During our graduation day in secondary school in 1980, we were quite excited to learn that Dr. Akanu Ibiam, the former Governor of the defunct Eastern Region, was our guest speaker. It was indeed a climax, as we had heard, read, and studied about him, but only a few of us had seen him in person. At that young age, seeing Akanu Ibiam was an opportunity we looked forward to — how much more hearing him speak directly to us on our most important day.
Dr. Ibiam arrived exactly on time in a simple white Peugeot 504 saloon car and walked straight into the hall. His speech lasted less than five minutes, with no protocols:
“Congratulations on the five years you have spent here in St. John Bosco’s. I thank the Principal, the Reverend Fathers, and the teachers for discharging their duty.
However, I am sad that many of you may die before even attaining 40 years, simply because of carelessness, drugs, womanizing, and irresponsible behaviour — which you were never taught in this college.
Many of you will be a burden to your parents who have laboured to bring you here. Painfully, many of you may not care to further your education or go to university. Many of you will become an embarrassment to this noble institution set up by the Catholic Church.
Only very, very few of you in this hall will make this school proud, make your parents proud, and make these teachers proud.
If you are angry with my speech, go into the world and prove me wrong.”
He dropped the microphone, waved at the high table, walked straight into his car, and left.
The dead silence that followed was soon broken by murmuring, anger, open resentment, and disappointment. We were angry with the messenger and ignored the message. “Go into the world and prove me wrong” was the challenge many of us did not understand. But like the elder statesman predicted, only a few did.
I joined the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, Enugu, two years later in 1982 as a young secondary school leaver. On this fateful day, I went to the Post Office on Okpara Avenue. As I stepped out, I met a classmate, simply and neatly dressed. After the usual pleasantries, the question that usually follows came:
“Orji, where are you now? What are you doing?”
I responded, “I just joined Radio Nigeria as a trainee. What about you?”
“I am in UNN,” my friend replied. “Orji, I have started proving that old man, Akanu Ibiam, wrong. Have you forgotten what he told us at graduation?”
As I trekked back to my office on Onitsha Road, the challenge to prove Akanu Ibiam wrong became a new agenda that fired everything in me, no matter the obstacles, as I took a firm resolve to build a career in the Public Service. Unknown to me at that young age, the Federal Public Service — of which Radio Nigeria was part — had several opportunities available to young school leavers, from either rich or poor homes, if one knew where to look. I was advised to consult the HR Department, which I did, and was properly guided.
One of those opportunities was study leave with pay: which means, work for two years, get your appointment confirmed, apply for study leave with pay, go to school, and return during holidays to work. From your salary, you could pay your school fees.
This option looked attractive to me, and I pursued it fully. I explored it maximally to gain full-time education up to PhD level, ensuring that government paid all my higher education fees, directly and indirectly, or both. In addition, I gained high-profile sponsorship to study in the best global institutions including Harvard, Oxford, etc. I educated several others too. These are lifetime, lasting impacts and memories difficult to measure.
But at a huge cost: I worked, toiled, and sacrificed all comfort, pleasures, and vacations along the way to create the future I dreamt of. To remain in Public Service, patiently over the years — to learn, to work, and to grow — was a great choice that changed my world forever. The rest is now history.
As I formally commence my terminal leave, marking the conclusion of 43 years of interesting working experience in the Federal Public Service, I do so with profound fulfillment and gratitude to God, the Mighty and Almighty, for the choices, opportunities, and privileges.
I joined the service at the young age of 19 in 1982 and rose through the ranks to serve for 43 years, 11½ of those years as a Federal Director, and 5 years, the full single tenure allowed by law, as Executive Secretary/CEO of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) — an agency set up to enthrone transparency and good governance of Nigeria’s natural resources, with specific focus on reforms in the oil, gas, and mining sectors.
I am immensely proud that I was among the few in that 1980 graduating class who proved Akanu Ibiam wrong. But his message was a life-changing wake-up call. Dr. Ibiam was, and remains, my hero. May his soul continue to rest in peace.
Born in 1909, Dr. Francis Akanu Ibiam hailed from Unwana, Afikpo. Born with no “spoon” at all — into a humble rural family rooted in Christian values, discipline, and service — he rose to become one of Nigeria’s first internationally trained medical doctors, studying at King’s College, Lagos, and later at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
Dr. Ibiam returned home not to seek wealth but to serve, working as a missionary doctor in remote communities across Eastern Nigeria, where medical care had never been available. His compassion, humility, and integrity earned him national respect.
In public life, he served as the first Governor of the Eastern Region (1960–1966), and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II, yet remained a model of simplicity, principled leadership, and moral courage throughout his life.
The message the great man tried to communicate to us at that graduation event 45 years ago was simple and timeless:
• Do not allow your background to define your future.
• If you are from a poor background, do not accept poverty as an inheritance. Reject it. Fight it. Work hard to break the chain to create a new future for yourself, your children, and the next generation. But do so with honour, skills, character, competence, and integrity.
• If you are fortunate to come from a rich background, please do not brag or take the privilege for granted. Keep your shoulders low, work hard to sustain it.
In the words of Chinua Achebe in Things Fall Apart:
“Those that the benevolent spirit has cracked their palm kernels should learn to be humble.”
Protect your life, guard it, distance yourself from evil, seek God’s grace, remain patient, humble, firm, but focused. Please note: an actor does not die in a film.
Amaikpe took a break when I was appointed in 2021 by President Muhammadu Buhari to head NEITI. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu sustained the appointment when he took over in May 2023. Putting Amaikpe on hold was deliberate to protect sensitive public policy from non-disclosure. I have served the full term allowed by law in two administrations, bowed out with gratitude, honour, and grace on 27th November 2025, handing over to my successor to proceed on terminal leave ahead of my final exit from service early next year, 2026.
As I step into life outside government, I look forward to committing more time to service — to God, to community, to humanity — and to supporting home-based initiatives that care for the less privileged, the vulnerable, and the excluded within our midst and in the larger society.
In furtherance of this pledge, Amaikpe is now back, and hopefully better, as a platform for community engagement, public education, and enlightenment.
Welcome home. Merry Christmas & Happy New Year.
