Description
Nigeria’s Femi Osofisan (aka Okinba Launko) is currently emeritus professor of drama and theatre
at the university of Ibadan, Nigeria. A restless artist and multiple award winner, he wears many cap
—as activist playwright, poet, biographer, novelist, journalist, actor, director, song writer, editor, etc.
His plays have been performed in different countries all over the world and in 2016, Osofisan
became the first African ever to win the international Thalia Prize. This is the first of three plays
dealing with the issue of Pan-Africanism, and the role of our brothers and sisters in the Diaspora in
the agenda of black unification, total liberation, and future development. Specifically, the play
focuses on the regime of Kwame Nkrumah, leader of the first African country to gain political
independence from the British, in 1957 and the first African leader to consciously invite African
Americans to the continent and make Accra a sort of Mecca for all liberation movements. Sadly,
he was overthrown in 1966 and went to live in Conakry with Sekou Toure, the Guinean leader, for
what he thought would be a brief interlude, but which in the end lasted for over six years till his
death. As it says in its title, the play deals with incidents from Nkrumah’s exile years in Conakry,
where he met and held discussions almost daily with Sekou Toure, and Amilcar Cabral . It was
commissioned and first performed for the African Literature Association’s meeting in Accra—its
first ever meeting on the African soil—in 1994, then a year later with great success at Colombo
(with the playwright directing jointly with Dr Neloufer del Mel), and later revived as part of the
ceremonies marking Ghana’s 50th independence anniversary in Accra. Anyone interested in Pan
Africanism and the story of African independence especially in the early years, will gain
considerably from reading or watching this play.
ISBN: 978-1-943533-62-6 Ι Published 2023 Ι Pan-African University Press
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