Danlami Samuel Ibrahim and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o: In memoriam, By Jibrin Ibrahim

DS Ibrahim had a firm no-nonsense attitude to work and never condoled laziness and poor-quality work. He contributed immensely to the development of education in Kano State and two of his former students, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and Ibrahim Shekarau, who became governors of Kano State, attest to the excellence of the training they received from him.

We lost our most senior brother, Mallam DS Ibrahim, Dan Masanin Wusasa, on 23 May, at the age of 86. DS, as we call him, spent most of his career at the Ministry of Education, Kano. He was one of the young secondary school graduates (set of 1959 of Alhudahuda College in Zaria) sent to the United Kingdom by the Northern Regional Government to train as teachers. He was at the University of Nottingham, where he specialised in technical education, and he took courses at Loughborough Training College, Institute of Education, Jordan Hill College of Education (1970-71) and also obtained the United Kingdom Technical Teachers Certificate.

He was employed as a teacher by the Northern Nigeria Public Service Commission on 23rd September 1963 and posted to teach at Government Secondary School, Bauchi, between 1963 and 1966, where he rose from being a woodwork teacher to the vice principal. In 1966, following the creation of states, he was transferred from Bauchi to Rumfa College, Kano, up till 1969. He has been the principal of Government Technical College, Kano (1974-77), executive secretary, Science and Technical Schools Board (1978-79) and zonal director, Municipal Educational Directorates Zone 1 (1980-82).

He was also director, Kano Educational Resource (KERD) from 1985 to 1987; director, Finance and Supplies, Ministry of Justice (1988-1993); director, Planning Research and Statistics, Kano State Polytechnic (1992–94); executive secretary, Local Government Staff Board (1995-1997); and rector, Kano State Polytechnic (1997-1999), from where he retired from the service. He was recalled back to service to be chairman, Kano State Pension Board (2001-2005) and member of the Committee on Verification of Complaints and Petition (2005-2006).

He was very sociable and had a large circle of friends who he regularly engaged in debates at Kano Club or at the Air Force Mess, where he played tennis. He was a kind-hearted family man and we all deeply feel his absence. DS Ibrahim was a traditional title holder, Dan Masanin, Wusasa. May his soul rest in perfect peace.

He lived the life of a committed civil servant and very strictly insisted on compliance with the Civil Service Rules and Regulations. DS Ibrahim’s extended career as a public servant is not unconnected with his reputation as, “An Epitome of integrity,” to quote Adnan Bawa Bello, who wrote these words in January 2020:

“Mr D.S Ibrahim is now over eighty years old. In his days, contractors submitted their applications for feeding the students to the board. One of them, Alhaji Aliyu Na Ramata, from Mandawari Quarters in Kano city asked Malam Amadu Dambazau, (messenger to D S Ibrahim), to advise him on how much to give DS Ibrahim to enable him secure the feeding contract. Submit your application and don’t give him a Kobo; Dambazau suggested. D.S Ibrahim showed the members of the Tender’s Board the envelopes containing the amount of money each of the contractors gave out to him and directed the messenger to go and pay the money to the treasury and bring the payment receipt . He tore their applications and dropped them in the dust bin. He informed the members that all the contractors are disqualified for offering bribe except Na Ramata who submitted his application without offering anything.”

DS Ibrahim had a firm no-nonsense attitude to work and never condoled laziness and poor-quality work. He contributed immensely to the development of education in Kano State and two of his former students, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and Ibrahim Shekarau, who became governors of Kano State, attest to the excellence of the training they received from him. He was very sociable and had a large circle of friends who he regularly engaged in debates at Kano Club or at the Air Force Mess, where he played tennis. He was a kind-hearted family man and we all deeply feel his absence. DS Ibrahim was a traditional title holder, Dan Masanin, Wusasa. May his soul rest in perfect peace.

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o joins the Ancestors

Ngũgĩ engaged with the legacy of colonialism through essays, plays and novels including Weep Not, Child (1964), Devil on the Cross (1980) and Wizard of the Crow (2006). Long critical of the post-colonial Kenyan government, he was arrested by the regime of Daniel Arap Moi in 1977 and imprisoned for over a year without trial. “He lived a full life, fought a good fight,” wrote his daughter, Wanjiku wa Ngũgĩ on Facebook.

I just learnt of the passage of Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, a giant of African literature. He was one of my most important teachers of radical politics, through his novels. Thanks to the African Writers Series that made those novels available all over Africa. Weep Not, Child was required reading for African literature in the school certificate syllabus. Ngũgĩ was a champion of indigenous African languages and my hopes of his getting the Nobel prize for literature never materialised.

Ngũgĩ was born in 1938, when Kenya was still very much a settler colony that the British wanted to keep forever, and he had to fight not only the dehumanisation associated with colonial rule but also the slavish mentality of the indigenous Kenyan elites that simply wanted to continue with colonial rule under their direction. Ngũgĩ engaged with the legacy of colonialism through essays, plays and novels including Weep Not, Child (1964), Devil on the Cross (1980) and Wizard of the Crow (2006). Long critical of the post-colonial Kenyan government, he was arrested by the regime of Daniel Arap Moi in 1977 and imprisoned for over a year without trial. “He lived a full life, fought a good fight,” wrote his daughter, Wanjiku wa Ngũgĩ on Facebook. Some of his words are the following:

“Blackness is not all that makes a man, Kamau said bitterly. There are some people, be they black or white, who don’t want others to rise above them. They want to be the source of all knowledge and share it piecemeal to others less endowed. That is what’s wrong with all these carpenters and men who have a certain knowledge. It is the same with rich people. A rich man does not want others to get rich because he wants to be the only man with wealth.” – Weep Not, Child

On colonialism: “Colonialism normalises the abnormal.” – Decolonising the Mind, 1986

“The present predicaments of Africa are often not a matter of personal choice: they arise from a historical situation. Their solutions are not so much a matter of personal decision as that of a fundamental social transformation of the structures of our societies starting with a real break with imperialism and its internal ruling allies. Imperialism and its comprador alliances in Africa can never develop the continent.” – Decolonising the Mind 

On resistance: “If the state can break such progressive nationalists, if they can make them come out of prison crying, ‘I am sorry for all my sins,’ such an unprincipled about-face would confirm the wisdom of the ruling clique in its division of the populace into the passive innocent millions and the disgruntled subversive few.” – Wrestling with the Devil, 2018

On the politics of language: “I have become a language warrior. I want to join all those others in the world who are fighting for marginalised languages. No language is ever marginal to the community that created it. Languages are like musical instruments. You don’t say, let there be a few global instruments, or let there be only one type of voice all singers can sing.” – Los Angeles Review of Book, 2017.

On being: “Our lives are a battlefield on which is fought a continuous war between the forces that are pledged to confirm our humanity and those determined to dismantle it; those who strive to build a protective wall around it, and those who wish to pull it down; those who seek to mold it, and those committed to breaking it up; those whose aim is to open our eyes, to make us see the light and look to tomorrow […] and those who wish to lull us into closing our eyes.” – Devil on the Cross, 1980

A professor of Political Science and development consultant/expert, Jibrin Ibrahim is a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Democracy and Development, and Chair of the Editorial Board of PREMIUM TIMES.