What do you think?
Rate this book
Naira Power
Naira (Nigerian currency) gives Ramonu power over justice up to a point...... When the power fails, the consequences for him are horrifying- and witnessed by the girl who has loved him secretly for years. This heart wrenching story set in 20th century Nigeria uncovers the consequences of greed and corruption side by side with love and loss, and the uncertainty of fatal choices.
Paperback
First published September 1, 1982
4 people are currently reading
256 people want to read
About the author
Buchi Emecheta
26 books610 followersBuchi Emecheta OBE was a Nigerian novelist who has published over 20 books, including Second-Class Citizen (1974), The Bride Price (1976), The Slave Girl (1977) and The Joys of Motherhood (1979). Her themes of child slavery, motherhood, female independence and freedom through education have won her considerable critical acclaim and honours, including an Order of the British Empire in 2005. Emecheta once described her stories as "stories of the world…[where]… women face the universal problems of poverty and oppression, and the longer they stay, no matter where they have come from originally, the more the problems become identical."
From 1965 to 1969, Emecheta worked as a library officer for the British Museum in London. From 1969 to 1976 she was a youth worker and sociologist for the Inner London Education Authority, and from 1976 to 1978 she was a community worker.
Following her success as an author, Emecheta travelled widely as a visiting professor and lecturer. From 1972 to 1979 she visited several American universities, including Pennsylvania State University, Rutgers University, the University of California, Los Angeles, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
From 1980 to 1981, she was senior resident fellow and visiting professor of English, University of Calabar, Nigeria. In 1982 she lectured at Yale University, and the University of London, as well as holding a fellowship at the University of London in 1986.
From 1982 to 1983 Buchi Emecheta, together with her journalist son Sylvester, ran the Ogwugwu Afor Publishing Company.
(from Wikipedia)
From 1965 to 1969, Emecheta worked as a library officer for the British Museum in London. From 1969 to 1976 she was a youth worker and sociologist for the Inner London Education Authority, and from 1976 to 1978 she was a community worker.
Following her success as an author, Emecheta travelled widely as a visiting professor and lecturer. From 1972 to 1979 she visited several American universities, including Pennsylvania State University, Rutgers University, the University of California, Los Angeles, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
From 1980 to 1981, she was senior resident fellow and visiting professor of English, University of Calabar, Nigeria. In 1982 she lectured at Yale University, and the University of London, as well as holding a fellowship at the University of London in 1986.
From 1982 to 1983 Buchi Emecheta, together with her journalist son Sylvester, ran the Ogwugwu Afor Publishing Company.
(from Wikipedia)
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
Read
July 28, 2018Best book ever read
November 23, 2021
I read this in Nairobi. The author explores the theme of family, money and corruption very well. This came to me at a time I needed it.
March 28, 2021
this was a wild ride. Buchi Emecheta knows how to capture ones attention.
October 30, 2023
“Going to the United Kingdom must surely be like paying God a visit,” Buchi Emecheta declared in a BBC One programme The Light of Experience about her perceptions about that island as a little girl growing up in Ibusa, Nigeria. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7cAw... She vowed to someday visit that country; she would go on to live there for decades. Bintu, the narrator of Naira Power by Buchi Emecheta, follows this path. “I am a woman who has stayed more than half of her life in the United Kingdom, pursuing one set of studies and then another,” Bintu introduces herself at the beginning of the novella.
The book opens with Bintu explaining that she has been visiting her family in Lagos, Nigeria and has spent some time with Nurudeen, her younger brother, and his third wife, Amina...While she waits impatiently for her return flight to the UK, Bintu offers to follow Amina to the market. As Amina drives them to the market, they stumble on a mob that has apprehended Ramonu, a man from Amina’s past. A member of the mob tells Amina that Ramonu was caught allegedly pickpocketing “an Ibo man” at the National Stadium in the middle of a football match.
The novel opens on the day that Bintu is expected to fly back to the United Kingdom. Nurudeen rules his house sternly. As he coordinates the house, Bintu remarks, “I could hear my brothers grave and sullen voice say something nasty to this person, or that person. I could hear Lamidi whimper in pain. I knew what had happened, my brother had given him a slap or two…But aggressiveness and rudeness are all part and parcel of being a male, I suppose.” The preceding lines set the tempo for the novella: female solidarity in the face of patriarchy and outright male chauvinism. “My eyes caught hers and we nearly collapsed laughing…For that split second we forgot we were women. We forgot that we were meant to laugh only gently in a subdued, feminine way,” narrates Bintu about the hilarity she and Amina derived from Nurudeen’s strict conduct of the house’s affairs. For a book first published in 1982 under the Macmillan Pacesetters series, the sentiments expressed in the immediately preceding extract are perhaps not strange.
The novella is mostly Amina’s recollections of Ramonu’s life — mostly untoward adventures in the quest for wealth. It turns out that they grew up together at Isalegangan, a fictitious neighbourhood on Lagos Island. “Lemonu was the name of Ramonou’s father. He came to Lagos as a young man. A very long time ago, he travelled from the North to the South to sell his cattle…Lemonu spoke neither English nor Yoruba,” but he found success as a sanitary officer. Lemonu’s story is like many who join the rural to urban drift and make it big by using their wits and derring-do; his is slightly more different because he achieves it somewhat legitimately. As is expected of successful men, Lemonu delves into polygamy, and the deleterious effects on Ramonu is presented to the reader. Ramonu’s relationship with his father hits the rocks as a fall out of this domestic polygamous arrangement, leading Ramonu being disowned by his father. After some years, Ramonu suddenly shows up, wealthy and in a far better financial state than his father had ever been. His past transgressions are forgiven, and he finds favour with the neighbourhood. Everyone wants to be Ramonu’s friend, or wife. “If you don’t have naira power here, Auntie, you are lost. Money can buy you everything, even justice. Everything,” Amina tells Bintu as she narrates the story.
I have little doubt about it; as Naira Power is reprinted and distributed once again, it will be an impactful book for another generation of Nigerians and Africans, especially to the younger readers for whom the Pacesetters series was initially designed.
The book opens with Bintu explaining that she has been visiting her family in Lagos, Nigeria and has spent some time with Nurudeen, her younger brother, and his third wife, Amina...While she waits impatiently for her return flight to the UK, Bintu offers to follow Amina to the market. As Amina drives them to the market, they stumble on a mob that has apprehended Ramonu, a man from Amina’s past. A member of the mob tells Amina that Ramonu was caught allegedly pickpocketing “an Ibo man” at the National Stadium in the middle of a football match.
The novel opens on the day that Bintu is expected to fly back to the United Kingdom. Nurudeen rules his house sternly. As he coordinates the house, Bintu remarks, “I could hear my brothers grave and sullen voice say something nasty to this person, or that person. I could hear Lamidi whimper in pain. I knew what had happened, my brother had given him a slap or two…But aggressiveness and rudeness are all part and parcel of being a male, I suppose.” The preceding lines set the tempo for the novella: female solidarity in the face of patriarchy and outright male chauvinism. “My eyes caught hers and we nearly collapsed laughing…For that split second we forgot we were women. We forgot that we were meant to laugh only gently in a subdued, feminine way,” narrates Bintu about the hilarity she and Amina derived from Nurudeen’s strict conduct of the house’s affairs. For a book first published in 1982 under the Macmillan Pacesetters series, the sentiments expressed in the immediately preceding extract are perhaps not strange.
The novella is mostly Amina’s recollections of Ramonu’s life — mostly untoward adventures in the quest for wealth. It turns out that they grew up together at Isalegangan, a fictitious neighbourhood on Lagos Island. “Lemonu was the name of Ramonou’s father. He came to Lagos as a young man. A very long time ago, he travelled from the North to the South to sell his cattle…Lemonu spoke neither English nor Yoruba,” but he found success as a sanitary officer. Lemonu’s story is like many who join the rural to urban drift and make it big by using their wits and derring-do; his is slightly more different because he achieves it somewhat legitimately. As is expected of successful men, Lemonu delves into polygamy, and the deleterious effects on Ramonu is presented to the reader. Ramonu’s relationship with his father hits the rocks as a fall out of this domestic polygamous arrangement, leading Ramonu being disowned by his father. After some years, Ramonu suddenly shows up, wealthy and in a far better financial state than his father had ever been. His past transgressions are forgiven, and he finds favour with the neighbourhood. Everyone wants to be Ramonu’s friend, or wife. “If you don’t have naira power here, Auntie, you are lost. Money can buy you everything, even justice. Everything,” Amina tells Bintu as she narrates the story.
I have little doubt about it; as Naira Power is reprinted and distributed once again, it will be an impactful book for another generation of Nigerians and Africans, especially to the younger readers for whom the Pacesetters series was initially designed.
July 3, 2019
Captivating
July 5, 2022
How to read the book is impossible
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews