KONGI'S HARVEST: MANY FACES OF THE DICTATOR

Most African countries have been plagued by corruption, rebellion, greed and misuse of power. Manyof the leaders on the continent have failed the people politically and economically and by so doing, undermined their own democracies.

These leaders, in a bid to stay in power, promote all sorts of heinous acts against their people. Some of them come into power genuinely through popular means (elections), while some come through coup d'etats or massively rigged elections. But whichever way they come into power, majority of them share common patterns and trends, which usually leave their people psychologically bewildered.

The above came into play again during the recent performance of Wole Soyinka's 'Kongi Harvest' by The New Masks at the Yar'Adua Centre in Abuja. The play, which mounted the stage on August 3, and subsequently at the Arts Theatre, University of Ibadan, between August 9 and 12, was sponsored by the National Association of Seadogs.

Although there were repeated embellishments during each production, the same aesthetic hue and dramatic tonality ran through all the performances. The Abuja production, which was the command performance, was perceived as the most constrained in terms of space. The actors and stagehands had to artistically manoever their movements on the relatively small stage. Some actions had to be diffused from the stage proper to the space between the stage and what could normally have served as the orchestra section in a proscenium theatre.

At the Arts Theatre, University of Ibadan, actors were much more at ease with their movements, as it was one of the venues used for the production rehearsals coupled with the fact that the arts theatre is the home ground of the director, Dr. Tunde Awosanmi – a contemporary Nigerian stage director and university theatre scholar.

The over two-hour production was a combination of eclectic experimentation in prop-sound musical effect, deft spatial manipulation, energetic dance steps, rhythmic interfusion of scene changes and a surrealistic rendering of Kongi's alter-ego. One other brilliant exposition of the production is its injection of current realities.

Though the play was written in the 1960s, the performance captured the socio-political realities from the 60s till today. In the play was a graphic-like description of Jerry Rawlings, Jean-Bedel Bokassa, Arap Moi, Dennis Sassou-Nguesso, Miguel Trovoada, Muammar Ghadhafi, Mobutu Sese Seko, Sani Abacha, Laurent Gbagbo, Idi Amin Dada, and even Olusegun Obasanjo, just to mention a few.