Politics
By Gregg Mmaduakolam,
The Ahiajoku Lecture is an annual gathering where aspects of Igbo culture are intellectually analysed and articulated.
It is a forum where Igbo gather to brainstorm and synthesize the importance of their culture and how it will assist them in developing their region.
The Ahiajoku lecture was started in 1979 by Sam Mbakwe, the first executive governor of Imo. Subsequently, other Imo governors continued to organise it.
However, in 1996, the military administrator Col. Tanko Zubairu banned the lecture between 1996 and 1999.
Also, throughout the eight years of the administration of Gov. Rochas Okorocha, he refused to hold the lecture.
Recently, Gov. Hope Uzodimma, reiterated his administration’s readiness to bring the Igbo-speaking states together again via the Ahiajoku lecture.
In order to ensure that this is held this year 2024, the governor is pulling all resources and machinery together to revive the annual lecture.
The Director-General of the Ahiajoku Centre, Raymond Emeana, at a news conference held in Owerri recently, said:
“The briefing was informed by the excitement, inquiries, and interests shown by Ndigbo both at home and in the diaspora over this year’s Ahiajoku lecture.”
“I am pleased to announce that under the leadership of Governor Uzodimma, there has been an unwavering commitment to the revival and promotion of the Ahịajọkụ festival.
“I can confirm that the topic for the lecture is: “The future of the Igbo economy amidst the challenges of insecurity in the South East: A call for a Paradigm Shift.”
To achieve this year’s lecture, Emeana said, “This topic has been meticulously chosen to reflect the critical imperatives of our time among the Igbo people, our collective well-being, security, governance and socio-economic development.
Emeana, said that the Ahiajoku festival remains one of the most cherished cultural heritages of the Igbo people.
He also said that the essence of the news conference was to provide important updates and to highlight the preparations underway for this year’s Ahiajoku festival and lecture series.
He said that under the leadership of Gov. Uzodimma, “there has been an unwavering commitment to the revival and promotion of the Ahiajoku festival”.
He noted that the governor, in his dedication to cultural preservation, has taken decisive steps to ensure that this year’s festival reflects both “our glorious past and the necessities of our present times”.
It should be recalled that Prof. M Echeruo, Bede Okigbo, Adiele Afigbo, Anya O Anya, Don Nwoga, Ben Nwabueze and Pius Okigbo, all eminent scholars and global distinction, took the podium in the first 7-8 years to set the tone for future Ahiajoku Lectures.
Among all these, the 1984 Ahiajoku Lecture on Igbo cosmology holds special significance.
Prof. Donatus Nwoga, Prof. of African Literature and then Dean of Faculty of Arts UNN, gave a lecture titled ‘Nka na Nzere’.
The professor dissected the focus on the Igbo World View (nka na nzere, meaning age and respect).
He said that Igbo recognises three types of reality – the physical, the spiritual and the abstract.
He also said that to achieve fulfilment, one must ensure that these are harmoniously reconciled, related and combined.
According to him, the Igbo ideology is that gods, to remain ‘worshipable’, must be of some use. Any non-effective deity is discarded.
He said, “The Igbo are democratic and accommodating, even in matters of religion. If anybody says “call me god”, the Igbo will call him god.
“But if the god starts falling, the Igbo will give him a way to crash to the ground.”
“The Igbo will go anywhere and live anywhere and will add the habits and dress styles of those people to their own on the principle that it is what is new that enhances what exists.
The distressing prevalence of these new items often hides a surprising degree of continuity of the old goals and characteristics.
The Igbo appear to engage in the process of addition, not replacement.
Or rather, the Igbo change the dress that covers the same old body of goals and aspirations surrounding the core motivation of excelling other individuals and other communities,” he said.
The administration of Ikedi Ohakim (2007 to 2011) brought the Ahiajoku Lecture to its immense prominence as the administration built an Ahiajoku Centre.
In 2009, the father of modern African literature, Chinua Achebe, returned from self-exile in the US to take the podium on the 30th anniversary of the lecture series.
After Ohakim, the Ahiajoku Lecture was not held during the eight years of the administration of Gov. Rochas Okorocha.
However, the short tenure of Emma Ihedioha in 2019 saw a renaissance of the Ahiajoku Lecture series.
He recovered the Centre built by Ikedi Ohakim and renamed it Ahiajoku Convention and organised the 40th-anniversary lecture in Owerri in 2019.
That 2019 edition was unique. The first Guest Lecturer of the series in 1979, Prof. MC Echeruo was also the Guest Lecturer in the 2019 edition, 40 years later.
Echeruo had 40 years to review the effect of his first lecture in 1979 titled “Ahamefula – Matter of Identity”. At that epic 2019 edition, he titled his paper, ‘Ogu Eri Mba: We Shall Survive’
“Although still lacking serious access to national political power, we nevertheless believe in the possibility of Igbo self-fulfillment as well as national growth in our traumatised Nigerian fatherland,” he reflected on the Igbo journey since 1979.
Gov. Uzodimma can revive the Ahiajoku Lecture, an event which its importance cannot be overemphasised by both the old and new generations of the Igbo race.
“The Ahiajoku Lecture is a heritage of Igbo intellectual tradition which cannot be allowed to die.
“It must take its place in digging deep into the resonant recesses of Igbo culture and providing compelling cultural direction for Ndi Igbo in the face of profound challenges of exclusion faced in the Nigerian federation.” (NANFeatures)
5th December, 2024.
C.E.
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