The Nigerian stage has lost a Jewel. The follow spot will never find her again, the cameras will Roll and she won’t be there any longer to thrill her fans. The spotlight blinked a pause, and the screen shed tears at the departure of an ever refreshing actress, Toun Oni, fondly known as “Mama T”, a dedicated theatre practitioner, who for over 35 years graced the stage and screens with passion, sang her swan song’ last Thursday night. The stage lights blinked a long pause, and the screen shed a tear at the departure of this enigmatic Nigerian, Stage, Screen, Radio Actress and Dancer.

Professor Sam Ukala, Provost, Delta State University, Asaba campus, is a literary icon. He is the Chairman, Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Delta State chapter. Recently at the 8th anniversary of the body which he has chaired for 8 years / public presentation of his anthology in Asaba,Ukala spoke on the values of the teenage author’s competition floated by Delta ANA, and other sundry issues.

Unlike societies right next to the Igbo for instance – more famously the Benin, or further West, the Yoruba or, all the way southwards of the continent, the Kwazulu of the legendary Shaka – the Igbo, with their strong social formation rooted in republicanism, would appear to belie my general claim. The Igbo have no history of expansionism, being content with a strong organization around autonomous clan entities that made contact – friendly or unfriendly with one another as the need arose (Wole Soyinka, Distinguished Nyerere Lecture, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, 2010: 1).

IT was like the Chairman, Organising Committee, International Colloquium on Slavery, Slave Trade and its Consequences, Professor Abi Derefaka of the University of Port Harcourt read the mind of the inquisitive looking journalists that he resorted to making the rhetorical statement: “ Many of us may want to know why we are holding a colloquium on slavery at this time.”

It was yet another shock for the art community as the news of the demise of one of the veteran actresses, dancers and icons of the movie industry Toun Oni, popularly known as Mama T was broken last week.