A dinner by the Mediterranean

The 2018 edition of the Study Abroad in Lebanon Program, an initiative to boost Lebanese-Nigerian cultural relations, ended with a grand dinner attended by eminent citizens of both countries on Tuesday.

IT was a beautiful evening on Tuesday as the curtains fell on the 2018 edition of the Study Abroad in Lebanon (SAIL) programme at Kalani Seaside Resort, Halat, Lebanon. There couldn’t have been a more befitting finale to the initiative which had seen 10 Nigerian participants drawn from journalism, administration and writing spend 12 enriching but intense days in the beautiful country.

With the lofty objective of teaching Nigerians world history through the eyes of Lebanon but with emphasis on Lebanese-Nigerian cultural relations, it is a programme of the Louaize-based Notre Dame University’s Benedict XVI Endowed Chair of Religious, Cultural, and Philosophical Studies in collaboration with The Cedars Institute and the Wole Soyinka Foundation (WSF).

Two previous sets of Nigerian students had participated in the programme, and the third set, alongside eminent Lebanese and Nigerians from different walks of life, were the ones being treated to a grand banquet by Dr Habib Jaafar, chief donor and promoter of SAIL/WSF Nigeria that Tuesday evening.

The faculty including Professors Edward Alam and Joseph Rahme, Drs Chady Rahme and Tony Nasrallah, chaperone Honoree Claris Eid who oversaw the welfare of the Nigerian mission, Lebanese Rachid Rahme who participated in the program, and Nisreen Kaj, a Lebanese-Nigerian who had hosted the Nigerian contingent to a dinner at her apartment two nights previously, were also among the guests. Nobel laureate and honorary faculty member, Professor Wole Soyinka, who was accompanied by his wife, Folake, was the guest of honour at the dinner held right beside the Mediterranean Sea at the Kalani.

Guests knew right from the onset they were in for a memorable dinner as beautiful ushers, with genuine smiles on their faces, warmly welcomed them. They greeted the guests and offered them tiny cards indicating their tables. They then directed them to the cocktail section where choice drinks and assorted appetizers were waiting. The waiters ensured all cups were filled and that there was enough to munch as people exchanged hugs, kisses and interacted with one another.

Moments later, it was time to eat. Before the meal commenced, Jaafar, the chief donor and promoter who was born in Kano, gave a brief speech on the background of the program and its goals. He also had praises for Professor Soyinka, lauding his brilliance as a writer and his aversion to tyranny and oppression. Jaafar didn’t fail to acknowledge other supporters of the initiative including Mr Faisal Khalil and two others.  “Of course, I’m saying this so that they can continue to support”, he concluded to laughter from the audience.

NDU’s President, Fr. Pierre Najem, who was represented by Professor Alam, thanked Jaafar and his wife for the lovely dinner.  He also acknowledged the magnate’s support for the SAIL/WSF programme. He didn’t fail to appreciate Khalil and the two other backers.

Commenting on the importance of the program, Fr Najem said: “given the significant number of Lebanese living and working in Nigeria, relations between our countries are important; but they are also delicate since this relationship has more often than not, been one dimensional and one-sided. But with the SAIL Nigeria initiative which was started when Professor Soyinka came to NDU over four years ago, we have been encouraged and inspired to stress the cultural and spiritual links between our two countries because without this deeper cultural and spiritual connections, we run the risk of allowing our mutual interchanges, digress into inhumane transactions that forget what’s most important; mainly the dignity of the human person.”

He also referred  to The Anis Makdisi Memorial Lecture delivered by Soyinka the previous day at the American University of Beirut entitled ‘Oh-Oh, Fables Sweeter Than Facts: History, Culture and Revisionism’ where the Nobel Laureate had asserted the importance of facts in the service of the truth for the sake and celebration of human dignity.

The NDU President submitted that “this message, beyond any doubt, is the central message that we in the universities need to promote and witness to in our curriculum and in the very structures of our university institutions which sadly, dangerously have all too often fallen prey to the demands for unjust systems. Such structures which forget the centrality of human dignity cannot produce students who are free and virtuous and critically minded but students who are manipulative and unjust. And who then go on to reinforce the same unbalanced structures in the universities and society at large.

“This is a great challenge, but one which we can face together, especially if we forge agreements between like-minded universities that value genuine liberal education and which tap into the incredible spiritual energy, the human energy that is there if we know where to look for it. In this regard, I’m reminded of the visit of Pope Benedict The 16th   to Cameroon, Angola, and Benin in 2009 and 2011 respectively where he pointed to the profound links between the Catholic beliefs in the communal saints and indigenous African beliefs in the sacred saints and energy of our ancestors. Yes, we can call upon those who have gone before us to help us stay rooted in those traditions that protect and if needs be,  to forgive them or ask to be forgiven by them in order to break the cycles of violence and injustice which show up time and again in each generation.

Fr Najem concluded his speech with a compliment to Soyinka. “Allow me to say that today, we do not really need more technicians, we have plenty of technicians. What we need are more playwrights, more philosophers, more artists, more visionaries, more social activists who are rooted in truth and facts, not historic fables. In a word, we need more Wole Soyinka”, he said.

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Reacting to the speeches, the Nobel Laureate also known as Kongi, said he felt very much at home in the gathering.  He also paid tributes to all involved in the SAIL program, noting that it is a great way to study history and civilizations “through the eyes of a remarkable community of people with their vicissitudes, triumphs, victories, cultural and business acumen.”

Professor Soyinka added that when DrJaafar first invited him to Lebanon, he had told him that most Nigerians believed that the Lebanese were all about commerce and that the impression needed to be corrected before it is held as fact. “I strongly suspect that it was the beginning of this cultural exchange,” he said, adding that the world needs to know more about Lebanon’s rich history, including its wine culture that he also didn’t know about until recently.  Soyinka stressed that the country’s claim to being the home of wine culture needed to be studied to ascertain if it’s fable or fact and that the world needs to take Lebanon seriously as a main centre of human civilizations.

But the night wasn’t about speeches, food and choice wines alone. The Nigerian contingent affirmed that ‘Naija no dey carry last’ (doesn’t come last) with a beautiful rendition of ‘Cedars of Lebanon’,  a song composed by Lanre Fakeye, known as Shakomended in music circles, during the program.  The distinguished gathering appreciated the beautiful song lamenting the exploitation of Lebanon’s cedar trees with a generous applause.

Unsurprisingly, there were a few wet eyes as the Nigerians said their goodbyes to their generous and caring hosts after the sumptuous feast.