On Corruption: “…as a safeguard to the future, it is generally felt that certain criminal offences of some members of the old regime and their agents, irrespective of their tribal or party affiliation, should be brought to book, such as graft and corruption by which some people were able to build up extensive financial empires to themselves which are in no way related to their legal income; any ill-gotten wealth in the hands of such people, whether it is in the form of lands, buildings, factories or cash, should be sequestrated and turned to the people to whom it rightly belongs.
On Corruption: “…as a safeguard to the future, it is generally felt that certain criminal offences of some members of the old regime and their agents, irrespective of their tribal or party affiliation, should be brought to book, such as graft and corruption by which some people were able to build up extensive financial empires to themselves which are in no way related to their legal income; any ill-gotten wealth in the hands of such people, whether it is in the form of lands, buildings, factories or cash, should be sequestrated and turned to the people to whom it rightly belongs.
Without this operation, future politicians may be tempted to continue the thieving policies of the old regime…”
From a letter to General Aguiyi-Ironsi on 2 February 1966
Since neither moral condemnation nor legislation alone can end bribery and corruption ___ because for one thing, ‘the more corrupt the state, the more laws,’ remarked Tacitus, a situation which necessarily breeds more avenues for corruption, what is required is a rapid and substantial development of the economy to create abundant opportunities, goods and services for all, including free housing, education, medicare, family, old age and unemployment allowances, as well as the public control of investment (and perhaps even consumption) to reduce the inducement to amass wealth that cannot be put to use without revelation of its source.
The Growth of Nations, Fourth Dimension Publishers, 1978, p. 330
On Nigerian Unity
“From my readings of history, I know that North-South dualism, such as we now experience, is a world-wide phenomenon _ the USA, Belgium, Italy, Sudan, Dahomey, India, even England and China are obvious examples _ and that the break up of a country is rarely easy or a sure guarantee of peaceful coexistence of the decomposed units thereafter. …with all due deference to those who think otherwise, I do feel very strongly that complete disintegration is neither imperative nor expedient in this age of the greater integration of people and nations.” From a speech to the Eastern Nigeria Consultative Assemble on 26 May, 1967
I want to see extensive teacher and student exchange among the various parts of the country as well as language lessons, youth and workers’ holiday camps which will help to foster national unity. I want to see academies of sciences which will coordinate research and development in the country and a state lottery to check the steady out-flow of funds to foreign football pools and sweepstakes. I want to see a national educational system which will give prominence to history, science, technology, civics, literature and international affairs. I want to see tribal and religious discriminations banned in the nation’s public life and a network of ‘Hyde Parks’ where grievances of all kinds can be ventilated without the Damoclean Sword of libel laws or police batons threatening one __ and these can be supplemented with an institution of the Ombudsman system on the Scandinavian lines.
Embattled Men: Profiles in Social Adjustment, Fourth Dimension Publishers, 1980, p. 114
On Political Parties
A political party, we know, may be corrupted not only by the hope of financial gain but by apathy, arrogance, intolerance, anti-intellectualism, authoritarianism, and parochialism; by the pursuit of sectional rather than national interests; by acceptance of things as they are and the lack of willingness to transform them into what they should be, and above all, perhaps, by lack of respect for truth and justice and the rights of men.
A Letter to Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Fourth Dimension Publishers 1979, p. x
On Nigerian Future
I have faith in the future of Nigeria and the capacity of its youth to make it great, and that is why I have stoically borne all the taunts and victimisations I have suffered at the hands of venal, bourgeois reaction, for I know that in the end youth shall inherit this green and pleasant land.
Embattled Men: Profiles in Social Adjustment, Fourth Dimension Publishers, 1980, p. 116
Compiled by Ifeoma Okoye
(Mokwugo Okoye, a nationalist, historian, philosopher, and writer died on September 21, 1998)
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