By Jonathan Elendu
Today we celebrate Chekwas Okorie, Ph.D. for attaining the proverbial 3 Score and 10. Seventy years in good health and sound mind is no mean achievement in Nigeria when the latest indices show that the life expectancy of the average Nigerian is 53 years.
But Chekwas Okorie is no average Nigerian. He is the quintessential Igbo man who embodies the ideals of a true OnyeIgbo, whose whole life typifies the story of Ndigbo.
The history of Ndigbo is replete with abundant talent; heroic exploits, great values, and courage, but misunderstood and even feared by friends, foes, and neighbours.
Chekwas Okorie has the title of Oje Ozi. The First time I heard someone call him Oje Ozi and he answered proudly with a smile on his face, I wondered if he started his career with DHL or International Messengers. I came to know a few days later that during the formative days of what is today known as Ohaneze Ndigbo, he, as a young man, was with the Igbo giants who founded the Igbo forum. So, as a young undergraduate at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, he became a founding member of Oheneze Ndigbo.
With the likes of the great Nnamdi Azikiwe, Akanu Ibiam, Dadi Onyeama, Jerome Udoji, J.U Agwu, Chief Achara, Mbazulike Amaechi, Chekwas began his activism and the struggle for the Igbo nation. He may not know it, but hanging out with the great Zik and his contemporaries was just a continuation of his work and walk with Igbo greats to today being celebrated as a great Igbo Man at 3 scores and 10.
To this day Chief Chekwas Okorie is the only one to be given not one, but two titles by Ohaneze Ndigbo.
In 2002, to commemorate the founding and registration of APGA, he was given the title “Ogbatulu Enyi Ndigbo”. Truly, registration of APGA was like killing an elephant. Chekwas had tried two times previously to register a political party and failed. APGA today is the second oldest party in the 4th republic.
Following the internal crisis that engulfed APGA, Oje Ozi Ndigbo moved again. Chief Chekwas Okorie’s desire to form a political party was rooted in his belief that Ndigbo needed a platform with which to engage with other ethnic nationalities in Nigeria. APGA was not for furthering his personal political ambition. Hence, he willingly surrendered the presidential ticket for the 2003 general elections to Dim Emeka Odumegu Ojukwu. It has been said that APGA swept the polls in the whole of the South East and beyond. This success of the party caused panic in Aso Rock and the government of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo declared APGA a national security problem. APGA’s victories at the polls were taken away from it.
President Obasanjo sponsored elements within APGA to destroy the party from the inside. After eight years of epic legal battles with three supreme court cases, Chekwas returned the registration certificate of APGA to INEC.
Dr. Okorie is the first Nigerian to voluntarily surrender the registration certificate of the political party he founded to INEC. He is the first Igbo man to found a national political party. He is the first Nigerian to start a political party and surrender the presidential ticket to another person.
In 2012, after leaving APGA, Chekwas Okorie founded the United Progressives Party (UPP). He joined the ranks of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Mallam Aminu Kano, and Alhaji Waziri Ibrahim as three other great Nigerians who founded two political parties in their lifetime.
In 2015, Okorie contested for the president of Nigeria on the platform of the UPP.
What has been Chekwas Okorie’s impact or effect on the Nigerian political landscape?
Although Chekwas Okorie, has been a member of the United Nigeria Congress Party (UNCP), the All Peoples Party (APP), and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) before founding APGA, it can safely be said that he largely determined his political trajectory. In 1992 he founded the Igboezue Cultural Association.
The former President of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, late Prof. George Obiozor described Chekwas Okorie as, “one politician who has remained relevant in the politics of Ala Igbo and indeed Nigeria without having occupied any government office in the local, state or federal government”.
On June 3rd, 2022, Chekwas was elected the presidential candidate of APGA by an overwhelming majority of delegates at the APGA Convention held at the Abuja Sheraton Hotels. This was soon after Chief Edozie Njoku, the National Chairman, led members of his National Executive Council and National Working Committee to his Enugu residence to tender an unreserved apology for the injustice and travails he suffered in APGA in years past.
It was expected that he would traverse the length and breadth of Nigeria, as he had done 15 times before, to sell his campaign manifesto. Alas, this was not to be as INEC, in a flagrant disregard and disobedience of a Supreme Court ruling refused to recognize Edozie Njoku as the authentic National Chairman of APGA.
For years, Chekwas Okorie has championed the cause for the restructuring of Nigeria. Chekwas has long posited that Nigeria as currently constituted is structured to fail. “Our desire for restructuring is predicated on the fact that the Nigeria of today is structured to fail,” he said in 2022.
During campaigns for the 2023 presidential elections, one or two candidates paid lip service to the issue of restructuring Nigeria. Yet, before the word restructuring became popular, Chekwas Okorie had started proffering the idea for 20 years. He talked about state and community policing as an essential ingredient for an effective security architecture. “An effective security architecture that can guarantee the safety of lives and property of our people must be predicated on state and community policing.”
On another occasion, he said: “I have traversed the length and breadth of Nigeria at least 15 times. I know that the problem of Nigerians in Kaltungu is not different from their compatriots in Birnin Kebbi. The woman in Azare desires the same thing as her counterpart in Azumini. Our people are suffering from a long era of low expectations, unfulfilled dreams, abandoned ambitions, and hopelessness. Nigeria must restructure to allow Nigerians of all nationalities to pursue their God-given gifts and aspirations”
A boy who was born in Alayi on the 19th of March, 1953 became a prince seven years later. From St. Michael’s Primary School in Umuahia to Joseph’s Catholic School, Alayi, his march to being a man began. The journey to adulthood continued at Annunciation Secondary School, Isuikwuato. By the time he became an undergraduate at the University of Nigeria, he had become a gift to Ndigbo as their messenger.
Chekwas Okorie is also described as a man ahead of his time. I agree. But after the debacle of the 2023 elections which has moved Nigeria further down the precipice, it is now my considered opinion that, here, is a man-made for this time. Alayi’s gift to Ndigbo is today’s man for Nigeria.
