Ojukwu burial: Igbo elders thank Jonathan ...Why Ohanaeze didn’t play active role, Uwazuruike stayed away

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Igbo elders have thanked President Goodluck Jonathan for according the late Igbo leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, a state burial. Ojukwu who died on November 26 last year was buried last Friday in his Umudim Nnewi, Anambra State ancestral home, with the president and his wife, Dame Patience Jonathan, attending the funeral service personally.

The thank you message from the Igbo elders under the aegis of Igbo Elders’ Forum obtained exclusively by Daily Sun came on the heels of revelations of why the Igbo socio-cultural group, Ohanaeze Ndigbo did not play active role in the burial of Ojukwu, while also the leader of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), Chief Ralph Uwazuruike, surprisingly stayed away in the dying minute.

The elders in the message signed by Chief Uwazurike also said that they had followed with keen interest, Jonathan’s genuine concerns when Ojukwu took ill and his contributions in their collective efforts to save his life.
The Igbo elders, therefore, pledged to continue to give Jonathan their maximum support even as they prayed that “the good spirit, goodwill and wisdom of our departed leader, Dim Dikedioranma will continue to be with you.”

As the Igbo elders write to Jonathan, an Ohanaeze Ndigbo chieftain who does not want his name in print told Daily Sun that a few influential members of the national burial committee for Ojukwu headed by Justice Chukwudifu Oputa (retd) were to be blamed for the near lackadaisical attitude showed by the Ohanaeze in the burial of Ojukwu.

The source pointed out that though the President General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Ralph Uwechue was named as a member of the national burial committee, he was never written or communicated officially on that, adding that not even a written protest from the Ohanaeze Secretary, Chief Nduka Eya, to one of the members of the committee who happened to be a staunch member of the Igbo apex socio-cultural group could sway the committee to correct the anomaly.

The source said that they first suspected that the powerful clique in the burial committee wanted to spite the Ohanaeze president general when they placed his name second to the last name on the list of committee members published in the national dailies.