I wrote this for Chimurenga Chronic a while ago: Since the 1970s, the importation of second-hand clothing has been banned in Nigeria. People give different reasons for the policy. An official of Nigerian Customs told me the practice was banned because they are dirty clothes picked from the streets of Europe, something unfit for Nigerians… Read More »
First the conclusion of this ‘review’ (really, it is a summary of what the ‘reviewer’ likes in the book; and such a word as review should ideally not be used for it. If, however, we choose to call it a review, we should add that it is at best anodyne) by Noo Saro-Wiwa: The final… Read More »
If you are in London: Date: Thursday 19th January, 6-8pm Venue: Brunei Suite, SOAS Book launch with author Michael Gould and Kaye Whiteman (journalist), Frederick Forsyth (author), Dipo Salimonu (political commentator & CEO at Ateriba) responding. Chair: Professor Dennis Judge In the summer of 1968, reports of starvation in the West African secessionist Republic of Biafra transformed the… Read More »
A guest post from Benson Eluma, a NigeriansTalk contributor. WHAT ARE THE differences between Achebe and Hart? Achebe says we have to go back 500 years to understand the problem of Africa; Hart says no, the required span is ‘the last century’. I feel that by the time we get to the start of Hart’s… Read More »
I just read this on the Nigerian Village Square: The literary world is abuzz with the news that Achebe in 2010, on the fiftieth anniversary of Nigeria’s independence, and the fortieth anniversary of the end of the Biafran war; is working on a major opus – Reflections on the Nigerian Civil War 1967-1970. It will… Read More »
While the Nigerian Civil War devastated Igbo business activities across Nigeria, and precipitated a mass return of Igbo migrants to their home area, it also laid the foundation for a consolidation and rapid development of Igbo informal enterprise, which has had integrative rather than divisive social and economic consequences for Nigeria as a whole. Operating… Read More »