How do you suddenly begin to refer to a friend and a colleague with whom you had banters concerning his birthday, which was only two days away, in the past tense on the very day he turned 50?
Well, that is the unpleasant situation we have all found ourselves in. Chuks Ehirim, the man we called Eze Igbo, died in the early hours of Thursday, June 15, the very day he was to celebrate his 50th birthday.
In this internet age, almost 90 people had wished him happy birthday on his Facebook page before the news filtered out that the man they were felicitating with had passed on.
Suddenly, “happy birthday messages” turned to “rest in peace.” Many thought it was simply a bad joke because people did not hear that he was sick.
My telephone has not ceased ringing since Thursday and the questions are the same. “Was Eze Igbo sick? What happened? Was it an accident?”
Yes, Chuks was sick and was admitted to hospital for a few days and discharged. Doctors said he had pneumonia.
When we spoke on Tuesday, June 13, he said he was getting better. When I asked how we would celebrate his birthday on Thursday, he laughed, accusing me of not getting it. I knew what he meant.
Yes, Chuks was sick briefly but he literally died of hunger.
Last week, the wife called me on phone to lament the terrible financial hardship the family had been plunged into because of her husband’s indisposition and pleaded for financial assistance having nobody else to run to.
She told me Chuks didn’t even know that she made that call. I told her I would call the husband right away, and I did.
When I asked him how he was and if his condition was relapsing – and without knowing that his wife spoke to me – Eze Igbo said his greatest problem was hunger.
He was feeling far better than he was when he went to the hospital but there was no dime in the house to feed. His children were out of school because he could not pay their fees. He had put some of his property up for sale without any buyers.
“As I speak with you, this is 11am and I have not taken my drugs this morning because I have not had my breakfast and to imagine I am on strong antibiotics. I don’t know what I would have done without my wife. She is the person I am pitying because she gets worried when I get depressed,” Chuks told me.
He was sure that if he could feed well for one week and take his drugs as prescribed, he would be fit again to hit the streets.
I told him to hang in there, promising to reach him the following week and reminding him that he was a “strong man” and, therefore, should not allow himself to be consumed by the country’s precarious situation.
He laughed and assured me that nothing would happen to him. “If I was not a strong man, I would have died long ago,” he said.
We left it at that.
I couldn’t raise enough money for Chuks before his death. Last week, we could not even print the newspaper because we had no money. Our printers could not help because they were owing their suppliers who also froze all credit facilities.
It is a vicious circle.
When my colleague, Oguwike Nwachuku, called me early on Thursday to break the heartrending news of Chuks’ death, I wept; not because he died – after all, we all live to die – but because of the circumstances of his death and the dislocations it had caused.
I wept because I know that if Chuks had as little as N100,000 last week, he would probably be alive today.
And to imagine that this tragedy happened in Nigeria, where men of power and influence use “Angel Champagne” which costs over N1 million a bottle to wash their hands frolicking with girlfriends.
To imagine that this happened to Chuks Ehirim, a man who graduated from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) in 1992, and obtained a Master’s degree from the same university.
To imagine that this was the fate of a hardworking, honest Nigerian, who gave his all to the country.
Chuks’ fate is what befalls those who play straight in Nigeria.
Those who play by the rule books live and die in pernury.
Those who break the rules live in affluence, get “elected” into public offices and are branded statesmen.
Eze Igbo had all it took to amass illegal wealth. As the immediate past chairman of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Abuja chapter, he could have used his position to acquire wealth and build mansions.
We have seen many NUJ leaders at both state and federal levels use such positions to acquire enormous economic and political power. But not Chuks.
As the chairman of Abuja chapter of the NUJ, his “official car” was so rickety that you would not want to hitch a ride with him.
Yet, the three years of his tenure (2012-2015) were the most momentous when we were told those who were willing became billionaires overnight.
If he wanted he could have effortlessly aligned with the poweers-that-be and make his millions like others.
If he did, he could have made enough money to go on medical tourism to any country of the world. And there would have been no need for this tribute because he would have been alive today.
But he didn’t. He alligned, instead, with the opposition candidate, Muhammadu Buhari.
He never regretted his decision. He did it for Nigeria. I am sure that in his next life, he will still do the same if need be. That is Chuks Ehirim for you.
The flip side is that the country for which he paid the supreme price does not care.
He was abandoned in his hour of need. And this is not the first time this will happen.
And you ask yourself whether Nigeria is worth dying for.
As NUJ chairman, Chuks was only interested in building a befitting secretariat for journalists in Abuja. Most times, he used his own money to run the office.
If there was any incorruptible journalist in Nigeria, Chuks was it.
As a journalist, he was dogged, fearless and investigative. He was self-motivated and resourceful. He had the contacts and could get a story where others thought there was none.
And he was a beautiful writer. You do not always find in a journalist a good writer with a nose for robust investigation. Chuks was well-rounded.
He was a patriot who believed in the Nigerian project. Though no one can take away anything from his Igbo heritage, he believed so much in Nigeria that he was prepared to lay down his life for what he called “the struggle.”
He always insisted the struggle was his life. And that was true, for his activism dated back to his students’ union days at the UNN, from where he later joined democratic forces to battle the military after the annulment of the June 12, 1993 elections.
Most times, I would tease him that all those who went into the trenches with him had crawled out, leaving only himself there, and he would simply laugh.
If there was any journalist that devoted his entire being, and selflessly too, to the realisation of the Muhammadu Buhari presidency without expecting any reward, that was Chuks.
His devotion to the “Buhari cause” did not start in 2015. But when the election was won and the spoils of office were shared, nobody remembered him. Perhaps, the powers that be remembered then that he came from the part of the country that brought “5 per cent” to the table.
As former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, noted in his condolence message, “Chuks was a fair-minded professional, a conscientious journalist, a progressive democrat and committed nationalist.”
But he was much more than that.
From Lagos to Abuja, to Imo, to Kano, to Enugu, to Zamfara, the overwhelming feeling of grief for anybody who knew him was mutual. It didn’t matter what you were to him. What was important was that you made his acquaintance.
Chuks believed in friendship. He celebrated it. He was a faithful devotee to humanity. He believed in fairness, equity and justice. He never coveted anything that was not his.
It is one of the supreme ironies of life that good men die young. I am told it is so because God wouldn’t want such people to be corrupted in this evil world and would therefore recall them to rest eternally in His bosom, while evil men are given a longer time on earth to repent.
I don’t know whether this belief is true. But if it is, it is a very unfair reward for goodness. Shouldn’t long life be a reward for goodness? Shouldn’t long life be a reward, a natural consequence of good life predicated on service to humanity?
We can neither question God nor pick quarrels with death. But Chuks’ death hurts, and badly too. The circumstance makes it even worse.
If at all we could be consoled, it is in the fact that in his 50 years on earth, he touched in a most positive way the lives of all who made his acquaintance.
That is a worthwhile testimonial life gave Christian Chuks Ehirim, the man we all called Eze Igbo.
Chuks, may your soul rest in peace!