Uzodinma Nwala: Scholar-activist and patriot at 80

One of Nigeria’s foremost progressive intellectuals, Professor Timothy Uzodinma Nwala clocked 80 years of age on March 20, 2022.

Already, his comrades, friends, associates, and family have been reflecting on his life, while putting finishing touches to celebrate the man who has impacted positively on the life of the down-trodden in society.

Nwala was born in 1942 in Itu, Ezinihitte Mbaise, Imo state. His life has been one of a restless search for knowledge and social/intellectual activism rooted in the quest for human liberation from bondage and slavery. Nwala is a consistent and persistent advocate of human emancipation from all forms of degradation, poverty, disease and squalor.
 
He had his primary education at Apostolic Primary Schools in Itu and Amaumara (1951-57) and passed out with Distinction and was appointed a Pupil’s Teacher in 1958. Then, he went to Elementary Teacher’s College, Oloko, Umuahia (1959-60). He also attended Government Teachers College, Uyo (January-June, 1963) and made his GCE O/Level  in 1962. He did not attend a formal secondary school. 

In December 1963, Nwala cleared his A/Level papers and gained admission into the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) to study Economics. When he arrived at UNN to commence registration, he met his former teacher at Uyo, the eminent scholar, Prof. Otonti Amadi Nduka, who convinced him to drop Economics and go for Philosophy.

At a stage, Nwala became the only student in the Philosophy class and graduated in 1967 as the first Nigerian to take a degree in Philosophy from an indigenous University. He would later play a prominent role in the teaching of African Philosophy and making it a globally recognised discipline in the world university system.
 
After the Nigerian-Biafran civil war, Nwala made a vantage contribution to national integration and Youth development in Nigeria. He pioneered the setting up of the East Central State Youth Volunteer Corps in Enugu. As the originator and Organiser of the scheme, he later went to key government officials under the regime of General Yakubu Gowon to submit the design and concept, which they eventually adopted for the setting up of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) in 1973. In 1972, Nwala left the shores of Nigeria on Government scholarship to the prestigious New School for Social Research where he bagged his Master and PhD degrees. He later went to Oxford University in Britain for a Commonwealth Fellowship programme and was also a Fellow of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Moscow in the defunct Soviet Union.

On the world stage, Nwala addressed the United Nations in 1975 under the auspices of the United Nations Economic and Social Council on the problems of the Youth in the world. Thereafter, the then Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kurt Waldheim, appointed him a member of a Special Committee to advise the UN on the measures to be taken to involve the Youths in world affairs.
 
While in New York, Nwala formed the Nigerian Study Group whose membership included Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, Prof. George Obiozor, Chia Surma (former Commissioner in Benue-Plateau state under the government of Joseph Dechi Gomwalk, a Commissioner of Police), amongst others. Back from overseas in 1976, Nwala resumed teaching at UNN. Later on, Chia Surma became the Treasurer of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) and told Chief Obafemi Awolowo about Nwala. Awo sent Dr. Tunji Otegbeye to lure Nwala to join the UPN but Nwala declined and told Otegbeye that he wanted to join the popular-democratic forces in Nigeria to create a counter-force against the bourgeois political parties.
 

It was not only at the University of Nigeria that Nwala taught. He spent over three decades at UNN but he moved around some Universities in the Middle Belt of Nigeria. He taught and established the Philosophy Department at the University of Abuja, Benue State University, Kogi State University and Nasarawa State University. He was for many years the President of the Philosophical Association of Nigeria.

They told him that he cannot run as President of Nigeria unless he resigns from office first.
 
Following the crises of Nigeria’s federalism and the rise of separatist agitations in Nigeria, Nwala has proffered an in-depth interpretation to the raging National Question. He argues that Nigeria is a multi-ethnic nation-state.

The problem with Nigeria, according to him is the Conquest Agenda promoted by a single Ethnic Nationality, coupled with reactionary and backward development policies which have retarded the progress of the federation. While some political leaders have called for the restructuring of the Nigerian Federation, Nwala doesn’t believe so. Rather he has called for the reconstitution and renegotiation of the artificial federation, along the lines of Autonomous Regions. If the oppressive rulers of Nigeria cannot grant Autonomy to the Regions, then the Ethnic Nationalities may be compelled by circumstances to assert their rights to self-determination, which may result in Autonomous Republics within the African Union.

In 2014, Nwala and a host of other prominent Igbo leaders founded the Alaigbo Development Foundation (ADF) which has been committed to defending Igbo interests in the Nigerian federation. Nwala believes that the age of empire states are over. In the past, we had the Roman Empire, British Empire, Russian Empire, German Empire etc. Those empires have disappeared. Secondly, state formations based on Federations have been disappearing, giving rise to the formation of organic states. These are states made up of people with a common language and a common culture with minor variations. The failure of the federations in Africa arose from their artificiality given their history as states that were set up at the 1884-85 Berlin Conference. British, French, German and Portuguese colonialism operated the artificial states as buffer zones for their economic and commercial interests. The case of Nigeria was worsened by the 1914 forced amalgamation of disparate nationalities. Many of the former colonies like Nigeria have become chaotic and ungovernable. Oppressed nationalities in Nigeria can only regain their democratic freedom when they take their destinies into their own hands.