Before Emmanuel Uduaghan died!

Dr. Emmanuel Eweta Uduaghan was just a good man. He was an incredible man of peace, a man who could do anything including daring death to achieve peace. I don’t know how many people in this world would stake their lives, be ready to die for peace to reign. Uduaghan did so as governor of his people. He revealed one instance in the story he told himself that I reproduce here today as part of my tributes to him.

It was in a thanksgiving service to mark his birthday after leaving office as governor of Delta State. It was published October 29, 2016 in Vanguard. I present the story today for you to appreciate my description of him as an incredible man of peace. The story titled MY CLOSE SHAVE WITH DEATH also points to his humble background and the humility that made him remarkable.

Read about Uduaghan, who called himself the village man who became a medical doctor and later a governor. Read also the second story on him from my archives, a story I reproduce not only in memory of the great achiever but also for the attention of the current Governor of Delta State, Sheriff Oborevwori who may pick interest in fulfilling what Uduaghan considered for the Illah community while hosting Super Eagles when they won the 2013 Nations Cup in South Africa.

The headline was ILLAH IN THE EYES OF UDUAGHAN. Of course another chapter of Uduaghan’s life was his love for sports and efforts to develop it. He once asked our Queen of the tracks, Mary Onyali what he could do to get Blessing Okagbare on the podium. Mary told him to place Blessing on a special training allowance. Uduaghan did so. And Blessing truly justified the investment in the Glasgow Commonwealth Games and other international championships with podium performances.

Uduaghan lifted sports not only in Delta but also in the country. We leave that for another day. Read the avalanche of tributes since he passed on and you will agree that a good man has joined the stars. Now, read about Uduaghan’s close shave with death as told by the man himself in a Thanksgiving service. MY CLOSE SHAVE WITH DEATH — Uduaghan SIR Tony Obuh described him as an accomplished man of peace in his goodwill message on his facebook page last weekend.

Sonny Areh, his media assistant, had also posted, on his facebook page, a birthday message to Dr Emmanuel Uduaghan, the immediate past governor of Delta State. He turned 62 last Saturday. What followed was an avalanche of birthday and goodwill messages. There were some in the newspapers too. And so the goodwill that marked Uduaghan’s two tenures as governor is still on the high.

And people showed this at a thanksgiving service at the Guiding Light Assembly Church at Parkview Estate, Ikoyi, Lagos, last Sunday. Uduaghan was at the church to thank God for His mercies all these years. People turned out in numbers in the church where the pastor preached about the Holy Spirit. The word of God was good. And the people reveled in it.

As the service was about to end, the pastor invited Uduaghan to make a brief remark after the church had prayed for him and his family. When he was done, the pastor prayed that more good things would continue to follow him. Uduaghan recalled one moment, as Governor of Delta State when he was caught between life and death and God saved his life. Part of his testimony went thus: “There are two things associated with governance.

I call them the two Ps. They are Power and Pain. You see a governor and you marvel at the power he commands. He can order the arrest of somebody, he moves in a convoy, he has so much power that he earns tremendous respect everywhere. People see the glamour and the glitz, etc. But they don’t see the pain. There’s pain in governance. You can only rely on the grace of God to guide and guard you. ”When I came in as governor in 2007, the violence we battled then in Delta was more than what is happening now with the Avengers, etc.

Kidnapping was high and expatriates were leaving. Militancy was more than what we have now. President Yar’Adua called me and said ‘what’s going on? These things are happening in your state.’ I told him that there were kaytwo ways to handle the militancy in Niger Delta. I asked that the Federal Government should do their own and I would do my own. We set out to work.

I had to go to the creeks. We had to dialogue with these people. ”I remember one Sunday, my family and I had prepared to go to church and I received a call that they were going to burn Chevron terminal. The facility they planned to burn was so huge the impact would have been terrible for our oil production. I told them I would come after church service but they insisted I should come immediately otherwise the militants would destroy the terminal.

I had to leave. I told my family to pray for me at the church. It was just one of my trips to the creeks. I took helicopter and then did the final journey by boat. And you know that when you go on such trips to the creeks you don’t take escorts or when you take them they don’t carry gun