‘’The fact of a competitive upset, we repeat, is the heartbeat of being Igbo. All else is in humor. Ahiazuwa.’’
By Jimanze Ego-Alowes
TUE, MARCH 19 2019-theG&BJournal-Rochas Okorocha is the outgoing governor of Imo State. But the real story is that his charge and third term placeholder was beaten silly in the last governorship election, in the said Imo State. Mr. Uche Nwosu, for such is the placeholder’s name, happens to be the son in-law of the said Okorocha.
To concoct the ”government magic” of replacing himself with his doppelganger son in-law, Okorocha took to selling the snake-oil that the Igbo generally and Ndi-Imo particularly, deride him because he associates with northerners. And his proof? That he was given the moniker – Okoro-Awusa. And he went on to posit that the more the Igbo derided him, the greater his fortune in the hands of the north. In other words, the easier come his strides into the Nigerian presidency.
As things are, the confessions of Okorocha himself constitute the evidence in chief that his deal with the north is in tatters. Okorocha is now a political flotsam. See: https://punchng.com/were-not-behind-okorochas-predicament-apc-vice-chairman/
Yet, all these are just by the way. The real thing is that being a governor as an Okorocha is, only gives one power. And it is power over little and mundane things, as initialing cheques, begging for more votes etc. When matters become rarefied, like in having the cognition to discern reality, high office, even up to the presidency, is of little use.
In other words, that Okorocha is governor does not indicate he knows what ails him. And nothing suggest this more than his take on his Okoro-Awusa moniker.
For the benefit of non-Igbo speakers, then the following. Okoro, means loosely, son of, or of. So Okoro-Ocha means, of the clan of the fair skinned. Awusa is Igbo for Hausa-Fulani or northern. Thus, Okoro-Awusa is Igbo for, of the northern. It should also be on notice that Okorocha like many Igbo – who are often ”Diasporic” – was born or grew up outside Igbo land. In his case, in the north.
The following facts are then important. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Generals Aguiyi Ironsi, Odumegwu Ojukwu, Ike Nwachukwu, Emeka Omeruah etc. were all born or grew up in the north. And they also served in various offices in Igbo land. Not one of them, unlike Okorocha, was dubbed or derided with an Awusa adjectival.
Thus, it is safe to state that the tagging of Okorocha as Okoro-Awusa is idiopathic, as the doctors would say. Thus, it has nothing to do with his upbringing in the north or his Hausa language baggage. His upbringing and Hausa speaking skills are indications he shares with the other Igbo, like Azikiwe, Ojukwu, Nwachukwu etc. In fact, Nwachukwu it is believed, is the offspring of an Hausa-Fulani princess. Yet, even in the Nwachukwu case nothing was ever charged of his ”northerness.”
So the question is, what makes Okorocha so specific, so idiopathic, he had to be branded Okoro-Awusa? The answer is simple. Okorocha, who is Igbo, insisted on ruling like a pre-colonial, even mediaeval northern emir. Check out this. Just about all persons that represent the Imo quota in Abuja and Imo establishments, are direct relations of Okorocha, by blood, sexual connections and or marriage. This Okorocha nepotistic monstrosity was so much it never happened in history, since Eshi founded the Oru na Igbo nation.
So, what is the linking metaphor with the north? It may not be clear to many, but this is a fact of history. The Greater Sultanate, that is including its tributary emirates in Zaria, Kano, Ilorin etc. are all ruled by the descendants of one ”in living memory” progenitor. In other words, whatever else the Greater Sokoto Caliphate is, it is a well oiled, well sustained, nepotism as a rulership machine.
Yes, some long passage of history may have blurred this fact of ruling Hausa-Fulani nepotism, but that is what it is. That is to say for the Hausa-Fulani aristocracy, as expressed in Nigeria, historically and today?, public power and office, and even other commons, constitute a closely guarded family asset.
This articulation of power and office as a private family asset is what Okorocha was about introducing into Igbo land. In other words he willed to disrupt and alter the sociology of the Igbo. That is to say that Okorocha is anti-Ofo na Ogu and thus anti-Igbo.
And this showed in his language. For example: “In other parts of the country, Onyeriri would not have contemplated contesting the senatorial election the moment he heard or knew that Owelle Okorocha was in the race. But, in this part of the country, anything goes. https://www.sunnewsonline.com/imo-west-youre-too-small-to-run-against-me-okorocha-tells-onyeriri/
For Umu-Imo, the point is: if challenging Okoro-Awusa in other parts of Nigeria is unacceptable to them, it is not only acceptable, it is most welcome and encouraged in Igbo land. To emphasize this, just during the last election Nnewi people went overboard to teach an heir to a billionaire fortune some lesson on Igbo sociology. The lucky sperm kid had chided one of his co-contestants that he is the son of an ordinary akara seller. How dare he challenge him, the son of a mogul and trained in London?
Furious, all Nnewi rose in unison as the Igbo are taught to do in such hours as this. All Nnewi sacked the lucky sperm impostor with electoral ignominy. Perhaps, no other persona gives the sharpest cut on being Igbo in this respect than Chinua Achebe. In his great novel, Achebe concluded in the first pages: ”In the end Okonkwo threw the Cat.”
The fact of that, of a competitive upset, we repeat, is the heartbeat of being Igbo. Yes, all we call for is excellence, but only as the Attic Greeks – competitive, competed for and not as Okoro-Awusa bestowed – excellence.
It is in this bestowal of uncontested for excellence, which Okorocha claims is northern, that yields the etymology of his moniker – Okoro-Awusa. It is not in his connections with northerners, the fact of which is too common with Ndi-Igbo. All else is in humor. Ahiazuwa.
Memories of My Father – A tribute to Josiah Udeaham Ohiaeri ( Nwa Ohiaeri), 1919-2019
My father, Josiah Udeaham Ohiaeri, known to all, by his famous exclamation, Nwa Ohiaeri!!, was born in January 1919 and lived for a century , before his peaceful demise in his sleep at 4.00pm on January 2, 2019. His, was a life of permanent adventure and challenges, brought about by a challenged early life in a rustic setting and the liberating feelings of education, travel and interaction with diverse cultures.
From the rustic village of Umudurunna, Abba, he was able to escape into the world of education and adventure, via the Dennis Memorial Grammar Scho (DMGS), Onitsha, a premier educational institution in colonial Eastern Nigeria. While at DMGS, he was recruited as an auxiliary police officer towards the later stages of the Second World War. Decommissioned just prior to getting a Grade 1 School Certificate in 1942, he immediately embarked on what would be a lifelong adventure of interregional travel and a permanent fixation with understanding of the multicultural society that was colonial Nigeria.
From Moore Plantation in Ibadan, western Nigeria, he traversed the vast agricultural territories of Northern Nigeria as researcher in Agriculture for the colonial Government at the Nigerian Institute of Science and Technology, the precursor to the Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria. The thirst for knowledge and adventure saw him accept the opportunity of higher education in the United Kingdom, at the Essex Institute of Technology, Chelmsford, Essex, where he bagged a Diploma in Agricultural Engineering in 1966, just as the descent to infamy in Nigeria commenced.
Coming back to the embattled Eastern Nigeria, he applied his knowledge of agriculture to the survival of his people, as agricultural fortunes, more than even the military, sustained the people in that tragic period of 1966-1970. At the end of that infamous period of excruciating hunger and banality of human evil, he again set to work to help alleviate the sufferings of the people in Eastern and even the rather unfriendly North of Nigeria. He spent all his useful life in the service of the development of food production techniques that ensured that the hunger that he saw in 1966-1970 was erased from the memory of succeeding generations.
As a father, Nwa Ohiaeri was a doting parent to all his four children Ngozi, Iheanyi, Olunwa and Chioma, ten grandchildren and two great grandchildren as well as all the vast Ohiaeri brood, where he was known by the youngest generation, as Papa Ajasc, for his funny stories. He had lost his first wife Flora in October 1955 and was again visited by tragedy when he lost his second wife, Mabel, in April 2006. He bore his losses with great courage and equanimity, buoyed by the fact that the products of the two marriages made him happy to be alive.
He was the great curator of the history of the Ohiaeri family, keeping impeccable records, while combining his physical record-keeping with the attributes of an African griot, the great repositories of the history and culture of the people, who unfortunately, because of an absence of written history, have been lost in the decline of history in modern African life. Thankfully, my father kept both written and storytelling records of the past of not only the Ohiaeri family, but also the history of his town Abba and Eastern, Western and Northern Nigeria, where he spent an adventurous life. I am very grateful to have acquired some of these historical skills, even if I was inclined to a purely technical education and career. It was my father that taught me about the importance of home, roots and family, as explicitly stated in his many poems, one of which is reproduced below:
”What a friend I have in mother//Who did long suffer for me,//I will never never forget//Mother whatever may be//Whether she is young or too old//Whether living or whether dead,
Mother is my great inspirer//Mother, you are dear to me!” My Mother, Mokwa, 1961
As we commit his body to mother earth on Friday, March 29, 2019, we cannot but be very grateful to both God and man, for the opportunity to live with and imbibe the great attributes of our patriarch, Josiah Udeaham Ohiaeri (Nwa Ohiaeri). May his soul rest in perfect peace in the bosom of the Lord. Iheanyi Nwa Ohiaeri (Nnaa), March 21, 2019. By Dr. Iheany Nwa-Ohiaeri.
Jimanze Ego-Alowes (PhD) is Author and public commentator
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