The 2024 edition of the Nigeria International Book Fair (NIBF) should have been over by now, going by the May 7th, 2024 story in Vanguard. It is assumed that everything went well and the Education minister, Prof. Tahir Mamman, was physically present as the Special Guest of Honour, with Prof. Florence Obi, the Vice Chancellor of University of Calabar, delivering a Keynote Address on ‘Addressing the Brain Drain Crisis in Nigeria’ and Prof. Lilian Salami, the Vice Chancellor of University of Benin and Chair of the Committee of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities played the Chief Host.
Others who must also have been at the conference would include Prof. Jide May Owoeye. the Founder of Lead City University, Ibadan as chair; Mrs Yemi Adamolekun, the Executive Director, ‘Enough is Enough’ Project and many other erudite scholars from across the tiers of tertiary education in Nigeria, as Vanguard put it.
At the book fair
It is a bit difficult to imagine such a giant book fair at a time of a famished field. The field must be famished both at the level of the volume of publications and the readership, an inference supported by some of the themes listed for discussion. This is not to mention a more controversial dimension – the quality of books nowadays, compared to the “good old days” as its protagonists would insist. Certainly, there seems to be fewer stuff coming out nowadays. Is it possible that they are there but driven off public sphere by other activities? Might it be that the social media has pushed the campuses into a ominous quietude and replaced the arena with preferred news makers? That doesn’t seem possible because, without the social media in those days, certain publications still made the news. It was the days of publication after publication, debate after debate and memorable seminars/conferences/symposia.
The way forward might not be to prove any sides right or wrong. A more helpful option, especially for the organizers of the fair, might be to attempt a listing of a few of the texts (books, essays, monographs, inaugural lectures and the likes) that, literarily, set the nation on fire a few decades ago.
This casual listing captures a number of the papers and debates that made the waves. There are no criteria as such which determined which publication appeared or did not appear here other than the compiler’s sense of an element of newness or a work that overturned a previous work, prediction come true, an enduring theme that remains inexhaustive, far sightedness, a simply provocative intervention or cases of conceptual innovations.
So, no allegations of deliberate exclusion of any set of publications or region or religion or group will be tenable. Some of the titles may not have been correctly captured, especially the ones that existed before the coming of ‘the internet of everything’ but the point in each case is to show that there was a text or an event like that. There is an attempt at grouping the texts around the theme each speaks to but that was not very strictly done.
- The Development of the Concept of Development (Chapter from Wallerstein’s The Politics of the World Economy)
- The Debate on the Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism in Europe: Its Relevance to the Study of African History – Norma Perchonock
- Skepticism and Political Virtues/Skepticism as Virtue – Billy Dudley
- The Inevitability of Instability – James O’Connell
- The Responsibility of Political (and other sciences) in Nigeria – Bala Usman/Egite Oyovbaire Debate
- Overcoming the Backwardness of Political Science in Africa – Okello Oculi
- Historians and Africanist History: A Critique – Temu and Swai
- The Scientific Status of Political Science – Claude Ake
- Social Science as Imperialism – Claude Ake
- Political Economy of Africa – Claude Ake
- Revolutionary Pressures in Africa – Claude Ake
- How Politics Underdevelops Africa – Claude Ake
- The Mode of Production ‘Nucleus’ as Integrator of Economic and Political Sciences – Eskor Toyo
- Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa: A Theoretical Statement – Peter Eke
- Marxism and Underdevelopment: A Critique of Ake – Bjorn Beckman
- The Trouble With Nigeria – Chinua Achebe
- Ethnic Politics in Nigeria – Okwudiba Nnoli
- For the Liberation of Nigeria – Bala Usman
- Towards Understanding the National Question – Obaro Ikime
- A Re-examination of the Conception of Ethnicity in Africa as an Ideology of Inter-Elite Competition – Eghosa Osaghae
- The Manipulation of Religion in Nigeria – Bala Usman
- Recent Patterns of Accumulation in Nigeria – Bright Ekhuare
- Nationalism, Accumulation and Labour Subordination in Nigeria, 1970 – 1978 – Yusuf Bangura
- The Causes of Nigeria’s Economic Crisis – Bala Usman/Yusuf Bangura Debate
- Oil and the 1983 Coup – Terisa Turner
- The Military as Revolutionary Vanguard – Bjorn Beckman
- Gowon – Jonah I. Elaigwu
- The Retired Military as Emergent Power Factor in Nigeria – Bayo Adekanye
- A Note on the Global Political Economy Dimension of SFEM – Akin Fadahunsi
- The Political Economy of Structural Adjustment Programme – Bayo Olukoshi
- Structural Adjustment, Agrarian Change and Rural Ethnicity in Nigeria – Sam Egwu
- The Dismal Tunnel: From Prebendal Republic to Rogue State in Nigeria – Richard Joseph
- Party Politics and Nigerian National Development – Aper Aku
- The Relevance of the NEPU/PRP Heritage to the Nigerian Revolution: A critique – Raufu Mustapha
- Critical Notes on the National Question: Practical Politics and the People’s Redemption Party – Raufu Mustapha
- The Inherent Limitations of Petit-Bourgeois Political Analysis – Sule Bello
- Literature and the Cultural Subsoil: The Conservative, Reformist and Revolutionary Approaches – Biodun Jeyifo
- Creativity and Protest in Popular Culture: The Political Music of Fela Anikulapo Kuti – Iyorchia Ayu
- Farewell to Policy – Bolaji Akinyemi
- Niger-Saki: Does Nigeria Have a Nuclear Option – Ali Mazrui
- Towards the Political Economy of Mass Communication in Nigeria: Some Parameters for a Theory and an Investigation – Jibrin Ibrahim
Two texts ought to be here by the “criteria” underlining this compilation. These are the paper Prof Claude Ake delivered at a Concord Press of Nigeria Conference in 1993 and an essay developed by Prof Festus Iyayi. The title of each of these escape my memory completely as to not even try. There is a third text which title is something like “Akinyemi: The Seagull” or so. And there is a fourth, the last word of which, again, one just can’t recall. The first three words are “Akinyemi: The Mutations of Right-Wing…”. It is a 2-part attack on Prof Bolaji Akinyemi by an academic writing under the pen name ‘Bamako Jaji’ published in the Lagos based The Guardian. Lastly, those who can find Prof Jibrin Ibrahim’s conference paper here and read it will now understand the on-going campaign for him to dock in theory. The paper anticipated much of what is going on today in social theory, with particular reference to post-Gramsci notion of hegemony, the declared central concept in political analysis.
Lastly, there has been no mention of any text from the Civil War literature because that should be a standalone piece for anyone who has the time. Otherwise, Ademoyega, Muffet, Madiebo, Joseph Garba, Obasanjo and Isama Alabi’s own accounts should have been here.
Social (Political) science can claim to have given account of itself on Nigeria. Just about 41 texts and the coverage is comprehensive enough. Yet, this is just a tip of the iceberg. Interestingly, it doesn’t look like the issues have changed much. What has, arguably, changed is the rigour of yesteryears compared to today, an area we have, democratically, agreed not to pursue.
