E. J. Alagoa, emeritus professor of history, University of Port Harcourt, is in the news again for excellent reasons. He is the lead author of the new long-awaited book on the life and times of Ernest Sisei Ikoli, Nigeria's first journalist and nationalist of repute. Even his peers in the pre-independence movement, such as Chief Obafemii Awolowo, acknowledged Ikoli as their mentor.
Co-author of the book is John Horace Enemugwem, justice of the peace. He is a professor of history, and current Dean, Faculty of Humanities, University of Port Harcourt. He has also served as Vice President, Historical Society of Nigeria.
The book counts as the first compulsive history of the life and times of Ernest Ikoli. It is at once a biography of the man, and long-running history of the genesis of Nigerian journalism, nationalism, and party politics, fields in which Ikoli served the nation as a versatile doyen, and a patriotic frontline pioneer.
The book is the outcome of extensive interviews conducted in Ikoli's hometown, Twon-Brass, across a spectrum of family members, living and dead, as well as his associates in politics and journalism in Lagos. The pages of the book have also benefited from exclusive titbits in Ernest Ikoli's personal papers, official colonial documents in Britain, and archival records in Nigeria.
A nine-man committee has already been constituted to plan a formal book presentation ceremony which is more than likely to hold at the new Ernest Ikoli Media Complex recently commissioned by the Bayelsa State Government. Members of the committee include respectable writers, scholars, and journalists from the Niger Delta, including Professor Barclays Ayakoroma, Charles Ogan, Pope Pen, and Ayiba Crowther Duba, Commissioner for Information, Bayelsa State.
Other members of the committee are Professor Atei Mark Okorobia, Lindsay Barrettt, Ibiba Don Pedro, as well as Stanley Job and Samuel Numonengi, chairmen of the Nigerian Union of Journalists, Rivers and Bayelsa chapters respectively. The book is expected to be reviewed by Dr. Reuben Abati. The contingent of expected guests, including royal fathers, technocrats, top-notch politicians, government officials, industrialists, and gentlemen of the press will be led by former President Goodluck Jonathan.
Professor E. J. Alagoa served for two consecutive terms as President of the Historical Society of Nigeria. He is a Fellow of the Nigerian Society of Letters, a laureate of the Nigerian National Order of Merit, NNOM, and an Officer of the Order of the Niger, OON. The appointed date for the formal launch of the book will be announced soon.
