The Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) on Saturday solicited for private and Federal Government's support in the building of Mamman Vatsa writers' village in Abuja.

Prof. Remi Raji, the National President of the association, made the plea in interview with News Agency of Nigerian (NAN).

Raji said that the plan to build the village began in 1985 when the late Maj.-Gen. Mamman Vatsa allocated the land for the association to build a world-class writers' village in Mpape district, Abuja.

He thanked God and every member of the association who had contributed to the realisation of the dream of the late writer.

NAN reports that the president of the association performed the inauguration of the writers' village on Jan. 24.

Vatsa was an accomplished poet and writer, with eight poetry collections for adults and 11 for children, with titles such as Back Again at Wargate (1982), Reach for the Skies (1984) and Verses for Nigerian State Capitals, (1973), among others.

He was a Major-General in the Nigerian Army, a Minister of the Federal Capital Abuja, and was executed by government in 1986 for an alleged complicity in a coup d'état.

NAN