Former Second Republic president of the Senate, Dr Joseph Wayas, recently passed on at the age of 80 after a protracted illness in a London hospital. The death of the flamboyant politician and ace administrator came at a time the nation needs his wise counsel. At 38, he became Nigeria’s third Senate President and the first Senate President to act as executive president of Nigeria in 1983 for 16 days when former President Aliyu Shehu Shagari and former Vice President Dr Alex Ekwueme were outside the country. He was also the first Senate president to be reelected into office. His political ascendancy was meteoric.
As a political neophyte, no one gave him a chance in the contest for the Ogoja senatorial district on July 9, 1979. Not only was his opponent, Mathew Mbu, a nationalist and First Republic minister, the doyen of the politics of the area for more than 50 years, his party, the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) was less popular than the popular Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP) on whose platform Mbu rode. He defied all odds to beat Mbu in a landslide and subsequently subdued another heavyweight, Senator David Dafinone, at a shadow election at the Federal Palace Hotel, Lagos, on September 22, 1979, to fly the flag of the South-South region of the party in the contest for the Senate presidency.
Like a force that was unstoppable, he went on to defeat the former Chief Judge of Old Bendel State, Senator Franklin Atake of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) to become the Senate president. His doggedness, perseverance and inimitable fighting spirit also impacted on the political transformations that occurred in his native Cross River State at the time. As a leader of the all conquering “Lagos Front” group, he was instrumental to the defeat of the then governor of the State, Dr Clement Isong in the 1983 NPN governorship primaries and his replacement with Senator Donald Etiebet who eventually won the 1983 governorship election in the state in 1983. Under him, the group dictated the pace of politics in the state till the end of the Second Republic.
During the aborted Third Republic, Wayas was also a force to be reckoned with. He was a member of the 1994/1995 National Conference and a founding member of the defunct All Peoples Party (APP) in 1998. At the prompting of the then Cross River State governor, Donald Duke, he defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). His political thoughts and philosophy were anchored on true federalism as a stabilising force in Nigeria’s democracy. Although he retreated on account of old age and failing health, he was very critical of the local council reforms by the Federal Government in 2003, and labelled it “unconstitutional.”
In 2009, he described post-election petitions as “senseless, reckless and time wasting.” He was also in the vanguard of those who backed the “doctrine of necessity” that made it possible for the then vice president, Goodluck Jonathan, to act in the stead of the then ailing president, Umaru Yar’Adua, in January 2010. After the collapse of the Second Republic in 1983, he went on self- exile abroad and returned to Nigeria in 1987 and was detained for one year at Kirikiri Prisons. He was a strong believer in one Nigeria.
He anchored his preference for one Nigeria on the fact that unity is the plank on which the achievement of its long-term goals will be realised. The former number three citizen was also a proponent of zoning leadership positions in the country. According to him, apart from creating balance, it gives everyone and every section of the country a sense of belonging. Wayas was a principled politician and a committed Nigerian patriot. His sense of justice earned him respect among his colleagues and other Nigerians. He was a statesman who played a critical role in the nation’s political development. We urge the Federal Government to immortalise him.
The late Wayas was born on May 21, 1941 in Bassang, Obudu, Obanliku Local Government Area of Cross River State. He attended Dennis Memorial Grammar School, Onitsha. Thereafter, he proceeded to the United Kingdom where he studied at the Higher Tottemham Technical College, London; the West Bromwich College of Commerce, Science and Technology, Birmingham, and Aston University, Birmingham. On his return to the country, Wayas became the Commissioner for Transport in the old South Eastern State from 1972 -1974. He became a member of the Constituent Assembly from 1977 to 1978.
We commiserate with his family, the people and government of Cross River State and the Federal Government on the irreparable loss. May God grant his soul eternal repose.