By UZODINMA NWALA
All efforts to get us to abandon that crusade for the salvation of Education in the country, proved abortive. But in every such situation there must be a Judas. In the heat of that strike that kept the nation on her toes, the Lagos branch of ASUU organized a symposium on the raging Strike and invited Chuba to speak. They did not invite me, the ASUU Executive General Secretary. Chuba mounted the stage, and as the great orator he was, he went home to town. He first identified himself with the case of “my (Chuba’s) colleagues, who should be hailed as great patriots and not maligned as villains… The Government’, he said, ‘should reach out and embrace my colleagues in the spirit of dialogue’
Then, Chuba paused for a while and changed his tone and continued ‘anasi na gbara gbara fee oke oburuzie ara – When radicalism overstretches its rational limits, it becomes madness. Is it not true?”, he quipped. He paused for a while again and continued, “Dear respected colleagues I have just one problem with this our revolution. And I want you to help me overcome it. It seems to me, I may be right or I may be wrong, that the tactics and strategies of this our revolution may have been foretold long before this our revolution started. It seems to me that the ABC of this our struggle may have been conceived, articulated and postulated by our one and only erudite and brilliant General Secretary right there in the green and serene hills of Nsukka”
Then he waved to them a monograph which my friend and colleague at Nsukka, Dr Inya Abang Eteng and I had compiled and published from the various communiques issued by several groups of University teachers and students, including our own at Nsukka. The book had a green cover with the caption – Crises in the Nigerian Universities, Underlying Factors and Solutions.
What Chuba tried to achieve in that great oratory was to liken the monograph to Mummar Ghadaffi’s Green Book, and so discredit the ASUU Struggle. Of course, that was his duty as Political Adviser to a government perceived to be under siege. However, it was too late for my friend to sway anybody. The strike had been carved as a piece of granite, strategic scientific planning. What was more, we had won the soul of the nation including our colleagues who were diehard NPN supporters. I was at the National Assembly the day, Chief Evans Enwerem was dethroned and Chuba was elected as President of the Senate. In fact what happened was that he reclaimed his mandate because he was the original choice of the party and the distinguished senators.
As soon as the result of the voting was announced, Chuba stood up amidst a deafening shout of Oyi! oyi! oyi!. He worked majestically to the Seat. He rolled his eyes around the hall; the cheering was still on. He turned to look at the seat. He slapped the seat several times as if he was exorcising it. He turned again to the audience steering at them and he sat down. What a drama. And Chuba was a great craftsman when it comes to political drama.
As the ioneer Director of Organisation and Strategy of the PDP, I was privy to all the dirty scheming that robbed him of his first chance of being elected Senate President by President Obasanjo and his men. Convening of the National Assembly had to be delayed until President Obasanjo was assured that his agents had bought enough votes to defeat Chuba. Even after his emergence as President of the Senate, the plot continued until they removed him as Senate President. Chuba and I were philosophical soul-mates, although our political styles were different. Any time I was in his house while he was Senate President, we would go into his study and he would give orders that if anybody comes he should be told to either wait or go and come back, that he was with his Philosophy friend and wouldn’t like to break the discussion.
As Director of Organisation and Strategy of the PDP, I had authored a scheme with Dr Okwesilieze Nwodo, Secretary of the PDP to ensure that the Federal Character principle as enshrined in the 1999 Constitution was implemented in the appointments of the new Government. So we prepared a Table with six Rows (to represent the Six Geo-political zones) Then we classified the ministries into A, B , C, D , E, F, etc We next grouped the ministries according to their weights into six. The idea was that each Zone would get one in each group – A, B, C. D. E, etc.
This was presented to the president by the party.What happened was that in the appointment of ministers, the highest ministry given to the South-East was Ministry of Transport that was given to I think late Chief Ojo Maduekwe. .
Meanwhile, when he lost the Presidency of the Senate, Chuba was made the Chairman of Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. The same bias of President Obasanjo against the South-East was repeated in the list of the nominees for Ambassadorial positions he submitted to the Senate. Chuba quickly moblised his colleagues and they radically altered the list in favour of justice and equity as enshrined in the Federal Character principle.
When Chuba returned from a sick leave abroad, I visited him, He told me how he was knocked down by the sickness. That God was so kind to him to spare his life. That he was going to have some rest before returning to active politics. I joined him in thanking God for his mercy. I said to him ‘I hope this experience will not make you to relapse into Pension Strategy’. He chuckled and then asked me ‘What do you mean by Pension Strategy?’
I said to him, it means when you now begin to reason ‘ I have really given my best in the service of nation and humanity. Right from my youthful days I was a labour activist, I was secretary of the NCNC Youth Wing. I served in various capacities in that party.
I have served the NPN and the nation as Political Adviser. I have been an elected Senator and rose to become the Senate President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Yeah, I have done my best. Let me now get some rest and avoid any confrontation with any one so that I can see what I can get from the government and colleagues which I may leave for my family and children when I am no more”.
I said to him, this is what I call Pension Strategy. Chuba got up and burst into a chorus shouting Pension Strategy! Pension Strategy! He worked to the kitchen, knocked and called his wife, Margerie, “come and ask my friend what Pension Strategy means. I repeated what I had said to Chuba. His wife laughed humorously.
As Chuba was seeing me off, at every step, he would shout Pension Strategy! If anyone was looking for a Nigerian public figure to adorn the title of Cesaro of Nigerian politics, It is difficult to have any rival for Chuba if you put him and anyone side by side, except of course the Great Zik of Africa.
Prof. Nwala is the President Alaigbo Development Foundation (ADF) Abuja