Date Published: 01/04/10
Iwuoha, Uba: Failing the test of true activism By Okechukwu Nwadike
I glanced at my study window and for a moment my thoughts mingled with the idea of ignoring this article and waiting upon the service of a court order requesting my appearance to defend the allegation of mental disorder I made in a recent article against one Mr. Samuelson Ikenna Iwuoha. The article is titled: “Iwuoha: The audacity of a lunatic in Imo state” and published online.
Beyond the hard rectangular pattern that marks the edges of my louvers I can see the eerie dance of the palm trees surrounding my sweet home in my country home in Imo state; a dance that has been but truly has not attracted my attention over the years. Then the green foliage and the singing of birds and the sound of fireworks done by children around my vicinity were forgotten and I failed to thinking of how man can be so self centred; how man’s ego can be so bruised when involved but boosted when others are.
I pondered over the proverb of my people that when another’s death is being carried, it looks to the foolish as if a log of wood is being carried. I questioned how a man could descend so low and master so perfectly the art of criticizing the activities of others but would want to jump into a boiling ocean when he is criticized. My ignorance, my passions, my errors of judgment and my lack of answers distorted my concentration and my reverie became greatly confused as I came back to reality resolving to tap on my laptop.
Recently, I have been inundated with calls, text messages and e-mails from apologists of Ikenna Samuelson Iwuoha, a self styled activist who had sworn to remain critical of the present administration in Imo state and had continued to heat up the polity with his kind of political activism.
While some of the calls and messages sound threatening to my life, others claimed they would drag me to the court to prove a certain paragraph in my article which did not go down well with the subject, Samuelsson Iwuoha.
One of the callers who simply introduced himself as “Chidi calling from Owerri” continued in verbatim: “I read this your write up. The title is the audacity of a frustrated lunatic in Imo state. After going through the write up there is this paragraph; paragraph nine and there is a particular sentence that captured my attention there. It is where you said diagnosed as brain disorder. That is the only sentence that I picked out of the whole thing that you wrote. Please I want you to prepare to appear in court to explain that sentence. That is my only concern. Thank you very much”, and he dropped with the speed of a lightening without hearing from my side.
Another text message at exactly 4.21pm on December 24, 2009 reads thus: “My brother NWADIKE, ur English is super. But u must prove dat I am a lunatic. God bless. From Ikenna Samuelson”
Before the above, I had equally received some calls from Mr. Maximus Uba, the progenitor of the whole brouhaha of the Ohakim must go crusade whom I could say was more polite in selling to me his CV and tried so much to convince me on why I should use my ingenuity to write for posterity.
While I have no intention to provoke any attack against Uba in this piece, I would like to inform Uba however that I do not write for money and do not involve in his type of “yoyo job” as he suspect. I write because I see the need to correct some of the erroneous impressions he and Iwuoha had often sold to the public against the state and its people. I write because I have no other state to refer as mine other than Imo state. I write to suggest the only legitimate way of voting out and voting in governments and their policies rather than resorting to personal attacks on the persons at the helms. I write to encourage Uba and Iwuoha to channel their writing abilities towards enlightening and mobilizing the Imo public on electoral perfection in subsequent elections in the state. Perhaps by doing this, INEC would even partner with them to ensure a credible election in the country come 2011. As a comfortable professional with blend of media practice, I write because I detest Uba, Iwuoha’s type of polity pollution and I believe my freedom of impressions inflamed my rights of expressions which unfortunately may not go down well with everybody, including the duo of Uba and Iwuoha.
Points from my conversation with Uba have since shown that there is only one reason why Uba has continued to fight Ohakim and those in his administration and that reason is envy; envy that these guys had moved on leaving him behind.
For instance, Uba has in one time or the other worked with virtually all his perceived enemies including Governor Ikedi Ohakim whom he claimed he brought into political limelight in the state by introducing him to the former governor Udenwa. He recalled at one of such marathon meetings in politics that he had to personally smuggle the gate-crashing Ohakim into the venue and saved him from the brutality of the police aides who had already bounced him out of the venue. Uba is angry that Governor Ohakim has not shown appreciation.
Uba has also worked with Nze Elvis Agukwe, the Director General of New Face Organization (NFO) who today must have been Uba’s most avowed enemy given his many media attacks on the Orlu born politician. Uba’s only reason against Agukwe whom he claimed used to be his partner when asked was that the former PDP National Director of Research, Program and Planning should not have been where he is today. In his words: “Elvis has no reason to be commanding the height he is commanding in Imo State’s politics and behaving as if he owns Ikedi Ohakim more than all of us…”. Envy in action.
As absurd as Uba’s reason for fighting Agukwe is, Uba who also claimed working with Chief Arthur Nzeribe; relating with Chief Chris Ubah and his elder brother – Andy Ubah of the Anambra politics; roommate to Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers state; personal friend to the First Lady, Turai Yar’Adua; Media Adviser to Senator Ifeanyi Ararume and his endless list of personalities from both the state and the national political circle could not convince me on his disposition of always demolishing all the houses he helped built and or why the people he started with usually abandon him whenever they climbed ahead in life.
Certainly there must be a disturbing attitude of his that does not let him receive his rewards after work. My grandparents called it Agwu and this I should suggest to my brother Maximus to seek for prayers and heavenly intervention because a labourer is entitled to his pay.
On Ikenna Samuelson Iwuoha who is now threatening brimstone, I think he should be ashamed of himself. That he had the effrontery to be vexed over my qualification of him as “lunatic” is the highest point of idiocy. Why would anyone with his right senses pick holes in his being referred to as Ozo when such person has been known for addressing others as Ozodimgba? Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones.
My Oxford Mini Reference Dictionary in page 243 defines Lunatic as a “person who is insane or very foolish or reckless”. Here before my screen are over thirty articles written and published online by Samuelson Iwuoha with stupid, unwise, idiotic, silly, irrational, thoughtless and imprudent presentations. These words are synonyms for the word “foolish” let alone “very foolish” as used by the dictionary for a lunatic.
Claims and contents of Iwuoha’s articles which I will equally seek court’s permission to present as exhibits and evidence of Iwuoha’s lunatic disposition are to the best of journalism ethics reckless. His claims which mostly cannot be published on any established newsprint are often irresponsible, wild, thoughtless, uncontrolled, out of control, careless and hasty. He is also inattentive to other people’s opinions. Again, these are synonyms for the word “reckless” as used in the dictionary for a lunatic.
While Maximus Uba could be said to have been in this business over time and courteous in his uses of words, Ikenna Samuelson Iwuoha has never been known either as a political or social activist in the past until after the demolition of his kerosene shanty in Owerri by the Ohakim’s administration that he ran untamed. If everyone painfully affected in one way or the other in the development of the state had taken to arms the way Iwuoha is doing, those of us living outside the state would have no place to return to as our state.
I do not know of any other word to describe a fellow who suddenly went wild and developed an acute diarrhea of the mouth and fingers, lambasting his state governor without respect and insulting his leaders without sparing any, all in the name of activism. My foot!
True activists over history had suffered persecutions. Many of them faced names calling, abuses and insults. Some were even jailed and humiliated even though they were all sane men who made prudent and constructive criticisms against various governments of their days. They never threatened transporting banana to the banana republic. But the chick shivers and runs at the proverb of the kite and the leopard can never be cleared of its spots. Iwuoha is simply selfish and not real.
That I chose to ignore those text messages, threats and calls to my phone when they came is in line with my decision to keep this an online interaction the way it started. However Iwuoha should be told that the gentle stride of the tiger is never a symbol of cowardice. The day the hero was born in a town was same as the day another was born in another town.
Since Samuelson Ikenna Iwuoha has failed my simple test of true activism, I should suggest that he stops pretending as one, shuts up and seeks for rehabilitation while channeling his life into a more meaningful endeavour until the day we shall meet in the court if he still intends to drag me there.
Greg Okechukwu Nwadike is the Coordinator, Imo People’s Movement (IPM) and a media practitioner based in the FCT.
Greg Okey Nwadike
Discovery News Nigeria
Garki, Abuja
08056454115
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