US-based Nigerian scholar, Prof Niyi Osundare is at the center of national and international acclaim following the announcement of his name as the winner of this year’s Nigeria National Order of Merit, NNOM, Empowered Newswire reports.
The award is Nigeria’s highest recognition for academic and intellectual achievement with past winners including the Nobel laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, distinguished historian, late Prof J.F. Ade Ajayi, world-renowned author, late Prof Chinua Achebe, distinguished professor of Medicine, late Prof Benjamin Olukayode Osuntokun among several others.
Osundare who is a Professor of English at the University of New Orleans, UNO, in the State of Louisiana left the US last weekend in order to attend the formal ceremony in Abuja few days ago -December 4, where he received the award from the Nigerian President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan.
While commendable responses have come from local and national voices in Nigeria, especially on how Osundare’s selection adds to the value of the award itself, the Nigerian born, world-reputed poet is also being celebrated in the US media and academic circles on his attainment of the national merit award for scholars.
Equally the Alumni of UNO has also written to congratulate the NNOM winner, glad that he has brought honor to the university
In a statement made available to The Guardian, the head of the English Department of the University of New Orleans said it has been a privilege to work with Osundare who is one of the few decorated “Distinguished Professors” in that school.
According to Prof Peter Schock in his congratulatory message to Osundare, released over the weekend, “for years, it has been our privilege to work with Distinguished Professor Niyi Osundare, to share our professional lives with this extraordinary person, as his achievements as a poet, scholar, critic, and defender of human rights have earned him the many awards that recognize his growing international reputation. “
Sharing the statement with the university community, Schock added, “I am delighted to announce that next month, in an investiture ceremony held in Abuja, Nigeria, our colleague will receive his nation’s highest honor for intellectual and academic achievement, the Nigerian National Order of Merit Award.”
Continuing the US professor added that Osundare is expected to receive even higher recognitions going forward.
Said he: “we know that higher forms of recognition yet will succeed this award, which was conferred on the late Chinua Achebe in 1979. This is inevitable, in that our colleague’s career embodies Wordsworth’s evocation of ‘something evermore about to be.’
Similarly the leading newspaper in the State of Louisiana, The Times-Picayune last week ran a generous story, splashed with Osundare’s hearty photo announcing the selection recently with the headline, UNO professor receives Nigerian National Order of Merit.
In his own reaction to his selection, Osundare told Empowered Newswire before he left the US “I am tremendously pleased, as this is one recognition regime that I recognize in Nigeria.”
He said he had always been impressed about the way the board of the NNMA does its job.
“They are strictly professional, and the board is manned by professors, professionals and higher echelons of the Nigerian academy,” he said enthusiastically.
Osundare, who is also a social critic, explained why he chose to accept the award even though he has been a firm critic of governments and politicians in Nigeria.
“This is not the kind of award you reject. I am impressed by how the NNMA Board has kept this award from contamination from politics. It is an award that has dignity and integrity,” the English professor who had retired from the University of Ibadan observed.
He said the award is one are of “our national life that has not been corrupted by federal character and quota.”
Commenting on the reaction both national and international to the news of his selection for the NNOM, Osundare said “I have never been so overwhelmed.”
He said the overwhelming reactions were not just that he won, but also regarding the quality of the award.
According to him, “people said they are happy that this is happening now in Nigeria’s history. Even here in UNO, my people are saying it is gratifying to have this good news from Nigeria.”
Customarily the incumbent president presents the award every first Thursday of December.
President Goodluck Jonathan presented the award personally at the Aso Rock Council Chambers, while the recipient gave a short vote of thanks at the event.
There have been years that the NNOM was given to a number of academicians on the same year, but the board decided on a sole winner this year.
Prof. Etim Essien, the Chairman of the Governing Board of the NNMA while announcing the winner for this year said: “Prof. Niyi Osundare who through outstanding scholarship, researches and service to humanity in the field of humanities has successfully carved his name in gold in the hearts of people of this nation and many nations of the world.
“Osundare, a poet, dramatist and an essayist, has been Nigeria’s noted nature poet of English language expression, and an accessible serious poet who sets out to engage the reader, and has made most significant contribution to the Nigerian poetic English diction.”