SYNOPSIS

RED FACE surveys the themes of authority, corruption and devevelopment in post-independent NIgeria. The characters of the Play, especially Ihuaku, battles the challenges of living in Nigeria and the complexity of identity that faces the Nigerian.

Ihuaku, a civil servant, is forced to resign from service because of conflict between her faith and official corruption. In the private sector, determined to make it in business, she is faced with the same force. Redface is a chronicle of her struggles to maintain integrity.

REDFACE

PROLOGUE
(dressed like a local hunter, with a mask on his face, he enters with dance, to the rhythm of ibo beats, the gong, the flute and the xylophone playing the Nigerian national anthem).

The antelope we caught, we canot eat;
The cricket we caught, we cannot eat;
The tiger we rode, we cannot eat.
The cow we bought, we cannot eat.
The chickens we bred, we cannot eat.
Our hearts have been painted
with the colour of grace and the shade of disgrace
And we are left with a red face.

My feet, my walk is crampled with sluggish mud
I have cried and I have laughed
But there is something I am yet to do.
Silence, nothing, these are not for me;
for If I but keep silence, who shall speak for me?
If I do nothing, what shall become of me?

The burden I bear these fifty years
Weigh heavily on my tired soul.
Stories have been toled and many have listened
Histories have been written and many have read them
What is left? Tell me what is left?

We are sorrounded by civilisation and barbarism
by mysticism and mystique
We are encircled by opportunities and the chaos of it
But why do we always turn these into an earthquake?

I left Lagos, Abuja, Kaduna,Enugu and Makurdi
I will go there. I will not go there!
What am I saying? What are you hearing?
The burden of these fifty years
Wigh ehavily on my happy heart.

Cheerful me, I am poisoned with a red face
Things have fallen apart, falling is now an art.
And me, who will give me a heart transplant?

I welcome you to this world of mine;
One I came to know since I was nine;
If you can make it better, if you can make it happier;
I want a change to my red face.