Denja Dares To Lift ANA Higher

July 25, 2015

Current Vice President of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Mr. Denja Abdullahi, had a parley with ANA Lagos members on his visit to the chapter recently, to canvass support for his bid to become the new President of ANA in the forthcoming 2015 elective positions among eligible members of the association. In this interview with ANA Lagos members, he clarifies many reasons why he sees himself as the most capable person to be elected as the new President of ANA, and how he intends to improve the writers’ body fortunes. Adjekpagbon Blessed Mudiaga informs
What is your view about performance poetry considering the thinking in some quarters that it is not an art to be taken too seriously?
Whoever is thinking of performance poetry as an unserious art form should himself or herself not be taken seriously. I say this because poetry in our part of the world is in the first place an oral form before it was later reduced to writing with the advent of eastern and western civilizations. If that is our heritage, then the rising wave of the spoken word performance should be encouraged and promoted as we are only returning to our primary essence as a people with a long and vibrant history of poetry as performance. If I become ANA President, I will ensure an international festival of performance poetry which will draw the world to Nigeria is held annually in Nigeria with all the right razzmatazz. I know a lot of champions in the field like Iquo Diana Abasi, Dike Chukwumerije, Efe Paul, Titilope Sonuga, Sage Hason, Akeem Lasisi, Dagga Tolar and many others who can help drive that kind of event.
The Nigerian Writers Series of the Association under which some new titles were recently published is a commendable project, but we noticed some of the books were badly edited. What happened and how can this be corrected in future?
I was the coordinator of the series and I know what processes the titles went through before they came out. There was a call for submissions, close to 200 manuscripts were received and 10 were selected after passing through 3 series editors who did what I will call ‘selectional’ editing and the 10 manuscripts were farmed out to 4 different publishing outfits who participated in an open competitive bidding before eventually bringing out the works. The editing problems seen should have been corrected by the publishers who are supposed to have their own in-house editors. But I must say everyone who participated in the bringing out of the series did their best given the time, the constraints and the circumstances. This present experience has taught us how to it better next time.
Tell us the latest on the ANA Land, What has this present exco which you part of, achieved on the land?
Simply I will tell you that this exco has been able to reclaim the land from trespassers and vicious Abuja land grabbers. This exco did a foundation laying ceremony on the land in 2013 and presently preliminary infrastructural development is on-going on the land with KMVL acting as its agency on the proposed development.
Does ANA have a newsletter and if it does not, why?
ANA National for some time now has not been publishing a hard copy newsletter for obvious reasons. The world has gone digital which very interactive and quick means of disseminating information beyond the printed matter. I think what should be emphasized now is regular publication of an electronic newsletter that can be circulated on-line to avoid the problem of distribution and movement of printed material here and there. The ANA website can be made more interactive and regularly updated with somebody to be tweaking it 24/7 so that you can always go there for the latest news and feature on the Association. I know some states chapters are publishing printed news=letters, they should continue but should also consider having e-versions. Websites, newsletters and all the other social media means of disseminating information can only be useful and achieve their purposes if they are factored into the workings of the Association as a policy and people given those particular tasks and the enabling facilities.
Does ANA have a style book? Should it not have one to take care of editing problems such as the one referred to earlier in respect of the Nigerian Writers Series (NWS)?
ANA does not presently have a style book. What can be likened to a style book is the guidelines for the adjudication of its prizes, which is only given to the judges and not available to writers. Even that document, to the best of my knowledge has not been available to the Association in recent years. I remember working with it in my days as ANA general Secretary (2005-2009).Even if that document is retrieved today, it will need serious updating and so many things have changed with the writing world and with ANA itself.ANA in trying to put the NWS in good stead has registered a publishing outfit that in future will properly manage the series and definitely the issue of stylebook will emerge when that outfit is run as an independent entity with personnel and paid minders of its operations.
How many years tenure is the proposed developer given on the ANA land?
ANA is operating a BOT arrangement with the developer and the tenure is for about 25-30 years or so. I cannot recall the details of the existing agreement for now but all I am sure of is that a business model has been worked out to give ANA all the revenue generating and recreational facilities it wants on the land and the developer the atmosphere to recoup its own investment.
Some young writers perceive ANA as majorly for old writers, that its structures do not allow young people to participate in its affairs. What do you have to say on this?
All classes of writers both old and young are members of the Association and we have different classes of membership ( Full members, Associate members, honorary members and institutional members). You participate in the Association in whatever capacity you are qualified for, I will not go into such details now. At State chapters, a lot of young people participate in ANA activities as members and even at our national events. ANA chapters in States have a lot of schemes and projects to encourage young writers and so also at the national level. The NWS project I talked about earlier published 10 titles of fiction and about half of those titles were mainly by young writers. ANA literary prizes were mainly instituted to encourage young writers and that philosophy has been behind the administration of the prizes for close to 35 years now. A lot of young writers have won those prizes and many of them have even gone to become world renowned writers. Add what ANA does in schools all over the country including the Yusuf Ali schools-based literary awareness campaign that has been running for 4 years now across the country; and with all these you will surely accept that there is a place for young people in ANA.
Does ANA have a social media presence?
Yes we do with our facebook pages both national and state chapters, website, blogs etc. But we can always do better.
You have been part of the present National EXCO, in what ways are you going to do things differently if elected?
You will have to read my manifesto to get the details of that but I will tell you simply I will make good use of my experience to avoid the usual pitfalls as I know what works and what never works. I will also carve a niche for my executive by ensuring we surpass whatever has been on the ground before with innovative programmes and projects and most importantly by rescuing the Association from its perennial problem of funding. I will also put in place a fully functional secretariat that will help in putting all the affairs of the Association in the appropriate administrative and operational perspectives. With me as President, the chapters will work closely with the national secretariat and will be carried along fully in our various operations.
What other supports are you envisaging for writers as President?
The Association primary objective for existing is to support writers. We shall do that by translating that big broad objectives into innovative and practicable programmes and projects like continuing with the NWS but in a more vibrant manner, workshops, residencies, encouraging publishing cooperatives, collaborating with other sectors in the book chain, advocating with other creative bodies for establishment of the National Endowment fund for the arts etc. We shall be there to speak for our members and package them to get the best from the society while also ensuring they contribute meaningfully to that same society.
What is the status of writers of motivational and inspirational books in ANA?
ANA is primarily an association for creative writers who have been published. People who have written the kinds of books you mentioned are welcomed provided they will add creative books to their arsenals. Writers of creative non-fiction are also accepted in ANA but once you join, first in the local State chapters or sub-chapters you will understand the membership structure of the association better and regularize your membership.
Will you allow democracy to prevail if elected?
There is no alternative to that I can tell you and if you look at my antecedents in the Association, you will realize that I have been very democratic in my operations. In the kind of association that we run which is voluntary and going by the nature of our membership which is made up of very independent-minded and sometimes eccentric people, you cannot afford not to be broad minded and democratic as a leader. Being democratic will allow you to harness the available potentials and challenge people to offer their talents and capacities in the service of the association.
What would you do to strengthen the ANA brand?
Strengthening the brand will start from piecing together the long history of the association in a documentation process that will underscore the strengths, weaknesses and potentials of the association. That will then be factored into the working out an 8 year strategic plan which I mentioned in my manifesto, to be drawn up by experts in the association. We will also engage reputable brand managers( we used some of them to give some mileage to our activities when I was general secretary of ANA and it worked) to assist us in projecting the appropriate image for the association that will attract the needed support for our activities. Mind you, this brand thing is not about image laundering in the case of ANA but ensuring that the Association benefits from its close to 35 years of unceasing labour for the literary and cultural development of this country.

Denja Abdullahi for ANA Presidency 2015

Interview published in Saturday Sun Literary Review of June 6,2015.
Your debut creative work in 2001 was entitled Mairogo: A Buffoon’s Poetic Journey around Northern Nigeria, and it is a work built on a journey motif. Is there any advantage that comes with the persona as a minstrel, going by your stylistic recourse?

The recourse to “minstrelsy” as a stylistic trope was what made the thematic preoccupation of the work to be unassailable. The wandering or journeying minstrel, we all know in our study of oral literature and even in our everyday encounter with that kind of poet persona, has a license to be irreverent, to say the “unsayable” without any untoward occurrence to his person. Those who listen to him expect him to be truthful in his words and to his art. He is no court poet and therefore the listeners brace up for anything he is coming up with and they will be disappointed if he or she does not veer off the path of the norm or convention. The highly critical overviews of Northern Nigeria i espouse in that work can only be carried in that form which enabled me to be humorous, to coat weighty statements with the liberalizing veneer of madness which frees the poet-persona and the real poet behind the façade of fiction from being taken too seriously to the point of being “fatwaed” by the “offended” readers. In Hausa language, there is a saying that the same dance someone danced and he is sprayed money is one another will dance and get beaten. This tells us that the dance is not the issue, but who is dancing it, the way it is danced, at what particular time and before which audience. My experiment in that work, which is based on an age long but fast disappearing tradition of the yakamanchi(itinerant Hausa minstrels), worked as the book has not stopped receiving commendation and critical attention.
Your second poetry collection, Abuja Nunyi' (2008), was product of the British Council's Crossing Borders project of 2006. Like Vatsa, you came to be addressed as a poet of the city. Are you flattered by this comparison?
Vatsa was a great patriot, soldier and poet and I should ordinarily be flattered if compared with him. He wrote about Abuja when the place was almost virginal, when it was a kind of resort town to the power wielders of Nigeria. Vatsa saw the promise in Abuja and wrote visionary poetry about the city and that was why he was called the poet laureate of Abuja. I like followed in his footsteps and wrote about the same place at a different time, with my own style and fervor about the many dimensions to the city. So if you read Vatsa and later read me and try to find some commonalities to our poetic preoccupation on Abuja, you will not be doing something far-fetched.
Abuja, in the poems in this collection, is presented in variegated complexions. What is it about Abuja that lends itself to poetic exploration?
Every place on the surface of the earth can be explored poetically. A place as a temporal space has no ascription to it, nor does it come with a label or name attached to it until poets, explorers and people of imagination begin to colour and extend it with their fecund visions. I recall Femi Osofisan said somewhere about another city Ibadan thus: “Mention a city and it mentions a poet .And if it is in any way significant ,if the city is remembered at all, it is almost always because its name openly or silently summons the memory of a poet”. I have found this statement to be very true of Abuja because the very mention of the city of Abuja today conjures the name of the poet-soldier, Mamman Jiya Vatsa and possibly in the future, a Denja Abdullahi will be part of that ascription and memory. People may have forgotten that Abuja has a long history behind it which predates the quest for a new capital city by Nigeria. People may have forgotten the sacrifices made by the indigenous populations and overlords of Abuja to allow the foundation of a new national capital to be laid in Abuja for Nigeria. People may not reckon with the indigenous brilliance, technology, cultures and the artistic dexterity of the people of Abuja as signposted by that famous potter, Dr Ladi Kwali. People may even take for granted the convivial topography, scenery and the atmospheric condition of Abuja which made it a perfect choice for those who were sent out to hunt for a new capital city. A poet true to his art and who has lived long enough in Abuja will not overlook all these and think the city is not worthy of poetic effusion. That was why Vatsa could not ignore Abuja and that was why largely I too found many things about Abuja to sing about. Today Abuja is Nigeria’s station of power, with variegated power games being played and with people living in the margins, skirting around boundaries of opulence. Can a poet continue to ignore all these?
Grey hair in the play, Death and the King’s Grey Hair, is used symbolically to interrogate traditional African leadership, how does the Junkun traditional concept of power rub on the contemporary experience?
It is all a long forgotten myth or even a lost myth I tried to dramatically extend in the play to contemplate leadership in contemporary times. In various traditional leadership situations, there are checks against tyranny and cushioning structures against even the lifelong monarchical system. In the mythical Jukun past where the monarch is asked to abdicate or commit suicide at the first sprout of grey hair on his head, there are reasons for that; it may be the societal check against the sit-tight syndrome and possible tyranny. It may also be a measure to ensure that those who come into leadership see it as a place of sacrifice and abrogation of the self. Can the expectation of leadership today be different from its ancient conception in traditional Africa? I see no difference here and we have been badly led all these while because our leaders are abjectly unaware of the sacred trust reposed in them by the people and the society. Leaders today see their positions as chances to engage in aggrandizement and their followers urge them on with the refrain “it is our turn to eat.” Recently, a couple of months ago, the final year Theatre and Performing Arts students of ABU Zaria put up the play at their drama village and I was amazed at the contemporary treatment they gave the play. The myth was kept, the poetic language of the play was well carried and the actions resonated meaningfully with the audience. I was particularly thrilled by what I call the “feminization” of the play, where the all pervasive wise men in the original play became wise women and where some other notable male characters in the play were cast as women in the ABU performance. I had no quarrel with their approach because it worked and it aligned with current social realities and the engaging discourse on gender roles as it is perceived to be in the past and even now. I am also well into the performance field as a theorist and practitioner to know that a playwright’s creativity ends with the script and it is the director that extends that creativity on stage and streamline any cloudiness of vision or picture inherent in a script when performance is afoot.
Death and the King’s Grey Hair contains two other plays, both written as an undergrad, Truce with the Devil and Fringe Benefit. Can you lead us into the ideological wedlock that governs these plays?
At the period I went to school between the mid 80s to early 90s, both as an undergrad and a graduate student, there was the intellectually fervency about the fidelity of the artistic vision to societal progressive ideals. We as critical students then were hooked to the sociology of literature as espoused in the theories of Marxist-Leninist literary critics at home and abroad: the Plekhanovs, Terry Eagletons, Biodun Jeyifos, Onafume Onoges and all the other names anybody who studied or taught literature could reel out. We wrote and presented seminar papers espousing our own counter theories to the then great ideological debate between the sociological and formalist approaches to literary study. We were also hooked to the revolutionary praxis of playwrights such as Ngugi Wa Thiongo. Ebraheem Hussein, Tefwik Al Hakeem, Femi Osofisan, Tunde Fatunde, Bode Sowande, Olu Obafemi and many others. The plays you referred to were actually written shortly after I had left school and the ideology behind them was progressive in tune with the time in which I wrote them. We did not believe in art for art’s sake then and I still do not believe in that. The thematic preoccupation of the title play is unabashedly sociological, about curbing the excesses of power. Truce with the Devil is a satire on the later abandonment of the creeds of Marxism by some of its trenchant adherents, a kind of mockery of turncoat revolutionaries in the grip of practical social realities. Fringe Benefits, original written as a radio play, is an expose on the happenings in our ivory towers at a point in history, seen from the eyes of a participant-observer. You may thus say the plays were written in conformity with a prevailing ideology which I believed in and which I think is still relevant, even though it may be found in different hues and strains today.
You are one of the longest serving functionaries of ANA, and rumours have it you are running for the association’s presidency later this year; what else do you have to prove after being around for almost two decades?
My aspiration for ANA Presidency has gone beyond the realm of rumour as I have publicly declared my intent since February this year. Apart from the formality of declaration, it is not unexpected that after my years of service to the Association in various capacities; starting from my establishment of a chapter of the Association in Kebbi State in the early 90s, right through my active involvement in the activities of 3 other chapters of the Association(Kwara, Kogi and the FCT) and my holding of various positions of responsibilities in the National Executive Council of the Association from 2001 till now as the sitting Vice President, that I should be interested in the Presidency. Like I said in my declaration, aspiring to a public office should be predicated on service, commitment and proven dedication. Anyone aspiring to a public office should be properly scrutinized to see what he or she has made of similar responsibilities that may have been handled by such person in the past. I have a track record of service to ANA at the national level first as an ex-officio member(2001-2003),Assistant General Secretary(2003-2005),General Secretary(2005-2009),reverted to the constitutional provisioned office of an ex-officio(2009-2011) and became Vice President(2011 to date). In holding all these offices, I was entrusted with various responsibilities which I executed to the best of my abilities and members of the Association are well aware of that. All these positions were elective positions and I would not have been elected and re-elected, sometimes unopposed into some of them, if I have been found wanting. I have worked closely with four ANA Presidents(Olu Obafemi,Wale Okediran ,Jerry Agada and the incumbent Remi Raji), and you could ask them all to give you a confidential assessment of my service to the Association under their watch. You could also go further and take samples across the broad range of members of the Association to find out what I have made out of the positions I have held in the Association.
Many people may not have bothered to find out what has contributed to my staying power in the Association. First of all, I handle any position of responsibility I find myself from the point of view of tangible service delivery. I will never position myself or angle after an office if I know within myself that I cannot deliver the expected service and much more. Added to that is the fact that in my day job for the past 17 years when I transferred to the public sector, what I do is arts, literary and cultural administration. I have over the years developed core competence and expertise within my job schedule which has been deployed to great effect in my ANA activities. So when others find it hard to grapple with the task of managing their roles within the Association, I do it without breaking a sweat. Managing artistes, working with people in the creative and cultural industries and relating with the creative intelligentsia on worthwhile national and international projects are my daily fare. I affirm in my declaration that arts or literary administration and the activism that goes with it is not a hobby or sidekick for me, it is a career.
With the experience I have in ANA,I am well aware of what it entails to lead the Association to a new era of relevance and vibrancy in the generation of ideas and the doggedness and competence to follow them through to fruition. I also know that ANA Presidency is, to put it in the Yoruba parlance, an elephant’s head, which is not a load for the unprepared, the laggard, the laid back and the man or woman with a provincial or castrated vision. In my present station in life, at the peak of my career in the federal public service, with my demonstrated past service to the Association, I am offering myself again to serve at the highest official level in the Association and I am hopeful of being given that opportunity by ANA’s teeming membership.
You have remained alloyed to your artistic vision as a populist poet, what excites the curiosity of populist bard like you living in a shambolic universe?
A populist poet must always be conscious of not misaligning from the concerns of the general populace. He or she must inject hope regularly into the enterprise of poetry. What excite me are unusual situations and usual situations that could be coloured in novel light. I am also excited about finding a form that could be used to elicit the greatest impact on the reading public. If poetry is not widely read, heard and enjoyed then what would be the aim of populism?
You subscribe, like Niyi Osundare, that poetry should be taken out of the classroom to the marketplace. But, for majority poets in Nigeria, the language of the marketplace is still far from the diction of the day. What role does simple language play in the making of a good poem?
It is very easy for the ordinary reader out there to see poetry today as a genre without purpose, a mere exercise in word play and verbal gymnastic, sheer reveling in meaningless rhythm; and this lead to poetry being seen as something not to be enjoyed but to be studied. On the other hand, people approach a novel with the eagerness to be told a tale. I am yet to see who does not like to be told a good or sweet story. A play is anticipated with bated breath for there is bound to be conflict over issues leading to the eventual dénouement or climax. In essence, there is a ready market for a novel or a play but poetry must struggle to be relevant in order to find a slice of the market. Therefore, springing from my creative ideology, which is popular and people oriented, I make sure the subjects of my poetry are interesting enough to elicit interest from a wider class of people while not sacrificing the basic expectations of what is expected of poetry. I am yet to see a writer who writes without a purpose, though many who write do not have a rather clear purpose, but every one of my poetry collection were written to impact a message or present a perspective to the reader out there beyond the scholars or the literary critics ready to feast on them with their dissecting theories. Anyone who says that profundity of thoughts cannot be conveyed through simple language in poetry does not know what poetry is. I feel gratified that I have achieved my purpose when my readers meet me and commend me for writing poetry in a way that it could be engaged with enjoyment and laughter.
The Talking Drums touches important aspects of life. Is there a conscious reflection of you as a cultural person in this collection of 48 poems, given the overflow of such poems?
I was pushed into writing that book because I felt we were not talking to our children enough in the grand manner necessary to inculcate in them a deep love and understanding for their cultural heritage. In the book, I decided to reduce the various spectacles of our cultural heritages, from the durbar, the boat regatta, the circus, the drumming, the languages and several other entities into poetic singsongs that the young can easily identify with. The intended outcome is to breed children who would exhibit pride in their country and who would be humbled by the diversity available around them. I am happy to relate here that the book has been the staple of many primary and secondary schools in Abuja and beyond when they celebrate their cultural days. I have seen the poems in the book eliciting exciting wall arts, drama, poetic rendition and declamation by pupils and students at many a cultural day fiestas.
The talking drum itself as an instrument seems to echo the message of a return to the past. In what light do you see this?
The talking drum is one of our unique cultural symbols and is also a veritable communication instrument. I do not accept that it echoes the past; it is a living instrument that has been passed from generations to generations. The talking drum has enlivened modern music and would continue to play a role in our music and festivities in years to come. What we need to do is to keep the art of beating the talking drum alive by finding contemporary usages for it, by using it to teach our children and by extending its semiotics to hitherto unrelated aspects of our lives.
A Thousand Years of Thirst is dominated with personal lyrics and there are echoes of social regeneration and justice. What defines your bent for societal redemption in this collection?
A Thousand Years of Thirst, is my poetic historiography, signposting how I started out as a poet, the turbulence of my imagination as a young writer and the many impressions I have tried to make on people and places as I journeyed through life. The idea of the wandering minstrel is very central to the overall thematic pre-occupation of that work. I worked through the poems in that collection with the overriding belief that the true artist would always find his or her place by the people, the poor, the powerless, the hoi polloi, the marginalized, the oppressed and the suppressed. I still do not see any other place other than these as a place for the artist. An artist should never tire of demanding for regeneration and justice where it is lacking, in his or her art.
.You have worked for a long time a cultural facilitator, how does it help your creative side?
I work in an arm of the public service where creativity is encouraged and in a department where we mainly relate with artistes and other people in the creative and cultural industries. So, I can say I am in a familiar and inspiring environment to do my writing. Meanwhile, I have not left literature since I studied it at my undergraduate and postgraduate levels. So you can call those of us who studied the subject at the higher levels of education as first born sons and daughters of the field; and for some of us who developed aspiration for writing, coming from that angle of acquired knowledge made us natural writers of sorts. Though my work in the governmental culture sector has brought me into contact with cultural materials that can be used to garnish creativity, but appropriating all that into actual creative enterprise has been one’s sole labour. You have to self-motivate yourself as a creative person working in the public sector or else you will grow stale and be denuded of originality, going sometimes by the stifling constraints of public sector work.
Written on a flight home from Saudi Arabia, the religious angle of you is profoundly reflected in the Haj Poems, like late Chris Okigbo. How does spirituality conform with your muse?
Poetry lends itself easily to spirituality. It is no happenstance that nearly all extant religious texts of most faiths of the world are rendered in poetic forms. Poetry like religion is a sober, reflective entity, not given to unnecessary verbosity. Poetry is codified, often condensed; possessing a kind of liturgical rhythm and religion is all that too. The vista I explored in that book embraces religious sites, rituals and their association to the faith of millions of people of all races and creeds. The pilgrimage was a humbling religious experience for me that easily conform to the ever present spiritual dimension of my poetic enterprise. I decided to pen some poems to arrest my feelings as I felt them for posterity. In doing that, I was aware I will not be the first or the last to be seized within those kinds of contemplative spiritual moments. That was why in standing on the plain of Mount Arafat, which was the peak of the Hajj rituals itself, with hands of supplication outstretched to the Almighty, I remembered the way Christopher Okigbo stood before Mother Idoto, and the form of the poem I would later write to capture that particular experience came to me like a revelation.
What is cooking in your creative broth now?
I feel like giving creative writing some berth until I do some large body of non-fictive writing. I hope to return to creative writing later on in ways and manners that people will hardly recognize as mine. I intend to shock in form and content with the next creative work from my forge. Beyond that, I have an expansive film script (screen play) I will like to produce or turn into a full length novel. I have sequels to Mairogo which I am toying with and another play I am working on.

IT IS ALL ABOUT SERVICE: TESTED COMMITMENT AND PROVEN DEDICATION, NOT MERE RHETORIC OF PROMISES

IT IS ALL ABOUT SERVICE: TESTED COMMITMENT AND PROVEN DEDICATION, NOT MERE RHETORIC OF PROMISES

My Aspiration for ANA Presidency in 2015 I hereby make known my aspiration to serve The Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) as her next President. To me, aspiring to a public office, whether by appointment, election, as a career choice or by volunteering is all about service. Service is a sacred trust and demands total commitment from anyone aspiring to be given the people’s mandate. It is also my believe that those who offer themselves to serve at any level must be assessed by their antecedents to see what they have made of their previous engagements in similar circumstances. With all sense of modesty, I urge the members of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) and the writing community in Nigeria to reflect and review my records of service to the Association ever since I became a member many years ago. My Antecedents of Service to ANA I joined ANA in the early 90s and became involved in its operations as a literary and cultural activist. That may be taken as a beginning built on the foundations of my previous engagements in similar activities in the middle 80s to early 90s as an undergraduate and postgraduate student of English and Literary Studies in two Nigerian Universities(Universities of Jos and Ilorin). I established a chapter of ANA in Kebbi State in the mid 90s while working as a lecturer in the Waziri Umaru Federal Polytechnic, Birnin Kebbi, Kebbi State. The seeds of the Association I planted and nurtured then in Kebbi State, which germinated to encompass Sokoto and Zamfara States, have all transformed today into thriving chapters of the Association in those areas. I joined the public service in 1998 and integrated myself into the FCT chapter of the ANA where I became one of those keeping the Association alive and well through a stretch of innovations and outreaches. The FCT chapter put me forward to the National Executive Council position in 2001 at the elective Convention in Port Harcourt in which I was elected as an Ex-Officio member. Since then, I have been in the National Executive Council of the Association without break, manning successfully and meritoriously the underlisted positions of responsibilities: • Elected as an Assistant General Secretary in 2003 at the Makurdi Convention. • Elected as the substantive General Secretary in 2005 at the Kano Convention. • Returned unopposed as the General Secretary at the 2007 Convention in Owerri. • Reverted to the position of an Ex-officio as constitutionally provisioned by virtue of being an immediate past General Secretary after the completion of my tenure at the 2009 Minna Convention. • Elected as Vice President at the Abuja Convention in 2011 and re-elected unopposed to same position at the Akure Convention in 2013. I have been serving in this position since then till date.

In all these positions, I did not hold on to them just to answer to the appellations or to decorate my CV but I took them all as opportunities to serve in the real sense without angling for adulation or approbation. The peak of my service to the Association, apart from those executed in the various chapters I belonged to (Kebbi, FCT, Kwara and Kogi), and apart from those rendered at other positions I held in the National Executive Council as Ex-officio and Assistant General Secretary, came when I was the General Secretary of the Association between 2005-2009.

As General Secretary, considered the engine room of ideas and administrative live wire of the Association, I helped to achieve the following:

• Delivering well-executed Annual International Conventions with topical themes between 2006-2009 at Yenagoa(the Association’s 30th Anniversary, Owerri, Zamfara and Minna).

• National Workshop on Drama which held at the University of Lagos (May 2006).

• International Colloquium on 20 Years After the Nobel Prize, held at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, in honour of Prof. Wole Soyinka, (24th – 26th August, 2006). • ANA/Chevron National Workshop on Literature and the Environment which held at the University of Lagos in March, 2007.

• ANA National Workshop on Travels, Tourism and Leisure Writing which held in Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University, Lapai, Niger State, July, 2007. • ANA/Mobil National Workshop on Literature and the Environment which held in Eket, Akwa-Ibom State, March 2008.

• The National Celebration of 50 Years Anniversary of the Publication of Things Fall Apart in six cities (Lagos, Abuja, Ibadan, Ogidi, Awka and Nsukka) and an International Colloquium at the University of Nigeria Nsukka which held between 12-26 April, 2008.

• Co-edited with Joe Ushie the Proceedings of the Things Fall Apart@ 50 celebratory colloquium into a book entitled Themes Fall Apart But the Centre Holds, published in 2009.

• Abubakar Imam International Colloquium on the Promotion of Writing in the Indigenous Languages which held at Kaduna State University, Kaduna, on the 9th of July, 2009.

• National Symposium on Writing in the Indigenous Languages: A Celebration of the Works of Adebayo Faleti, which held at Leads University, Ibadan on the 13th August,2009.

• ANA/Atiku Abubakar National Workshop on Children’s Literature which held at American University of Nigeria, Yola, Adamawa State, between 16-17 of October, 2009.

Beyond these milestone events, which made my tenure and the Executive Council of that period to be adjudged as the most active in the history of the Association in recent times, I ran an all-inclusive secretariat with rapid response to matters bothering on protecting writers’ welfare and interests.

Since my election as Vice President in 2011 and re-election in 2013,I have supported effectively the current President and all other Executive Council members without viewing my office as that of a ‘spare tyre’ as it is perceived in Nigerian popular political parlance. In a voluntary organization where every expertise and sacrifices are needed to pursue and sustain avowed objectives; there can be no spare tyre, as all tyres are needed to keep the vehicle running. With this philosophy in mind, I weathered the storm in being ANA’s sole and principal defense witness in the court battle to reclaim ANA’s land from Home Securities Limited between 2008-2012 when the case was finally decided in favour of ANA at an Abuja High Court.

Well into my tenure as Vice President, amongst all other duties carried out, I was part of the organization of these events:

• Member of The National Transition Committee that arranged the Burial Rites and Funeral Proceedings of the literary icon, Prof. Chinua Achebe, in cities across Nigeria, May 2013.

• Member, National Organising Committee, of the Arrow of God@ 50 National Celebrations across 8 Nigerian cities from March 21-April 28,2014.

• Coordinator, Nigerian Writers Series(an imprint of the Association of Nigerian Authors), a process that saw to the publication of ten(10) fictional titles that was presented to the public in Ibadan in November and Minna in December,2014.

My Agenda of Service to ANA if Elected President With the foregoing track record of service to the Association and with much more unmentioned, I presently offer myself for further service to the Association in the capacity of President, to build on past and present efforts and also do the following: Run an all-inclusive administration where every member, at home and abroad, will be given the chance to contribute his or her talents and expertise to the development of the Association in an atmosphere of sacrifice, integrity and conviviality. Cooperate and advocate with other creative associations for the establishment of the national endowment funds for the arts, so that the creative sector can access funds for viable programmes and projects. Internationalize the operations of the Association by collaborating with other writers’ unions across Africa and the world. I am already talking to the Pan –African Writers’ Association (PAWA) with headquarter in Accra, Ghana on how to galvanize Africa through the literary and cultural fronts as it was in the 60s but in line with the contemporary world.ANA under my watch will develop creative collaborations with other like international agencies such as PEN and major literary and cultural groups across the world. Return ANA fully to its fundamental objectives of being a writers’ craft union that will be committed without fail to the advancement of the interests of its members within the overall pursuit of building and maintaining an egalitarian society. Repackage the developmental objectives of the Association and make the staging of workshops, seminars, conferences, going on local and international residencies and hosting celebratory activities routine activities. Take the hard-nosed decisions that will wean the Association from over-dependence on government patronage with regards to funding of Conventions and other programmes and projects. We will do this by actively cultivating individuals, corporate bodies, local and foreign grant giving agencies and foundations for institutional supports. We will also ensure that members live up fully to their responsibilities of membership. Create platforms for the facilitation of creative support to the Association through payment of dues by members at all times and other voluntary financial contributions for the running of its affairs. Engage in advocacy in line with the founding objectives of the Association and its overall interests. We will also stake our claims to participation in the governance of the country at all levels within our areas of core competence. Review the administration of ANA literary prizes with a view to beefing up their profiles as well as seek for the establishment of new prizes that will be developmental and sustainable. Ensure that the Mamman Jiya Vatsa Writers’ Resort in Abuja is eventually built and operational with all the income generating facilities placed on it and subsequently run like business so that the Association will become financially solvent. Unbundle the annual international convention of the Association and repackage it to make it more of a writers’ affair where books, authors and creativity will be fully celebrated. We will pull out some activities within the annual convention to stand on their own as full-fledged events within the year. Seek out very creative and innovative ideas that will make ANA become a much-sought after brand that will continue to contribute to the intellectual and cultural development of the society. This will be furthered by engendering proactive relationship with our educational institutions at all levels and other sectors in the book chain and in the creative industry. Actively internationalize ANA Conferences and other literary events with the full complement of the participation of writers and literary activists from Africa and other parts of the world. Liaising with foreign embassies and cultural institutions to support ANA and promote the sponsorship of the participation of Nigerian writers in foreign writing workshops, residencies and summer courses. Make ANA a self sustaining organization completely freed from perennial funding deficits and over dependence on support from political office holders of our annual conference hosting states. Review the administrative structure and organs of the Association with a view to strengthening them for utmost service delivery and initiating new organs as provisioned in the Constitution of the Association. Develop an 8 years strategic plan for the Association (2016-2023) by setting up a technical team of experienced members of the Association to work on that and bring out a blueprint for the running of the Association well into the future. What I have outlined as the new areas I wish to add to the operations of ANA are achievable if pursued with tenacity of purpose and readiness of all to make sacrifices in ideas, time and resources for the general good of the Association. To me, arts and literary administration is not a hobby or side-kick, it is a career, which must be managed with all indices of professionalism. I therefore call on all members of the Association and those admiring or contemplating us from afar to come join me in working towards delivering all these to the greater glory of our dear Association. Denja Abdullahi February,2015

Denja Abdullahi: I have no need to lead ANA if I can’t improve it

Denja Abdullahi: I have no need to lead ANA if I can’t improve it

 Denja Abdullahi is a Director at the National Council for Arts and Culture as well as the Vice President of ANA. IN this interview, the poet spoke about his ambition for ANA as he guns for the presidency.

You are contesting for the presidency of ANA, after being the vice president for the last two terms. What do you think you will bring that is different from what this administration has had to offer?
The Hausas and the Yorubas do have an identical saying which can be roughly translated as “ten kings, ten different milieu.”  There is a clear difference between being a vice president and a president. I have my set agenda or manifesto, which is already a public document; and when you go through it you will see the difference I intend to make if elected ; of course with the support of  my fellow executives and cooperation of the entire membership of the Association. Let me mention just a few. ANA, under my watch, will lead an active advocacy, with other associations in the creative industry, for the establishment of the national endowment funds for the arts. I intend to unbundle and re-package the annual convention of the association by pulling out some events to stand on their own outside the convention and make the convention more of a literary fiesta, which it should be. I am going to set up a think tank that will come up with an 8 year strategic plan (2016-2013) for the Association that will cover all its operations, programmes and projects. I intend to also galvanise strategic support locally and internationally for the Association as well as redefine the operations of the Association so as to overcome the funding and capacity gap that have been hampering our full flight as a body that has done a whole lot, though largely unsung, for Nigerian literature and culture. My ability to bring about the difference you seek rests on the solid fact that I have played an active role in the achievements already recorded, which I  intend to even surpass, or else there will be no need to attempt to mount the leadership saddle.

Having served in various capacities in the association, have you ever considered stepping aside for new names to take over the affairs of the association?
I have not been serving alone. I have been serving along with others and we have all played our various roles at various times for the overall progress of the Association. I have also not violated the constitutional provisions governing the tenure of the various offices in which I have served. And most importantly, elections were held to fill up those offices and each time I presented myself, I was always elected and at times returned unopposed. In 2001, ANA Abuja, led by Mallam Haruna Penni, presented me to go into the National Executive Council and I was elected as an Ex-officio member at the Port Harcourt Convention. In 2003, I was nudged to step up to the position of the Assistant General Secretary, when the incumbent did not make the Convention in Makurdi, and I contested and was elected. In 2005, I actually was not thinking of contesting but the leading presidential aspirant then, Dr Wale Okediran, who we were all rooting for, who himself had been a General Secretary under the Abubakar Gimba led executive (1997-2001), made it a condition that I must run for the office of the General Secretary, if he were to accept to vie for President. The group behind our aspirations endorsed me and luckily we both contested and won our positions at the Kano Convention. In 2007, at the Owerri Convention,I was re-elected unopposed to the same position. In 2009,at the Minna Convention, I reverted to the position of an ex-officio, by constitutional provision ,after completing my two term tenure as General Secretary. In 2011, I barely made it to the Abuja convention as I was away on pilgrimage, but I was prevailed upon to come on board as VP.I again contested and won. I have gone to this length to give you this narrative to let you know my trajectory in the Association’s executive and to show you I had always been willing to allow others come on board but I kept being called upon to serve. It is all about service and winning the confidence of the members on your ability and capability to deliver on the job you take on yourself.

Considering the huge potential of ANA in terms of its enormous man power, would you say that the association has failed to live up to its expectations?
It will be clearly against the run of the achievements of the association in the about 34 years of its existence to come to that conclusion. Given its organizational dynamics as a purely voluntary association with no binding right of corralling all practising creative authors into its membership or the enjoyment of a regular in-flow of funds as check-off dues like a typical union and the fact that its affairs are run on a part-time, absolutely volunteering basis; the association should indeed be commended for having achieved so much. The Association has, in my assessment, lived up to the expectations behind its establishment by the late Chinua Achebe and others and has been operating in line with its founding ideals. It has sustained interest in Nigeria literature, it has fought at various times for the interests of Nigerian writers, it has established schemes and ventures to promote and project Nigerian writings and writers and has most importantly added its voice regularly to the building of an egalitarian Nigerian society.
Even in the face of all these, there is still room for improvement and fine tuning of its operation in line with new trends, necessitating regular renewal of leadership and vision.

You are running against your longtime friend, BM Dzukogi. Is it possible that one of you could step down for the other?
Yes, it is possible but this possibility must be predicated on experience, length of service, ranking and widespread acceptability among members of the association. Ironically, I and BM Dzukogi in the recent history of the association have been jointly the chief advocates of consensus building at periods of leadership renewal. In the past, we have helped resolved, through active consultation and consensus building, what would have amounted to perilous contests for leadership at both the national and states’ levels. If we had successfully done that many times over in the past with the use of the tools of fairness, justice, precedence and objective assessment, then why should we have this situation between us? Definitely, something somewhere is not adding up. However, there is still room for mending fences as people do say.
This administration, of which you are part, came onboard on the premise of developing ANA’s most precious possession, the land at Mpape, Abuja. What is the situation of that development now and how do you think, should you be voted into power, pursue it further?
 ANA is gradually waking up from its slumber on the Abuja land matter. We have won the court case on the land since 2012 and paid the necessary damages due to a developer whose intent was to hold us hostage to his lack of capacity. We have a new agency on the land that has helped us fight off vicious trespassers, encroachers and land grabbers. Preliminary or take off infrastructures are currently being laid on the land on a very challenging topography. Under my watch, I will ensure there will be no deviation from the original plan for the land to be a writers’ resort with layers of facilities that will house important edifices and generate income for the Association. I will also ensure a business model is adopted for the development of the land and the running of its facilities so that the Association will derive from there at least 50% of its running cost while the remaining 50% is sourced from membership dues and sponsors for necessary programmes and projects.

One of your cardinal campaign catchphrases is “quality leadership”. How do you intend to deliver this to ANA?
Quality leadership in ANA and even everywhere else entails having the right experience, competence and capability to lead people. It must also be imbued with the right mix of the abrogation of self for communal objectives while being mindful of the legacies you want to leave behind. I intend to deliver this quality leadership by remaining faithful and committed to the ideals, causes and objectives of the association as I have always done. This quality leadership in an association like ANA must go with one having the right temperament and the security to inspire and challenge others to come forward to contribute their talents, expertise, time and resources in the service of the association. A leader in ANA and elsewhere must always be ready and willing to give everyone his or her due without feeling diminished or eclipsed.

What informed the choice of Camilus Uka as your running mate? What does he bring to the team?
I have not announced officially any running mate but people seem to have chosen one for me already. Remember in ANA, no one runs on the ticket of another, you must face the congress and be elected on your own merit. Nevertheless, I have full confidence in Camilus Ukah becoming a good vice president to me as president if we are so elected. Camilus Ukah is a highly experienced member of the Association like me, though he has never been in the national executive. He has been a one-time chairman of the Imo State chapter and I have had the opportunity to experience firsthand his selflessness, doggedness, determination and capacity for hard work in the affairs of the association when Imo State successfully hosted ANA national convention in 2007 during his tenure as chairman while I was General Secretary. Camilus is a team builder, a bridge builder, a literary entrepreneur who has over 10 quality novels to his credit. He has helped nurture many writers, literary associations and ANA chapters in the South-South and South-East of Nigeria.  In Camilus Ukah, I will have an effective vice president, not a ceremonial spare- tyre kind of vice president to put it in the Nigerian popular political parlance. As VP myself, I have not been a spare tyre and I like I said In my manifesto: “in a voluntary organization where every expertise and sacrifices are needed to pursue and sustain avowed objectives; there can be no spare tyre, as all tyres are needed to keep the vehicle running.”
How do you think ANA can reposition itself to serve the need of its members and what makes you think you are the man to deliver?
ANA must move with the times and keep re-inventing itself for optimum performance while not sacrificing the fundamental ideals of its existence. ANA also needs to restructure to introduce some permanent structure into its administrative capacity. I can deliver because with me you cannot be re-inventing the wheel as I have been there long enough to know what works and what has never worked. I am also amenable to innovation and willing to encourage contributions and support initiatives without prejudice and as long as you will roll up your sleeve to work towards achieving set goals. At present, I have quite a span of institutional memory on the workings, activities and affairs of the association that cannot be wished away in taking the right steps at all time.

Denja Abdullahi: I have no need to lead ANA if I can’t improve it

• 
• 

Category: The Arts

Published on Sunday, 21 June 2015 05:01

Written by Abubakar Adam Ibrahim

Hits: 119

View Comments

Tweet

Denja Abdullahi is a Director at the National Council for Arts and Culture as well as the Vice President of ANA. IN this interview, the poet spoke about his ambition for ANA as he guns for the presidency.

You are contesting for the presidency of ANA, after being the vice president for the last two terms. What do you think you will bring that is different from what this administration has had to offer?
The Hausas and the Yorubas do have an identical saying which can be roughly translated as “ten kings, ten different milieu.”  There is a clear difference between being a vice president and a president. I have my set agenda or manifesto, which is already a public document; and when you go through it you will see the difference I intend to make if elected ; of course with the support of  my fellow executives and cooperation of the entire membership of the Association. Let me mention just a few. ANA, under my watch, will lead an active advocacy, with other associations in the creative industry, for the establishment of the national endowment funds for the arts. I intend to unbundle and re-package the annual convention of the association by pulling out some events to stand on their own outside the convention and make the convention more of a literary fiesta, which it should be. I am going to set up a think tank that will come up with an 8 year strategic plan (2016-2013) for the Association that will cover all its operations, programmes and projects. I intend to also galvanise strategic support locally and internationally for the Association as well as redefine the operations of the Association so as to overcome the funding and capacity gap that have been hampering our full flight as a body that has done a whole lot, though largely unsung, for Nigerian literature and culture. My ability to bring about the difference you seek rests on the solid fact that I have played an active role in the achievements already recorded, which I  intend to even surpass, or else there will be no need to attempt to mount the leadership saddle.

Having served in various capacities in the association, have you ever considered stepping aside for new names to take over the affairs of the association?
I have not been serving alone. I have been serving along with others and we have all played our various roles at various times for the overall progress of the Association. I have also not violated the constitutional provisions governing the tenure of the various offices in which I have served. And most importantly, elections were held to fill up those offices and each time I presented myself, I was always elected and at times returned unopposed. In 2001, ANA Abuja, led by Mallam Haruna Penni, presented me to go into the National Executive Council and I was elected as an Ex-officio member at the Port Harcourt Convention. In 2003, I was nudged to step up to the position of the Assistant General Secretary, when the incumbent did not make the Convention in Makurdi, and I contested and was elected. In 2005, I actually was not thinking of contesting but the leading presidential aspirant then, Dr Wale Okediran, who we were all rooting for, who himself had been a General Secretary under the Abubakar Gimba led executive (1997-2001), made it a condition that I must run for the office of the General Secretary, if he were to accept to vie for President. The group behind our aspirations endorsed me and luckily we both contested and won our positions at the Kano Convention. In 2007, at the Owerri Convention,I was re-elected unopposed to the same position. In 2009,at the Minna Convention, I reverted to the position of an ex-officio, by constitutional provision ,after completing my two term tenure as General Secretary. In 2011, I barely made it to the Abuja convention as I was away on pilgrimage, but I was prevailed upon to come on board as VP.I again contested and won. I have gone to this length to give you this narrative to let you know my trajectory in the Association’s executive and to show you I had always been willing to allow others come on board but I kept being called upon to serve. It is all about service and winning the confidence of the members on your ability and capability to deliver on the job you take on yourself.

Considering the huge potential of ANA in terms of its enormous man power, would you say that the association has failed to live up to its expectations?
It will be clearly against the run of the achievements of the association in the about 34 years of its existence to come to that conclusion. Given its organizational dynamics as a purely voluntary association with no binding right of corralling all practising creative authors into its membership or the enjoyment of a regular in-flow of funds as check-off dues like a typical union and the fact that its affairs are run on a part-time, absolutely volunteering basis; the association should indeed be commended for having achieved so much. The Association has, in my assessment, lived up to the expectations behind its establishment by the late Chinua Achebe and others and has been operating in line with its founding ideals. It has sustained interest in Nigeria literature, it has fought at various times for the interests of Nigerian writers, it has established schemes and ventures to promote and project Nigerian writings and writers and has most importantly added its voice regularly to the building of an egalitarian Nigerian society.
Even in the face of all these, there is still room for improvement and fine tuning of its operation in line with new trends, necessitating regular renewal of leadership and vision.

You are running against your longtime friend, BM Dzukogi. Is it possible that one of you could step down for the other?
Yes, it is possible but this possibility must be predicated on experience, length of service, ranking and widespread acceptability among members of the association. Ironically, I and BM Dzukogi in the recent history of the association have been jointly the chief advocates of consensus building at periods of leadership renewal. In the past, we have helped resolved, through active consultation and consensus building, what would have amounted to perilous contests for leadership at both the national and states’ levels. If we had successfully done that many times over in the past with the use of the tools of fairness, justice, precedence and objective assessment, then why should we have this situation between us? Definitely, something somewhere is not adding up. However, there is still room for mending fences as people do say.
This administration, of which you are part, came onboard on the premise of developing ANA’s most precious possession, the land at Mpape, Abuja. What is the situation of that development now and how do you think, should you be voted into power, pursue it further?
 ANA is gradually waking up from its slumber on the Abuja land matter. We have won the court case on the land since 2012 and paid the necessary damages due to a developer whose intent was to hold us hostage to his lack of capacity. We have a new agency on the land that has helped us fight off vicious trespassers, encroachers and land grabbers. Preliminary or take off infrastructures are currently being laid on the land on a very challenging topography. Under my watch, I will ensure there will be no deviation from the original plan for the land to be a writers’ resort with layers of facilities that will house important edifices and generate income for the Association. I will also ensure a business model is adopted for the development of the land and the running of its facilities so that the Association will derive from there at least 50% of its running cost while the remaining 50% is sourced from membership dues and sponsors for necessary programmes and projects.

One of your cardinal campaign catchphrases is “quality leadership”. How do you intend to deliver this to ANA?
Quality leadership in ANA and even everywhere else entails having the right experience, competence and capability to lead people. It must also be imbued with the right mix of the abrogation of self for communal objectives while being mindful of the legacies you want to leave behind. I intend to deliver this quality leadership by remaining faithful and committed to the ideals, causes and objectives of the association as I have always done. This quality leadership in an association like ANA must go with one having the right temperament and the security to inspire and challenge others to come forward to contribute their talents, expertise, time and resources in the service of the association. A leader in ANA and elsewhere must always be ready and willing to give everyone his or her due without feeling diminished or eclipsed.

What informed the choice of Camilus Uka as your running mate? What does he bring to the team?
I have not announced officially any running mate but people seem to have chosen one for me already. Remember in ANA, no one runs on the ticket of another, you must face the congress and be elected on your own merit. Nevertheless, I have full confidence in Camilus Ukah becoming a good vice president to me as president if we are so elected. Camilus Ukah is a highly experienced member of the Association like me, though he has never been in the national executive. He has been a one-time chairman of the Imo State chapter and I have had the opportunity to experience firsthand his selflessness, doggedness, determination and capacity for hard work in the affairs of the association when Imo State successfully hosted ANA national convention in 2007 during his tenure as chairman while I was General Secretary. Camilus is a team builder, a bridge builder, a literary entrepreneur who has over 10 quality novels to his credit. He has helped nurture many writers, literary associations and ANA chapters in the South-South and South-East of Nigeria.  In Camilus Ukah, I will have an effective vice president, not a ceremonial spare- tyre kind of vice president to put it in the Nigerian popular political parlance. As VP myself, I have not been a spare tyre and I like I said In my manifesto: “in a voluntary organization where every expertise and sacrifices are needed to pursue and sustain avowed objectives; there can be no spare tyre, as all tyres are needed to keep the vehicle running.”
How do you think ANA can reposition itself to serve the need of its members and what makes you think you are the man to deliver?
ANA must move with the times and keep re-inventing itself for optimum performance while not sacrificing the fundamental ideals of its existence. ANA also needs to restructure to introduce some permanent structure into its administrative capacity. I can deliver because with me you cannot be re-inventing the wheel as I have been there long enough to know what works and what has never worked. I am also amenable to innovation and willing to encourage contributions and support initiatives without prejudice and as long as you will roll up your sleeve to work towards achieving set goals. At present, I have quite a span of institutional memory on the workings, activities and affairs of the association that cannot be wished away in taking the right steps at all time.

Why I want to be ANA president —Denja Abdullahi

Why I want to be ANA president —Denja Abdullahi

Denja Abdullahi, the current vice president of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), is contesting for the association’s presidency. In this interview with ADEWALE OSHODI  he speaks on why he wants to lead the writers’ body, and what he intends to achieve if elected. EXCERPTS:

•Denja Abdullahi

YOU are currently in contention to become the president of ANA; what do you hope to achieve if elected?

I intend to galvanise the talents, expertise and different pockets of competence the association is blessed with in its membership to reposition it. In my long period of service to the association, I have discovered that you can only achieve anything significant, in the midst of the perennial paucity of funds, by leveraging on and harnessing the potentials in members and other lovers of literature for identified aims and objectives. I will also create working synergy between ANA and other associations and bodies in the creative sector to fight for common goals that will improve the lot of the sector such as ensuring the establishment of the national endowment funds for the arts and the like. I will internationalise the operations of the Associations and stake its claim in the scheme of governance in Nigeria. I am also going to develop an eight-year strategic plan and blueprint for the operations of the association from the year 2016 and well into the future.  My manifesto is long on what I will do to reposition ANA if elected, but these are just a few of them and they are all translatable into pockets of programmes, projects and activities.

As vice president of the association, what are those things you have done which could serve as an advantage for you in your quest to lead the association?

As   Vice President, I have loyally and faithfully served the cause of the association in very many areas. I was the head of the team that audited the ANA Prizes and recommended on the streamlining executed. I was ANA pointsman on the National Transition Committee that ensured that a befitting burial was given   to the late founder of the association, Prof Chinua Achebe, in 2013. I also played a major role as a member of the committee that celebrated Arrow of God@50 across eight cities in Nigeria in 2014. I was the co-coordinator of the Nigerian Writers Series (NWS) of ANA , where I oversaw the publications of ten fictional titles under that imprint. I also followed to the end ANA’s winning of its land case at an Abuja High Court in February 2012, having been the sole and principal witness in the case for ANA between it and Home Securities Ltd, which ran from 2008-2012. I also at various points stood effectively for the president of ANA at important occasions and supported him adequately to administer the association. Before my being elected VP, a position I have held for close to 4 years, I have been an ex-officio member(2001-2003), Assistant General Secretary(2003-2005),General Secretary(2005-2009),ex-officio again(2009-2011) and VP(2011 to date); all at the national level, apart from my local service to about four state chapters of the association. If these years of proven staunch service to the Association and the experience garnered do not stand me in good stead for my quest, I wonder what else will.

You are contesting against Mallam BM Dzukogi, who is your friend; can’t you both reach a consensus, thereby making one to step down for the other?

From what I have recounted above, concession can be reached but will have to be predicated on the fact of experience, ranking, length of service and widespread acceptability among members of the association. It is also widely known among ANA members as far back as even four years ago that I was on the track to becoming ANA president eventually someday in the near future. I have even been nudged to give it a shot times in the past, some by even aspirants who later became presidents. By my nature, I will not go for an office when I feel I am not ready for it, nor play the opportunistic card just for the sake of occupying a position. I will rather support someone for an office if I know at a particular time that the person will be better at it than me rather than going for it myself. I have done that in ANA a couple of times. Right now as we speak, I am prepared and ready to lead the association and I know I will not fail. I am not saying leading ANA is my birthright. It is not, anyone can aspire and even get there. I am aspiring like any other person and I am ready to present myself to the congress for election. Let them decide if I am competent to lead the association or not.

One of the problems ANA is facing is fund generation, and the last convention in Ibadan almost did not hold but for the intervention of the Goodluck Jonathan administration. If you are elected, how would you make ANA rely less on government for funding?

 I have said in my manifesto that I will take the hard-nosed decisions that will wean the association from over-dependence on government patronage with regards to funding of conventions and other programmes and projects. We will do this by actively cultivating individuals, corporate bodies, local and foreign grant-giving agencies and foundations for institutional supports. We will also ensure that members live up fully to their responsibilities of membership. I will also create platforms for the facilitation of creative support to the association through payment of dues by members at all times and other voluntary financial contributions for the running of its affairs. I will ensure that the Mamman Jiya Vatsa Writers’ Resort in Abuja is eventually built and operational with all the income generating facilities placed on it and subsequently run like business so that the association will become financially solvent.

It was former Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu who assisted the association with the take-off grant for the Nigerian Writers Series; what is the fate of the project now that Dr Aliyu is no more in power?

The project was designed to outlive the initial grant given by the former governor. The project was designed to be self sustaining with aggressive marketing and profit from initial runs and prints ploughed into subsequent releases. We have done the first phase of the project (call for manuscripts, assessment, publication and presentation) we are now on the second phase where we will know if the model we have for it will work or not.

You are a member of the outgoing Remi Raji presidency; how would you rate the performance of the administration?

The administration has done well. It has introduced some modernity. quality and order into the affairs and activities  of the association. I rate the Remi Raji’s administration very well above average. My rating is modest and restrained, let the people we serve rate us.