By Emmanuel Abi Couson
The first Executive Governor of Anambra State, Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife is dead.
Ezeife joined his ancestors Thirsday evening, NewsSpecng learnt.
According to a statement signed by Chief Rob Nwakaire Ezeife, on behalf of the Ezeife Family, in which he noted that the Igboukwu-born elder statesman passed on at the Federal Medical Centre, Abuja, on Thursday evening around 6pm
“On behalf of the Ezeife Dynasty of Igbo-Ukwu, I wish to announce the promotion to glory of our most distinguished son, Okwadike, Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife,CON, a former Federal Permanent Secretary, the first Executive Governor of Anambra State, a former Political Adviser to the President and former Presidential Aspirant.
“This sad event took place yesterday at 6pm at the Federal Medical Centre, Abuja. More details about the deceased and the arrangements for his State Burial will be announced later,” the statement read.
Dr. Ezeife’s death is coming barely twenty months after his wife passed on, and barely eight months after another former governor of the State, Chief Chinwoke Mbadinuju also joined his ancestors.
Dr. Ezeife was elected Governor of Anambra State from January 1992 to November 1993 during the Nigerian Third Republic.
Ezeife was born at Igbo-Ukwu, Anambra State on 20 November 1939. He did not attend secondary school, but taught himself through correspondence courses, qualifying for university admission.
He gained a BSc in Economics from the University College Ibadan, then attended Harvard University on a Rockefeller Foundation scholarship where he obtain a masters and then PhD degree in 1972. He became a School Headmaster, a lecturer at Makarare University College, Kampala, Uganda, a Teaching Fellow at Harvard University, and a Consultant with Arthur D. Little in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Ezeife joined the civil service as an Administrative Officer and rose to the position of Permanent Secretary.
Ezeife was elected governor of Anambra State on the Social Democratic Party (SDP) platform, holding office from 2 January 1992 to 17 November 1993, when General Sani Abacha took power after a military coup. As governor, he was said to be more interested in planning than in addressing immediate developmental needs, and achieved few tangible results.
He transferred Nnamdi Azikiwe University and Federal Polytechnic, Oko to the federal government, which helped ensure that they survived in the ensuing military regime.
During the Nigerian Fourth Republic Ezeife, who describes himself as a social democrat, was appointed presidential Adviser on Political Matters to President Olusegun Obasanjo
Popularly known as Okwadike Igboukwu, Ezeife died at the age of 85.
