AWA - SETTING AGENDA FOR A NEW AWA

SETTING AGENDA FOR A NEW AWA

Okey Okoli Emmanuel
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF,
Awa Legends and Heritage Magazine

Historians tell us that the world is evolving generationally. Put in another way, generations come and go - each emerging generation getting more refined and more sophisticated in form and beauty. The Bible book of Daniel captured this more aptly in a pictorial form in the vision of King Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 2). According to Bible scholars, God gave Nebuchadnezzar a load down of generations of earthly kingdoms using human image: Head of fine gold, chest & arm of silver, belly of bronze, legs of iron, and toes of mixture of iron & clay.

Looking at the image above you notice a steady increase in quality, mordernisation and beauty - from toes of clay to head of pure gold. Compare this with the crude generation of premodal man (covering his nakedness with leaves, wondering in caves and bushes, and feeding on raw animal flesh) to a modern man using ceramics to dispose excreta in a posh house and flying around in space crafts.

Our Joe Anatune painted a picture of Awa in the late 60s & 70s as a community living in mud houses, some looking somewhat like caves. That's just fifty-something years ago. Comparing that with our Awa of today, one will be tempted to think that we have arrived. To some extent, yes. But there is need to juxtapose our success with the global trends and, perhaps project where we shall be in some decades to come.

PROJECTING A NEW/MODERN AWA

Talking of projection, Dr Ray Ofor gave us a sumptuous ray of hope when he projected that Awa shall overtake most communities in Orumba by twenty years time. The erudite scholar certainly may not be wrong but like Mr Joe Anatune put it, we must be abreast of global trends while working towards our glorious city. This calls for an agenda setting for Awa where, in Joe's words, conscious efforts must be made to build the youths that will take Awa to next level.

While we do this, we must not fail to take a retrospect to discover some mistakes we made in the past. One agonizing one was what socio-cultural lifestyle did to us some 80 - 100 years ago. A lot of eminent Awanians during our interview sessions regretted with great remorse how the Igba Egwurugwu dance dragged a good number of Awa men in Ulonma Age Grade home from the cities and truncated, so painfully, great opportunities awaiting, not just them, but the entire community. According to report, some of them who were recruited into civil service, including police force, prisons and army, and their counterparts who were taken abroad to learn trade, absconded their high calling to partake in the Igba Egwurugwu dance in the village. How ignorance can ruin a people! You can imagine where those men, their families, and in fact Awa would have been if this cultural nuance had not betrayed our future.

While recounting his experience, our Professor emeritus, Prof. D. S. Obikeze narrated how he was ridiculed and jeered for choosing to go to school. To his peers, there was no greater fool than he. Thank God for long life, we now know better.

But have we really known better? Can we truly say that we have embraced education? If you find yourself in a situation where, in a community meeting, you are scratching your head looking for a qualified person to take the minutes of your meeting, then there's trouble. How much of our youths are in school, or aspiring to take to education? Can anybody give us a statistics? Even without statistics I can say with some surety that we still leave much to be desired. Chief (Sir) Paul Nwafor, Ide Awa, didn't agree less to this when he advocated that we must go to our various villages and campaign that our youths must take to education. He became more blunt when he said, "any person who fails to train his children in school is a fool." Yes, Ide Awa has tested wealth, affluence and good life but he made this emphatic statement, "even if I do not have this good life that am enjoying now, I cannot regret going to school".

Now, coming back to agenda setting for a new Awa, let me quickly remind us that a new Awa cannot be different from the "global trends", according to Joe. In case you don't know, the world is heading towards the 4th industrial revolution. The moving spirit and key instrument of this new world order is a super form of digitisation which some people describe as "a realm of artificial intelligence". It shall bring us to a generation where there is no dividing line between physical world and digital world. Meaning that in this generation almost everything in life shall be digitised. Yes, in this new realm you have robots taking the works of man - supermarket attendants shall be robots, medical prescriptions shall be done by virtual doctors using the handset, manufacturing personnel shall seize to be humans, vehicles moving on the road shall be without drivers. Yes, in less than ten years we are entering a world of driverless cars!

There's fear all over the world today. Even in the Western world palpable fear is gripping everybody - including government bodies. At the center of this fear is the issue of job loses. Medical doctors, engineers, pharmacists, desk officers, name them. There's fear of job loses across disciplines. Robots are set to take over men's jobs. Everyday, world leaders are brainstorming on how to face the fearful challenges of the fourth industrial revolution.

THE FOURTH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION

Remember the world today is a global village. Like Ide Awa said, only fools will say "it doesn't concern me".

The fourth industrial revolution is simply plotting a new world where digital knowledge is key. Like the Bible predicted, in last days knowledge will increase (Daniel 12:4).

So, projecting a new glorious Awa simply means projecting an Awa where education is key. Here comes the question again, by how much are our today's youths embracing education? The truth is that any community that does not take education serious shall be left behind in the new age that we are approaching. When our Ulonma boys trivialised education and chose traditions and cultural lifestyle, little did they know that the world was leaving them behind. If we're not careful, our today's quest for reviving culture and cultural practices will be a playback of what happened to Ulonma age grade. God forbid!

Joe, Ray, Mascot, Prof Dan, Prof. Obii and indeed everyone that we interviewed in this magazine all agreed that in setting agenda for a new glorious Awa, education of our younger ones must be given a prime place. Joe gave us a recipe for this - COUNSELLING! According to him, our elites must partner together and counsel our youths that every route to success hinges on education. But we need a platform to do the counselling. This is where Dr Ray's advice suffices, youths shall be encouraged to bring back the students union or anything that shall play similar roles. We did in the days when members of Ekwueme Age Grade were youths and it worked. This explains why over 80% of the who-is-who in Awa today belongs to Ekwueme Age Grade. In his view, Dr Ray said education is Awa's greatest industry.

We all look towards a new Awa. By God's grace a glorious Awa shall emerge but we shall do the needful.

*Okey Okoli Emmanuel is a Brand Specialist and Marketing Communication Consultant