It was late in 1966 that I first became aware of both his name and his existence.
Because the man's surname was uncommon, I asked its meaning. I also asked who he was. My father said he was our brother. He had written a letter to my family from London. It was a condolence message.
They had killed my elder brother John Ositadinma Iloegbunam in Kano, and they had also killed two of my first cousins - Emmanuel Obielozie Iloegbunam and Gabriel Chinwuba Iloegbunam. The three numbered in the tens of thousands of Ndigbo slaughtered as reprisals for the army mutiny of January 1966 and in the name of aware, their call for secession. Therefore, this brother of ours had written to express his sympathies.
When the civil war ended, I returned to high school and earned the school certificate in 1972 - seven years after I had entered Form One. My secondary school education was a miracle because we didn't even have money for food, let alone for buying biros and exercise books. Armed with the WASC, my only option was to seek gainful employment while my mates placed by fate on higher stations busied themselves seeking post-secondary or university admissions. I headed for Lagos.
With envelopes and foolscap sheets aplenty, I went applying for jobs. My mother had advised that the first thing to do in Lagos was get in touch with our brother who held a senior position in the Federal Civil Service. Throughout the war and since it ended, he remained in constant touch with our family. Who really was this man? My mother explained that my paternal grandmother and his maternal grandmother hailed from the Aguiyi family in Enu-Ogbu, Abatete.
That meant that he was my cousin once removed. Besides, he and Emmanuel Obielozie and Gabriel Chinwuba had been childhood friends who invited each other to "uta" feasts during traditional festivities. The man never forgot those happy days. Nor did my mother who was freshly into wedlock at the time in point.
In Lagos, I lived with my late cousin, Joseph Umerah, who worked with Afromedia (Nigeria) Limited. His Nuru Oniwo Street home in Aguda was a 10-minute walk to the Fred Anyiam, Surulere, address of this brother of mine. We visited him one weekend. He welcomed us warmly. A fair-complexioned man of average height, he took what seemed like ages asking after my parents and siblings. While we "used" some drinks, he collected a photocopy of my school certificate.
He spoke very little thereafter and when he did it was as if the heavens would fall if his voice registered with any loudness. His precocious daughter, Chinwe, who couldn't be more than seven, spoke English with an oyibo accent.
She pointed out the family photo albums to us. In those non-digital days, it was part of the entertainment to offer visitors pictures to look at as conversation went ahead. In one of the pictures, I saw a smiling Chinwe on a settee decorated with Biafran flags.
When we left, I raised that point with Joseph. He explained that G. C., (for Gordian Chukwuemeka), the son of poor parents, had attended Christ, the King College, Onitsha, and the University of St. Andrews in Scotland on scholarships because of his spectacular brain power. With a master's degree in history and philosophy, he joined the Nigerian Foreign Service and was posted to the Nigeria High Commission at the Court of St. James in London.
It was while in the British capital that he got married, and Chinwe was born, which explained her accent. Meanwhile, Biafra was declared. G. C. promptly switched allegiances and was party to establishing the Biafra House in Lisbon, Portugal. After the war, he returned to the Nigerian Civil Service and was posted to the Finance Ministry.
Less than a month after our visit, G. C. got me a job at the Finance Ministry that Alhaji Shehu Shagari presided over as the Federal Commissioner (Minister). I was posted to the Ministry's Sub Treasury Department on Oil Mill Street, a sprawling office through whose giant windows we often espied in the adjoining building Sir Mobolaji Bank-Anthony running his multimillion Naira businesses.
Three years later, and to G. C,'s delight, I gained admission into the University of Ife. In my final year at Ife, he twice sent me civil service employment forms to fill up and return to him. He assumed that a civil service career would be a fait accompli for me.
But I had other ideas. I didn't fill up any of the forms. Finally, he sent a subordinate to Ife with a new set of forms. The messenger said I should quickly fill up and return the forms because whoever did so before me would automatically become my senior. I thanked him, waved him goodbye and put the forms aside.
Children of nowadays will find my behaviour incomprehensible. But in the 1970s and early 1980s, the employment of graduates in the public and private sectors was a matter of routine. In fact, months before degree examinations, officials from banks, commercial houses, government departments and parastatals, and the military establishment, etc., visited campuses to interview candidates who had applied for jobs. I didn't pay the slightest attention to any of those headhunters.
Uncle Sam Amuka-Pemu's kindness had afforded me three vacation jobs at the Punch newspapers and the allure of journalism had enthralled me. G. C. took no offence at my repudiation of the civil service.
Four years after graduation, I went to G. C. with the news that I had found a great lady to marry. He and two others of my townsmen accompanied me to go and "knock on the door" of my would-be in-laws who lived on Adegoke Street in Surulere. Months later, he drove my spouse and some flower girls in his white Mercedes Benz car to our wedding at the Church of the Assumption, Falomo. He chaired our wedding reception at the Lagos Island Club. I soon shifted base to London. Significantly, G. C. never failed to phone me anytime the tour of duty brought him to the British capital, and I would gladly go visit him.
Shortly after I returned to Nigeria, Abuja happened, and G. C. followed the Federal structure to the new Nigerian capital. He continued to rise steadily till his career peaked with his preferment as a Director-General (Permanent Secretary). He was the D-G of the Federal Capital Territory for many years. I travelled to Abuja to present him with a copy of my Ironsi biography. He was overjoyed and immediately started contributing to the funding and logistics for its public presentation.
He didn't falsify his date of birth to serve to a creaking, old age in the public service. When his service years ended, most didn't realise that he remained in Abuja, retaining, and maintaining his calm nature and retiring mien. He was never the loud type. He never acted as though he had two heads on his shoulders. Hardly any Abatete man or woman has granted more jobs to his people than G. C. He spent his time out of service brokering peace and promoting amity, assisting the needy and quietly worshipping the Creator of Heaven and Earth.
I recall that, while I worked with the Jonathan presidency, a dispute broke out in the Abuja Branch of the Abatete Development Organisation (ADO) that appeared intractable. Reason prevailed when the ADO members trooped to Oranika's Asokoro residence. He was their patron. By the time the hitherto divided family departed hours later, G. C. had solved the problem. The ADO unity he brokered has sustained and strengthened ever since. That is because he was a man of honour, a Christian without cant, a lover of his people, and a stickler for justice who enjoyed the reverence of all who knew him.
Chief Gordian Chukwuemeka Oranika lived worthily for 89 years. His funeral took place in Abatete on Friday, December 6, 2024. The clergy, in their scores, was led by the Archbishop of Onitsha, Dr. Valerian Okeke, in a concelebrated requiem mass, which was held at the Christ, the King Catholic Church, that he had singlehandedly built.
Many dance groups and assorted masquerades, including the Ijele, and the ones that walked on stilts performed. Various bands and other entertainment groups played music amplified by sophisticated electronic systems. At every turn, there was a member of the team of masters of ceremonies with a microphone in hand and a message on his lips saying, "We are not mourning. This is a celebration of life." It was indeed an amalgamated funereal, cultural, and religious carnival!
From all who showed up - and they came in the thousands - there was only one testimony: "Oranika was a good man!" He did not use his high official standing in Abuja to appropriate half of the Federal Capital Territory or to wantonly bulldoze structures his fellow human beings had sacrificed everything to erect. He stood between regular folk and those who would cheat them out of their properly acquired lands. Unlike some arrivistes that dot everywhere nowadays, I never heard that he seized anyone's land in Abatete or elsewhere.
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I never heard that he presided over or joined any team disposed to bestowing to Okafor what rightfully belonged to Okonkwo. He never was involved in dissipating time and energy on irrelevant and distracting disputes and tussles over largely insignificant chieftaincy titles. There are some who, because they can buy up all the Senior Advocates in the country, have amassed scores of egregious lawsuits for and against themselves.
I never heard that Oranika ever sued anyone. He didn't have to. To the best of my knowledge, no one ever sued him. There hardly was a cause for such a course of action. Oranika always stood uncompromisingly for justice. For peace. For amity.
The number of people he trained in Nigeria and abroad is almost beyond computation. And he made no noise about his generosity.
Chief Oranika was a man raised and placed on a high pedestal by God, the Almighty Father. He stooped and picked up his fellow human beings so that they could rise and reign with him. He was the epitome of humility. He never forgot that even Jesus, the Divine Master, was born in a manger inside a stable in Bethlehem. He donated an engineering building to the Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. He built the roundabout on the approaches to the university's administrative blocks.
But one would have to climb the structure to see the tiny prints in which the Oranika name is written. Even though he was conferred with countless academic, professional, and traditional titles, including Ochendo Abatete and Onwa Idemili, he invariably introduced himself simply as G. C. Oranika.
He was a Papal Knight. He was a Knight of Saint Mulumba. He was one of the first Nigerians to attend the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS). He counted the advertisement of personal achievement as meaningless. He just worshipped his Creator and served his fellow human beings. Our fervent prayer is that his immediate family will forever benefit from the goodwill and compassion he exuded to humankind. He rests in the Lord.
