Good leaders do not necessarily make the best decisions; they make necessary decisions. Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, who died last week, took the necessary decisions for his people at critical times. The Ikemba definitely fascinated me as an enigma, underlined by the fact that the reasons for my captivation are the same for which his fans adore him, some Igbo revere him, his critics berate him, and his enemies loathe him, all at the same time.
Good leaders do not necessarily make the best decisions; they make necessary decisions. Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, who died last week, took the necessary decisions for his people at critical times. The Ikemba definitely fascinated me as an enigma, underlined by the fact that the reasons for my captivation are the same for which his fans adore him, some Igbo revere him, his critics berate him, and his enemies loathe him, all at the same time.
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That paradox is definitely not of the Ikemba’s creation. Ojukwu was not a complex human being, not by any measure. On the contrary, he came across as sincere and straightforward. Unlike many of his slithery comrades both in the military and in politics, you could see Ojukwu coming from ten miles. When pressed to apologise for taking the Igbo to war, he declared without equivocation, “We didn’t declare war on anybody”. As for a solution to the AIDS crisis in Africa he said, “I don’t know. I am not a doctor”. As Chido Nwangwu observed in 1999, “There exist, rarely, grey areas about this man”.
Unfortunately, friends and foes alike pre-paint unreasonable pictures of the man, attributing to him things that he did not say, imputing motives to him that he did not agree. Consequently, many notably from the North and the West were reluctant to listen to him. And of those, mainly Igbo, that listened a large proportion either did not understand the Ikemba’s message or chose deliberately to misrepresent him.
He spoke to anyone that cared to listen, even though he chose what he spoke. For example, he refused to publish his war memoirs, insisting he would not, until General Yakubu Gowon first writes his own account. He entertained big international media names but also had time for young upcoming journalists. In the process, he said things that many people, friends and foes alike, did not like to hear. In fact, one of the hallmarks of Emeka Ojukwu was that he spoke things some people would not speak and to which some others would not like to listen. It is a hallmark of true leaders, but not of politicians. Emeka Ojukwu was a leader. He was not a politician. Thus, I consider it a tribute to his memory, that some of us are prepared to say things about the Ikemba now, which others, friends and foes alike, may not like to hear.
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The North could not see beyond Emeka the rebel. Western Nigerians were fixated on the unwise war general. The greater problem, however, is that his profound insights into Nigeria’s history and his aspirations for the country’s politics disappeared into a sea of his own people’s wishful beatification of Ojukwu. Put off by tall Igbo tales, the rest of Nigeria consequently failed to accord the man the respect that his well-informed messages deserved. It sounds cliché but Ojukwu is truly one of those leaders that came before their time.
More than Oxford degrees, on which I will comment later, Ojukwu’s philosophical understanding of Nigeria’s history and politics was a result of his practical knowledge of the country. He was born (coincidentally, as the late Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe) in Zungeru in northern Nigeria. He spent his adolescence in Lagos in the West and served most of his Nigerian Army career in the North. Those antecedents not only enabled him speak better Yoruba than many natives but also gave him a sense of belonging in any part of greater Nigeria, at the same time as being fittingly a proud Igbo man. However and as all humans, the man had his own foibles.
While other people have written a lot especially about his civil war roles, his political (mis)adventures, and his love of the good life, which I do not want to repeat here, there are other areas that I consider worthy of mention.
I will not go as far as label the Ikemba, the way some do, as another spoilt son of a rich father but there is evidence (Frederick Forsyth) that his family background inspired in him a sense of entitlement to Nigeria’s rulership. Something he hypocritically but constantly criticised of Nigeria’s Fulani rulers. Ironically, for a people that constantly lecture the rest of the country on their traditional democracy, majority of Igbo people appear to subscribe to the notion that Emeka Ojukwu’s wealthy heritage and schooling, places him at par with Nigeria’s Fulani princes. More than that, it seems, they believe it qualifies him for the same entitlement to that well known born to rule mentality. It probably explains why the Igbo show unbelievable annoyance when other Nigerians are not as impressed with Ojukwu’s family heritage and his education, as they are.
The truth is that Yoruba nobles and scholars had been graduating from Oxford and Cambridge for over a century before Ojukwu and, as Salisu Suleiman wrote recently, Sokoto princes like Alhaji Abubakar Alhaji and Shehu Malami even spent their holidays in Buckingham Palace while studying in the UK. Some people may acknowledge heritage but they respect only individual achievements.
Apart from the President, probably only two other living Southerners could make the type of journey that General Olusegun Obasanjo made two months ago, to mediate in the Boko Haram crisis, and come out alive. One is Obasanjo himself. The other person was Dim Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu. As if to underline their bare tolerance, the actors promptly murdered Obasanjo’s host within forty-eight hours. I recall that incident for a purpose.
For different reasons, Obasanjo and Ojukwu personify (personified, in Ojukwu’s case now) their ethnic nations within Nigeria’s current political dispensation, in a way that no other member of those nations can. The wisdom is that a lethal attack on any of the two would constitute an attack symbolically on his nation. It explains why, though Ojukwu lost elections to politicians in Anambra, the Igbo still plan a global funeral, and demand an official national burial for him. It is a fitting tribute to a tentative politician but an indisputable leader of his people.
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