A statue to Aikhomu.

The death recently of Admiral Augustus Aikhomu marked the passing of a man whose memory contemporary Nigerians should mourn with fondness.
That he has an assured place in our nation’s history is a certainty: Students chronicling Nigerian Armed Forces academic discipline will be asked his name in exam papers. Naval officer cadets will aspire to his rank and record. Indeed if Nigeria were another kind of place, his statue would be raised with public funds subscribed by a grateful nation.
For, Augustus Aikhomu did not only serve his country as Vice-President; he was Nigeria’s first full Admiral of the Navy. Let the Federal Republic last a thousand years and more yet there shall never again be another first full Admiral of the Nigerian Navy. Such is the eternal uniqueness that fate has bestowed upon Augustus Aikhomu.
A lot more can be said of the proud service of the officer and a gentleman to his young country. For me, however, he will always remain first and foremost the genial, humane, giving, humble, everyday ordinary bloke I was proud to call my friend.
You would not think you, were frolicking with a man of history if you met him in informal company.
I should be forgiven for repeating a narration of our first meeting, as I recalled in memoirs titled, Then Spoke the Thunder.
I was with the Admiral at his Lagos home early one night soon after he retired from Service as well as relinquished political office. The guards at the gate rang to say that Chris Okolie, former publisher of Newbreed magazine was asking to come in. I know dozens of Nigerian Big Men of lesser calibre who would have refused Chris admittance if only because he had not taken the trouble to make a prior appointment.
More importantly, it was Aikhomu after all who signed the government order by which Chris was clamped in prison detention without charge or trial during the Babangida regime. Aikhomu could not have known in what mood or for what purpose the unexpected visitor came to his home.
Chris came in with a smile and an impromptu statement. Speaking with emotion, he introduced a young man he said was his son.
He said he came to tell the Admiral that he bore him no ill will whatsoever. On the contrary, he judged Aikhomu to be one of the fairest military leaders Nigeria had had. He had often talked to his son about the Admiral and tonight he brought the young  man to meet a good man. Aikhomu rose wordlessly and embraced Chris Okolie.
During the rest of what turned out to be a convivial evening, Chris’s son and I mostly sat listening to the former military authoritarian and the crusading  journalist swapping stories and reminiscing  about the  circumstances that once brought their careers to clash.
I shall remember him always for his generosity and magnanimity of spirit. Aikhomu’s humility was not forced.
He once told my magazine, AfricaNow, in a poignant, intimate interview that the mud house in which he was born was washed away in a rainstorm, dispossessing his impoverished widowed mother.
“I cannot even point to a spot and say this is where I was born.” There were no tears, instead stated matter-of-fact.
I loved him for the trusting man that he was.
He quickly adopted you into his circumnavigations. That was because he was an exceptionally loyal friend who expected the same even of a new acquaintance. But if you thought this was naivety be careful that you gave Augustine Aikhomu no cause to write you off. For though he hated making an enemy; he hated disloyalty even more.
Some closet critics among those who had his ear said he was weak or inconsistent. How wrong they were. I watched the Vice-President grinding a State Governor to dust albeit with a sunny disposition that was characteristic of his style.
His Excellency the Governor was agitatedly pleading innocence for something he had done or had failed to do. Whichever it was wasn’t clear to me. I was meeting Aikhomu for the first time and thought maybe he was being playful. But His Excellency the Governor knew different. He knew he was under a rack.
“You know I cannot offend you, sir. I will never do that to you, sir!” the Governor went on, pouring a torrent of protestations, a knee touching the floor.
“There’s no need for that,” the Vice-President repeatedly told His Excellency, urging the pathetic fellow to resume his dignity.
That scene is etched in my memory on account of its seeming theatricality, but also — and perhaps more importantly —for its evidence of a military leader at court. Only those who know the topography of Esanland, its lack of waterways and its distance from the sea can appreciate the unlikelihood of a man from Irrua having a distinguished career in boats!
It had to take guts, application, determination and willpower to achieve the admiralty of the Navy. Aikhomu did it.
If called upon by rank or circumstance of high office to perform a difficult duty he did so without malice, in an iron fist in a velvet glove he pulled off with niceness when he could do so with grace.
As a leader; as a contributing construction worker in Nigeria’s search for a steady rhythm in its staggering, wobbling, march towards the destiny of nationhood, August Aikhomu, a man from a minority ethnic group, steadfastly played a historic role of compromise seeker, without arrogance, without rancour, without inflated demand.
His passion for Nigeria was evident in his passion for success in Nigerian sports.