9th December, 2012
The Igbo Youth Movement (IYM) in Enugu on Sunday conferred an award titled “The Great Igbo Icon’’ on Prof. Chinua Achebe, a renowned novelist.
The award was presented at the organisation’s 2012 End of Year Colloquium.
The IYM also gave a leadership award to retired Admiral Ndubuisi Kanu, while it recognised Senator Uche Chukwumerije, as the `People’s Hero’.
Its President, Mr Elliot Uko, said that the award given to Achebe was to recognise his truthfulness in his writing.
Uko described Achebe as a great writer who had put the tradition of the Igbo in the contemporary map of the world with his writing.
He said the literary icon was worth celebrating because he portrayed things succinctly as they occurred, adding that he deserved more than the award.
Achebe recently stirred controversy in his latest book, his Biafra memoirs, when he attacked former premier of Western Nigeria, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, blaming him for the starvation of Igbos during the war.
On Kanu, the youth leader said he was given the award because he championed the cause of the Igbo selflessly and fearlessly.
He also said that Chukwumerije was honoured because he spoke for the people wherever the opportunity arose, describing him as a real hero.
In a paper entitled: “Ndigbo and 2015: An exhortation’’, Chukwumerije said the Igbos were in trouble politically and needed urgent and decisive remedies to tackle the situation.
“Every other national group, big and small, are currently unifying their ranks, realigning their forces, establishing linkages, creating alliances and girding their loins for the great political confrontation ahead.
“What do we witness in Igboland other than disunity, inaction, inertia, silence? We must take control of our political destiny, we cannot outsource it to any other person or group,’’ the senator said.
He said the Igbos must make an unqualified, unapologetic and uncompromising bid for the Nigerian presidency in 2015.
“Our presidential bid has all the required moral content. It also has a geo-strategic value as well as a demographic force behind it.’’
Also reacting, Kanu reiterated his call for a national conference to decide on the country’s federalism, saying that no amount of state creation would solve the imbalance in the system.
He said the ethnic nations existed before the emergence of Nigeria, arguing that the country’s constitution did not emanate from the federating units.