I have just finished reading Ropo Sekoni's essay "Yoruba Market Dynamics and the Aesthetics of Negotiation in Female Precolonial Narrative" published in Research in African Literatures,Vol.25.No.3.I was led to the essay by my interest in the symbolism of the market in Classical African thought,expounded in another paper by Nkeonye Otakpor,"The World as a Marketplace",written from the perspective of Igbo culture.The last story, of the Tortoise, in Sekoni's essay is particularly interesting and revealing .
While enjoying the superb structure of the essay,its striking English and its very impressive collection of and analysis of three folktales,the relationship between the character and role of the trickster in oral narrative,particularly from Yorubaland,and the current Nigerian crisis of governance struck me.I was particularly struck by the significance of the dramatisation of the trickster in Yoruba tradition in relation to the current crisis of government in Nigeria and its relationship,indirect and otherwise,to the sad story of Abdul Mutallab.
What has struck me about the trickster in the Yoruba tradition in relation to the current Nigerian crisis occasioned by the disappearance of the Nigerian President into a Saudi hospital,remaining incommunicado and thereby exposing the underbelly of aspects of Nigerian political arrangements as have developed since before and after Nigerian independence in 1960 and now crystallised by the reigning PDP? How does this relate to Mutallab?
The core relationship there is the issue of exposing a ridiculous situation through a ridiculous happening,a happening that would have been comic if it was not so dangerous,but which will still be comic to others watching from outside the afflicted region,others living in political and social systems that have long gone beyond such social clowning.
Esu,the quintessential Yoruba trickster,is laughing at us from his place on the crossroads,where he can often be found,and where strange forces intersect which have to be carefully managed,at times through sacrifice,forces that may enable progression or inspire obstacles that could prove disastrous.
The crossroads we are at are those represented by the simple but not so simple question that was asked and answered in the negative well before the President left for Saudi Arabia: "Should the President hand over temporarily to his deputy while he is away?"
Clearly,the act of handing over power to his deputy,Goodluck Jonathan-the very rich irony of this man's name in relation to the intersection between his personal history and national history has been pointed out by a writer in a Nigerian newspaper in the article "Thrice Lucky Goodluck Jonathan",thereby reinforcing thre currents of irony at play here-goes beyond a simple administrative procedure meant to oil the wheels of governance,making such a temporary transition impossible in terms of the current mindset at play with the people whose will has been most significant in this issue.
The irony of the difference between what,ideally,is a simple administrative initiative,and the Nigerian reality of the ethnically fraught potential of such an action emerges with horrible comedy in assertions like those attributed to the Attorney General of the Federation that the President can rule from his Saudi sick bed,and Omo Omoruyi's claim that his wife Turai Yaradua can rule in his place.The comically fantastic character of the last assertion is magnified by the fact the the person making this wonderful claim is a long standing professor of political science who goes on to try to educate us on an interesting version of US history by asserting that two US President's wives have ruled in their place when the Presidents were incapacitated.
There is a Yoruba song that goes this way.I cant really write Yoruba so please forgive any mistakes:
Esu o,Esu o
Onile onita o
Jo ma yoju soro me....
Esu o
Esu o
Owner of the house
Owner of the space beyond the house
Please,dont place your face inside,dont enter into my affairs....
The supplicative force of the song is reinforced by the plaintive,drawn out rhythm in which it is voiced.The movement is melancholy and heavy.The person is praying that Esu should not show up in her/his affairs because Esu's presence is manifest in terms of unanticipated disruptions,like when he caused a quarrel between two friends by walking between their farms wearing a cap red on one side and black on the other.The two friends fought and fell out because each thought the other was calling him a liar by claiming the cap was red or black.
In a similar sense as the supplicant in that prayer,we find ourselves in an unanticipated situation but one that has all the hallmarks of an Esu situation in being tragically comic.Esu's disruptions are often related to the comedy that comes from something at times grotesque,at times laughable from a superior perspective,a perspective possibly attained after one has transcendent that troubling situation,as Nigeria might have left this kind of comedy in question behind a century from now.
The comic situation:a very sick man insists on,or is made to insist on,or others insist on his behalf,that he must continue as the president of a supposedly sovereign nation while lying on his back undergoing intensive care in a faraway country in another continent.Meanwhile no one knows who is in charge in the country he purportedly heads. His second in command who is supposed to deputise for him refuses to sign vital documents arguing that he is not empowered by law to do so since the President did not hand over power to him before leaving on the latest of recurrent hospital trips outside the country,the irony of the president of a nation being in the hands of foreigners being the least of problematic and shameful scenarios in evidence here.Meanwhile meetings take place of the supposed ruling body of the country although it is a mystery what the validity of those deliberations are since the legal apparatus that justifies any decisions made at those meetings is questionable.At the height of this comedy it is stated that the very sick president,all the way on his hospital bed in Saudi,has signed or will sign the national budget,of course without the presence of eyewitnesses from the press and other such disenfranchised Nigerian mortals who can testify to his capacity to study what been described as the bulky budget document that would take at least 40 mins to read.
Can you imagine a more comic scenario? It is a genuine Hans Anderson scenario.Hans Anderson is the European folklorist who collected and retold many European folktales that have become great classics.In the light of developments like the current Nigerian scenario,these folktales can be seen to dramatise much that is true about the human predicament,indicating that East or West,North or South,thousands of years ago till today the basic contours of the human mind and human social interaction,may not have changed.
The Anderson tale this sad Nigerian situation reminds me of is called "The Emperor's New Clothes".An emperor and his court are convinced by a couple of self professed master tailors who collect huge advance fees for a splendid ceremonial dress for the emperor.Whenever the emperor and members of his court go to look at them at work,however,they see nothing.All they see are two men sewing the empty air.Why?!The master tailors inform them that only people who are pure of heart can see the clothes.So everyone keeps mum and subdues the evidence of their eyes.
On the faithful day of the emperor wearing this fabulous robe for the first time,he parades the capital city in what is supposed to be the splendour of his new acquisition,which the master tailors had purportedly draped ceremoniously over him before his majestic walk.Ironically,nobody can these wonderful clothes.All they see are his underpants.Since everyone has been informed that only pure hearted people can see the clothes,everyone comments generously on how wonderful the robes are,how gorgeous,how overflowingly splendid.
The whole farce is shattered by a child who shouts: "But he has no clothes on!"An adult nearby tries to shut him up: "Shut up!What do you know?" But the child insists: "I cannot see anything other than his underpants!" With the child's insistence,people become bolder and begin to whisper that, yes,the emperor has no clothes on.As the strength of numbers gives them courage they gradually say it out aloud until the emperor is forced to move quickly indoors to hide himself and nurse this monumental shame.Meanwhile the two great tailor have disappeared.
Nigeria could be said to be in a classic The Emperor Has No Clothes On scenario.The supposed wonderful garments,assuring a peaceful transition of power, can be described as the PDP arrangement of a rotational presidency.The fact that such an ethnically based arrangement is at best quasi-democratic has not been seriously addressed before now.But the unexpected state of the President and his failure to transfer power to his Vice- President,even for any length of time, has led Nigerians to asking,what kind of political arrangement have they been saddled with by the political godfathers? The Vice-President,even in spite of his Vice-Presidenting,is not a Northerner, so his taking over,even for a second,from the President cannot be countenanced because it is the turn of the North to be President,after being President for most of Nigerian history but were forced to concede to a rotational plan by relatively recent events.Goodluck,the Vice-President,a man whose luck does not sleep,is also made further unattractive by the fact that he is from a politically disempowered geographical region, the Niger Delta,the source of the country's main source of revenue but a place a place raped by both the Nigerian government and some of its own direct rulers.
Meanwhile,Esu continues to laugh mischievously at the crossroads of decision where he tripped the nation as it stumbled into the future.The enlightenment that may emerge from this experience is Esu's legacy of enlightenment in the midst of upset fortunes.The cap he wore that confused the two friends was both red and black.Realising that would have freed the friends from the duality of their limited conceptions.True,Nigeria is in a nasty situation right now,but the situation can also be seen as salutary,since the weaknesses of its current political arrangements have been exposed in terms of such tragic comedy.
I will address the Mutallab dimension if and when I am able to think it through.I think it relates to the question of the role of Islam within the legacy of Western globalisation,and the implications of that for Nigeria.
Toyin Adepoju
While enjoying the superb structure of the essay,its striking English and its very impressive collection of and analysis of three folktales,the relationship between the character and role of the trickster in oral narrative,particularly from Yorubaland,and the current Nigerian crisis of governance struck me.I was particularly struck by the significance of the dramatisation of the trickster in Yoruba tradition in relation to the current crisis of government in Nigeria and its relationship,indirect and otherwise,to the sad story of Abdul Mutallab.
What has struck me about the trickster in the Yoruba tradition in relation to the current Nigerian crisis occasioned by the disappearance of the Nigerian President into a Saudi hospital,remaining incommunicado and thereby exposing the underbelly of aspects of Nigerian political arrangements as have developed since before and after Nigerian independence in 1960 and now crystallised by the reigning PDP? How does this relate to Mutallab?
The core relationship there is the issue of exposing a ridiculous situation through a ridiculous happening,a happening that would have been comic if it was not so dangerous,but which will still be comic to others watching from outside the afflicted region,others living in political and social systems that have long gone beyond such social clowning.
Esu,the quintessential Yoruba trickster,is laughing at us from his place on the crossroads,where he can often be found,and where strange forces intersect which have to be carefully managed,at times through sacrifice,forces that may enable progression or inspire obstacles that could prove disastrous.
The crossroads we are at are those represented by the simple but not so simple question that was asked and answered in the negative well before the President left for Saudi Arabia: "Should the President hand over temporarily to his deputy while he is away?"
Clearly,the act of handing over power to his deputy,Goodluck Jonathan-the very rich irony of this man's name in relation to the intersection between his personal history and national history has been pointed out by a writer in a Nigerian newspaper in the article "Thrice Lucky Goodluck Jonathan",thereby reinforcing thre currents of irony at play here-goes beyond a simple administrative procedure meant to oil the wheels of governance,making such a temporary transition impossible in terms of the current mindset at play with the people whose will has been most significant in this issue.
The irony of the difference between what,ideally,is a simple administrative initiative,and the Nigerian reality of the ethnically fraught potential of such an action emerges with horrible comedy in assertions like those attributed to the Attorney General of the Federation that the President can rule from his Saudi sick bed,and Omo Omoruyi's claim that his wife Turai Yaradua can rule in his place.The comically fantastic character of the last assertion is magnified by the fact the the person making this wonderful claim is a long standing professor of political science who goes on to try to educate us on an interesting version of US history by asserting that two US President's wives have ruled in their place when the Presidents were incapacitated.
There is a Yoruba song that goes this way.I cant really write Yoruba so please forgive any mistakes:
Esu o,Esu o
Onile onita o
Jo ma yoju soro me....
Esu o
Esu o
Owner of the house
Owner of the space beyond the house
Please,dont place your face inside,dont enter into my affairs....
The supplicative force of the song is reinforced by the plaintive,drawn out rhythm in which it is voiced.The movement is melancholy and heavy.The person is praying that Esu should not show up in her/his affairs because Esu's presence is manifest in terms of unanticipated disruptions,like when he caused a quarrel between two friends by walking between their farms wearing a cap red on one side and black on the other.The two friends fought and fell out because each thought the other was calling him a liar by claiming the cap was red or black.
In a similar sense as the supplicant in that prayer,we find ourselves in an unanticipated situation but one that has all the hallmarks of an Esu situation in being tragically comic.Esu's disruptions are often related to the comedy that comes from something at times grotesque,at times laughable from a superior perspective,a perspective possibly attained after one has transcendent that troubling situation,as Nigeria might have left this kind of comedy in question behind a century from now.
The comic situation:a very sick man insists on,or is made to insist on,or others insist on his behalf,that he must continue as the president of a supposedly sovereign nation while lying on his back undergoing intensive care in a faraway country in another continent.Meanwhile no one knows who is in charge in the country he purportedly heads. His second in command who is supposed to deputise for him refuses to sign vital documents arguing that he is not empowered by law to do so since the President did not hand over power to him before leaving on the latest of recurrent hospital trips outside the country,the irony of the president of a nation being in the hands of foreigners being the least of problematic and shameful scenarios in evidence here.Meanwhile meetings take place of the supposed ruling body of the country although it is a mystery what the validity of those deliberations are since the legal apparatus that justifies any decisions made at those meetings is questionable.At the height of this comedy it is stated that the very sick president,all the way on his hospital bed in Saudi,has signed or will sign the national budget,of course without the presence of eyewitnesses from the press and other such disenfranchised Nigerian mortals who can testify to his capacity to study what been described as the bulky budget document that would take at least 40 mins to read.
Can you imagine a more comic scenario? It is a genuine Hans Anderson scenario.Hans Anderson is the European folklorist who collected and retold many European folktales that have become great classics.In the light of developments like the current Nigerian scenario,these folktales can be seen to dramatise much that is true about the human predicament,indicating that East or West,North or South,thousands of years ago till today the basic contours of the human mind and human social interaction,may not have changed.
The Anderson tale this sad Nigerian situation reminds me of is called "The Emperor's New Clothes".An emperor and his court are convinced by a couple of self professed master tailors who collect huge advance fees for a splendid ceremonial dress for the emperor.Whenever the emperor and members of his court go to look at them at work,however,they see nothing.All they see are two men sewing the empty air.Why?!The master tailors inform them that only people who are pure of heart can see the clothes.So everyone keeps mum and subdues the evidence of their eyes.
On the faithful day of the emperor wearing this fabulous robe for the first time,he parades the capital city in what is supposed to be the splendour of his new acquisition,which the master tailors had purportedly draped ceremoniously over him before his majestic walk.Ironically,nobody can these wonderful clothes.All they see are his underpants.Since everyone has been informed that only pure hearted people can see the clothes,everyone comments generously on how wonderful the robes are,how gorgeous,how overflowingly splendid.
The whole farce is shattered by a child who shouts: "But he has no clothes on!"An adult nearby tries to shut him up: "Shut up!What do you know?" But the child insists: "I cannot see anything other than his underpants!" With the child's insistence,people become bolder and begin to whisper that, yes,the emperor has no clothes on.As the strength of numbers gives them courage they gradually say it out aloud until the emperor is forced to move quickly indoors to hide himself and nurse this monumental shame.Meanwhile the two great tailor have disappeared.
Nigeria could be said to be in a classic The Emperor Has No Clothes On scenario.The supposed wonderful garments,assuring a peaceful transition of power, can be described as the PDP arrangement of a rotational presidency.The fact that such an ethnically based arrangement is at best quasi-democratic has not been seriously addressed before now.But the unexpected state of the President and his failure to transfer power to his Vice- President,even for any length of time, has led Nigerians to asking,what kind of political arrangement have they been saddled with by the political godfathers? The Vice-President,even in spite of his Vice-Presidenting,is not a Northerner, so his taking over,even for a second,from the President cannot be countenanced because it is the turn of the North to be President,after being President for most of Nigerian history but were forced to concede to a rotational plan by relatively recent events.Goodluck,the Vice-President,a man whose luck does not sleep,is also made further unattractive by the fact that he is from a politically disempowered geographical region, the Niger Delta,the source of the country's main source of revenue but a place a place raped by both the Nigerian government and some of its own direct rulers.
Meanwhile,Esu continues to laugh mischievously at the crossroads of decision where he tripped the nation as it stumbled into the future.The enlightenment that may emerge from this experience is Esu's legacy of enlightenment in the midst of upset fortunes.The cap he wore that confused the two friends was both red and black.Realising that would have freed the friends from the duality of their limited conceptions.True,Nigeria is in a nasty situation right now,but the situation can also be seen as salutary,since the weaknesses of its current political arrangements have been exposed in terms of such tragic comedy.
I will address the Mutallab dimension if and when I am able to think it through.I think it relates to the question of the role of Islam within the legacy of Western globalisation,and the implications of that for Nigeria.
Toyin Adepoju
