Long after these gentlemen served and left public offices at different times, not much has been heard about them again, despite the fact that politics and the quest for public office are in top gear across the country; ELEOJO IDACHABA writes.
Alex Ogomudia
Gen. Alex Ogomudia is the former Chief of Army Staff as well as Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) under former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Ogomudia succeeded Ibrahim Ogohi as CDS. He joined the military in 1969 and was enlisted into the Army Military Signal Corps on completion of his course. Thereafter, he began to receive further training at various times in Nigeria, India and the United States before he retired in 2006 after putting in the mandatory 35 years of service. Gen. Ogomudia is said to be the first military officer under a civilian dispensation to attain the full rank of a four-Star General from the army. Ogohi who attained that status before him was from the naval extraction.
One fact about retired Gen. Ogomudia is that all through his career under the military regime, he never held any political appointment, the reason for which when Obasanjo came to power, this former CDS was among the officers OBJ was willing to work with.
That was what a public affairs analyst, Nowa Omoigu, captured in one of his essays about Ogomudia, “Unconfirmed stories suggest that Ogomudia is among those officers who during the military era spent most of their career suffering in silence going from army job to army job and training course to training course; either denied political appointment or who avoided such appointments. The emergence of democratic era in 1999 and wholesale retirement of politically-tainted but still active officers opened the way for long suppressed officers like him who did their professional jobs with diligence and excellence to be identified. His likes were seen but not heard; had no political god-father and were hooked into the caucus of coup addicts and militicians of that era.” That is the story of this Isoko-born retired General from Delta state. Since he left office as CDS in 2006, nothing has been heard about him again despite the robust political activities going on in the country.
Fidelis Makka
Lt.-Col. Fidelis Attahiru Makka (retd.) was a former military administrator of Benue state between 1988 and 1992 under former President Ibrahim Babangida. He joined the military in 1973 and once served in the United Nations Force in Lebanon in 1976. He was also a one-time Defence Attaché to the Nigerian Embassy in the Republic of Cameroun before he was appointed as Military Administrator in 1988. It was under him as Administrator that Benue State University was established in 1991.
During his tenure, this Niger state-born former military officer was described by many as an energetic administrator committed to transparency. For instance, he was the one that completed some of the abandoned projects like the Aper Aku Stadium that the former governor could not complete. He also built the IBB Square, Fidelis Makka Library and Pauline Makka Women Centre as well as six general hospitals, several roads and extended several rural electrification projects. While there, he made the then monthly environmental sanitation exercise compulsory with military men in supervision, the reason for which Makurdi and major towns were transformed into cleanliness unlike before.
Since his retirement from the military, no one has heard anything about him again and it is not on record that he has passed on.
Usman Bayero Nafada
Usman Bayero Nafada was the deputy speaker in the House of Representatives when Dimeji Bankole was speaker. Before then, he was a member of Gombe state House of Assembly where he held the position of majority leader of the House and later as speaker on the platform of All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) from 1999 until 2003. Following the general elections of 2003, he was elected into the House of Representatives in that election also on the same party platform to represent Dukku/Nafada Federal Constituency of the state. However, owing to political development in his state of Gombe, he switched over to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). His ascension to the exalted position of deputy speaker actually started after the resignation of Babangida Nguroje amidst the famous Patricia Etteh corruption saga in which a fellow lawmaker, Friday Itulah from Edo state, nominated him to succeed Nguroje as deputy speaker. He was, therefore, elected unopposed on November 2, 2007.
Nafada was a dependable ally to the speaker, Bankole, as both of them joined hands to pilot the affairs of the lower House through the rough roads in the midst of the hiccups from fellow lawmakers. At the moment, this former lawmaker who seems to have shunned partisan politics is rumoured to shuttle between Gombe, the state capital, and Abuja, but it is not precise where he is and what he is doing at the moment.
