Today, 5 years ago in Igbo History, Angel Network News commemorates a great son of Igbo land, Chief Onuora Nzekwu (OON), who died in 21st April, 2017 and was laid to rest on 30th Jun, 2017. Chief Onuora Nzekwu was a renowned writer and broadcaster. His 1966 novel, “Eze Goes To School”, shot him to prominence.
Onuora Nzekwu (OON) also Joseph Onuora Nzekwu , was a Nigerian professor, writer and editor of Igbo extraction. He was the author of the 1961 novel, Wand of Noble Wood and the 1963 novel Eze Goes to School, which were published by the African Writers Series.
Nzekwu was born in Kafanchan, Kaduna State, to Mr. Obiese Nzekwu and Mrs. Mary Ogugua Nzekwu (née Aghadiuno) of Onitsha in Anambra State. In January 1956, Nzekwu joined the Federal Civil Service and worked as an editorial assistant at the Nigeria Magazine division of the Federal Ministry of Information and Communications, from 1956 to 1958. In 1958, he took over the position of editor-in-chief of the magazine. Nzekwu continued to run the Nigeria Magazine division of the Federal Ministry of Information and Communications until 1966, when the Nigerian crisis compelled him to transfer his services to the Eastern Nigeria Public Service.
He began as a Senior Information Officer at Eastern Nigeria, a post that combined the roles of Information Ministry and Cultural officer. In 1968, he was promoted deputy director of the newly created Cultural Division. At the end of hostilities in January 1970, Nzekwu returned to the Federal Ministry of Information in May and was assigned to the information division as Senior Information Officer.
Nzekwu worked as acting General Manager of News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) until 1 July 1979, when he then took over as the substantive general manager. He retired from the Nigeria Public Service in 1985, after presiding over the affairs of NAN for nearly eight years and servicing his country’s government for 39 years.
Onuora Nzekwu received the Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship in 1961, which enabled him to study American Methods of Magazine Production with Crafts Horizons in New York. In 1964, he was awarded a UNESCO Fellowship, which allowed him to study copyright administration for three months in Geneva, Prague, Paris, London, New York and Washington.
On 8 August 2006, News Agency of Nigeria observed its 30th anniversary during celebrations at Abuja. The NAN presented a plaque, with the engraving “Maker of NAN”, to Nzekwu. In December 2008, Nzekwu was conferred with the Nigerian national honour of Officer of the Order of the Niger (OON).
Nzekwu has also authored several novels. He co-authored Eze Goes to School and Eze Goes to College with historian Michael Crowder. The two school supplementary readers were first published by African University Press in 1964 and 1988 respectively.
In 1977, Nzekwu published his first non-fiction work, The Chima Dynasty in Onitsha, in which he presented the history of Onitsha through an account of the reign of its monarchs. Nzekwu’s novel, Faith of Our Fathers, a compendium of the arts, beliefs, social institutions and code of values that characterize the Onitsha traditional community, was published in 2003, Troubled Dust was published in 2012, Ahmed Daggash (Story of the True) was published in 2016. He had other interesting published works.
Chief Nzekwu died on the 17th day of April, 2017 in his hometown Onitsha, Anambra state and was laid to rest on the 30th June, 2017. He was aged 89 years.
The Igbo race had really lost an Icon in the publishing industry.
Though Chief Onuora Nzekwu is gone and laid to rest, his legacy Iives on in the minds of African Writers especially the Igbo race.
Chief Nzekwu is GONE but not FORGOTTEN!