Chukwuemeka Ezeife (born 20 November 1938) is a
Nigerian
Nigerians or the Nigerian people are citizens of Nigeria or people with ancestry from Nigeria. The name Nigeria was taken from the Niger River running through the country. This name was allegedly coined in the late 19th century by British jour ...
politician
A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...
who was elected governor of
Anambra State
Anambra State is a Nigerian state, located in the southeastern region of the country. The state was created on August 27, 1991. Anambra state is bounded by Delta State to the west, Imo State to the south, Enugu State to the east and Kogi St ...
in
Nigeria
Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...
from January 1992 to November 1993 during the
Nigerian Third Republic.
Background
Ezeife was born at
Igbo-Ukwu
Igbo-Ukwu (English: ''Great Igbo'') is a town in the Nigerian state of Anambra in the south-central part of the country. The town comprises three quarters namely Obiuno, Ngo, and Ihite (an agglomeration of 4 quarters) with several villages within ...
, Anambra State on 20 November 1939. He did not attend secondary school, but taught himself through correspondence courses, qualifying for university admission. He gained a BSc in Economics from the
University College Ibadan, then attended
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
on a
Rockefeller Foundation scholarship where he obtain a masters and then PhD degree in 1972.
He became a School Headmaster, a lecturer at Makarare University College,
Kampala
Kampala (, ) is the capital and largest city of Uganda. The city proper has a population of 1,680,000 and is divided into the five political divisions of Kampala Central Division, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division, and Ruba ...
,
Uganda
}), is a landlocked country in East Africa. The country is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the south by Tanzania. The sou ...
, a Teaching Fellow at Harvard University, and a Consultant with
Arthur D. Little
Arthur D. Little is an international management consulting firm originally headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, founded in 1886 and formally incorporated in 1909 by Arthur Dehon Little, an MIT chemist who had discovered acetate. ...
in
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston ...
.
Ezeife joined the civil service as an Administrative Officer and rose to the position of
Permanent Secretary.
Political career
Ezeife was elected governor of Anambra State on the
Social Democratic Party
The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology.
Active parties
Fo ...
(SDP) platform, holding office from 2 January 1992 to 17 November 1993, when General
Sani Abacha
Sani Abacha (20 September 1943 – 8 June 1998) was a Nigerian military officer and politician who ruled as the military head of state of Nigeria from 1993 until his death in 1998. He seized power on 17 November 1993 in the last successful c ...
took power after a military coup.
As governor, he was said to be more interested in planning than in addressing immediate developmental needs, and achieved few tangible results.
He transferred
Nnamdi Azikiwe University
Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, also called UNIZIK or NAU in short is a federal university in Nigeria. It consists of two campuses in Anambra State. Its main campus is in Awka (the capital of Anambra State), while its other campus is in Nnewi. ...
and
Federal Polytechnic, Oko
Federal Polytechnic, Oko is a Nigerian polytechnic located in Oko, Anambra State. It was founded in 1979, and was previously known as the College of Arts, Science and Technology.
Federal Polytechnic, Oko is one of is developing tertiary instit ...
to the federal government, which helped ensure that they survived in the ensuing military regime.
During the
Nigerian Fourth Republic
The Fourth Republic is the current republican government of Nigeria. Since 1999, it has governed the country according to the fourth republican constitution. It was in many ways a revival of the Second Republic, which was in place between 1979 an ...
Ezeife, who describes himself as a social democrat, was appointed presidential Adviser on Political Matters to President
Olusegun Obasanjo
Chief Olusegun Matthew Okikiola Ogunboye Aremu Obasanjo, , ( ; yo, Olúṣẹ́gun Ọbásanjọ́ ; born 5 March 1937) is a Nigerian political and military leader who served as Nigeria's head of state from 1976 to 1979 and later as its presid ...
.
[
]
Later career
Ezeife was appointed a member of the board of the Center for Development & Empowerment of Commercial Motorcyclists.[
In February 2006 the Federal Capital development Authority bulldozed his house in Abuja on the grounds that the plot of land and those of adjacent houses had been acquired improperly.
In January 2010 he was among thousands who demonstrated in ]Awka
Awka () is the capital city of Anambra State, Nigeria. The city was declared capital on 21 August 1991, after the creation of Anambra and Enugu state, which moved the capital from Enugu to Awka (an administrative center since pre.-colonial times). ...
calling for credible and violence-free governorship elections on February 6.
In April 2010 one of Ezeife's wives, Onyedi, was kidnapped by hoodlums who had earlier killed four policemen. The kidnappers demanded a high ransom.
References
1939 births
Living people
Social Democratic Party (Nigeria) politicians
Governors of Anambra State
Harvard University alumni
Nigerian Permanent Secretaries
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