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INTRODUCTION
People go to school to become journalists� most people, that is. Junk or jingoistic, journalism is a profession. I have no such training -- as you will soon find out, but I will tell an "original" story for a change. I have read Rudolf Okonkwo's World Igbo Congress outing in Windy City '99 and Tonye David-West's meeting with President Obasanjo, Senator Okadigbo (before he became senate president), Minister Bola Ige, and others. I like such "original" travelogue-ish stories, but they are few and far between around here. That's not the main reason: I write because it is not really sinking into many Naija diasporeans that there is a gulf of thousands of miles between those on the mainland (Motherland) and the political/economic exiles. A Nigeriaworld.com writer was rejoicing the other day that the Internet was wiping away the concept of distance. Not so fast, buddy; it is still a long way to that REAL global village. So let's talk about the latest good news in our part of the wid! e world.

NIGERIA PEOPLES FORUM
Unless you have just landed from Mars or Venus (depending on your gender), you must have heard about the formal launch of NPF. No? No, it has nothing to do with "police" or "force"... just Nigeria. The birth of Nigerian Peoples Forum (NPF) marks a huge milestone in the search for an association of all Nigerians in the United States of America. Following the politicization of Congress of Nigerians Abroad (CONA) and its infiltration/contamination by Abacha Securocrats and arrant AGIPists, some of whom are repenting, reforming, and resurfacing as darlings of democracy, I did not foresee a credible pan-Nigerian association emerging so soon and so successfully nationwide, especially with the explosion of ethnocentric organizations. Then again, I did not know Bart Nnaji.

I take that back: I did know of Professor Bart O. Nnaji; after all, he's a homeboy - a thoroughbred Coal City-zen. I know all about the brainpower of this eminent engineer. What I did not know was his organizational brawn, unrelenting drive to succeed, and almost inexhaustible energy at organizing people across social strata, political persuasion, and ethnic extraction. An ex-minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Nnaji has succeeded where many mavericks and maniacs and much money have all failed, and he has succeeded very well. If the momentum is kept, and all hands are kept where we can see them, NPF will do Nigeria proud in America.

The journey to Washington, DC 2000 started awhile back. It oozed out of the desire for Nigerians in America to have a definite and democratic input in the political goings-on in Nigeria and in America. Time was when millions of dollars were funneled to shady characters that lurk around Nigerian missions abroad. Time was when these individuals were employed exclusively to destabilize any progressive pan-Nigerian movement. Time when these fat cats with brains the size a pea preyed on the intelligence of friends and fellow Nigerians without compunction. Those were times when people see red and swore it was black. It seems like a century ago. It is a century gone, in fact; a couple of years in reality.

It has been a long and painstaking process. But nothing succeeds like hard work and perseverance. The Forum's National Chairman Nnaji has pulled off a great feat with the able National Secretary, Dr. Juliette Tuakli - of whose "sacrifices in time and resources all through the months," Professor Nnaji never fails to remind members, the commitment of such front-liners as Dr. Vincent Ahonkhai, Conference Committee Chair Philomena Des-Ogugua, local organizing committee chair, Hubert Shaiyen, Awards Committtee Chair Joe Eto, Iyabo Onipede, Ajibola Osinubi, Bato Amu, Jimi Lawal, Emeka Ugwuonye, Bolaji Aluko, and all chapter chairs.

Of course, there are many members of NPF who chipped in along the way and whose names never appeared on the front pages: the Zeribe Ezeanunas (NJ), the Eddie Onaduwans (NY), the Manny Aniebonams (DC), the Charlie Umes (GA), etc. I have seen them at close quarters working to make the venture a success. But only one person could truly tell the story of this success: Professor Bart Nnaji. Naija's Nnaji has done much more within this period than was thought ever possible, and Nigerians in USA owe him quite a lot for his energy and enthusiasm. So shall we say: May his kind multiply!

"TOWN HALL MEETING"
A press release on the formal activities will reveal the pitch and profundity of NPF roots in the United States. On the formal launch of NPF in Capitol Hilton Hotel, Friday night, I will pass. Echoes from the gala night will reveal a whole lot more about NPF. So let's fast-forward to Day Three. The town hall meeting is the main thrust here. The NPF town hall meeting of Saturday, April 15, 2000 did not take place in a town hall, and it was not a meeting, strictly speaking. But that's what NPF called it. And so it shall be called.

At 11.15 AM prompt on this Saturday, inside a hotel in Washington, DC, Prof. Bart Nnaji took to the podium and apologized for what was fast becoming a "Nigerian-time" affair. No kidding! With only fifteen minutes gone? He announced that the Speaker of the Nigerian House of Representatives was on his way; ditto: Alhaji Abubakar Mohammed Rimi (former Governor of Kano State) Senator Ike Omar Sanda Nwachukwu (former minister of external affairs and Chairman of Senate Power & Steel Committee), Chief John Nnia Nwodo (former adviser to President Shehu Aliyu Usman Shagari and ex-federal minister of information). The presence of Dr. Alex Ifeanyichukwu Ekwueme, former Nigerian Vice President and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, was acknowledged.

The turnout was impressive, especially since the formal events had taken place. Everyone was happy... or looked happy to me. Oh, there was a loud complaint about the food of the night before. Whoever tasted it for pepper must have his or her taste buds analyzed for sensitivity -- or so we were made to believe. If that was the only thing that went wrong, then the gala was a great success. Of course, the timeline didn't quite go as projected. Hey, who is complaining: We are still Nigerians, even in America.

EKWUEME & RIMI
The more I looked at Dr. Alex Ekwueme and Alhaji Abubakar Rimi seated up there on the podium, the more my ear lobes warmed up. Whenever that happens, I know there is a connection to be made somewhere, somehow. I ignored the auricular sensation and listened as Alhaji Ghali Na'Abba held court. Folks asked questions and some pretty predictable answers followed.

Of interest to me however was my meeting with the Ide of Orumba, Dr. Ekwueme. I finally got to meet with the man of whom Archbishop Anthony Olubunmi Okogie of Lagos Catholic Archdiocese said recently: "The only people I think had the right to cry of marginalization are those from Alex Ekwueme's side. I don't want to say the Igbo. But those are the people, if you look at it, I feel for them. If you look at the constitution or rather the formation of PDP, you see the part Ekwueme played there. What did he get? All of a sudden, came Obasanjo from the blues. So if you look at things, even though it is not my problem but as a Nigerian I have to be interested." [Newswatch, March 2000: "Sharia'll Lead to Open War"]

Dr. Ekwueme did not look like he had been crying. On the contrary, he was cheerful and looked very fit. Years of meeting and traveling had taken their toll on everybody, but he looked good in his tan traditional robe and noble red "Ichie" cap. The elder statesman surely has many more miles in him. One thing that impressed me about Ekwueme was his simplicity and unassuming nature. As a high-ranking active politician, he inspires confidence in the troubled ship we call Nigeria -- and he is not the captain.

SOVEREIGN STRUCTURES
The answer I waited eagerly to hear from Dr. Ekwueme concerned the sovereign national conference (snc) debate. I am of the school that thinks that Nigerian nations need to talk and talk until they can talk no more; then they should rest and talk some more. However, I have a problem with the "sovereign" attachment. This was why I signed the letter calling for a conference only when the "popular" attachment appeared. So when Professor Bolaji Aluko asked the former Vice President specifically if he sincerely believed that Nigeria would attain the height of her glory as "presently structured," I psycho-suppressed the auricular sensation, which was actually keeping me from sliding into voluntary apnea as Speaker Na'Abba went on and on Would it not be better to convene a sovereign national conference and correct the fundamental flaws in the fraudulent foundations?

Dr. Ekwueme must have wondered if he would ever chip in his piece. Me too! Luckily for us all, the elder statesman spoke. And he knows his stuff; after all, he is the architect of the present six-zone arrangement -- thanks to his unnecessarily long and unjustifiable incarceration by Buhari-Idiagbon regime. But this was long before the present Sharia saga and the call by Igbo-state governors for a confederation of Nigerian nations. This was also long before eastern Nigerian nations began the arduous task of overcoming the unpleasantness of the past; before the Niger-Delta communities discovered that what ailed them came from further afield.

Ekwueme said that the issue of a sovereign national conference should be taken in its proper historical context. He could remember Benin and Congo embarking on such a route recently. However, no nation with a constituted democratic government, he submitted, had ever embarked on such a course. While professing his sympathy with the proponents of this idea and not dismissing the idea outright, he volunteered that the idea of sovereign national conference lacks in originality, logistics, and legitimacy. Now you know why Obasanjo and Okadigbo dismissed the call as "idle talk." Is this the PDP position? Is the argument sound?

Perhaps the greatest applause was reserved for Dr. Ekwueme's condemnation of conference of any kind without an agenda. He challenged those asking for a conference to put on the table what they want to achieve. If they want to break up Nigeria, he pointedly advised, let them say so. If they want confederation, let them say so. His reasoning was simple: The last time Nigerians had such a conference, it failed. Then came the Aburi, Ghana, outing. Everyone agreed; then they disagreed And we fought a frightening war. Now, if Nigerians go into a conference, sovereign or popular, what would happen if it collapses?

GAINS OF GRAYS
Now those gray hairs on Dr. Alex Ekwueme just did it for me, and it was so simple. For any planned meeting, there must be an agenda. If there is no agenda, there is almost always chaos. So there we have it, folks: Let the talk begin. I think Ekwueme wants to avoid what Professor Wole Soyinka proposes in "The Mistake Of 1914" [Tempo (Lagos) April 12, 2000]:

"At such a congress of peoples, all options must be tabled - centralism, federalism, confederalism, monarchism, theocracy, secularism, even dictatorship or as has been proposed, probably as a tongue-in-cheek expression of desperation, a return to colonial tutelage! There must be room at the forum for both sages and madmen, for visionaries and pragmatists, for babes-in-woods and gerontologists, for dyed-in-the-wood ideologues and laissez-faire fatalists."

Since I respect grays, I paused to dissect the submissions of our noble Nobel laureate. I am not comfortable with this motley crowd of strange associates seeking a cohabitation, trial separation, or outright divorce in one family courtroom. We have so many anarchists and militant madmen running around in the streets. To bring them under one roof and announce a convention is a sure recipe for a riot of rabid emissions. There must be a way to narrow down the available options; there must be a way to consider these and others without making a wing for every tribal tortoise who wants to party up there with hawks and kites.

For now, many agree that we need to renegotiate the so-called "Mistake of 1914." We need to stay apart a teeny weenie bit or, as Ikemba Nnewi put it in a BBC interview on Friday, May 30, 1997, be consumed by "the friction of our closeness." As things stand, the principle of confederacy or confederation (or is it "confederalism") is gradually taking root. Federalism in Nigerian has become centralism, the same unitary system for which General JTU Aguiyi-Ironsi was butchered by forces loyal to the present minister of defense, TY Danjuma. And it is killing people in Warri, Shagamu, Kano, Kaduna, Aba, etc.

Actually, the talk and the walk to change the system have commenced. Up northwest, the "Sarduana of Zamfara," Governor Sani Ahmed Yerima, is already doing his own thing: chopping off hands for stealing suya and flogging folks for snuffing off thirst with beer. Down southwest, the Chicago-certified "Aare Ona Kakanfo of Alausa, Lagos," Governor Bola Tinubu, will soon be signing visas for anyone trying to visit Lagos and declaring when federal senators can visit his Obadom. Only in Nigeria! Meanwhile across the Niger in "God's own state of Abia, saved-by-the-bell Governor Orji Uzor Kalu is applying for land in Kaduna to build a permanent place of abode. One Nigeria sosai! The other governors only need to follow with their brand of trial separation, test the water a la Nzeribe, and see how far the executive and legislature can be stretched before they scream "FOUL!"

HOME ABROAD
But that's Nigeria; this is here. Without meaning to, NPF has started that conference in USA. By meeting and talking, Nigerians will one day decide the option they leave for their children. If they fail, they will answer to Chike. I never found out what questions the adolescent wanted to ask at the meeting. Like many men and women who indicated interest in asking a question or two, affable and cheerful Chike Nnaji never got the chance to be called upon to express himself.

I pray and hope that when his mates and those of Eli�n Gonz�leze's generation after them start asking very serious questions -- questions about nation-building efforts -- that Nigerians in USA will have simple answers to issues of identity and pride of place in America. That's an issue for NPF to address.

Everything else is embellishment.
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