Nigeria Gradually Losing Reading Culture – Amb Igali

A former Ambassador to Scandinavian countries (Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway), Ambassador Godknows Igali has lamented that Nigeria is gradually losing its reading culture.

Amb. Igali stated this in Abuja at a reading colloquium” appraising the aesthetics of a reading culture in Nigeria.

Igali who explained that reading is beyond relating with ideas written with ink on paper, added that man has been reading before the evasion of technology.

“The whole idea of reading has been from the beginning of history. I disagree with those who believe that reading is only when you put ideas on ink and paper. Man has always read but now, gradually, the reading culture has been taken over by modern society” he added.

“There was a time we took reading so importantly but gradually reading is disappearing with the evasion of technology” he stated.

The Former Ambassador explained that in sub-saharan Africa most people do not read as much as they ought to while some other societies are also losing the culture of reading.

On her part, the author of the book and organiser of the program, a Bayelsa-based lawyer, Theresa Ebi Tobuyei, said the work is a summary of the devastating effects of years of the ethnic crisis that rocked Warri in Delta State, for several years ending in 2003.

“Warri was trailed with conflict/crisis between 1997 to 2003 recording a great number of casualties, thereby attracting the attention of international peacekeeping and human rights bodies from around the globe” she added.

Acccording to her, the book tilted “GASP” was written to bring out the devastating effects of the crisis, and the lasting horrible memories it had on the lives of the victims and other people that witnessed it.

“It was in a bid to appraise the negative consequences of the violence in the light of the active and passive conflict still plaguing the Nigerian State, Africa and the World, that I wrote GASP. It’s a literary piece that focused on the consequences, the psychological issues that arose from the scars inflicted on the people especially marginalized groups such as children, young people, and women, in the times of the crisis, wars, and armed conflicts, around the world..

“GASP is a piece of literature that unearthed the harsh realities of how even decades after the end of active violence, the victims still struggle to embrace their now-tainted lives.”

She further explained that GASP is a fictional tale about some girls who physically witnessed the brutality of Warri crisis; with each of them losing a member of their family.

“The story as contained in the book captured how they were separated by the circumstances of life, displaying how each of them navigated their way through life whilst nursing the scars the crisis left behind.

“The book also considered other societal vices like electoral violence, domestic violence, bullying, sexual assault, child abandonment and the likes; displaying the travails and triumphs of her characters,” she added.

Georgina Humphrey, Edited By Grace Namiji