Word: essien
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...future of Nigeria, Essien-Udom foresees a period of peaceful economic growth, without tribal strife. "There is rarely friction between the people of different tribes. It's the politicians who make the friction. But in Nigeria a party knows that it can't control the country by appealing to a particular tribe; it might get the support of a whole region, but it could never control the federal legislature. That is why our politicians are forced to rise above the tribes and think in terms of Nigeria...
While there is a good deal of sympathy for Communism among the intellectuals in French Africa, Essien-Udom thinks this danger is negligible in the former British colonies: "You just can't get an English speaking person interested in ideas....The people in English Africa are just interested in middle-class comforts and in becoming little bourgeois themselves--as quickly as possible...
Looking at the current African leaders, Essien-Udom contrasts Toure, whom he calls a revolutionist, wanting to change the whole of society, with Nkrumah, a reformist who only wants to patch things up, here and there. As to which of these kinds of change he thinks Nigeria needs most, Essien-Udom merely answers: "I am not a politician...
Among his other activities at the University, Essien-Udom is currently leading a non-honors tutorial at Dunster House on "The Genesis and Relevance of Pan-Africanism to Nationalist Movements." Here he plans to deal with what he calls, "unquestionably the major problem for Africa," that of overcoming the many different divisive forces and developing common, pan-african loyalties and values: "There are Yarubas in Dahomey and Yarubas in Gold Coast who, because of the artificial lines drawn by colonialism, can no longer understand each other. Sometimes divisions like this are actually encouraged by politicians who have gotten a little...
...Harvard Essien-Udom is also working on a study of the African elite that emerged between 1900 and World War II. He plans eventually to return to West Africa, hopefully to Nigeria, and to teach in one of the universities there. Although he does not intend to enter politics, he does hope to help work for a united Africa; an Africa that can develop its resources and still preserve "the tradition and wisdom passed on to us by our ancestors...