I found something really interesting in my literature archives! An article on ‘Buying Nigerian’ that I saved ages ago from Next 123, the online newspaper. There was a column called Rukky’s Frocks by Rukky Ladoja that I always enjoyed reading. It’s such a shame that the paper stopped printing. I hope Rukky returns to writing, in addition to running her fashion label ‘Grey’ (www.begrey.com), because her dry wit and perception were always a delight to read.

RUKKY’S FROCKS: The Problem with Buying Nigerian

Rukky Ladoja

November 21, 2010 12:00AMT

Listen, I’ve seen people do irrational things for fashion: forget their kids at school or spend the groceries budget on a pair of shoes. C’est la vie. I’ve done my share of the unjustifiable. Which is why I’m certain that the problem with buying Nigerian has nothing to do with the price, quality or accessibility, but everything to do with our mentality.

You’ve probably heard of the buy Nigerian initiative championed by the Nigerian fashion website stylehousefiles.com. Surely, you’ve heard of it? Except you’ve been paying attention to more important things like a royal engagement or trivial ones like politics, Third World development, the fate of asylum seekers…

The buy Nigerian campaign asks that every fashionista wear something-anything-made in Nigeria, right from a shoehorn, a dented bangle to a scrap of fabric, every day for a month. The aim is to jump-start the local fashion industry and encourage better productivity, competition and quality in the industry. Instead of giving your disposable income to ungrateful international brands, tis about time you brought it back home. To the ungrateful brands here. That you spend it with the same reckless abandon you might do abroad, at the bend-down boutiques or online.
Naturally, I’m all in support. I embrace it. If could afford to, I’d make T-shirts in commemoration and send one to each of you for Christmas. Aside from the success of such a campaign putting some shiny kobo in my handbag, I know what retail therapy can do to one’s endorphins. And if it helps a designer become irritatingly smug about their creativity and preferred career choice, why the hell not?

Which is why, to my great dismay, the campaign is getting more backlash than one would have expected. Everything in the world gets some backlash. This is the truth: Owambe parties, the Obama campaign and even the Dalai Lama. Some backlash is mandatory. But this much for this campaign? Not so much. And with misplaced reasons nonetheless.

Some have argued that the biggest obstacle to shopping Nigerian has been the price. Being a nation of well-endowed misers, of money stealing, opportunity-grabbing citizens, that the biggest problem with buying Nigerian is how expensive everything is. Total bollocks.
Sure we all inhale, wail and set sail, imagining our tailors in Sura market or Obalende can probably recreate Nigeria’s finest pieces, but given the infrastructural constraints, the same that drive up the price of everything else in Nigeria-fuel, cars, buckets and printing-most prices of Nigerian made clothes can be justified.

And for those that seem completely outrageous, why not embrace the mantra: “if at the first designer you don’t succeed, try and try again”. The unjustifiable prices of a few designers should never be the reason not to buy Nigerian, not when the plethora and variety of options keep expanding.

Other problems include: the quality of the clothes and accessibility to the designers. Often times, Nigerian designers struggle with fabric, finishing and/or the extent to which they are “inspired” by other designers’ work. But you can often tell them to sort it out and like I said earlier, if you really do have an issue with it, you simply don’t buy from that label. Choose another.

And on the accessibility front, i.e., the unbelievable indignity of having to book an appointment or drive in hours of traffic to drop your hard-earned money, unfortunately no location has been carved out as a fashion district or high street for easy pedestrian access. But with one-day sales like Fusion and Le Petit Marche, by Jove, the argument practically loses its humour. Plus let’s be honest here, shall we? Between you and I, if you were in some foreign country and knew a designer in the furthest, most inconvenient corner of the city, you’d still be more than happy to take the time to go searching.

Which brings me to the real problem about shopping Nigerian. Prejudice. The issue we have with buying here is not in our purses, uneven hemlines or three-hour traffic jams. The real problem is in our heads: our mentality and attitude to everything made in Nigeria. We’ve been mentally programmed to belittle the local goods. To be suspicious of cheap products and decry the expensive ones. To look for faults that don’t exist, exaggerate those that do and make up the ones that should.

Every one of the most frequently mentioned problems with buying Nigerian exists all over the world and in every industry. I’ve bought dresses from Portobello with their seams falling apart. Simply because… well, simply because. We will pay and can blindly justify the prices of international high-end fashion based on nothing more than location. The mantra “Nigerian good, international better” lets us do so. It’s why corporate Nigeria is willing to pay more to employees with an international background.

But what I’m doing. I’m not sitting here, expecting a change in alliances. From international to local. That would be naive. I’m merely asking for some honesty. And the truth is the reason why we don’t buy Nigerian has nothing to do with the excuses we give. The real reason we don’t buy has to do with our snobbery, the superiority or smugness we feel from buying anything that is from the “abroad”, even when those items pale in comparison to those found locally.