It was the burial of one of their own. For Cecelia Abashi was not a radical by association with the late husband, Chris Abashi. She was the personification of radicalism – stubborn in a principled way, resilient and a long distance runner. So, the radical activists, particularly but not exclusively those around the University of Jos in the early 1980s were the collective mourners at her burial on February 27th, 2024, the same day Nigerian workers were pouring on the streets against hardships and insecurity nationwide. It is the sort of action Chris and Cece Abashi would have loved to participate. Alas, they lay in their graves next to each other at Akwanga, Nasarawa State of Nigeria.
Some late comers pray for the repose of Cece’s soul on the family compound
The burnt house Cece was gradually rebuilding it step by step before her death last week.
It was to be understood that burial is an early morning affair around that geo-cultural axis. Between 7 and 8 am that morning, the community observed a lying-in-state protocol at the College of Education, Akwanga where Cece was a lecturer for over two decades. Then to the Catholic Church where it was learnt the officiating priest spent no more than 10 minutes for the sermon. All those who arrived Akwanga after 11 am were late comers, technically speaking, although the burial rites continued with different groups doing their own things in different spheres in and around the Abashi family house, a house set on a hill and a source of enlightened radical tradition in the days gone by.
It was the end of an era and the founding moment was bound to thrust itself unto the agenda almost from nowhere as the comrades who lighted that pathway found themselves calling memory to the help of self-appraisal. It is not clear if it is known to all the voices heard at this gathering that a close Babangida aide once said that unless and until one of that generation made the Nigerian presidency (although he said leadership, not presidency specifically), Nigeria would never get out of sleep-walking. Although he made this statement in relation to Mallam Kabir Yusuf’s success in setting up a newspaper which has survived in the north of Nigeria, Kabir Yusuf is broadly part of the generation in question as well as Umaru Yar’Adua who was a conscious socialist during and after his university days. Kabir Yusuf was, for many years, lost to the anti-Apartheid struggle in South Africa, the aspect of the struggle that he found more fundamental at the time.
Anyway, at Akwanga, Barrister Tony Akika, the chairperson of the emergency Politburo, asked Cde John Odah, ex-General Secretary of the NLC to lead the memorialisation. In 2010 when the labour movement celebrated John Odah’s 50th birthday, Cde Labaran Maku had said that John Odah “is not someone who puts himself in the front but a key operator behind the massive action you see in the front. He was an activist whose sense of commitment could cut through any mountain, a real product of communal upbringing in the rural society and its high sense of value, propriety and culture”. It is still something of a ‘foundational’ sociological statement, not only about John but about the majority of the young undergraduates who lighted the fire that shone brilliantly on Nigeria before the succession of juntas blighted it.
John started from the Flat in Isolo in Lagos where the student activists of the early 1980s reconvened. The owners of the house were three staff of the NLC but it was turned into where activists of the generation squatted or frequented: They were many but most regulars were Emma Ezeazu, Chima Ubani, Chidi Nganga and Labaran Maku whom John named “an exceptional squatter” because it was as a squatter with John when John was a PG student that Labaran went on in his 2nd year to get elected president of UNIJOS Student Union and later NANS PRO. John threw more stones at everyone: how Festus Okoye went to squat in Y.Z Y’au’s house in Kano but always argues that he only went to keep Y’au company; how Barrister Titus Mann collapsed the defunct Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) when he was made the president and Chairperson of the board; the late Abashi, Okoye, Akika and T’Mann crashed what was supposed to be a revolutionary law firm. He spared only Barrister John Mathew whose 30th marriage anniversary was that day but most likely because John Mathews attended ABU, Zaria rather than Jos. Naseer Kura and Adagbo Onoja were not spared for crashing NANS as president and secretary-general respectively in 1993.
All the comrade mourners
All the mourning Josites
Only a telephone call coincidentally from Cde Y. Z Y’au could halt Odah. Y’au remained part of the conversation electronically for quite some time. It would not be anything outrageous to say Y’au was the ideological and tactical pillar of student radicalism at Bayero University in Kano both as a student and as a lecturer. But he is a democratic centralist too – those who moved things from behind without being seen. Interestingly, the Kura/Onoja pair which John holds responsible for crashing NANS had his imprint. By 1994, NANS, like the other front organisations had imploded or were in that process and it would have been a miracle if otherwise.
But jokes aside, there was the story that came out in Odah’s reflection regarding the making of Cde Festus Okoye as secretary-general of NANS in December 1982 at the convention in Bayero University, Kano. The Movement for the Advancement of African Society (MAAS) which was the local Politburo controlling the radical students struggle at UNIJOS had decided on the late Chris Abashi as the candidate to be fielded for president of NANS at the convention. NANS had many tendencies then. Abashi was considered charismatic, a member of MAAS and very articulate fellow. He was a rhetorically powerful person and thus a crowd handler. So, there were no reservations about Abashi but who was going to serve as the secretary-general along with Abashi since NANS ran the Secretariat system, meaning that the president and secretary-general must all come from one university at a time.
Ali Tanko was tipped but the young man did not find such responsibility acceptable. So, he was nowhere to be seen. There was a search for right into his village in Pankshin. Abashi was the driver. Nobody was comfortable with his devil-may-care handling of the steering but he called it ‘revolutionary’ driving and wouldn’t be persuaded that he was running risks. Anyway, he never had any accident there or elsewhere. But the pursuit was an unproductive mission as Ali Tanko could not be found. Festus Okoye became the only other student considered fit. But there was still a problem: Festus had just been operated upon and was still in the hospital. So, what was to be done? A decision was taken by the mandarins of the caucus to discharge Okoye from the hospital by themselves and take him along to the convention in Kano. That was implemented. It was from Kano that the family was informed that Festus was very okay and there should be no concern. Okoye’s family could take it because Okoye, the father was not inly a subtle supporter of student radicalism, his house was where the ‘kidnappers’ used to go and make landline telephone calls in those days where there was no GSM. So, the ‘kidnappers’ could go scot-free. If it were now when kidnapping is the subject of a military campaign, the ringleaders of the kidnap operation such as John Odah might have been in a big trouble.
Muhammed Abubakar Rimi was the governor of the old Kano State then. So, Kano was a good atmosphere for democracy with Stalinist touch, including the set of tendency opponents from UNILAG who were kept busy with exploring the pluralism Sabongari Kano could offer any set of visitors until the elections were over in far away BUK campus.
Anyway, Okoye won the election and became secretary-general. In fact, all candidates of that tendency in NANS won their elections, particularly Ngozi Ojudo, now Ngozi Iwere who emerged the PRO of NANS against very determined opponents from the University of Calabar and then university of Ife. Ngozi was then an undergraduate studying French at BUK. For NANS aspiring to make a statement on gender sensitivity, Ngozi’s victory was the victory to celebrate subtly. Lessons: nobody decided what he or she would be in those days in NANS. You do not come with money or family name or academic brilliance or your state of origin or religion or whatever to say you wanted to be president of NANS or whatever. The caucus decided who was qualified and on what basis.
The rulebook was ‘democratic centralism. It was the source of the directive principles which forbade an Andy Okolie but approved of a Chom Bagu as the PRO of NANS under Lanre Arogundade’s presidency. Bagu who had been expelled from ABU, Zaria in his last year in 1981 was considered the veteran’s veteran, the one who would stabilise the Arogundade presidency of NANS. Even if any other candidate was an angel, s/he was not qualified enough. Democratic centralism does not rule out inputs from below but it located the site of final decision in the ‘Politburo’. So, Bagu got the job. “As you see this Chom, he may look like a peasant but he was a General”, said John yesterday. Andy Okolie who has morphed into an intellectual around Atiku Abubakar today retreated after being blocked then and ended the first student of Sociology in UNIJOS to obtain a First Class in the subject in those days, ending up again at the global front rank University of Toronto in Canada. He is one of the cheerful contributors to the Cecelia Abashi Burial Fund, all the way from Canada where he is based.
Bye!
Akika welcoming Chom
Barrister Akika was happy with the opportunity comrades had to be together again, made possible by Cece Abashi’s death. “Her death has united us without protocol”, he said. We want to come back again to reflect on what to do with Chris’s place, he added. (The duplex is totally burnt). Without forgetting Chris Abashi, he called him a very charismatic and unifying figure. Akika praised John Odah for always quickly rallying everyone whenever there was a tragedy. He tasked Odah, Okoye and Labaran with coordinating a return to Chris’s house issue within a year.
Akika added snippets to Odah’s narrative of the emergence of Okoye. Ali Tanko’s disinclination was good as far as some voices in the caucus who didn’t feel comfortable with a president and secretary-general all coming from Plateau State were concerned. These voices were happy that Ali Tanko wasn’t available and if that was the case, then Festus Okoye was the only other option. Okoye was Abashi’s friend, they were all reading Law already and members of the caucus.
Turning to Labaran Maku, Akika dressed him with showing the potentials and having courage, being a fighter even as minister. Similarly praising Olisa (Agbakoba) for institutionalising human rights pursuit in Nigeria, he asks what would have happened to monitoring and documenting if Festus Okoye did not found Human Rights Monitor. All the going to the villages on account of that is what he sees as Okoye’s contribution. But he didn’t forget commending Okoye’s father for his endorsement of their ‘democratic centralism’ at UNIJOS. And then he moved to Ene Obi, the first female president of the Students Union at UNIJOS and who has since moved far, peaking at Country Director of ActionAid International-Nigeria. There was reference to Tom Adanbara who is late now as the unsung genius along the line. He was the archetypal philosopher-king who held the forte as Speaker of the Students Union Parliament at a point. He thanked Barrister John Mathew for all the coordinating he had done in the event of the death of Cece, closing with the argument that “we know each other, we need each other. We have realised the gaps”.
Barrister John Mathew recalled how Chris Abashi made him to read Law instead of the science line he was pursuing. It was also Chris that made him meet many of the comrades, particularly Festus Okoye and from whom he received rudiments of legal practice. He did not forget to remark that he is a product of ABU, Zaria “which produced your law lecturers in (UNI) Jos”, a frenemic shot taken with some joking roar. Unbowed, he prayed the next meeting of the emerging Politburo would not be over funeral. Amen!
Barrister Titus Mann, the living legal philosopher, literati and cultural resource person all rolled into one, agreed because, for him, the bonds are strong and are worth keeping. “Let’s have the will and the strength to keep it”.
It was ‘General’ Chom Bagu’s turn to speak. Chom had been the butts of jokes while being awaited. Labaran Maku could be heard throwing jabs at him as to whether he was coming on a horse because it was taking him too long to arrive Akwanga after the first telephone contact with him earlier that morning. When he arrived, he received the welcome of the General. Okoye who was angling to leave spent no less than an hour or so more because the ‘General’ was around.
Chom argues that the education members of the group received was an experience which was not available to everyone. The members gathered were not just activists but revolutionaries. “We went deep. We have to be thankful to God because it is not everyone who had the opportunity to go to university who also had that privilege”, said Chom who recalled knowing only three students on arrival in Jos after his expulsion from ABU, Zaria under Prof Ango Abdullahi. These students were Tom Adanbara, Dzeremo Baver (a former local government chairperson in Benue State but who is now late and an Idoma chap called Inalegwu. To get admitted to UNIJOS after expulsion from Zaria was tough because the National Universities Commission (NUC) had directed the universities against all such admissions. But the directive prevented nothing.
As Odah indicated earlier, Chom had taken charge already. But opposition to his tendency decisions were coming. One of it was that a particular decision was not ratified by the Parliament. But Chom who was then speaker of UNIJOS parliament along with Kingsley Odika as clerk came up with the theory of ‘Permanent Session’, meaning that the Parliament was permanently in session and time was, therefore, not an issue regarding the ratification of any decision. He regarded Nasarawa Eggon a favoured community, being where Abashi and Cece came from, pointing out how Cece was part and parcel of the student radicalism of then. It is for that reason he was determined to be at the burial, whether on horseback or donkey. He created his own round of laughter with that.
Labaran Maku, information as well as defence minister under Dr. Goodluck Jonathan spoke last as the host and it was a marathon, typically Labaran ever since NANS PRO. His take-off point is comrades never having had the opportunity of sitting down together like this. But everyone at the session in his house grew up under the movement and the reflective session at the burial is part of it all – the culture of adding value to society. He is sure the comrades are the only people capable of adding such value, making so much sacrifice. Without this movement, IBB would still have been in power in one form or another, he said.
A different women group
And yet another
Labaran recalled epic battles of students against the Federal Government, particularly against Prof Ango Abdullahi at ABU, Zaria which he was on hand to address a rally before the police invasion of the campus later that night in 1986. And the subsequent students reaction. He recalled a student march from Naraguta Hostel to the town to where Bola Ajibola, the then Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, was holding a meeting through the School of Forestry back to school and which turned Jos town upside down. The following day, he went to Nsukka to connect with some other underground movers who had set up action plans on the ground already. Nsukka and all other schools were closed down before they reconvened at the NLC to think through a June 4th street action. Because June 4th coincided with the anniversary of military vanguardism in Ghana, the Babangida regime was alarmed and they rolled out all guns to intimidate.
The Akanbi Panel was set up with spoken and unspoken instructions from the highest quarters to find a way to put these boys behind bars so that there would be peace in the society. Akanbi who is late now went through the motions but the student leaders proved too brilliant, messing up a named SAN brought in by the FG. With Femi Falana and Tony Akika from Alao Aka Bashorun Chambers, the establishment was on fire from all angles, repeatedly embarrassed in the court. At the end of the day, Akanbi who had been a student at Nkrumah’s ideological school at Winneba told whoever cared to listen that the students were too intelligent that he could not in good conscience, commit them to jail even if they committed the crimes. As far as he was concerned, they were future leaders based on what he heard heard them say or the way they responded to the questions in court. So, he declined to jail them contrary to the instruction he received. Akanbi’s statement refusing to jail young people on the ground that he could see future leaders in the way they were factually and interpretatively messing up school administrators, heads of security and the establishment give firm support to the wisdom that it is not being a good man that matters but being ideologically educated.
Labaran is alarmed that Nigeria is progressively going down by the day. The Yahoo generation that has taken over as well as the cult practitioners have no culture of debate. Neither is the country debating itself. All that happens is somebody says this is the right thing and everyone else scampers in that direction. The radicals have to do something, he said, charging John Odah to keep his organising of everyone going.
His remarks marked the end of a philosophically dense death and burial. Only Chris and Cece Abashi could fight so many fights in a short life time and remain unifiers at death.
