Sta,--Mr. Eric Sevareid is rightly provocative in his continents on
Nigeria and one might question much of what he says. May I take him up on two points? I. Although I have been closely interested in music in the Eastern region since 1939, I do not seem to have heard very much of 'the Nigerian composer, Dr. Stephen Rhoades,' who is so pessimistic about the results of his single-handed 'efforts to revive and re- Popularise the ancient Yoruba and Ibo music.' But I have been the neighbour for eight years of Mr. Wilberforce Echezona, whose broadcasts of record- ings of original Ibo music of all kinds have been very P°Pular, and under whose influence there must be dozens of young men composing the most elaborate Music of a distinctively Ibo character and great varietY, which is much preferred to anything im- ported. There is also a lively interest in all forms of traditional dancing.
2. As a Nigerian customer I find it hard to under- stand why British manufacturers are content to en- dure the complacency and inefficiency of the British firms to whose agency they entrust their business. A foreign firm has been allowed to capture the greater Part of the radio trade because it immediately estab- lished efficient servicing. The comparable English firm had, until two or three years ago. only one man at work in the Eastern region and he was very short °f spares. Their publicity has now improved, and
People are asking for their sets because of their superior quality, but the chance of dominating a large new market seems to have gone.
We have our own electricity supply from a plant
Manufactured by a British firm with a world-wide rePutation for quality, and we have had good ser- vice from it, because we have been able to do the Servicing of it ourselves. I do not know of any other Plant of that make which has not lain idle for months at a
time because of the inefficiency of the agents,
and 1 have heard many say that they will not buy that make of plant again. We have had trouble allowed ourselves in getting spares, as we are not ?eci to get them straight from the maker. On several occasions I have found after months of in- 9airY that the goods have still not been ordered. It is disturbing that firms of the standing of the two I have in mind should apparently be at the mercy of such inefficiency.—Yours faithfully.
Pri D. F. C. HAWKINS
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