FROM THE ARCHIVES: Contractors fail to deliver on Zik's Mausoleum - Alvan Ewuzie (The Sun, December 26, 2008)

[Mobolaji ALUKO]

 

THE LAST OF THE SERIES in this conspiracy of silence that must be broken

 

 

1.  Contractors fail to deliver on Zik's Mausoleum - Alvan Ewuzie (The Sun, December 26, 2008)

 

 

 

Timeline:

 

1.  November 16, 1904 - Zik is born in Zungeru

2.  January 1, 1960 - Zik becomes President of the Senate of Nigeria (under British Colonial Rule)

3.  October 1, 1960 - Nigeria becomes an independent country

4.  November 16, 1960 - Zik becomes Governor General of Nigeria

5.  October 1, 1963 - Zik becomes President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria

6.  November 16, 1963 or thereabout - Zik's life-size statue in Onitsha (near Inosi Onira Retreat home of Zik) unveiled by sculptor Prof. Ben Enwonwu in commemoration of then President Zik's 59th Birthday (became President of the Republic October

7.  May 11, 1996 - Zik dies in Onitsha 

8.  November 7, 2005 - large portion of Inosi Onira Retreat (home of Zik) in Onitsha destroyed allegedly by MASSOB;

9.  November 7, 2005 or thereabout - head of Zik in Statue removed by unknown (?) person(s).

10.  February, September 2006 - Visits to statue site by various persons confirm the headless-ness

11.  September 2006 - August 2010 - No documented report of replacement of Zik's head on statue

12. August 2010 - Awaiting photographic status of statue and state of mausoleum: headless or not? Overgrown with weeds or not?

 

 

Compiled by Bolaji Aluko

 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

 

Off Target!
Contractors fail to deliver on Zik’s Mausoleum
By ALVAN EWUZIE

Friday, December 26, 2008

•Front view of the main building Photo: Sun News Publishing

Contractors handling construction of the Nnamdi Azikiwe mausoleum (final resting place) have failed to deliver on target. The project, which was first abandoned by the first contractor, six years ago, was reawarded December last year at N121 million to a foreign firm, Beton Bau (Nig) limited, a civil engineering firm.

The firm through its Managing Director, Mr. Joseph Dueni had promised to deliver the project in nine months. However, twelve months after, the project is nowhere near completion.
When Daily Sun visited the place recently, the leader of the workers on the project’s site, said he was under instruction not to speak to the press.

The current occupant of the Inosi Onira, retreat Owelle Chukwuma Azikiwe was said to have traveled out of town.
Daily Sun gathers that before the contract was awarded, a team of officials from federal Ministry of Works, led by a director, Alhaji Aliyu, had held a meeting with Chief Chukwuma Azikiwe and assurances were given on completion of the project, which also included renovation of the late statesman’ main building that was gutted by fire during the November 7, 2005 suspected arson following fracas between security agents and members of the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign state of Biafra, (MASSOB). When contacted the Special Assistant to Governor Peter Obi on media, Mr Val Obienyem said the project belongs to Federal Government, stating that the state was only involved in reconstruction and repairs of the roads around that part of Onitsha.

Here below Daily Sun reveals the accounts of its encounter in the famous "Inosi Onira Retreat" of the Zik of Africa:

Legends hardly die. That’s why they are so-called. And Nigeria has a fair share of them in various spheres of endeavour. Dr Benjamin Nnamdi Azikiwe, first president, even if a ceremonial one, and quintessential statesman, is a legend by every standard.

He has not ceased to be in the news, directly or by proxy, courtesy of his family, twelve years after we went "the way of all mortals," to quote him. The legendry man of great oratorical powers would have been 104 years old last month. Curiosity led Daily Sun to his Onitsha residence, while in pursuit of other duties.

The famous Inosi Onira retreat, a rendezvous for politicians, journalists and jobbers lay quiet like a grave yard, a week after the great man’s post humous birthday. The lone person you encountered at the half-opened gate, confessed to being a tenant in the expansive compound who, being a student in an institution within the state, only comes during academic sessions. He knows virtually nothing about the place, except the straight road from the gate leading into his house behind the main building.

Then you step into the compound. As you walk in, the quietness becomes deafening. "Indeed, the legend is dead" your mind tells you as you recall the heydays of political activities when the owner of that compound bestrode the political spectrum like a colossus. In physique, he stood tall (at our six feet), towering above his environment and even beyond. He was so much revered that he commanded influence virtually across the globe.

The almond trees and dying grass become physical, yet figurative expressions of the diminished status and influence of that legend, which situation compels a thought to mind – so, legends do die, afterall. A lone Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) signpost welcoming visitors to "Zik’s Compound" gives an inkling into what would have been fast-fading government presence in the compound of the country’s former number one citizen.

Beside the sign post, you come face-to-face with outright decay. The building you see, though strong, has begun to show signs of deterioration like the weather-beaten Peugeot 504 salon car, parked at the entrance. Then someone emerges, a young man, whose intonation gives him away as a ‘Calabar man’ in local parlance. He tells you that ‘Oga’ had travelled. He did not know where, but suspects that he could have gone to Lagos. The lone occupant of the building and current Owelle of Onitsha, Chief Chukwuma Azikiwe, with whom the writer had intended to exchange ideas by way of an interview, had not been there few days before his late father’s post-humous birthday.

"Even when the oga dey, e no easy to see am. In fact, you won’t even know whether he is around or not," the young man tells you.

He draws your attention to a group of people sitting behind an upcoming building, directly opposite the old one. Oh! yes the Mausoleum (final resting place). Construction in the place had been on-and-off. The initial contractors, Lemmy Akakan and Co. had allegedly abandoned the project for five years. Then the unimaginable happened, on Monday November 7, 2005. parts of Zik’s house was set ablaze. Areas that could not be torched were vandalised in a face-off between security agents and members of Movement for the Actualisation of Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB).

The shattered window panes and scorched blinds stood as undying testimony of that mindless act of vandalism, which has been consigned to the bad side of history; an act by the "unknown person." MASSOB and security agents kept a prolonged ding-dong of who-did-it debate until the Federal Government intervened with a definite promise to rebuild the place and continue the abandoned Mausoleum.

That promise, which came in January 2006 via Honourable Gozie Agbokoba, representing Onitsha Federal constituency took nearly two years to come to fruition. In December 2007, the Federal Government re-awarded contracts for the Mausoleum for N121 million to Beton Bau Nigeria Limited, a civil engineering firm. The job was an initial step in a two-phase contract, which included renovation of the razed main building. The first phase, the abandoned Mausoleum was to be completed in nine months, two months to Zik’s birthday.

Eleven months after that and one week after his post-humous birthday, it would appear that the contractor was barely mobilising to the site, in spite of assurances by Managing Director Mr. Joseph Dueni, that the project would be completed on target. It would be an act of miracle if the Mausoleum that Daily Sun saw, is completed, even by Zik’s 105th post-humous birthday.

And the contractors seem to have adopted an anti-press stance to stave off enquiries on the project. The site’ workers, mostly (hewers of wood and mixers of cement) you encounter as you step into the place tell you pointedly that they have no information. In any case, their boss was not on site. You promise to return to see the boss.

As you return the next day, the boss quips what appears to be a standard line among the staff:
"I am under instruction not to speak to the press," he tells you.
"But you have spoken to the press before," you argue.
"That was in the past. For now I won’t even tell you my name, let alone say anything," he retorts.
"Are you aware that this is a public project funded with public money. This is a public museum and it belongs to the Nigerian people," you try to press him.
"That’s why I have allowed you to take photographs. But beyond that I can’t tell you anything."
"Is it because you are running behind schedule," you press further.
"Oga I have finished with you. Thank you" he turned and admonished his workers, who by then had gathered round the two of you, to go back to work.

The writer stood helplessly wishing that the Freedom of Information, (FOI) bill had come into effect to compel the fellow to give the needed facts.
As the dingdong of pressure on both sides get searing, matters got to a head when a mobile policeman, who heard the altercation from the gate stepped in and urged the man to co-operate.

He refused flatly insisting that nobody could compel him to talk on the project.

"If Owelle were around, he could speak or ask me to speak. But for now I am under instruction not to talk to anybody, especially the press on this project," he declared.

The young police officer returned to his post. With the seeming stiff ‘upper lips" from the staff, the writer simply walked around the premises, taking special note of notable structures in the mausoleum which has 22 pillars standing in two rows inside an oval formation with 16 beams at the frontage, and wondering when the tourist centre would be completed and be opened to the public.

Outside the compound, the Zik Roundabout stood as an epitome of neglect. The statesman’s statue towered in the midst of overgrown weed, beckoning for attention just like the vandalised building inside the compound.

Ironically, as the appalling situation seems to confound people, those in the compound seem to have adopted the code - see no evil; hear no evil.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________