The funeral of Senator Francis Arthur Nzeribe (Ogbuagu, Oshiji Damanze Oyimba) at Sacred heart Catholic Church Oguta, Imo State.

Francis Arthur Nzeribe (bornNovember 2, 1938), a multi-billionaire investment mogul hails from Oguta, Imo State.

A search on his profile shows that he had an aristocratic background. His father, Oyimba Nzeribe, was a lawyer and former state counsel, and his grandfather, Akpati Nzeribe, held the traditional title of Ogbuagu, Oshiji, Damanze Oyimba of Oguta.

His second wife is the sister of Hajia Asabe Yar’Adua, wife of the late General Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua, who was brother of late President Umaru Yar’Adua

Nzeribe lost his mother when he was a primary school student, while his father was away in Great Britain studying law.

His care was taken over by Catholic priests who were involved in furthering his education.

Nzeribe lost his mother when he was a primary school student, while his father was away in Great Britain studying law.

His care was taken over by Catholic priests who were involved in furthering his education.
He attended Bishop Shanahan College, Orlu and Holy Ghost College, Owerri.

In 1957, he travelled to Lagos where he obtained employment with Nigeria’s Port Authority as an engineering cadet, and a year later, he received a scholarship from the organisation to study marine engineering. He took courses at Portsmouth College of Technology and later attended Chesterfield College of Technology in England.

That was immediately after his Secondary education at Bishop Shanahan College, Orlu and Holy Ghost College, Owerri. As a student, he had given hints of the kind of man he would grow up to become. His peers at that famous Catholic School knew him as a non- conformist and goal-getter.

By 1960, he sold life insurance to black immigrants in Britain. At a point, he was said to have met Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, that year and started working for him in the area of public relations. Nzeribe bought his first Rolls Royce car a year later.

After the fall of Nkrumah in 1966, he lost power and influence in Ghana and returned to Europe. That same year, Nzeribe started the FANZ Organization based in London. The organisation dealt in heavy construction, arms, oil brokerage, and publishing and property investment. He joined the club of millionaires at the age of 29. He also engaged in businesses in the Middle East and the Gulf region. By 1979, FANZ had an annual trading turnover of £70 million. Today, he is believed to be worth over $5.5 billion.

In Nigeria, Nzeribe built Sentinel Assurance and other companies. His country home in Oguta is called Haven of Peace, a plush estate that has multiple mansions that still compete with anything you can get anywhere in the country.

His foray into politics in the second republic as a member of the Nigeria Peoples’ Party (NPP) was said to herald money politics, when voters were heavily induced.

During the campaign, Chief Nzeribe, who contested for Orlu seat at the Senate in 1983 had the ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) to contend with and told everyone who cared to listen that “he would match rigging with rigging, naira with naira, fire with fire, stockfish with stockfish and thuggery with thuggery.”

Besides, Chief Nzeribe had a helicopter that hovered in the vicinity of the collation exercise to send signals that he was in control of the environment and well prepared to protect ballot boxes.

Nzeribe in an interview with The Guardian said, “On election day I had 10,000 men in uniform. My men were waiting for them outside the town hall and I was outnumbering the police there four to one. I told the Returning Officer and the Assistant Commissioner of Police,

“Just tamper with my result, look outside, none of us is going home alive. Just look outside. I outnumber you four to one. You can do what you like in this hall. None of us will get out here alive. You had all the chance to campaign. You had all the chance to rig. You didn’t do any of that.

“Now you want to hijack. So what do you do if somebody wants to hijack your thing? Stop him, not so? So I stopped them!” The votes were correctly counted, correctly collated, and correctly announced. Nzeribe won. The fear of death was the beginning of fairness.”

But many will not forget in a hurry how he collected back the aircraft he borrowed the Presidential candidate of the NPP, Dr Nnamidi Azikwe before the election and how he decamped to the NPN shortly after winning election to the Senate under the platform of the NPP.

In 1983, Chief Nzeribe reportedly spent a whopping N12m to win that senatorial seat in Orlu that shot him into the limelight. But his stay at the senate in the second republic was short-lived, as he was sworn-in in October 1983 and there was another military coup in December 31 of the same year by Major General Muhammadu Buhari and Major Gen. Tunde Idiagbon.

Again, the billionaire businessman was elected into the Senate in 1999 and 2003 under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

However, the tide turned against him in November 2002 when the then President of the Senate, Anyim Pius Anyim, suspended him indefinitely, following an allegation of N22m fraud. Nzeribe was said to be planning an impeachment motion against Anyim at the time.

He also attempted to impeach former President Olusegun Obasanjo twice but failed. His power and influence further declined in April 2006, when the Orlu People’s Consultative Assembly, sponsored by the then Governor of Imo State, Chief Achike Udenwa, staged what it called a “One-million-man march” to mobilise support for Nzeribe’s recall from the Senate. In December 2006, Osita Izunaso (with the help of then Gov Achike Udenwa) defeated him during the PDP primary election. However, in August 2007, Nzeribe was appointed a member of the Board of Trustees of the PDP.

Mokason288:

RIP GREAT MAN

Throwback:
Arms Dealer.