It appears Okoko Ndem is really dead, here is a powerfull requiem someone wrote for him. --------------------------------------------------
In Praise Of Okokon Ndem by Chinyemike Torti
At the risk of being branded a MASSOB activist, even though there is nothing shameful being labelled with that appellation, given the preponderance of closet secessionist groups like O.P.C, Egbesu, Ogoni, Bill of Rights, Kaiama Declaration, Sovereign National Conference and Resource control agitators, strutting all over the federation; Ndigbo at home and abroad must rise in unison and hats off, to the late Chief Okokon Ndem whose golden voice ventilated the very essence of our resistance against the evils of genocide, pogrom, injustice and inhumanity.
While the boys in the war fronts were keeping the federalist army busy for three years, Okokon Ndem and his colleagues on their air waves effectively projected the Biafran counterpoint to the outside world and in the process drubbed Chief Anthony Enahoro's propaganda machinery hands down, so much so, that the Uromi Chief was booed by irate foreign journalists at the 1968 Kampala peace talks when he sought to clarify an agenda on the conference theme.
Today the octogenarian is sulking and embittered after being used and dumped as a Federal Minister of Information famous for white-washing the cracks of an imperfect federation which Chief Okokon Ndem articulated 30 years ago. The Edo Chief has joined the club of camouflage secessionists with his pet project dubbed Movement for National Reformation.
Okokon Ndem with his well-modulated and posh diction reeking with the elocution of the muses, functioned as an emotional prop and invigorator of sagging spirits in the beleaguered Igbo heartland, then at the receiving end of bombs, rockets, artillery fire, starvation, kwashiorkor and all the cruel bludgeoning of warfare. Behind the microphone, the style of his delivery had character and chutzpah, which put the dread in the hearts of enemy troops. Not only did his oratory disembowel the barefaced misrepresentation of the contending sides but also gave dialectical advocacy to the structural imperfections, ills and contradictions of the Nigerian federation which later day converts like Ken Saro-Wiwa, Afenifere and June twelvers latched on.
Apart from the public relations mileage Igbos gained from his endowments, Okokon Ndem in tandem with other easterners from the Calabar-Ogoja-Rivers flank like Chief N.U Akpan, General Philips Effiong, Major Archibong, Chief Emmanuel Aguma put paid to the vicious propaganda of Igbo domination. Okokon Ndem succinctly demonstrated that if you were competent in your chosen career, any person from the so-called minorities belt could match; excel and outclass his Igbo compatriot; which was the reality on the ground.
Hundreds of riverine, Efik, Ibibio and Ogoni civil servants occupied very senior positions in the Eastern Nigerian Civil Service. The first African principal of the elite Government College Umuahia in 1958 was the Buguma chieftain, Mr. Erekosima. Chief Kogbara, an Ogoni, was the Biafran envoy to United Kingdom. Ken Saro Wiwa himself passed out from Government College Umuahia in 1956, enjoyed Nnamdi Azikiwe scholarship and to cap it, Ken was a house Captain at Fisher House. Up till this day his name Kenule Saro-Wiwa is emblazoned in the roll of honour plaque at the Umuahia Government college of which I am privileged to be an old boy.
Chief Okokon Ndem debunked, demystified the nebula of Igbo domination. After the civil war, in the face of persecution from the conquering forces who threatened to pull out his tongue, Okokon Ndem never recanted, never did a verbal somersault. May his soul reincarnate in Igboland. And therein lies the morality of immortalising him.
Canonising Okokon Ndem should herald the genesis of the process of the recognition and rehabilitation of our genuine leaders and heroes both living and dead who went beyond the call of duty to do, what they had to do in the heady days of the sixties. The list is legion, but my mind readily recalls names likes Col. Onwuatuegwu, Chief Jacob Ukeje Agwu, Sir Louis Mbanefo, Dr. Nwariaku, Chief Roy Umenyi, Col. Ogbugo Kalu, Okigbo brothers, Chief Mojekwu, Dr. Ikejiani, Comrade Chukwumerije, Achebe, Professor Kalu Ezera, Eni-Njoku, etc. Nobody and nobody would ever pour cold water on the virtues of the Nigerian civil war because the causes are still very relevant to the solutions of the national question today.
The efforts of our heroes past as the say must not be diminished otherwise we would have a situation where ethnic irredentists, Igbophobes, re-write, distort and chronicle our history from their prejudiced blinkers. In recent years, we have witnessed hack writers and columnists who were in their diapers when the guns were booming, pontificate that Igbos fought a wrong war! Their verbal assault is beginning to gnaw into the psyche and subliminal of some wet and spineless Igbos who now denigrate their roots of origin.
Okokon Ndem, is a metaphor nay epitome of the effervescent human spirit in its quest for excellence, fair play and liberty from the grips of hegemonic power relations. That was the centrepiece of the 1960 Aburi Accords, whose truncation led to the civil war. Thirty years after, the crux of the national question still revolves around the unresolved problems. You wonder why the Niger-Delta is conflagrating? The cauldron in Warri is a microcosm of the discontent nationwide. God is not mocked. You cannot sow cassava and reap cocoyam.
Posts: 1532 | From: USA | Registered: Mar 2001
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May his soul rest in piece. I only wish I was old enough to have heard his voice on the radio in those days. Do anyboy have an audio of his voice from those days or know of a Web site were one can listen to him.
___________________ Feel me? Ofu onye ana asi unu abia go. - Ednut Igbo-American . www.airamericaradio.com visit her. Posts: 2447 | From: Mother Earth | Registered: Mar 2001
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oh Lord who by the light of the holy spirit, did instruct him grant him rejoice.
do anyone if isi udene agbo ncha (yakubu wagon)made any comment about his crossing over
___________________ though tribe and tongue may differ in brotherhood we stand Posts: 25 | From: westchester new york | Registered: Jun 2003
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Okoko Ndem. Adieu ,you departed this evil world ,but your name will still worth it,s while to those that know the value. May you find peace where ever you will spend your eternity. Umuibe
___________________ Biafra is not part of nIGERIA but a nation on the making. Posts: 66 | From: BIAFRA | Registered: May 2003
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TO LIVE IN THE HEARTS OF THOSE YOU LOVE IS NOT TO DIE!
Adieu ufan mi, my father's friend and hero!
___________________ Awo's political idea was based on the assumption that any town beyond Owo was Igbo or Hausa. Awo was not socialised; he was not a good mixer because he did not have the opportunity, which the secondary school offered. ~TOS Benson, Baba Oba of Lagos Posts: 2644 | From: United Kingdom | Registered: Apr 2001
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What his voice told us then still echoes today as hack-writers and neo-propagandists take off from where the Yoruba-Edo axis MASTERS OF HATE in the person of Awolowo and Anthony Enahoro left bombard the airwaves and websites with their Igbophobic tandum. What all these tells us is that WE MUST BE AWAKE and resist them as the Okoko Ndems did.
Adieu THE VOICE OF TRUTH from the east. May your gentle soul rest in perfect peace!!!
Posts: 997 | From: Germany | Registered: Mar 2001
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May his soul rest in Peace.Biafra's most exclusive, soulful and disntinctive voice, that voice which is the "The Voice of Biafra", OKOKO NDEM. Hail Biafra to you.
Hail Biafra Posts: 1672 | From: Minnesota USA | Registered: Mar 2001
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Thanks for that link. Many Biafra veterans have told me that the voice of Okoko Ndem was one of their best sources of inspiration as they fought the Nigerian savages.
Obong Okoko Ndem is gone, but he is not forgotten. May his gentle soul rest in peace.
Posts: 397 | Registered: May 2001
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Okoko Ndem was a venerable servant of Biafra. As usual, pictures of such distinguished men are hard to come by. The Ngbati press flooded the Internet with pictures of that incompetent Yoruba coach, Onigbinde, and that Ndayako man who died a few days ago. But, they could not list a picture of Ndem who lived a more worthy life. I hope that all the surviving Biafra heroes like Ojukwu, Effiong, Madiebo, Achuzie, and others attend the funeral of Ndem.
May his soul rest in peace!
___________________ The only solution is to divide BiafraNigeria. If not now, then when? If not us, then who? Posts: 173 | Registered: Mar 2001
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Chinyemike Torti's submission, "In Praise Of Okokon Ndem", made a good reading. However, I'd like to add that Condolences to the bereaved family could be conveyed by e-mail to:
ogechiondem@yahoo.com
Jep, Okokon Ndem, was a Biafran Icon and a morale boaster. You have to experience a situation like when Zik did his turnaround, and hearing Okokon Ndem in the MW, it uplifted your demoralised soul.
The more I read of these departures, the more the pain in my heart, bcos yet Re-actualisation of Biafra is not in his/her life time.
So fellows, if you can send your condolence to the above e-mail.
My curios mind wants to know what he did after Biafra. Does anybody know?
Like one someone wrote, "Voice Of Biafra" has not ceased to exist; it lives on.
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I am glad Okoko Ndem got a hero's burial. Where is that character Egede1 that shamelessly lied about Ndem's orgin on this board. I have warned all these self hating Igbo's to be carefull how they sell themselves on BNW the records will always be there for all to see. -------------------------------------------------- We fought to make Nigeria better, says Ojukwu
By Bassey Inyang
Daily Independent, Calabar
Ex-Biafran leader and presidential candidate of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA), Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu at the weekend in Calabar stated that the bloody Nigerian civil war fought between July 1967 and December 1970 was to make Nigeria better rather than diminish it in status.
Ojukwu stated that they had to do that alongside the veteran broadcaster Late Okokon Ndem because of the conviction they shared that the people deserved a better deal.
The ex-Biafran president spoke while paying a personal tribute to Ndem whose remains was laid to rest at the weekend in Calabar, the Cross River State capital.
The APGA flagbearer while describing Ndem as a hero whose like was difficult to come by said he was a respected and beloved personality.
Before a mammoth crowed which gathered at the Cultural Centre Calabar, Ojukwu declared thus: “Before you let me proclaim that he is a hero the type of which is difficult to come by. Together we embarked on a struggle to make Nigeria better not to make Nigeria less.”
He stated that he had to come to Calabar at the weekend despite the fact that the Igbo cultural day was being celebrated at Enugu because of the level of esteem to which he held Ndem and the family.
The former Biafran leader emphasised that the fallen hero will never be forgotten by those he left behind.
“Let live before you an assurance that throughout our existence on earth we shall remember you, Okokon Ndem” Ojukwu declared before the gathering.
[ October 01, 2003, 03:37 AM: Message edited by: chiboy ]
Posts: 1532 | From: USA | Registered: Mar 2001
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Where are the likes of Egede and Clement Ikpatt, The biafrans all over the world will not forget Okoko ndem. From ogidi to Uzoakoli, from Ogoja to Opobo, from oron calaber to Bonima, those who are trying to divid Biafran Igbos and their minority sibblings are find it difficult everyday. Mr Ndem was a true hero and like Ikemba said his type is hard to come by, and we will not forget him.
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Egede1 is an efulefu who came into this forum and tried to change history with a bunch of lies. Until the likes of Chiboy called on him to provide facts to backup his assertions, he quickly disappeared.
___________________ BIAFRA MUST RISE AGAIN. LONG LIVE BIAFRA!! Posts: 1080 | From: California, USA. | Registered: Oct 2002
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