The First World Festival of Black Arts was held in 1966 Dakar, Senegal. Nigeria was invited to hold the second festival in 1970. This second festival, called the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture was to be held in November/December 1975. Political problems in Nigeria caused the festival to be postponed for some years, but it was finally staged as "Festac '77" in Lagos in January, 1977.

As part of the preparations for Australia’s involvement in the festival, an Australian Coordinating Committee was formed in February 1974. In October 1974 Kath Walker was asked to become involved in this committee. Kath Walker attended the 5th meeting of the International Festival Committee held in Kaduna in November 1974. On her return flight, the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) plane she was travelling on was hijacked in Dubai and flown to Tunisia. The hijack lasted three days, and one passenger was killed. She wrote two poems during this ordeal (held in Series A Subseries 1).

During the lead up to the Festival in 1977, Kath Walker was involved in the preparations for the event and eventually attended it as an Australian delegate and senior advisor.

These folders include documents from the Department of Aboriginal Affairs; correspondence, meeting agendas, minutes and reports for the Nigerian Co-coordinating Committee of the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture; an open letter to the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies (dated 24 Jul 1975) regarding the poems, Yussef and Commonplace which she wrote when her plane was hijacked; reports from other countries; contract between Kath Walker and The Elizabethan Theatre Trust; Itineraries and quotations for proposed group travel to Nigeria with general background information about Africa from ACTU World Travel; Aboriginal Theatre Foundation - correspondence with Department of Aboriginal Affairs and interim reports regarding costings and budget for dancers, musicians and song men for trip to festival; and Tickets, invitations, brochures, programmes, report by Kath Walker about festival to the Australia Council, souvenirs, 1977.