THE NATION WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2011
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The Midweek Magazine E-mail:- ozoluauhakheme@yahoo.com
Judy Nwanodi, 76, is in love with Nigeria. She came to Nigeria in 1959 after marrying a young lawyer, Chief Nwobike Nwanodi, who is now a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), and has lived here since 1959. She is the patron of Rainbow Book Club. In this interview with EVELYN OSAGIE, she relives her sojourn in the country. Meeting my husband
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MET my husband, Chief Nwobike Nwanodi (SAN), at a seminar in the University of Oxford at the end of October 1956. He was a student then. It was his intelligence that attracted me. We got married in 1958. Before then, my father, who had worked in Malaysia, Singapore from 1931 to 1965, advised me to visit Nigeria before we actually got married. So, I came here for five weeks – December/ January, 1957/58. And went to Jos, Port Harcourt and Ibadan; met my future in-laws. We had friends in other parts of the country. I was a geography student then, so I found it educative. And then, we got married and lived in England for just over a year. I was working while my husband completed his law programme.
Living in Nigeria My sojourn in Nigeria has been a mix of so many things. We came back in 1959, his parents helped us initially and my father also helped us to enable us get to Nigeria so that we could get going. My father paid for my ticket and his father for his. Rent was paid, some money were made available to get furniture, the first year we didn’t have a fridge; we managed. I walked to the market. We lived near the main market in Port Harcourt at the railway station. After I delivered, which was the middle of September 1960, the market women were so thrilled and the birth to them was unexpected because I was very small in stature. They brought me fruits and other items where we lived in a part called Town, which was called ‘big man’s quarters’ in those days because lawyers, doctors and professionals lived there. I also began work when our child was four months old at Baptist High School, Moore House Street where I taught for five years. And I moved to Holy Rosary where I worked for a year and a half until the Civil War closed the school.
Experiencing the war In the election held in the east in 1965, my husband was elected to the Federal House of Representatives as one of the four independent members. That Christmas we visited Lagos with our two small children. We got back to Port Harcourt before the New Year and he returned to Lagos for the next sitting of the House only to be met in the middle of January by a coup which threw us all out because we thought things were going reasonably well. The Midwest Region had been created. I know there were some problems in the west but we were still fairly confident. That summer, the children and I were in England to see my father. And my husband was to join us; but while we were there, the second coup happened. And two things came out of that, my husband was very involved with the creation of the original Rivers State, collecting signatures. And he was very concerned about the possible declaration of Biafra. In fact, he advised me not to come back with the children in September. But I came back anyway to meet a big crisis and by the following year in October 1967, American nationals in eastern Nigeria were advised to leave by the consul which was what I did with the children. They would have taken my husband but he wanted to stay behind. Meanwhile, his brother in-law, Chief Emmanuel Aguma, was very active in the Eastern Region government and moved into Biafra. In spite of being with Biafra politically, he did as much as he could to save the lives of people of what is now Rivers State. He died last year. He also made sure that my husband was detained for his own safety in a prison in Owerri along with people such as Chike Obi and other prominent people who could not fully support Biafra because they felt Nigeria was really what was important and not the secession of one part of the country.
My husband’s belief in Nigeria Yes, my husband felt Nigeria was really what was important and not the secession of one part of the country. It was known because he was going to meetings of the ‘Leaders of Thought’ in Enugu. And people knew he was a federalist. And, in fact, he was detained for his own safety, as I have said, through the fortunate action of his brother in-law. While he was in detention – and this also happened to the late Nabo Graham-Douglas (SAN) – their three houses were ransacked and their legal books were taken out and burnt. Graham-Douglas refused to allow his house to be rebuilt, so if you go to I.B. Johnson Street today, you would see the damage that was done during the Civil War to that prominent lawyer’s residence in the oldest part of Port Harcourt near the prison.
•Nwanodi
‘My Nigerian journey’ Lessons learnt in Nigeria Like my husband, I believe in Nigeria. In the number of years I have lived here, I would say the main point is that as a developing nation, there is room for improvement. The history of most nations of the world obviously varies a great deal. One cannot easily compare. One may say that in some countries people literarily fought for their independence. May be they did but that was 300 years ago perhaps. There was a revolution in France, you could say that in some ways France hasn’t changed a great deal since that revolution; in
‘Like my husband, I believe in Nigeria. In the number of years I have lived here, I would say the main point is that as a developing nation, there is room for improvement’
other ways it has. And we could go on talking about the history of various countries… And I think to weld into one nation made up of such a variety of groups of people, even if they have certain things in common, the large number of languages and cultural practices, different history of migration, world views, etc, is not something you do in 50 years. All sections of the society should be considered during decision making processes. That is the only way to end the crises.
On the Niger Delta With what is happening across the country, not just in the Niger Delta a lot still needs to be done on security. I have been afraid up to a point that I have changed some of my habits. Like going out at 6 o’clock in the morning to go swimming; my husband and I don’t go for walks on the streets any longer. I would hesitate to walk as freely as I used to. I’d love to walk, meet, greet people in their own languages but I don’t feel quite as free as I used to any more. At the same time, the government needs to take action. And that is the only way to end crisis. People need to be educated on the need for peace. The greatest problem that we have is that we are not willing to respect, love and •Continued on page 31