When Prof. Chinua Achebe released his last controversial book, There Was a Country: A Personal history of Biafra”, sometime in October 2012, little did he know that barely five months afterwards, the event of his passage Friday March 22, 2013 would dramatically offer a hint of yet a title: “There was Achebe”.
Having bid the literary world his long and final goodnight, Achebe may have gone, but the world will always remember that there was and there will always be Achebe, just as there was a country and there will always be a country.
Born almost 83 years ago on November 16, 1930 as Albert ChinåalåmÍgå Achebe, he grew up to be renowned as one of the world most celebrated authors. The fallen literary legend lived through and helped define radical change in Nigeria, from independence to dictatorship to the disastrous war between Nigeria and the breakaway country of Biafra in the late 1960s.
As a literary icon, Prof. Chinua Achebe was regarded as both a moral and literary compass who charted the way for modern African literature with his magnum opus, Things Fall Apart.
In the course of his literary voyage on earth, Achebe’s works and his person never ceased to court controversies. As a writer, he personally took issues with Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, where he took a swipe at the racist slur contained in Conrad’s work and the portrayal of African continent as inherently evil.
It was against this backdrop that some scholars had suggested that Achebe was shunned by intellectual society for criticising Conrad and traditions of racism in the West, culminating in allegedly denying him a Nobel Prize, despite his scholarly achievements and the global importance of his work. Achebe never received a Nobel Prize, which some observers viewed as unjust.
From his A Man of the People, published in 1966, a bleak satire set in an unnamed African state which has just attained independence, the ending of the novel believed more as a prognosis of the civil war, had brought Achebe to the attention of military personnel, who suspected him of having foreknowledge of the coup.
Upon receipt of word of his pursuit, he reportedly sent his wife (who was pregnant) and children on a squalid boat through a series of unseen creeks to the Igbo stronghold of Port Harcourt. They arrived safely, but Christie suffered a miscarriage at the journey’s end. Achebe rejoined them soon afterwards in Ogidi.
And then to last but not least of his work, There Was a Country: A personal history of Biafra”, Achebe masterfully recounted his experience, both as he lived it and how he came to understand it. He began his narratives with Nigeria’s birth pangs and the story of his own upbringing as a man and as a writer so that the world might come to understand the country’s promise, which turned to horror when the scorching winds of hatred began to stir.
There Was a Country is a powerful reminder of what the fallen literary legend had always advocated during his time- that artists have a particular obligation, especially during a time of war. According to Achebe, “All artists, should be committed writers— they should speak for their history, their beliefs, and their people.”
“There Was a Country”, is a distillation of vivid firsthand observation and forty years of research and reflection. In it, Achebe marries history and memoir, poetry and prose, wise, humane, and authoritative.
But in his literary construct of the Nigerian/Biafran war, Achebe was accused of gross distortion of fact, a confluence of historical embellishment, inaccuracies and infelicities and ultimately, a mowing down of individual in the characterisation of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo and General Yakubu Gowon (rtd).
An excerpt from the book stirred the soul of not only the Yoruba nation, some Nigerian across the country who felt Achebe’s account of Awolowo’s role in the 30 month old war was not only a historical travesty but an outright ‘desecration’ of Awo soon took up the gauntlet. Achebe accused late Chief Obafemi Awolowo of masterminding the policy of starvation of the Igbo during the Nigeria civil war. Awolowo was the Federal Commissioner for Finance and Vice Chairman of the Federal Executive Council.
In the book, the late literary Iroko had alleged: “The wartime cabinet of General Gowon, the military ruler, it should also be remembered, was full of intellectuals like Chief Obafemi Awolowo among others who came up with a boatload of infamous and regrettable policies. A statement credited to Awolowo and echoed by his cohorts is the most callous and unfortunate: all is fair in war, and starvation is one of the weapons of war. I don’t see why we should feed our enemies fat in order for them to fight harder.
“It is my impression that Awolowo was driven by an overriding ambition for power, for himself and for his Yoruba people. There is, on the surface at least, nothing wrong with those aspirations.
“However, Awolowo saw the dominant Igbo at the time as the obstacles to that goal, and when the opportunity arose – the Nigeria-Biafra War – his ambition drove him into a frenzy to go to every length to achieve his dreams.
“In the Biafran case, it meant hatching up a diabolical policy to reduce the numbers of his enemies significantly through starvation – eliminating over two million people, mainly members of future generations.”
And the battle line was drawn, Yoruba versus Igbo. Intellectuals, politicians, the media, with none willing to sit on the fence. It was a war of supports versus condemnations. Virtual commentators from the two divides deployed sumptuous invectives in defence of their ‘hero’.
Throughout his time, Achebe did not conceal his revulsion for tendencies that militated against Nigeria’s march towards greatness. He demonstrated much of his angst through writings and protestations.
According to him “We, the intellectuals, were deeply disillusioned by the ineptitude of Nigeria’s ruling elite and by what we saw taking place in our young nation. As far as their relationship with the masses was concerned, Nigerian politicians, we felt, had slowly transformed themselves into the personification of the wasp—a notorious predator from the insect kingdom, Wasps, African children learn during story time, greet unsuspecting prey with a painful, paralysing sting; then lay eggs on their body, which then proceed to “eat the victim alive.”
In 2004, Achebe rejected the award of Nigeria’s highest honours offered to him by then President Olusegun Obasanjo.
At the time, Achebe said his decision was intended to serve as a “wake-up” call and he hoped that “change” would be achieved through protests.
He was most scathing about the situation in his home state of Anambra in the south-east, adding then that “A small clique of renegades, openly boasting its connections in high places, seems determined to turn my homeland into a bankrupt and lawless fiefdom.”
Seven years later, while rejecting similar award by President Goodluck Jonathan, Achebe reiterated his earlier stance in snubbing the national honour: “The reasons for rejecting the offer when it was first made have not been addressed, let alone solved. It is inappropriate to offer it again to me. I must therefore regretfully decline the offer again.”
In 2004, in the letter in which he rejected the same honour, Achebe sent to President Olusegun Obasanjo the following, longer letter: “I write this letter with a very heavy heart. For some time now I have watched events in Nigeria with alarm and dismay. I have watched particularly the chaos in my own state of Anambra where a small clique of renegades, openly boasting its connections in high places, seems determined to turn my homeland into a bankrupt and lawless fiefdom. I am appalled by the brazenness of this clique and the silence, if not connivance, of the Presidency.
“Forty three years ago, at the first anniversary of Nigeria’s independence, I was given the first Nigerian National Trophy for Literature. In 1979, I received two further honours – the Nigerian National Order of Merit and the Order of the Federal Republic – and in 1999 the first National Creativity Award.
“I accepted all these honours fully aware that Nigeria was not perfect; but I had a strong belief that we would outgrow our shortcomings under leaders committed to uniting our diverse peoples. Nigeria’s condition today under your watch is, however, too dangerous for silence. I must register my disappointment and protest by declining to accept the high honour awarded me in the 2004 Honours List.”
Those were some of the late literary icon’s strong positions on the listlessness of leadership, endemic corruption which had rendered the country prostrate.
As he bade Nigeria and the indeed, the literary world his long and final goodnight yesterday, the late Achebe will be remembered by many for his strident moral voice, for penning the world most translated work, Things Fall Apart, for his integrity and for reminding his people, amidst controversy that There Was a Country. Indeed, he may have, but one fact remains poignant: there was Achebe and there will always be Achebe, and with his rich literary works, things will never fall apart for his vast concourse of his audience.