Jekwu Ozoemene

Nigerian Banker, Poet and Playwright, Jekwu Ozoemene, is from Awka in Awka-South Local Government Area of Anambra State Nigeria. Born in Lagos, Nigeria on February 26, 1973, he grew up in Vienna, Austria where he lived with his parents until 1979. From 1979 to 1990, during Ozoemene’s primary and secondary school years, he resided in Awka and attended Federal Government College Enugu Nigeria (as a boarding student) where his membership of the school’s drama club sowed the initial seeds for his romance with the theatre as a Playwright and subsequently as a Director. He later earned a degree in English from the University of Lagos Akoka-Yaba in Lagos and was a prominent member and coordinator of the foremost theatre group on campus at the time, the Theatre 15 Unilag (also known as T15). He went on to obtain a Specialist MBA in Finance from the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom.Ozoemene was inspired to write his first collection of poetry while listening to Professor Karen King Aribisala’s reading of D.H. Lawrence’s Snake in her ‘Practical Criticism’ Class of 1993 at the University of Lagos. In addition has written six unpublished stage plays; Nightmare (1996), Hell’s Invitation (1997), This Time Tomorrow (1998), Objections Overruled (2000), We Will Live (an adaptation of Hell’s Invitation) in 2008 and The Anger of Unfulfillment (2010). Four of the plays have since been staged on several occasions in Nigeria, most of which have featured at the prestigious Muson Centre, Victoria Island, Lagos. In 2009 Ozoemene published his first anthology of poetry in the Editor’s Choice winning book, Shadows of Existence, An Anthology of Poetry. In the words of the Foreword Clarion Review, ‘ Jekwu Ozoemene’s poetry collection, Shadows of Existence, is one with something to say. Here, the poet touches on everything from gender and abuse to poverty and consumerism. These poems focus on the African continent and on a culture that is as unique as it is problematic. Like a badge on a uniform, this poet’s politics are as loud and proud as the poem’s layered rhyme schemes and rich imagery…………….This is a book for readers who want bold yet easy-to-understand poems about a truly unique culture. For better or for worse, Ozoemene is a poet who wears his heart on his sleeve. The rough-around-the-edges honesty of these pieces makes them that much more honest and endearing. More than a death march, these poems are a rallying cry to an unchanged nation in need of updating. To take on bigotry and prejudice is no easy feat. And yet, Ozoemene does not flinch’.Between 2006 and 2007, Ozoemene worked (and lived) in The Hague as a Senior Investment Officer in the Africa Department of the Netherlands Development Investment Company (FMO). He currently lives in Port Harcourt, Nigeria with his wife and two young children and is a Regional Manager with Access Bank Plc. He enjoys reading, running, watching movies and stage plays, exercising, and facilitating youth mentoring programs. He also teaches Project & Real Estate Finance at the Financial Institutions Training Centre (FITC) in Lagos Nigeria, serves on the Presidential Implementation Committee on Affordable Housing, and is a key resource person to the Federal Ministry of Environment, Housing and Urban Development on Title and Mortgage Insurance.