BY TONY ERHA
About forty-three years ago, my path got crossed with Joseph Ohens’. And it has been stuck! This long, it is still engraved in my perception, thus opening my mind’s eye to puzzled expressions like ‘ordination’, ‘providence’ and ‘predestination’ etc. as they relate with the human person(s). About four and a half decades of knowing a person or subject, would be sufficient for one to know it in and out.
Joseph Adonor Ohens (more known as Joe Ohens), is a trained educationist, journalist and lawyer; a motivational speaker, healthcare giver and philanthropist extraordinaire, who is Global President of the Annunciation Catholic College Irrua Boys Association (ACCIOBA).
It was early in 1981, amidst flurry activities of a newly-established higher educational institution, located in the present-day Edo State. Here, we had met for the first time. Being a keeper of admission and academic records of the institution, it didn’t take me long to know some students of the institution, who were in top forms of academic brilliancy. Joe Ohens happened to be one of the few. He was also studious, calmed and focused.
One wouldn’t be surprised, therefore, that from a little-known and humble beginning, aided with a blazing intellect, Joe Ohens strode upward the rungs of living, to rest his hands on the table of the affairs of men. Added that he always strives to better the have-nots; the ignorant; the despaired and the wretch of the earth! In the charitable realms, he is widely acknowledged as a light that inspires hope and an assuager of the dire thirst of the needy. Indeed, free giving is to him a second nature, as he is a forgiving heart, who tolerantly gives to others his only-cup-of-cold water.
In Lagos, where he later relocated, he set up a business firm with a well-equipped office complex in the high-class Allen Avenue of the city. His residence wasn’t well-away from this workplace. Both became a confluence and shelter of the sorts, frequented by friends, fellow journalists and the needy, particularly those from his Esan and Edo origins.
With him giving a place within his elaborate office as our secretariat, Joe Ohens was also very resourceful in the success story of the once stormy restitutional activism that I championed for some 3,000 deformed victims of serial kerosene-petrol explosions, which ruined the poor and vulnerable of Edo State, in 2001.
Joe Ohens was smarting out from the heels of a robust journalism practice, particularly with the now-rested CityNews, a famous tabloid published within the proximate of Clay Bus Stop, on the Ojudu/Ikeja road, Lagos. He was its Editor-in-Chief and Manager, encumbered with the editorials and running of the ubiquitous newspaper, bankrolled by the late Chief Victor Imiavan (a.k.a. Vanni), a Nigerian patriot and billionaire business man, who hailed from Igueben, Edo State.
Suffice that CityNews, as edited by Ohens, was a fearless and objective medium, a front-line watchdog of the Nigerian society. The fear of Joe Ohens’ CityNews was the beginning of wisdom for the oppressive government-of-the-day. CityNews was relentless in a global campaign for re-validation of the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election results, by the repressive military regime of General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida. The election was widely believed to have been won by Chief M.K.O Abiola of the Social Democratic Party (SDP).
Dr. Ohens is tireless at giving back to the society as he is generous and caring to Opoji (his hometown), Esan (his tribe), Edo (home state) and to his fellow Nigerians. Also in far-away United States of America, where he has lived for decades, his humanitarian activity knows no limits.
Joe Ohens, a research-bent fellow, is an alumnus of the Nigeria Institute of Journalism, Lagos and Lagos State University, variously, where he got a first degree in Law. He also bagged Masters and Doctorate degrees, respectively, in Law from the esteemed University of California, Berkeley School of Law. Currently serving as a Senior Vice President at the largest primary health care administration in the north coast of California, he is also an adjunct professor of law in advanced legal writing and US health system and policies.
‘Erudite Joseph Ohens’ professes to “Education as the common property of humankind”. He readily inspires all, especially the youth to go to school and develop their selves. He urges others to go acquire vocational trainings. He continually gives scholarships to the school children and youth, as he also assists numerous others to establish a trade.
His deep love for education and desires for others to have it, is firmly rooted in his philanthropic deeds.
For instance, the Annunciation Catholic School (ACC), Irrua, his alma mater, has long received the attention of Dr. Ohens and his old school mates, who have transformed it, so much so that it is now a cynosure of eyes, and a former commissioner of Education, Joan Oviawe, regarded it as a benchmark for other alma maters to transform their schools, all over Edo State, where leaning is often neglected.
Dr. Ohens is a consistent member of the Annunciation Catholic College Irrua Boys Association (ACCIOBA), as he ascended to be its Global President, having served as president of its North America branch and Chairman of the Project Committee, which turned the school around.
ACC, located at Irrua, headquarters of Esan Central Local Government Area, a pioneering boys secondary school, was established in March 25,1955 by the Catholic Mission, that consistently managed it. However, it was taken over by government, from where it dwindled in infrastructures, learning and moral discipline.
ACCIOBA, with it past global presidents like the public-spirited Sir Pascal Isele, past executives and members, had ploughed over N2.29 billion joint and personal fund and efforts, to bring it back from the precipice.
Provided are a massive gate, with a perimeter fencing; six-bedroom Corpers’ Lodge; 500-person capacity College Auditorium; 20-bed ultra-modern Medical Centre; provision of solar powered electricity; tarring of roads within; provision of books and other learning aids; furnishing and modernization of existing buildings; improvement of sports and other recreational facilities and employment of teachers etc.
Charity begins at home. “Abi ojie ga, ai ti ole obhokhan”. When a child is born a king, he isn’t regarded as a mere child, but one to be revered. In the purview of the Esan tribe of Edo State, Nigeria, this idiom holds sway. It also applies to many African cultures. To the same Esan and Edo people, a child is ordinarily envisaged to act out the peculiarities of the ‘native-name’ he was given at birth. It is same thing as saying that such name conferred on a child, could largely determine the fate or manner of life he or she was going to live.
For Joseph Ohens, ‘Adonor, his hallowed ‘Esan name’, apparently overshadows his other names, in his hometown of Opoji, Esan Central Local Government of the state. In this bubbling semi-urban community, the inhabitants would beam into paroxysms of animated smiles, echoing to newcomers, his name in a catchphrase, “Adonor n’ obhi Ohenlen” (Adonor the son of Ohens).
It also goes that Chief Anthony Enahoro, the late sage and Nigerian statesman of note, earned a significant ‘Adolor of Uromi’ traditional title of a notable kingdom of Esan land, because of his immense contributions to the community and humanity.
What is there in a name? Interestingly, the Catholic Church (with its desired creeds), into which Ohens was born and is a devotee and valuable volunteer of its Catholic Journalists Association, had his baptism name as ‘Joseph’.
Inspiringly, Wikipedia, the authoritative online encyclopedia, informs us all that ‘Joseph’, a name inclined to the meaning of ‘Adonor’, has a Biblical Hebrew origin, meaning ‘God will add’ or ‘God will increase…’
Tony Erha, a journalist and activist, lives in Abuja, Nigeria and could be reached at tonyerha@gmail.com
