Onoja and The Living Seed

2017 graduate of Benue State University, Comrade Odeh Edache Benedict, in his first major literary work, chronicles the humble beginning of former Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Defence, Chief Mike Okibe Onoja, and his love for business, philanthropy and politics, captured by AGI ONDA in this postscript.

Preamble

A biography or memoir is an exciting sub-genre of non-fiction prose, which focuses on the life of an individual as told by another individual.

Basically, it is a common narrative of the life and change or metamorphosis of the subject, covering such aspects as childhood development, education, life’s significant encounters and personal relationships.
Biographies are therefore popular and very successful ways of communicating ideas and ideals of individuals whose legacies form the fulcrum of societal values and etiquette from where readers draw lessons.

Throughout ages, biographies have remained illuminating sources of vital information as readers tend to get first-hand information of their respected leaders, clergy, politicians, literary icons, inventors, heroes and heroines, through the literary works of authors who make painstaking efforts to document their memoirs.

As the title suggests, The Living Seed is panoply on the tiny mustard seed which germinated on the rural homestead of “A Place Called Agila” (Chapter 1) around 1948. It is a story of a man born during the interplay of the forces of tradition and worship, proselytisation and Christianity in Agila land, as told by the young author, Odeh Edache Benedict.

The attraction, however, is that, that tiny seed, which would have been muzzled by family history and societal forces, defied the thorns and tonsils of the isle to emerge a mighty oak, where birds of all kinds make their shades and nests, and take refuge from the vicissitudes of life. That is the onus of the biography.

Setting & Synopsis
The 180–page book is set in Agila, Ado LGA of Benue State; and is divided into 12 chapters of varying lengths. Chapter one explores the history and myth of Agila dialectal race of the Idoma nation; the movement of the people across the Benue Valley to their present settlement as well as the transformation of the culture and deity of the rich people of the kingdom, including what led them out of the place of their old abode.

In chapter two, the author tries to provide answers to the genealogy and nativity of the subject – Onoja – whose parentage provided the nucleus of his strong character and values, which helped to build the strong moral principle that finally propelled the young boy on the upward swing.

Here, quoting from William Shakespeare, the author begins his narrative thus: “Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them.” The Akanaba k’Idoma, however, is a combination of a solid family background, dint of personal effort and hard work.

Chapter three begins with the story of the birth of the subject and terminates with the organogram of Onoja’s family tree and transcends to chapter four in the pursuit of Onoja’s quest for quality education back in his university days at the famous Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria. It culminates in his graduation in 1972 and eventually getting his first appointment with the Federal Ministry of National Planning.

Again, the narrative prowess of the writer captures the insights into the doggedness of young Onoja which eventually led to his selection from among his peers at the time for scholarship abroad for his master’s degree programme.

Chapter five is built around the character and strength of the protagonist. Here, the author paints a glowing picture of what makes his hero unique in a rather lyrical notation: The essential Mike remains constant like the Northern star… throughout his 31 years in the civil service; he remains a man who is magnificently-gifted, quick-witted, astute, and indefatigable.

He begins while others are procrastinating, he saves while others are wasting, he persists while others are quitting, he commends while others are criticizing, he decides while others are delaying, he listens while others are talking, he believes while others are doubting, he plans while others are sleeping, he is busy studying. Pp 54-5.

Besides, the philanthropic gestures and lifestyle of Onoja are the author’s tools for telling the religious virtue of the Agila people. Indeed, many of the traditional tittles conferred on this great son of Nigeria were not just given because of his rise in his civil service career but on his great impacts and contributions to humanity, especially the down trodden of the society.

From page to page, readers are bemused with Onoja’s concern for his people and this follows the narrative to chapter six where the iconoclast finally settles down to family life in 1980 with young Justina (Otsanya of Agila) after coming back from his academic sojourn abroad.

From here, and like the proverbial Greek colossus, Mike Okibe Onoja bestrides the narrow gate of technocracy, business and love for the family, exemplified in his five children (two males and three females, all trained in the best of universities abroad.

Climax
With an exciting character, deft and focus in chapters 7 and 8, emphasis is shifted from philanthropy and service to life in partisan politics, after retirement from the civil service. The author is painstaking in chronicling Onoja’s entry into the race for the Benue State Government House, when he slugged it out with an array of governorship contenders, including Gabriel Tor Suswam in 2007, and came close to winning the slot only to be denied by political exigency.

Following his people’s clamour, the protagonist changed tactics to challenge Emeritus President of the Senate, David Alechenu Bonaventure Mark via the 2015 Senatorial encore but long after the man showed interest with a large following, his heart for fairness, especially against the expectation of the constituents that Mark’s 5th consecutive term would facilitate the creation of Apa State for the people of Zone C, ‘fell’ Onoja’s hand for the second time.

This, and the fact of Onoja’s many honours and awards, as well as the verdicts passed on the man by his numerous admirers, forms the nucleus of the concluding narrative and anti-climax of Edache’s biography in chapters 9, 10, 11 and 12.

Strength
The strength of The Living Seed is in the ability of the author to draw from the history and background of the subject to tell his story in a rather unambiguous style, using pellucid, running prose narrative. This is particularly reflected in the drama surrounding Mama Eneada’s labour and Pa Onoja’s anxiety during Mike’s birth, following the history of the woman’s sad past with child births; for as Edache tells us, young Mike was the second surviving child of his mother.

Weakness
For all the good narrative of Comrade Odeh Edache’s literary work, The Living Seed is ‘limited’ by a myriad of punctuation errors, omissions and tense-fouls, etc. These are however noticeable only by critical minds and literary critics which do not in any way rob off the ingenuity of this quality effort.

 

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