BY Tokunbo Ogunbiyi
toksalpha@gmail.com
London, UK



The adulation, encomiums and general praise heaped on General Chukwemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu in the wake of his death last November were thoroughly deserved! It is not often that a life will traverse the nation-space and make such a forceful and far-reaching, if controversial, impact as Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu's did! And what a life it was! It is necessary for us after the dust of the obsequies have settled to take time to examine and meditate on the lessons, if any, that such a life may perhaps teach us. In our frenzied everyday life we often rush past potential nobel prize winners and do not give such a second glance perhaps because they have not fulfilled their potentialities, yet! But it is not unusual for us to gloss over and sometimes pass facile judgement on the lives of even the great. It would be a cardinal error if we did not approach an examination of Ikemba Nnewi's life with uncommon candour allowing for honesty of purpose to enthrone truth in our endeavours.


I submit up front that I am not qualified to carry out such a searching scrutiny of the life of an exceptional man of our times; no, instead I have been moved or better still driven by the waves of response to his passing to issue a clarion to all men and women of goodwill, to all patriots and all who care to share in our common endeavour, otherwise called the Nigeria project to stand up and be counted! And in being counted to take account of this person that ultimately was larger than life!

To be sure Ojukwu himself would have objected to my title above but this is my article and it is my modest and inadequate salute to Ikemba. If he were faced between a choice of this outpouring and the realisation of his dream for Nigeria, I guess I know his choice! But I digress; Ojukwu never set out to be a hero but ended up an authentic Nigerian hero. Such paradox would encapsulate the totality of his persona. An Igbo man born in northern Nigeria in the land of the Gwari and the Nupe, he grew up in Lagos going to school and speaking Yoruba better than many Yoruba, as a schoolboy at King's College Lagos running into trouble with constituted authority in the days when white colonial masters were decidedly not only our betters and superiors but gods incarnate, a blackman as a student of Holman House in Epsom College as he himself described it "amongst a sea of white faces", excelling at rugby, winning prizes which were controversially not awarded to him!

As an Oxford graduate he might have expected to settle into a very good job in the administrative class in Lagos or in Enugu and in due course become a permanent secretary or alternatively joined the already successful family business that spanned everything from road haulage and personnel transport to cement manufacturing and banking, making his father, the late Sir Louis Odumegwu-Ojukwu not only an authentic self-made millionaire but a knight of the British Empire to boot! But it was not to Enugu or Lagos that the young man out of Lincoln College, Oxford headed, but to the eastern provinces at Udi as district officer. My father worked in the colonial civil service in Lagos and Enugu and Udi in those days could not be considered a glam posting! But that was where the bulk of the people lived and Ojukwu set out early to serve the people, not the interests of money or high politics.

But the paradoxes do not end there. It was Ojukwu, perhaps a greater believer in one Nigeria than any of his generation who mobilised the former Eastern Nigeria to break away as Biafra. The circumstances of the bitter days of 1966 and 1967 are too well known to require rehearsal here but let it be understood that the idea of one Nigeria and the unity of Nigeria was tattooed in Ojukwu's blood; how else could it be since as a babe in arms he drank the breast milk of one Nigeria! But then it is not unusual in our political discourse to read and re-read contrary views. Several schools of thought or thoughtlessness exist ranging from those who see Biafra as the triumph of his personal ambition and bloated ego, or the acquisitive Igbo desiring to appropriate the oil riches of the Niger Delta for their sole benefit. So far no one had adduced evidence of the effort made by those with the responsibility of protecting the lives of Nd'Igbo in northern Nigeria in 1966 and 1967 to end the bloodshed. No one either has demonstrated what Igbo should have done, faced with extermination as they indeed were during that dark period.

By his singular and brave and clear-sighted actions in 1966 through to 1970 and beyond Ojukwu held up a mirror to the Nigerian nation and state and invited us to look ourselves in the face. According to the New International Version of the Bible " Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like" (James 1: 23 and 24).

I will conclude by saying that in holding that mirror up Ojukwu became the authentic Nigerian hero because he dared to tell us what we ought to know about ourselves; alas the Nigerian people promptly forgot what they looked like after observing their face in that mirror! All the issues Ojukwu raised and which led us to Biafra remain with us forty six years later!

Good Write up.

Never knew Ojukwu could speak Yoruba better than many Yorubas.

Aringarosa:

BY Tokunbo Ogunbiyi
toksalpha@gmail.com
London, UK



The adulation, encomiums and general praise heaped on General Chukwemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu in the wake of his death last November were thoroughly deserved! It is not often that a life will traverse the nation-space and make such a forceful and far-reaching, if controversial, impact as Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu's did! And what a life it was! It is necessary for us after the dust of the obsequies have settled to take time to examine and meditate on the lessons, if any, that such a life may perhaps teach us. In our frenzied everyday life we often rush past potential nobel prize winners and do not give such a second glance perhaps because they have not fulfilled their potentialities, yet! But it is not unusual for us to gloss over and sometimes pass facile judgement on the lives of even the great. It would be a cardinal error if we did not approach an examination of Ikemba Nnewi's life with uncommon candour allowing for honesty of purpose to enthrone truth in our endeavours.


I submit up front that I am not qualified to carry out such a searching scrutiny of the life of an exceptional man of our times; no, instead I have been moved or better still driven by the waves of response to his passing to issue a clarion to all men and women of goodwill, to all patriots and all who care to share in our common endeavour, otherwise called the Nigeria project to stand up and be counted! And in being counted to take account of this person that ultimately was larger than life!

To be sure Ojukwu himself would have objected to my title above but this is my article and it is my modest and inadequate salute to Ikemba. If he were faced between a choice of this outpouring and the realisation of his dream for Nigeria, I guess I know his choice! But I digress; Ojukwu never set out to be a hero but ended up an authentic Nigerian hero. Such paradox would encapsulate the totality of his persona. An Igbo man born in northern Nigeria in the land of the Gwari and the Nupe, he grew up in Lagos going to school and speaking Yoruba better than many Yoruba, as a schoolboy at King's College Lagos running into trouble with constituted authority in the days when white colonial masters were decidedly not only our betters and superiors but gods incarnate, a blackman as a student of Holman House in Epsom College as he himself described it "amongst a sea of white faces", excelling at rugby, winning prizes which were controversially not awarded to him!

As an Oxford graduate he might have expected to settle into a very good job in the administrative class in Lagos or in Enugu and in due course become a permanent secretary or alternatively joined the already successful family business that spanned everything from road haulage and personnel transport to cement manufacturing and banking, making his father, the late Sir Louis Odumegwu-Ojukwu not only an authentic self-made millionaire but a knight of the British Empire to boot! But it was not to Enugu or Lagos that the young man out of Lincoln College, Oxford headed, but to the eastern provinces at Udi as district officer. My father worked in the colonial civil service in Lagos and Enugu and Udi in those days could not be considered a glam posting! But that was where the bulk of the people lived and Ojukwu set out early to serve the people, not the interests of money or high politics.

[size=18pt]But the paradoxes do not end there. It was Ojukwu, perhaps a greater believer in one Nigeria than any of his generation who mobilised the former Eastern Nigeria to break away as Biafra. The circumstances of the bitter days of 1966 and 1967 are too well known to require rehearsal here but let it be understood that the idea of one Nigeria and the unity of Nigeria was tattooed in Ojukwu's blood; how else could it be since as a babe in arms he drank the bosom milk of one Nigeria! But then it is not unusual in our political discourse to read and re-read contrary views. Several schools of thought or thoughtlessness exist ranging from those who see Biafra as the triumph of his personal ambition and bloated ego, or the acquisitive Igbo desiring to appropriate the oil riches of the Niger Delta for their sole benefit. So far no one had adduced evidence of the effort made by those with the responsibility of protecting the lives of Nd'Igbo in northern Nigeria in 1966 and 1967 to end the bloodshed. No one either has demonstrated what Igbo should have done, faced with extermination as they indeed were during that dark period.

By his singular and brave and clear-sighted actions in 1966 through to 1970 and beyond Ojukwu held up a mirror to the Nigerian nation and state and invited us to look ourselves in the face. According to the New International Version of the Bible " Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like" (James 1: 23 and 24).

I will conclude by saying that in holding that mirror up Ojukwu became the authentic Nigerian hero because he dared to tell us what we ought to know about ourselves; alas the Nigerian people promptly forgot what they looked like after observing their face in that mirror! All the issues Ojukwu raised and which led us to Biafra remain with us forty six years later![/size]

May GOD bless your soul. Let the thruth keep on coming out. I hope The fostrated Animal that call himself Ben AKARA will read this and get elighting
Ojukwu rest in peace

[Le Seigneur t'aime comme tu n'a etait jamais aime, il te guide chaque jour comme une etoile dan la nuit. Quand tu partage le pain,il te donne son amour. C'est le pain de l'aimitie,le pain de dieu.]

Merci, mon frere.

Ojukwu the great Man.

May soul soul rest in peace

May your dream live on