Ihedioha returns Ahajioku Lectures

Governor Emeka Ihedioha returns Ahajioku lectures after years of disdain by ex-Governor Rochas Okorocha.

The Imo State Government is sponsoring the return of Ahajioku Lectures, an annual intellectual and cultural event celebrating Igbo heritage and values. It says this is part of government’s effort to revive art and culture matters which appeared to be under assault by the preceding administration.

Redoubtable late Governor of Imo State, Chief Samuel Onunaka Mbakwe, PhD, birthed Ahajioku Lectures to celebrate culture and intellectualism among Ndigbo.

As originally conceived, each year’s event featured a lecture by a world class academic drawn from any state in Nigeria with significant Igbo population, including Rivers and Delta, as distinguished Speaker.

These academic giants looked at Igbo history, business literature, technology or values from his or her special area of scholarship.

World renowned academic, professor and literary critic, Michael Joseph Chukwudalu (MJC) Echeruo, himself from Imo State will deliver this year’s lecture.

The day will also feature an arts exhibition at the venue, the Ahajioku Convention Centre, in New Owerri.

A cultural fiesta

Ten years ago, the Ahajioku Lecture became a huge international cultural fiesta in the Imo State Capital, as soon as it transformed into an international Conference on Igbo Civilisation.

The 2009 Lecture became a two-phase event that culminated the seminal lecture delivered by the ijele of African literature, Prof. Chinua Achebe.

Achebe returned from a self-imposed exile in the United States to do the lecture.

It was a month-long cultural funfare that featured a film exhibition, youth conference on Igbo civilisation, world Igbo day prayers, and a religious workshop, among other activities.

Under the administration of ex-Governor Rochas Okorocha, this fixture in the national cultural calendar of Nigeria all but went into oblivion.

Although he sponsored one or two annual lectures, Gov. Okorocha, now a Senator, apparently had different ideas about how to organise arts and culture matters during his reign.

Policy offensives

For instance, many in the elite class who are in the position to appreciate arts and cultural matters did not understand Okorocha’s policy offensive against the arts. One of these was the destruction of the famous Mbari Square and its conversion into what he called Eze Centre.

Okorocha also approved the conversion of the Ahajioku Centre in New Owerri, venue of this year’s lecture, into a trade fair centre, to the consternation of many.

Ihedioha has returned the Centre to it’s original status as the Ahajioku Convention Centre.

Sir Emeka David Ani, the Associate editor of the Owerri Catholic Diocese newspaper, The Leader, put the matter succinctly. “Speaking as an outsider, I can tell you that Imolites are happy that the celebration of arts and culture is taking a central place once again in the State capital.”

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