Man lives each day consumed by the certainty of death. While some people mold the certainty of death to their advantage, riding the surety of finality to leave a legacy, others allow this certainty to rattle them, force them to live carelessly and ultimately steal them when they least expect it.
On 6th February, 2024,The Asagba of Asaba Kingdom in Delta State and one of Nigeria’s foremost traditional rulers, Professor Chike Edozien, joined his ancestors. He was ninety-nine and had spent thirty-two years on the throne.
A world renowned nutritionist, the Asagba was first appointed a professor in the University of Ibadan in 1961 before becoming the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine in 1962. He attended the famous Christ the King College Onitsha,the Achimota School, Accra, Ghana, and the University of Ireland before going on to teach at the University of London, University of Ibadan, Massachusetts Institute of Technology,Cambridge MA, and the University of North Carolina where he retired as an emeritus Professor and returned to Nigeria in 1991.
As Nigeria’s prime example of an academic as a traditional ruler, the Asagba was education refined; a citadel of consistency and civility in a country that seemed to coddle chaos every now and then.
A proud survivor of the Nigerian Civil War, it was Nigeria’s political turmoil that forced him into exile in France where he lived as a refugee until he was appointed a Professor of Nutrition at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge, MA.
His time as the Asagba coincided with the elevation of Asaba as the capital of Delta State with all its chaotic transformation meant for the ancient traditions of the ancient kingdom. He was conferred with the national honour of Commander of the Federal Republic by President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2003 and was one traditional ruler who encouraged and promoted mutual coexistence especially between people in the northern and southern parts of the country.
He lived for ninety-nine years, sat on the throne for thirty-two years, but will live in the hearts of many until time itself itches away. As the traditional ruler of Asaba he always had the ghosts of the Asaba massacre to contend with and appease.
He bore gripping witness to the Asaba massacre which stands as one of the sorest moments of the atrocious Nigerian Civil War of 1967 to 1970. Between October 5-7 1967, Nigerian troops descended on Asaba like a swarm of locusts and mauled down about five hundred young men. Many women were raped.
The Asagba was an Iroko full of leaves and though he was swarmed by locusts again and again, he pulled through with much grace and grit.
The good people of Asaba Kingdom have indeed lost their shelter and sanctuary, and despite his ripe old age of ninety-nine, it is a loss keenly felt.
But it is not just in Asaba that the grating sense of loss is being felt. The Asagba was a being that went beyond boundaries.
At a time when the traditional institution in Nigeria is increasingly coming under backbreaking pressure, his fellow royal fathers must especially lament his loss.
In neighboring Anambra State, irked by the conferment of a chieftaincy title on a politician he considers a massive threat in the 2025 Governorship election, Governor Chukwuma Soludo suspended the traditional ruler of Neni, Igwe Damian Ezeani before quickly querying Igwe Gerald Mbamalu of Ojoto and Igwe Felix Ebelendu of Aguluezechukwu.
When the Anambra State Traditional Rulers Council stung the governor with a rebuke over the suspension, the council was immediately disbanded.
In Ekiti State, a sacrilegious attack on the sanctity of human life and the traditional institution culminated in the killing of two monarchs by suspected kidnappers on January 29, 2024.
Nigerians also remember how the Kano State government summarily deposed Sanusi Lamido as the Emir of Kano in 2020. In January 2016, Obi Edward Akaeze Ofulue 111, the Obi of Ubulu Uku, a neighboring kingdom to Asaba, was killed by suspected herdsmen. Shortly before he left office, Yahaya Bello, the immediate past governor of Kogi State took it upon himself to put some traditional rulers in their place.
Achebe ascended the throne in 1991, his longevity on the ancient stool offering a consistent platform from which he drove change agreeable to the ancient customs and traditions of his people. His life and long witness to traditional values even as everything else changed around him bear witness to the immeasurable gift he was. Other traditional rulers will do well to emulate him.
While it is true that over the years, executive interference in the traditional institution has helped to denigrate its image, it is even truer that some traditional rulers have contributed to the demystification of their exalted positions. In many communities around the country, traditional stools have become tools passed around to settle political scores, curry cheap loyalty or reward sycophancy. As a result of executive interference in traditional affairs which is not without active complicity from some traditional rulers themselves, hitherto feared traditional institutions have become a shadow of themselves turning in rather insipid performance as Nigeria has stunk its way to inevitable degeneration.
If Nigeria is to regain its values as a country and its place on the path to fulfilling its prodigious promise, then the traditional institution will play a critical role. The Asagba of Asaba may no longer be around to guide the process, but even in death, his telling examples will continue to be a source of insight and inspiration.
Kene Obiezu,
