For the first time since the history of black history month, Nigeria as a country will this year official identify with this important black celebration, courtesy of the Lagos Theatre Association. The Black History Month is a month set aside to remember all important people in the history of Africa and the entire black world. The occasion also celebrates the important events like the infamous slave trade that ravaged the black world for centuries. The event was first celebrated at Kent State University in February 1970 .

All through the remarkable literary career of Professor JP Clark (the First African writer to be appointed professor of English), the centrality of his plays has always been the relevance of the culture of his own people. Clark, the man of memorable electrifying verses, the man who vomits poetry naturally without conscious effort, deserves all the accolades in the world for beaming the beauty of the Ijaw culture to the world. Clark skillfully makes a break from this his universally acknowledged cultural zone when his play The Wives’ Revolt emerged in the literary scene after many years of hibernation in Kiagbodo where his MUSE supposedly dwells.

Professor (Sir) Victor Efosa Uwaifo is a reporter’s delight any day. An enigma, music maestro and talented artist, Prof. Uwaifo is the Nigerian Leonardo Vinci. A professor of Arts at the University of Benin , there was no dull moment with him as he moved the venue of the interview to his office to avert distractions.

WHEN friends, colleagues, culture activists and promoters gathered at the Kongi’s Harvest Gallery , Freedom Park, Lagos last week for the 50th birthday celebration of Jahman Anikulapo, one thing that was uppermost in the minds of many was the personality of the man involved.

It could only happen in Port Harcourt, the city now referred as the World Book Capital. Here, literature has become so common that even wedding feats are now turned into literary festivals, thanks to the Garden city Literary Festivals, and the Association of Nigerian Authors, ANA, Rivers state branch.

Lemi Ghariokwu,self taught Nigerian born artist is the famous illustrator of late Afrocentric king Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s record labels. He also illustrates so many other artists and his creative album designs tell beautiful stories about music and carries along strong message from the artists across through visual capturing of metaphoric thoughts of the artists. Designing about twenty six of Fela’s album covers, and over two thousand other album covers in the last thirty eight years, Ghariokwu has no doubt carved a niche for himself.

Ogochukwu Promise (Phd) is a Fiction writer, playwright, poet and essayist. She is the founder and coordinator of The Lumina Foundation which instituted the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa. She also edits and publishes the literary magazine, The Lumina, as well as The Promise Magazine.

Reconstruction of social and historical account of African traditional societies is an enterprise that ought to be thriving in an environment that has over the centuries groaned under the perfidy of discovering themselves through the eye of writers outside their cultural experience, but more importantly, at a time when studying history as an academic discipline has been outlawed.

Jahman Oladejo Anikulapo, the outgoing Editor of Guardian on Sunday joined the golden club of those who have lived for five decades on January 16, 2013. This tireless man who, as an undergraduate of Theatre Arts in the University of Ibadan acted in Professor Femi Osofisan’s play, “A Restless run of a locust” is not just an enigma. He is a restless ubiquitous man with a sense of mission and passion for humanity.

TUCKED in Okupe estate in Maryland Lagos is a privately owned Sculptural garden. This property which plays host to a number of local and international visitors annually, is owned by renowned art collector and promoter, Engr. Yemisi Adedoyin Shyllon.