At the Aka-Ikenga dinner celebrating the founding of this association of Igbo fat cats in Lagos, Governor Raji Fashola, either out of postprandial volubility, or in a bid to be charming among friends, or even as some have suggested, enhance the political fortunes of his friend and fellow partisan, Dr. Chris Ngige in Anambra, offered what had been termed an “unreserved apology” to the Igbo. His apology was for the apparent mischief of selectively targeting and “deporting” some Igbo to Onitsha in one of the most unprecedented constitutional gaffes in Nigeria.

Although the visit was cancelled eventually, it did not prevent the Kano riots in which scores of Ndigbo were murdered. Therefore, it is very clear that during the colonial period and shortly after independence, the British colonialists were obsessed with maintaining what until now is euphemistically referred to as “One Nigeria” for her own neo-colonialist agenda, notwithstanding the centrifugal forces of ethnicity and religion pulling in the opposite direction.

‘I have been to morgues. There is no siren there. There is no posing in the morgue. There are no celebrities there. You put people under six feet and you realise that cars and houses do not fit in. I have come to understand that when people die, nobody has jumped into the vault to say bury me along.

Traditional institutions are supposed to play a neutral role in politics but one cannot say same of Nigerian traditional institutions. Now it appears they are trying to rope in the Obi of Onitsha, Igwe Alfred Achebe into the politics of the up-coming Anambra guber election.

It is amazing how many Nollywood productions disappear into the annals of oblivion simply because (aside from quality issues) their owners fail to invest the same financial and creative commitment in marketing as they did in production (unlike Hollywood where marketing budgets frequently outstrip the cost of producing the movies themselves).