PHILIPSBURG:--- Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs received SOS: Season of Storms here on Wednesday from the book’s author, Fabian Adekunle Badejo, said his publisher House of Nehesi (HNP).
The new poetry collection, presented to Prime Minister Jacobs on International Literacy Day, opens with a live wire of experiences borne of hurricanes Irma and Maria. Prime Minister Jacobs told Badejo that she was looking forward to reading the poems.
“In SOS: Season of Storms Badejo focuses firstly on the St. Martin story. He offers, as memories or solutions, clear, crafted poems about ‘cackling children,’ the elderly, the mentally disturbed, Dutch marines, and disaster hazards faced by the general population of our ‘Borderless’ St. Martin,” said HNP projects director Lasana M. Sekou.
“SOS is also a witness that in his writings right after the storms, Badejo exposed what would become challenges in Dutch disaster relief,” said Sekou. “He did this ahead of the delivery shortcomings that have been arising between The Hague and the territory’s government in Great Bay, headed by Prime Minister Jacobs.”
Following Wednesday’s presentation, Badejo said, “I’m confident that Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs will identify with, and hopefully draw good use from the poems in SOS as they move from hurricanes to protests, to COVID-19 life and death issues instead of statistical incidents,” said Badejo.
Highlighted among Badejo’s protest poetry is the PPRN land issue in the northern part of St. Martin and the anti-corruption “#EndSARS NOW!” in Nigeria.
The third main theme of the book is found in the chapter by the same name, “Pandemic.”
SOS: Season of Storms is available at Arnia’s and Van Dorp bookstores, SOS radio station in Marigot, the African Market store on Frontstreet, Amazon, and SPDbooks.org.
