Diego Odoh Okenyodo

Odoh Diego Okenyodo (born December 2, 1974) is a Nigerian writer, journalist, development communication expert, media strategist, poet, and media entrepreneur. He is the founder and chief executive officer of Akweya TV Limited, a participatory media organisation focused on language promotion and community dialogue, and Isu Media Ltd, a public relations and communication consulting firm headquartered in Abuja, Nigeria. Okenyodo was one of the founding members of the Kaduna Writers’ League and has served as a director of the Splendors Of Dawn Poetry Foundation. With Prof Nduka Otiono, he co‑edited Camouflage: Best of Contemporary Writing from Nigeria, an anthology of contemporary Nigerian writers. The anthology included works by the most renowned contemporary Nigerian writers such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Helon Habila. Quotes Well, before I published the collection you referred to, From A Poem to Its Creator, it probably had been ready for 7 years, somewhere around 2001 or 2002. Creatively, I grew up under the tutelage of Mu’azu Maiwada and my father, the late Akpallah Okenyodo, both of whom were craftsmen that believed you should give your best at any time you choose to put your foot forward. Of course, my immediate elder brothers, Amed and Rapmans were huge influences too. What all these people had in common were a dedication to the art, some kind of desire to offer what you consider your best at any point. In this age and time, not many people see this as a virtue, but I guess that if I were a computer, this app is one that I am unable to uninstall! The second part of the story is that of some form of despondency with the limited copies of books writers-turned-publishers can produce and distribute. We are most times producing 1000 copies, at best, and of those 1000, about 300 copies go to family, friends, co-workers, journalists, reviewers, mentors and so on. Of the 700 copies, the cost of distribution comes to about N100,000 as you send 10 copies to one university, 20 copies to a dozen bookshops in faraway cities, and you log your books with you in bags as you attend book readings, fairs and exhibitions. Many of these would be sold and the monies wouldn’t come back. So, I have always asked myself why I should go into another strenuous exercise that won’t scale up? For a population of over 200m people, I am always thinking that 20,000 copies should be the most dismal minimum any writer ought to target. I might be over-ambitious to many but this is what keeps worrying me. This is not a reason for other writers to fold their arms, but just what is holding me back. I can’t have another collection that remains in the booth of my car! I don’t strive at perfection in the sense of the word but I strive to give my best. I detest proofreading errors, copyediting errors—for instance, page numbers being mixed up—things that I can take care of before we go to press. I also think that collections should be slim and every poem, every word, should earn its place. I remember how I was almost going to press with my work and I had Ahmed Maiwada read it, and in addition to other incisive contributions, he told me the original title “Words From A Poem to Its Creator” was a bit verbose for a collection. He suggested I kick out the word “word” and that was how we arrived at what I considered more apt, “From A Poem to Its Creator”.