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39  Chapter Five The Eastern Crisis of 1953 The activities consequent upon my father’s exit having subsided, I returned to my headquarters in Kumba to pursue the diverse calls that constituted the duties of a parliamentarian. Soon we were off to Enugu, then to Lagos and back to Kumba again. Forward and backward we travelled between our constituencies and the Legislative Houses as our new duties as lawmakers demanded. Then there were the tours in our constituencies which were often arduous and exacting. Of course there were the lighter moments in our new job that had given us the title of “Honourable Member”. A new elite had come to the society and the “Honourable Member” had indeed arrived. In the cocktail parties that were becoming the fashion, “Honourable Members” were often high in the list of invitees. Their wives too were coming along, as the lady partners of the new members of high society. At Enugu and Lagos, the Honourable Members were there at the Governor’s and Ministers’ parties, and in the country as a whole it had become the order of the day for them to grace social occasions with their presence. Amongst the members themselves new friendships and affinities began to develop, following discovery of common interests and accords between them. I soon found such a man in the person of Peter Motomby-Woleta who with Dr. E.M.L. Endeley had been elected from Victoria Division. Peter was henceforth one with whom I shared common interests and relations right to his early grave in March 1962. All went well with the Honourable Members in their new positions. The Christmas parties of 1952 found these new elite of the society all over the country playing their new role of bearers of the light. All this however, was like the calm that precedes the storm as subsequent events were soon to show. In January 1953, the legislatures began their early sessions. The Eastern House of Assembly was called and its members converged into Enugu. As was the custom, party caucuses always held their parliamentary group meetings preparatory to the opening of the sessions. The NCNC parliamentary group in the Eastern House of Assembly convened, this time with a difference. The party leader Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, president of the NCNC and member for Lagos in 40  the Western House of Assembly had flown in and was presiding over the party’s National Executive Committee of which I was a member. One item of business on the agenda of that party meeting appeared strong and contentious. It involved the question of a possible reshuffle of the Eastern Regional Government. The Eastern Regional Government of nine ministers then referred to as the Eyo Ita Government had been sworn in early 1952, only days of the coming together of the elected members following the general elections of December 1951. Most members were meeting themselves for the first time in their lives, so that the recommendations for appointment of the NCNC Ministers were based often on very limited knowledge of those selected. It was observed during 1952, that the performance of several of these ministers fell short of the expectations of the NCNC. The party therefore decided to reshuffle the government despite its stay in office for only twelve months. Indeed when weighed against the ideology and principles for which the NCNC stood, it was intolerable to continue with men whose performance constituted a grave contradiction to the cause of the party especially as this was the first ever NCNC controlled Government in Nigeria. The party was therefore impelled either to acquiesce to the open charge of failure or take the bold step to put things right by weeding out misfits and putting in those with capacity to project the true spirit and purpose of the party. In this the National Executive Committee had no choice; it had to do the right thing. In a long drawn out meeting from 5 p.m. to 3 a.m., the National Executive Committee (N.E.C.) of the NCNC finally decided to reshuffle the cabinet of the Government of the Eastern Region. In practice six of the nine ministers were dropped (Eyo Ita, E.I. on, R.1. Uzoma, SJ. Una, S.W. Ubani-Ukoma, J.E. Koripamo). Three were retained to serve in the new government (Dr. M.l. Okpara, Mr. S.T. Muna and Mr. M.C. Awgu). The new list of the Eastern Government as decided by the NCNC was now...

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