The African intrepid
Until his transition on 2nd January 2022 at 87, Ambassador (Prof) Lawrence Baraebibai Ekpebu served Nigeria with singleness of purpose. Indeed, his abiding creed was “Service to God and Mankind.”
He explained, “The only career for man is serving God and mankind irrespective of age and circumstance. One’s skills and education are means to this sacred calling. A baby who quietens at night to enable his parents enjoy a sound sleep is serving God. The parents who sacrifice all to train their children are also serving God. Even a dying old man about to expire can also serve God.
“An old man about to expire can with his last breath say something capable of bringing peace or strife to those he’s leaving behind. Whatever comes out of his mouth becomes a position to be defended. Knowing he’s about to be silenced forever, a wise patriarch will set his house in order by telling the whole truth. That is serving God.”
Born May 2, 1935 to Chief Naupa Ekpebu and Mary Geku of Okoloba town, Kolokuma/Opokuma LGA, Bayelsa State, Professor Ekpebu made history as the first African to graduate from Harvard University in 1960 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. In 1962 he earned a Master’s in Public Administration, MPA, from the Woodrow Wilson School of Government, Princeton University. This was followed by another Master’s and Doctorate from Harvard in 1965. Then declining the best from the West, he returned to Nigeria that same year to take up a teaching job with the University of Ibadan.
Rivers First Eleven
On 27th May 1967, General Yakubu (Jack) Gowon magnanimously created Rivers and South Eastern States for the former Eastern Minorities. The man he picked to build Rivers was a young naval officer called Commander Alfred Diete-Spiff. Willing to learn, Commander Spiff assembled eleven commissioners, historically known as Rivers First Eleven, to assist him. Those he picked were deep minds whose conducts and actions catapulted the state to foremost position.
They included then Dr Lawrence Baraebibai Ekpebu, Commissioner for Finance; Chief Harold Dappa-Biriye, Commissioner for Agriculture, Fisheries and Natural Resources; Mr Kenule Beeson Tsaro-Wiwa, Commissioner for Education; Mr. N. Nwanodi, Commissioner for Health and Dr. Nabo B. Graham-Douglas, Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice.
Others were Chief EJA Oriji, Commissioner for Economic Development, Trade and Industry; Mr O Ngei, Commissioner for Works, Land and Transport; Chief S.F. Kombo-Igbeta, Commissioner for Establishment; Dr Obi Wali, Commissioner for Rehabilitation; Dr. WT Wakama, Commissioner for Local Government and Information and Professor Isaac Dema, Chairman, Public Service Commission.
Apart from the famed Rivers First Eleven, Commander Spiff later recruited JTT Alamene Bobai, Dr. MT Akobo, Nnaa Edward Kobani, Melford Okilo, Barr CD Orike and ENB Opurum. These great men put in their very best to make Rivers great.
Commander Spiff led Rivers as pioneer military governor, 1967-1975. The following military officers also led the state as governors, namely, Zamani Lekwot, 1975-1978; Suleiman Saidu, 1978-1979; Fidelis Oyakhilome, 1984-1986; Anthony Ukpo, 1986-1988; Ernest Adelaye, 1988-1990; Godwin Abbe, 1990-1992; Dauda Komo, 1993-1996; Musa Shehu, 1996-1998 and Sam Ewang 1998-1999.
Civilian governors were Melford Okilo, 1979-1983; Ada George, 1992-1993; Peter Odili, 1999-2007; Celestine Omehia, 2007; Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, 2007-2015 and Ezebunwo Wike, 2015-present. We thank them for doing their very best for Rivers not minding the highly circumscribed space allowed them.
Contributed in Building Rivers
Sacrificing a flourishing lecturing job with the University of Ibadan and family comfort, Ekpebu relocated to the war-torn Rivers in 1968. As the longest serving commissioner, he served a total of seven years- five years as Commissioner for Finance and two as joint Commissioner for Ministry of Economic Development and Reconstruction and Ministry of Information.
Commander Spiff’s immediate priority was convincing Rivers people to send their children back to school. He built hundreds of new primary and secondary schools in addition to rebuilding the old ones destroyed in the fighting. His action saw Rivers children back to school.
At the tertiary level, the Rivers Automatic Scholarship Scheme, RASS, was established for students at home and abroad. This scholarship was the brainchild of Ekpebu who modelled it after one of the Harvard scholarships he created through Chief Samuel Awokoya. The Harvard scholarships included the Nigerian-American Scholarship Programme, NASP; African Scholarship Programme of American Universities, ASPAU; African Graduate Fellowship Programme, AFGRAD, and Advanced Training for Leadership and Skills, ATLAS. Some 250 American universities and 53 African countries joined the programmes benefiting 4000 African scholars. Ekpebu repackaged NASP as RASS for Rivers students.
He played a big role establishing the Rivers State College of Science and Technology and College of Education that metamorphosed into the then Rivers State University of Science and Technology, RSUST, known today as Rivers State University, RSU, and Ignatius Ajuru University of Education. When the Federal Government placed embargo on state universities, he negotiated the establishment of the University of Port Harcourt. As Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of Governing Council of RSUST, he repositioned the institution for greater productivity.
With cessation of hostilities in January 1970, Ekpebu established Rivers treasury, sub-treasuries and internal revenue boards. Before the war Barclays Bank, African Continental Bank, ACB, United Bank for Africa, UBA, Wema Bank, Union Bank, etc, were unwilling to give loans to Rivers people who had nothing to offer as collaterals. This led to widespread poverty exacerbated by the monumental destruction that took place during the war.
After the war no bank agreed to return to Port Harcourt not minding Ekpebu’s entreaties as Commissioner for Finance. As a last resort he raised a memo, which Commander Spiff approved, for the establishment of Rivers-owned Pan African Bank, PAB. He modelled the PAB after the Chase Manhattan Bank where he did his intern while a postgraduate student of Princeton University. The PAB funded the PABOD Group of Companies. Consisting of PABOD Breweries, PABOD Stores, Rivbank Finance and Rivbank Insurance, this conglomerate formed the nucleus of Rivers economy.
When Indigenisation Programme began, Rivers people were too poor to participate. Ekpebu intervened using state funds to buy assets before turning such properties over to private persons as a way of launching them into corporate Nigeria. Metaloplastica and Nigerian Engineering Works were among assets so acquired.
In terms of agriculture, Commander Spiff secured a generous loan from the World Bank to establish Risonpalm, one of the biggest oil palm plantations in Africa. Ekpebu played a big role in securing the loan. Robert MacNamara, President of World Bank, automatically approved the loan on learning that Ekpebu was a Harvard product. Apart from bringing in scarce funds into the state coffers, Risonpalm created permanent employment for hundreds.
Commander Spiff’s transport programme covered land, sea and air. The Waterglass Boatyard built fast-moving watercraft operated by the Waterlines transport company that also ran a scheduled bus service. Boat hospitals took healthcare to remote creek towns. Rivers acquired Delta Airline from JKG Amacheree for scheduled commercial helicopter services. A brand new international airport was built by the Federal Government at Omagwa bringing to two the number of airports in the state.
The 1959 World Bank report stated that the Niger Delta had the capacity to feed Africa with paddy rice. Opening up Rivers for commercial farming was the initial reason Ekpebu conceptualised the East-West Road. To get the Federal Government involved, he did two things. One, he upgraded the road to Trunk A by involving the coastal South Eastern and Midwestern States. And two, he argued that such interstate highway would enable Nigerian army to quickly deploy and protect critical oil facilities in the event of foreign invasion.
Dumez (Nigeria) Limited, a French company, was awarded the East-West Road contract by the state government before the Federal Government was persuaded to take it. Ekpebu remained eternally grateful to Commander Spiff for not throwing the road project out for lack of funds. He was also grateful to Alhaji Shehu Shagari and Professor Adebayo Adedeji for their roles in making the federal government, under General Gowon, take over this project.
Rivers energy needs were met when a second refinery was added to the existing one at Eleme; mainly as a result of the state collaboration with the Federal Government. The electricity generating station at Afam was repaired and Rivers had regular power. Whereas Rivers First Eleven worked with candlelight 1968 when they returned from exile, in 1975 they left Port Harcourt a picturesque city glowing with electricity.
Immortalise Ekpebu
I once asked Professor Ekpebu why Commander Spiff and Rivers First Eleven refused to name schools and streets after themselves. He shook his head, “If we really served old Rivers well, posterity will remember and honour us. You don’t honour yourself. Those whose lives you positively touched should do that.”
So far, posterity has honoured the great Commander Spiff, Saro-Wiwa, Obi Wali and Harold Dappa-Biriye; among Rivers First Eleven. Rivers people thanked Governor Wike for naming the newly built Nigerian Law School, Port Harcourt, after Nabo Graham-Douglass.Also, Rivers government rightly honoured Ignatius Ajuru, Elechi Amadi, Ada George and Peter Odili.
Professor Ekpebu was among Rivers First Eleven yet to be recognised or honoured. Rivers people are constrained to condemn the injustice of not honouring him not minding his immense contribution to what we are today. There is no engineer, academic, medical doctor, pharmacist, lawyer, etc, of the 1970s that was not a beneficiary of the RASS.
We implore Governor Wike to right the historic wrong done Professor Ekpebu, a great Son of old Rivers, by naming a higher institution of learning, a major road or the Faculty of Social Sciences of the RSU after him. Alternatively, as His Excellency has the ultimate discretion, Governor Wike could immortalise this great icon by gazetting a public holiday as Professor Lawrence Ekpebu’s Day.
Eke, a publicist, writes from Port Harcourt, Rivers State
(Email: [email protected])
