By McPhilips Nwachukwu

Prof Ekpo Eyo, the first Nigerian-born head of the National Commission for Museums and Monuments, NCMM, and Patron of the African Refugees Foundation is dead.

 According to a  statement by Olujimi Olusola III, CEO, African Refugee Foundation, Eyo died in the early hours of Sunday,  May 29, 2011 at his home in Maryland, USA. He was, until 2006, a Professor of Anthropology at University of Maryland in the US.

Of Efik, Creek Town, Western Calabar, origin, Prof Eyo was appointed Director of the then Federal Department of Antiquities in 1967. He is survived by his widow and children. Prof  Eyo, who was made a Fellow of the Smithsonian Institution in 1984  and is on record as Nigeria’s Museums Chief with the longest uninterrupted tenure.