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Remembering Biafran Warlord, Dim Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu (1933 – 2011)

Published

2 months ago

November 8, 2025

Eric

By Eric Elezuo

He came as a unifying force, defying all known luxury to settle for career he was in love it – military. His name was Dim Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu; a Nigerian soldier turned Biafran Warlord as a result of exigencies that ‘cannot be ignored’.If Ojukwu had lived till date, he would have been celebrating 92 years on November 4, the day he was born. But Ojukwu died on November 26, 2011 after a brief illness in London. He legacy has remained evergreen, especially among the Igbo speaking tribe of Nigeria, residing in the south-east region of the country; a people, he gave his utmost best to liberate from the shackles of mass murder, supervising a bloody war with little or no arms and ammunition for 30 months.

Ojukwu is the toast of the average Igboman, his shortcomings notwithstanding.

Born with the shinniest of silver spoons in the Zungeru area of colonial Nigeria, on November 4, 1933, to one of the wealthiest individuals of his time, Sir Louis Odumegwu Ojukwu, the young had the best of everything life could offer, growing up. He was educated at obe of the most prestigious institutions in the country then, King’s College, Lagos, and later at Epsom College in Surrey, England.

He proceeded afterwards to Lincoln College, Oxford University where he obtained a master’s degree in Modern History in 1955. He returned to Nigeria to serve as an administrative officer and suddenly, contrary to expectation, he joined the Nigerian army, and grew by the ranks. He was the first of a kind, joining the military with a retinue of academic successes and certificates.

It would be noted that Ojukwu joined the army in protest. He was protesting the termination of his appointment in civil service when he was posted to Calabar, by the Sir John Macpherson at the instant of his father.

A breakdown of Ojukwu’s sojourn in the field of academics has it that at the outbreak of World War II when he was seven, his father sent him to St. Patrick’s School and CMS Grammar School both in Lagos. In 1944 at the age of 10, Ojukwu started studying at King’s College, Lagos. In 1945 when Ojukwu has stayed for two years in Kings College, his father, who want him to be educated in England, made consultations from his English friend. Epsom College in Surrey was recommended and by 1946, he was sent there for an advanced education.

Ojukwu stayed at Epsom for six years. During that time, he excelled in academics as well as in sports and athletics. He played rugby for the college winning the spring javelin throwing and discus. At 18 he entered Lincoln College, Oxford and studied briefly in 1952. Loius wanted his son to be a lawyer as it was the most common in Nigeria but Ojukwu wants to read modern history. Between 1952 and 1955 he studied law and later switched to history. He also joined the West African Students’ Union in Oxford. During his final years, he joined Oxford Rugby Union as wing three quarter in Lincoln College’s team. Ojukwu graduated with a B.A in arts in 1955 and travelled back to Lagos. He would later return to Oxford to obtain his M.A.

His destiny was beginning to get shaped when six years after Nigeria’s independence in 1960, a group of military officers overthrew the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa-led civilian government. The failure of the coup brought General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi to power, and he appointed Ojukwu as the Military Governor of the Igbo-dominated Eastern Region.

Following a pogrom against the Igbo in several parts of Nigeria, especially in the north after the coup that claimed Aguiyi-Ironsi’s life, Ojukwu, as the governor of Eastern Region, engaged the government in several diplomatic discussions on the road to peace. An accord was reached during some of the parley, one of which is the popular Aburi Accord.The failure of the Accord and continuous pogrom led Ojukwu into seceding from Nigeria, declaring the Republic of Biafra, and becoming its first Head of State. The action led to a civil war, which has been argued in many quarters as a genocide against the Igbos of the then-Eastern region.

Ojukwu did not have what it takes to fight the war as regards weapons. He only had the determination and willpower of his people. But that did not take them far as the Nigerian military, with support from the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, came out victorious, using the weapon of hunger and alleged genocide.

Ojukwu’s effort to use the foreign media to highlight the plight of Biafran civilians and depict the war as genocide against Igbos went unheard, receiving recognition only from France, Haiti and Cote d’ Ivoire among one other two others. He lost the war after superlatively standing off the Nigerian military with its massive oversea’s support, and with it, the young Biafran nation and about three million Biafrans.

Ojukwu subsequently fled to Ivory Coast in exile, where President Félix Houphouët-Boigny granted him political asylum. He returned to Nigeria 1981,when President Shehu Shagari granted him total amnesty.

Though he tried unsuccessfully to grab political power, he made his mark for himself and his people. He began by fighting to reclaim all his property across the country, and married the 21-year-old Bianca Onoh, daughter of a one time governor of Anambra State, C. C. Onoh.

He died in 2011 at the age of 78 in London, England. His body was returned to Nigeria, where Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan gave him a state funeral, a funeral suitable for a general, which he was. He was buried with full military honours, including a 21-gun salute from the Nigerian Army, and thousands of people attended his funeral.

To some, Ojukwu is a contentious figure in the history of Nigeria, but to many, especially the Igbo, he is a hero and wears a messianic cloak. They believe that though the war was lost, a statement was made in the loudest of voices.

Today, however, the voice of Biafra has re-echoed, first from MASSOB, and presently from Nnamdi Kanu’s Indigenous People of Biafra (IBOP).

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Strategy and Sovereignty: Inside Adenuga’s Oil Deal of the Decade

Published

8 hours ago

January 11, 2026

Eric

By Michael Abimboye

In global energy circles, the most consequential deals are often not the loudest. They unfold quietly, reshape portfolios, recalibrate value, and only later reveal their full significance.

The recent strategic transaction between Conoil Producing Limited and TotalEnergies belongs firmly in that category. A deal whose implications stretch beyond balance sheets into Nigeria’s long-troubled oil production narrative.

For Mike Adenuga, named The Boss of the Year 2025 by The Boss Newspapers, the agreement is more than a corporate milestone. It is the culmination of a long-term upstream strategy that is now translating into hard value barrels, cash flow, and renewed confidence in indigenous capacity.

At the heart of the transaction is a portfolio rebalancing agreement that sees TotalEnergies deepen its interest in an offshore asset while Conoil consolidates full ownership of a producing block critical to its medium-term growth trajectory. The parties have not publicly disclosed the monetary value, industry analysts place similar offshore and shallow-water asset transfers in the high hundreds of millions of dollars, depending on reserve certification and development timelines. What is indisputable, however, is the deal’s structural clarity: each partner exits with assets aligned to its strategic strengths.

For Conoil, the transaction represents something more profound than asset shuffling. It is the validation of an indigenous oil company’s ability to operate, produce, and partner at scale. That validation was already underway in 2024, when Conoil achieved a landmark breakthrough: the successful production and export of Obodo crude, a new Nigerian crude blend from its onshore acreage.

In a country where new crude streams have become rare, Obodo’s emergence signalled operational maturity. More importantly, it shifted Conoil from being perceived primarily as a downstream and marginal upstream player into a full-spectrum producer with export-grade assets.

The commercial impact was immediate. Obodo crude enhanced Conoil’s revenue profile, strengthened cash flows, and materially improved the company’s asset valuation.

For Mike Adenuga, Obodo represented something else entirely: oil income with scale and durability. Producing crude shifts wealth from theoretical to realised. It is the difference between potential and proof.

That momentum was reinforced by Conoil’s acquisition of a new drilling rig, a move that underscored its intent to control not just resources, but execution. In an industry where rig availability often dictates production timelines, owning modern drilling capacity gives Conoil a strategic advantage lowering costs, reducing dependency, and accelerating development cycles. It also enhances the company’s bargaining power in partnerships such as the one with TotalEnergies.

Taken together, the Obodo crude success, the rig acquisition, and the TotalEnergies transaction, these moves materially expand Conoil’s enterprise value. While private company valuations remain opaque, upstream assets with proven production, infrastructure control, and international partnerships typically command significant multiple expansion. For Adenuga, all of these represents a stabilising and appreciating pillar of wealth.

As The Boss Newspapers honours Mike Adenuga as Boss of the Year 2025, the recognition lands at a moment when his oil ambitions are no longer peripheral to his legacy. They are central. In Obodo crude, in steel rigs, and in carefully negotiated partnerships, Adenuga is shaping a version of Nigerian capitalism that privileges patience, scale, and execution over spectacle.

In the end, the most powerful statement of wealth is not net worth rankings or headlines. It is the ability to convert strategy into assets, assets into production, and production into national relevance. On that score, the Conoil–TotalEnergies deal may well stand as one of the most consequential chapters in Mike Adenuga’s business story and in Nigeria’s evolving oil future.

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Peter Obi, Only Life in ADC, Says Fayose

Published

2 days ago

January 10, 2026

Eric

Former Governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Fayose, says the former presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, is the only life in the African Democratic Congress, ADC.

Fayose made this statement on Friday while fielding questions in an interview on ‘Politics Today’, a programme on Channels Television.

He also said that the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, is technically no more, adding that it is dead.

The former governor equally said that Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde, should not be dragged into the woes of the PDP.

He said: “Obi is the only life in ADC; all other people in ADC are semi-existent. If Obi had remained in Labour Party or has gone to Accord Party, he is the only life there. All the other people there, they are not existing. They are old-forces.

“Openly, I supported Tinubu in 2023. I didn’t hide it. Till now I’m still there. I don’t jump. I have said it to you I’m not a member of APC and I will never be.”

DailyPost

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More Troubles for Ahmed Farouk: Dangote Drags Ex-NMDPRA Boss to EFCC over Corruption Claims

Published

2 days ago

January 9, 2026

Eric

The Chairman of Dangote Industries, Aliko Dangote, through his legal representative, has filed a formal corruption petition against the former Managing Director of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority, Farouk Ahmed, at the headquarters of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

This was disclosed in a statement made available to our correspondent by the Dangote Group media team on Friday.

Recall that Dangote had earlier petitioned the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission to investigate Ahmed for allegedly spending $5 million on his children’s secondary education in Switzerland. He withdrew the petition a few days ago, even as the ICPC vowed to continue with its investigation.

The statement on Friday said Dangote’s petition to the EFCC followed “The withdrawal of the same petition from the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, a strategic decision aimed at accelerating the prosecution process.”

In the petition, signed by Lead Counsel Dr O.J. Onoja, Dangote urged the EFCC to investigate allegations of abuse of office and corrupt enrichment against Ahmed, and to prosecute him if found culpable.

The petition further stated that Dangote would provide evidence to substantiate claims of financial misconduct and impunity.

“We make bold to state that the commission is strategically positioned, along with sister agencies, to prosecute financial crimes and corruption-related offences, and upon establishing a prima facie case, the courts do not hesitate to punish offenders. See Lawan v. F.R.N (2024) 12 NWLR (Pt. 1953) 501 and Shema v. F.R.N. (2018) 9 NWLR (Pt.1624) 337,” the petition read.

Onoja further urged the commission, under the leadership of Mr Olanipekun Olukoyede, “To investigate the complaint of abuse of office and corruption against Engr. Farouk Ahmed and to accordingly prosecute him if found wanting.”