you.

Yes, the rest of the world (the Western world that is) is becoming lazy, doesn't make it right, and doesn't mean we should join them. I appreciate the value of entertainment, but we must learn how to do things when they are meant to be done.

This is the time for us as a people to take stock of our problems and try and pull ourselves forward.