Achebe was the Igbo, Nigerian, African conscience and consciousness. By Onyeka Onwenu

Achebe was the Igbo, Nigerian, African conscience and consciousness.
By Onyeka Onwenu, MFR

Exclusive tribute in USAfricaonline.com & CLASSmagazine Houston. Special to USAfrica multimedia networks, and CLASSmagazine, Houston.                                                                 @Twitter.com/Chido247, Facebook.com/USAfricaChido

The news of Prof. Chinua Achebe’s death, this week, came as a rude shock to me. My heart stopped for a second. Yes he had lived to a ripe old age

but there are people one expects would never die, as irrational as that sounds. He was certainly one such person.

Chinua Achebe was larger than life. His life’s work had become so central to the Igbo/Nigerian/African identity and survival that it had become impossible to think of ourselves without his ever looming presence, to prod and direct our thinking, every now and then. He was the Igbo, nay Nigerian, nay African conscience and consciousness.

I first met Chinua Achebe in 1983, when I interviewed him for the BBC film, “Nigeria, A Squandering Of Riches”. He had just written ” The Trouble With Nigeria”. As usual, his observations about our country, a country he cared so much about, was succinct, honest, hard hitting and constructive.

Chinua Achebe’s answers to my questions were incisive, heartfelt and sincere as well. When I asked if he would ever consider leaving Nigeria for another country, his answer was  categorically, “no”. “This is where God in His infinite wisdom has placed me. Why should I live in a place that someone else has cleaned up” – I paraphrase. That answer, so apt, was vintage Chinua Achebe. It became the central message of our film –  that Nigerians who are smart enough to recognize the source of their problems, are the ones to remedy the ills of our society.

Although Chinua Achebe did leave Nigeria to reside in the United States because of the medical condition, caused by his near fatal motor car accident, he never did leave Nigeria in spirit. He continued to prod, chastise and direct, with criticisms, contributions and suggestions. Even the refusal of National Awards was his way of saying, “there is still so much work to be done”. The man loved his country, he didn’t lie – apologies to Wole Soyinka.

Here is an anecdote. Your dad confessed to me, after our first meeting, that he did not have high expectations for the interview, what with me being a “singing journalist” and all. But that it turned out to be one of the best interviews he had ever subjected himself to, as at that time.

Thereafter, his respect for me grew, to the point that he invited me, through you, to participate in the “Chinua Achebe Foundation Interview Series”. I conducted Margaret Ekpo’s last major interview before her death and Chief Gani Fawehinmi’s, as well.
His respect for me was most flattering, as you can imagine. I was grateful for it. What an honour it was, indeed, that this literary giant, our hero for all times, would consider me worthy of his attention.

Chinua Achebe will be sorely missed. But then, he is not dead. People like him never die. His works remain with us, into history, as one of the greatest writers, expressionists God blessed this world with, His advise and admonitions continue until we heed them.
What pride that he was from and of us. What pride that he was your father. But the Achebe family shared him with the world. Thank you. God bless the Achebe family and comfort you and us.
May his noble soul rest in peace.                                                                                                     •Onwenu, nominated for the USAfrica international creative leadership award at the 20th Anniversary of USAfrica on May 11, 2013 in Houston, is the foremost female artiste in Nigeria (of the past 22 years) and a leading voice on empowerment, development, broadcasting, political advocacy and transparency in Africa. She has been a contributing editor since 1999 of USAfricaonline.com , the first African-owned, U.S-based professional newspaper published on the internet.   

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Long Live, CHINUA ACHEBE! The Eagle on the iroko.                                                                By Chido Nwangwu, moderator of the Achebe Colloquium (Governance, Security, and Peace in Africa) December 7-8, 2012 at Brown University, is the Publisher of USAfrica and first African-owned, U.S-based newspaper published on the internet USAfricaonline.com

Africa’s most acclaimed and fluent writer of the English Language, the most translated writer of Black heritage in the world, broadcaster extraordinaire, social conscience of millions, cultural 

custodian and elevator, chronicler and essayist, goodwill ambassador and man of progressive rock-ribbed principles, the Eagle on the Iroko, Ugo n’abo Professor Chinua Achebe,joined his ancestors a few hours ago, at the age of 82, in a peaceful and graceful transition in the warm company of his family.

Reasonably, Achebe’s message has been neither dimmed nor dulled by time and clime. He’s our pathfinder, the intellectual godfather of millions of Africans and lovers of the fine art of good writing. Achebe’s cultural contexts are, at once, pan-African, globalist and local; hence, his literary contextualizations soar beyond the confines of Umuofia and any Igbo or Nigerian setting of his creative imagination or historical recall.

His globalist underpinnings and outlook are truly reflective of the true essence of his/our Igbo world-view, his Igbo upbringing and disposition. Igbos and Jews share (with a few other other cultures) this pan-global disposition to issues of art, life, commerce, juridical pursuits, and quest to be republicanist in terms of the vitality of the individual/self. 

In Achebe’s works, the centrality of Chi (God) attains an additional clarity in the Igbo cosmology… it is a world which prefers a quasi-capitalistic business attitude while taking due cognizance of the usefulness of the whole, the community.

I’ve studied, lived and tried to better understand, essentially, the rigor and towering moral certainties which Achebe have employed in most of his works and his world. I know, among other reasons, because I share the same Igbo ancestry with him.

Permit me to attempt a brief sentence, with that Achebean simplicty and clarity. Here, folks, what the world has known since 1958: Achebe is good! Eagle on the Iroko, may your Lineage endure! There has never been one like you! Ugo n’abo, chukwu gozie gi oo!

FULL text of this tribute-commentary at USAfricaonline.com click link https://usafricaonline.com/2013/03/22/long-live-chinua-achebe-by-chido-nwangwu/

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WHY I CELEBRATE THE LIFE AND WORKS OF NELSON MANDELA. By Chido Nwangwu  https://usafricaonline.com/2010/07/15/mandela-why-i-celebrate-his-life-works-by-chido-nwangwu/

Mandela, others send tributes mourning Achebe

Special to USAfrica multimedia networks, and CLASSmagazine, Houston.                                                                 @Twitter.com/Chido247, Facebook.com/USAfricaChido n Facebook.com/USAfrica247

The death of the grand-father of modern African literature Prof. Chinua Achebe is drawing several messages from some of the world’s leaders, Nigeria’s president, his friends, contemporaries and writers.

A statement from the Nelson Mandela Foundation in South Africa has been sent to the family of the late renowned writer Chinua Achebe. It conveyed, on behalf of the Chairperson, Board of Trustees and staff of the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, “our condolences to the family of Prof. Chinua Achebe, a great African writer and thinker, who passed away on 21 March 2013 at the age of 82.”

Nelson Mandela, a friend of Achebe’s and an avid reader of his works, notably once referred to Prof. Achebe as a writer “in whose company the prison walls fell down” — a reference to Mandela’s 27 years in apartheid South Africa jail.

Both men are known for their principled positions on issues of justice, opposition to bigotry, discrimination and commitment to fairness to all persons and support for progressive pan Africanism.                                                                                                                               ——–

  Eight lessons of the 1994 Rwanda Genocide. By Chido Nwangwu, Publisher of USAfrica multimedia networks, Houston. https://usafricaonline.com/2009/11/01/chido-8lessons-rwanda-genocide/