Literature

Remi Raji posed to re-write ANA?s history

PROFESSOR ADEREMI RAJI-OYELADE a.k.a. Remi Raji is a well known name in the community of writers and academics, having authored a number of creative pieces and critical works in the areas of literary theory, African and African American Literatures, popular culture and creative writing. The Professor of English and African Literature at the University of Ibadan has served as Publicity Secretary, Vice-Chairman and Chairman of the Oyo State chapter of Association of Nigerian Authors, ANA. He has also been Editor of the Association?s yearly journal, ANA Review. Now he wants to be the president of the association. In this interview with SUMAILA UMAISHA, he speaks on the forthcoming ANA election holding at the international conference of the association coming up on 30th November, 2011, which he hopes will usher him to the exalted seat. He also speaks on the problems of ANA and how he intends to tackle them when he eventually gets the seat.

NNS: Tell us briefly about yourself.

Remi Raji: My name is Remi Raji, which is a simple reduction of my formal name ? Aderemi Raji-Oyelade. I was born in Ibadan in 1961 to a family of artisans and farmers, extended from one of the major progenitors of the huge war-camp by the Savannah which lends its name to the city. I had primary and secondary education in both Islamic and Christian mission schools and completed my Higher School Certificate in 1981 at the prestigious Olivet Baptist High School, Oyo. That same year, I entered the University of Ibadan to study English with secondary interests in Communication and Theatre Arts. I graduated with a Second Class Upper degree in 1984, a Master of Art in Literature in 1986, and a PhD in 1994 from the same University. I have been a lecturer since then, teaching, researching and publishing in the areas of literary theory, African and African American Literatures, popular culture and creative writing. I became a full Professor of English and African Literature in 2007.

I have edited or guest-edited, co-edited over ten books, and published five collections of poetry apart of other appearances in journals, e-journals, and literary festivals in Africa, Europe and America.

What prompted you to decide to contest for the post of president of ANA?

A time comes when a man sits and reflects on his work, his interests, his legacy and his value in society. A time comes when you begin to query your own significance vis-a-vis the more enduring project of the literary tradition to which you belong. I reflected on the drift, negative I will say, in the direction of the Association of Nigerian Authors to which I belong. At the local level, I have served as Publicity Secretary, Vice-Chairman and Chairman of the Oyo State chapter of ANA; I have also been Editor of the Association?s yearly journal, called ANA Review; and I have been a communiqué writer for the 2004 Congress in Lokoja, as well as co-editor of the collection of short stories to commemorate the 2008 Congress in Minna. Those were tangential and secondary works for the association at the national level.

I have been an unacknowledged or non-commissioned critic of the activities of ANA over time, believing that we are running half-steam at a certain time, believing that we have not been able to harness and exploit all our God-given talents to serve ANA and put it where it rightly belongs in the scheme of art administration, not only in Nigeria but also on the African continent. More recently, I shudder at the grim fact that ANA has suffered real inactivity. So if we complained of running half-steam some years ago, we are talking of running without feet, and flying without wings at the present time. No well-meaning member of ANA who is capable of delivering should sit down and watch the gallery of inertia and anarchy continues.

This was what prompted me to contest for the post of the President of ANA, believing that I have garnered enough experience over the years to deliver, believing that I have associated with the best minds in creative writing/arts administration all over the world to know what to do. We do have the main elements ? an eager youth willing to do well if they get the right direction and encouragement. I want to do that, not alone, but with others who believe in my abilities.

Do you think you know much about the workings of ANA to be able to solve its problems?

As I said earlier, it does not take much to know the workings and the problems of association like ANA, but it does demand so much to be able to know how to solve the problems. The problem currently is that those at the helms of affairs of ANA do not think there is a problem. I have been a member of ANA National since 1988 to know enough about these problems. But even those who are new members, not more than five years in the fold know the problems.

Then would you say are the main problems of ANA?

We have the problem of identity; we have the problem of definition; we have the problem of interest and focus; and indeed, we have one problem that everybody knows, that is the problem of funding. But these other problems which I have identified apart from that of funding are very crucial to the body politic of ANA. We have lost track of the main agenda set forth by Chinua Achebe and his other colleagues at the formation of the association. I am sorry to say that there are many real writers who are no longer part of ANA because of our loss of focus, and because the chicanery laundered by those who have no business being in the loft of the house of writing in the first place. What makes a writer? What are the requisites for a writing tradition, and who should be involved in the administration of a writers? body? What are the benefits of a writers? association for the upcoming as well as established author? These are main issues which the current leaders in ANA National have failed to address.

Are you sure you can win the election considering the fact that the incumbent excos still have a term to go?

I am told that there are smses flying around from their stable begging and pleading for a second term, to consolidate on what has been done in the past two years. That enough sounds like an insult to the imagination of a true writer. You cannot consolidate on nothing, nor can you build something on nothing, except if you are in the fictional world of castle-building. Whether I can win the election is actually immaterial. What I have done in the past one year, consistently, is to bring the matter of the state of ANA to public glare. Very few people actually want to discuss it, that we have a secretariat that has been overly corrupted, that we have a presidency that is ineffectual and half-hearted and politicised, that nothing holds at the centre and therefore it has been a free fall of things in the house of writing. It is indeed sad. As for winning the election, I can.

What is your level of preparations for the election?

Let me just say here that I have reached out to all members of ANA in all the state chapters letting them know my intentions, reasons and plans for ANA within the next two years. The electorate will decide. The rest waits till when we get to the venue of the election in Abuja.

Now, specifically, how do you intend to solve the problems when you are elected?

I have noted three major matters to address when elected as President of ANA. We are going to focus on Outreach, Mentoring and Advocacy as a matter of urgency and strategy. Outreach will involve connecting with other organisations related to our own interests, governmental parastatals, corporate organisations, the civil society in need of literary support and collaboration; it is from these that we hope to re-launch ANA. We will also reach out to our potential audience, in secondary and tertiary institutions in hope that we will find market as well as recruits for another generation of Nigerian literatures.

We will make it a rule to get each state chapter to create a Mentor-Author twinning programme in a way that younger writers will benefit by association to ANA. Besides this, we will address the issue of the identity of the writer as member of ANA because we have different cadres of membership ? full, associate, honorary and life memberships. We are going to find a place for the younger ones to occupy, although I am aware that one or two state chapters are already ahead in this. We will tap into this.

Also, in the area of Advocacy, we want the voice of ANA to be distinct in the matter of national development; we want to contribute immensely, as writers, as constructive critics, as imaginative people to the literary tradition and by extension we want to mean more than mere decimals in the matter of representations in our country?s culture and information industry.

What do you have to say to ANA members regarding your candidacy?

To the constituency of writers, I offer myself to serve. I am not hesitant in offering myself. I have well thought-out the demands, and the sacrifice of service. So I depend on the vote of every member of the association, from Maiduguri to Asaba, from Lagos to Sokoto, from Kano, Kaduna to Port-Harcourt, from Owerri to Lokoja, and from Makurdi to Abuja. I want all of us to converge in Abuja and use our God-given intelligence as writers, to re-write the history of ANA on its thirtieth anniversary.

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Literature