Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Oreoluwa Okediran. It is indeed a great pleasure to stand before you today .
Before I begin reading, I’d like to give you a little context about the piece you are about to hear.
I’m sharing a short excerpt from the novel Madagali, written by my father, Dr. Wale Okediran, who is not only a Nigerian author but also a storyteller deeply interested in the lives of ordinary people caught in extraordinary circumstances.
Madagali is set in a town in north-eastern Nigeria, a region affected by conflict and displacement. It follows the experiences of Lance Corporal Bukar Salisu, a young soldier navigating the challenges of war, moral dilemmas, and personal crises. The novel blends the harsh realities of conflict with reflections on duty, love, and identity.
As his daughter, I’ve had the privilege of seeing how my father draws from real-life experiences, not only to tell a story but also to highlight moral and social questions that resonate with all of us. Today, I will share excerpts from the opening chapter of the book – a scene that captures both the intensity of the battlefield and the inner struggles of the protagonist.
I invite you to listen closely, to imagine the world he has created, and to reflect on the human choices we face when duty, loyalty, and personal desire collide.
Paraphrased excepts from chapter:
The explosions had barely faded when Bukar became painfully aware of a deeper silence the kind that creeps into a soldier’s bones.
The sky was gray with dust; the air, thick with the smell of scorched earth and fear. He lay in the red soil of Madagali, each breath a reminder of how close life and death had met in a flash.
Around him, comrades groaned and spat dirt, but Bukar felt detached, as if watching rather than living. A bullet had found him not in the chest, but in the hidden places where a man’s courage hides.
He traced his fingers along the pain, the absurdity of soldier’s jokes about such wounds still faint on his lips. In this fog of war, he found a strange calm: here, truth was stripped like paint off rusted metal.
War did not only take limbs or breathe fire at the skyline, it reshaped a man’s inner geography his sense of self, his pride, his very belief in tomorrow. Bukar knew then that this day this ambush in Madagali would mark him in ways a medal never could.
The desert wind whispered through torn tents and shattered rifles. Somewhere beyond the smoke, orders were still being shouted.
But Bukar’s thoughts had turned inward: If this was survival, what did it now mean to be alive? And with that question came a kind of fear deeper than any battlefield shriek a fear not of death, but of losing the man he had been.
Closing line:
And there, amid the smoke and echoes of gunfire, Lance Corporal Bukar Salisu stood, torn between duty and desire, between fear and hope — a man whose choices would shape not only his fate, but the lives of those around him. In Madagali, every decision carries weight, and the question remains: what would you do if the world demanded you choose between your heart and your honour?
Thank you.
