From last week, continues the  narrative on the individuals appointed over the years to serve as Nigeria’s ambassadors to different  countries right from the formative years of the   country’s foreign diplomacy

Chief Lawrence Odiata Victor 

Anionwu was the first Nigerian Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of External Affairs and the country’s first ambassador to Rome. Those achievements made Chief Anionwu outstanding in the history of administration in modern Nigeria, for he not only oversaw the work of an important government department during the formative years of Nigeria’s foreign policy, but also rose to become one of the leading envoys of Nigeria. 

Chief Anionwu was at the Imperial Defence College in London, and on his return to Lagos, was posted to the Ministry of External Affairs where he served as the first Nigerian Permanent Secretary from 1960 until 1963. An able officer, he soon displayed the exemplary qualities that won the admiration and respect of his colleagues. Three years later he was given the task of opening the Nigerian Embassy in Rome where he was the country’s first representative. He was to go to London as High Commissioner in 1967 when civil war broke out in Nigeria, thus interrupting his diplomatic career. 

Chief Anionwu retired from the public service when the civil war ended in 1970, but continued to make generous contributions towards community development in his home town, Onitsha. Among the projects he was involved in was the reconstruction of the Emmanuel Church. He also served on the Board of the Central Water Transportation Service based there. He died from a stroke in London, where he was visiting, in 1980.

Alhaji Abdul Maliki was Nigeria’s first High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. He was born in 1914 to the Attah of Igbirra Kingdom, traditional ruler of the Igbirra group in what is now known as Kogi State. He was educated at Katsina Training College. He taught at Okene Middle School in his home area in 1934-1935, and was then appointed supervisor of Native Authority Works, a post he held from 1936 to 1939. 

He held other posts in a rapid rise in the service of the colonial administration in the Northern Provinces. In 1939-1940, he was Provincial Clerk in Katsina, an important post for a Nigerian in the colonial government service at that time. In 1940, he was appointed to an even more important post, that of Chief Executive Officer of Igbirra N.A.  He also became chairman of Okene Town Council, the first elected municipal council in the former Northern Region. He was thus one of the most prominent members of the Igbirra (or Ebira) community, while in the Public Service. He went on a local government course in Britain in 1950. 

He was a member of the Northern Region House of Assembly and then of the Federal House of Representatives from 1952 to 1955. He was a member of the Northern People’s Congress, NPC. In 1955 he was appointed Commissioner to the United Kingdom for Northern Nigeria; he held this post until 1958, and during this time was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE.

He joined the Federal Diplomatic Service in 1958. On the independence of Nigeria in 1960 he was appointed the first High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. He served for six years in what was then the most vital diplomatic post representing Nigeria overseas. In mid-1966 he was transferred to France as ambassador there, a difficult post because of France’s support for the secessionists in the civil war then still raging. He died in the middle of 1969 while on leave at home. 

Chief Edwin Ogebe Ogbu was born on December 28, 1926 to Chief Ogbu Iyanga, the paramount Chief of Utonkon and Mrs Eje Ogbu in Benue State. He attended primary schools in Utonkon and Igumale before proceeding to the famous Methodist College Uzuakoli in 1938 where he excelled and came out with division one in the Cambridge School Certificate Examination (one of the precursors to modern day Senior School Certificate Examination) in 1945.

He later joined the Northern Region Civil Service and Federal Civil Service. 

To be concluded