By Ethelbert Okere
I was not opportune to write a tribute on the late Professor Celestine Onwuliri at the time of his death last year because I was out of the country then. Although I returned a few days before his burial, the media was already awash with publications on the life and times of the late Professor of Zoology and Parasitology that there was hardly any more space left for me to come in.
One year after, the tributes have not ceased to flow. A two-week anniversary programme drawn up by his family and the National Universities Commission (NUC) where he last worked has also inundated the air waves with talks on his career and personal life as a good Christian and family man.
From all that has been said, there can be no doubt that the late Onwuliri is so much missed by his colleagues, family and those who came across him is one way or the other. One of the tributes paid to his memory at the one-day colloquium held in Abuja last week read in part thus: “those who came in contact with you were positively challenged, motivated and elevated”.
I did not have any personal encounter with the late Professor in the real sense of it. But I had the opportunity of watching him closely on the few occasions he accompanied his wife, Mrs. Viola Onwuliri, to the government house, Owerri after the latter had emerged as the deputy governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party for the general election in 2011. Before that, I had heard stories that the couple was very close.
In fact, I once heard this gossip that at the Federal University Technology Owerri (FUTO), where they both worked, Mrs Onwuliri was “feared” because she had so much influence on the husband who served as Vice Chancellor for five years.
So, when I started seeing the couple together frequently, I told my self that that is the usual myth surrounding well educated married couples seen to be close. To be sure, there are several book men and women who have had successful marriages but it said that that of Celestine and Viola was exceptional. I am aware that even up to now, the percentage of men who would like their wives to attain the same academic heights with them is very little. In every case where this has happened, there is usually the talk that the woman “controls her husband”.
Based on what I heard before and on this general perception, I took more than a casual interest in watching Professor and Professor Onwuliri each time I saw them together and I had no difficulty in discovering that they were good friends. Because of my own personal set backs in conjugal matters, I have since developed the habit of watching couples and one of the first things I discovered was that many married couples are not friends. Of course, I am not the only one that knew that Mr and Mrs (forget this professor thing for now) Celestine Onwuliri were good friends. In other words, many are we who knew how pained Madam was at that most unexpected manner in which she lost her best friend.
In the avalanche of literature that has been churned out since the demise of the late professor, not many came across the following sobering words from Mrs. Onwuliri at the heat of our grief last year: “…quite unlike you, you have not called to share your where about and usual step-by-step account of your trip. You have answered no calls, returned none. The reality of your departure is beginning to set in. If I had known, the last hug would have been tighter, kisses more passionate and more than three, touch more loving and hands held much longer to make you miss the flight!”.
The above passage, volunteered in the midst of emotions, is instructive. How many men give “step-by-step accounts” of their trips while away? Instead, most men get irritated if they are called by their anxious spouses to know how they were faring while on a trip. “Can’t you wait until I settle down?”, they would snap. What this means is that beyond the knowledge that went with the late Onwuliri, we were also robbed of a personality whose life was full of values and attributes that is rare among many a man. By that death, we lost an exemplary marriage from which younger couples would have learnt a lot from, especially now that social and economic conditions in the land tend to turn couples’ bedrooms and living rooms into punching arenas.
Unfortunately, not much attention is paid to values of departed men and women who conducted themselves so well that their marriages became models. The narratives are usually limited to accomplishment in careers but it needs no emphasis to state that the greatest legacy to leave behind is a good family. From all we have seen and heard, the late Celestine Onwuliri did just that, not because his wife was a professor but, indeed, in-spite of that.
Along with this was his exemplary Christian life which endured till the very end. The late professor’s body was found with a Rosary in his hand. At his funeral service last year, the Bishop of Jos who presided drew the attention of the congregation that it was not for nothing that Onwuliri’s body was found without a scratch, unlike those of other victims that got burnt beyond recognition. According to the Bishop, who, instructively, came all the way from Jos where the late professor spent most of his academic life, that was a testimony that God is always ready to single out those who abide by Him for special grace even in death.
