GOOD NIGHT TO DIPLOMAT’S DIPLOMAT
It is not only patriotic but equally motivational to acknowledge our country’s women and men who gave their best to this country. Today’s x-ray is devoted to an octogenarian who served this nation with all his strength and all in many nations including Australia, the defunct Yugoslavia, the United Kingdom, Senegal and Trinidad and Tobago as Ambassador before taking his exit on January 27, 2020. The late Ambassador Emmanuel Olufemi Fowora debunked the fallacious statement that nothing good comes out of Nazareth (Nigeria).
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The transformation to immortality of this irrepressible ambassador who personified patriotism, nationalism, pan Africanism, affection, love, drive, excellence, confidence, perseverance, extra-ordinary service to his fatherland, commitment, humility and good naturedness should not be unsung. That we lost Otunba (Ambassador) Emmanuel Olufemi Fowora to death is a reality those who knew him must face despite our condemnation of death! It is desirable therefore that we celebrate a life characterised by amiability, affability, congeniality, godliness, friendliness, geniality, sociability, passion, graciousness, pleasantness, warmheartedness, courage and many other virtues. He was a great man that many of us knew that said the truth and nothing but the truth in all his personal and official interactions. Despite his huge and sartorial disposition, he was compassionate, confident without being arrogant, cerebral without being brash and decisive without being harsh.
As extracted from his 80th Birthday publication, the late Ambassador was born on Christmas day in 1936 in the ancient town of Ijebu Ode. After his secondary school education, he worked briefly as a clerk before departing the shores of Nigeria for the United Kingdom in search of the proverbial Golden Fleece. He was there; he saw and achieved his mission by graduating with a second class upper division in Law. A golden fish that he was, he was recruited into the country’s Foreign Service from London the same year he graduated (1962). He served the nation meritoriously as a diplomat’s diplomat in many countries and in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs headquarters as director of administration and finance until he retired in 1997, that was, after 35 years of unblemished service to his fatherland. This country benefitted immeasurably from his sagacity, objectivity, maturity and uncanny love for the diplomatic service. He was huge in stature, huge in sartorial elegance and adept at diplomatic nuances.
Ambassador Emmanuel Olufemi Fowora was remarkable enough to be famous, to be very well known within and outside the shores of Nigeria, albeit this nation never thought of honouring him with a national honour before his transformation. However, the late President Senghor of Senegal honoured him with that country’s national honour of CHEVALIER DE NATIONALE, that is, Knight of the National Order of Senegal.
At home, the indomitable, unassailable and great custodian of Ijebu culture and tradition, His Majesty, Oba (Dr.) Sikiru Kayode Adetona, Awujale and Paramount Ruler of Ijebuland honoured him with the prestigious title of Otunba Setejoye of Ijebu with all the rights, privileges and honour appertaining thereto while his Age Grade System’s sons instituted the ANNUAL AMBASSADOR E. O. FOWORA PRIZE to the best graduating student in History & Diplomatic Studies at Olabisi Onabanjo University in Ago Iwoye.
His ‘inestimable jewel’, apologies to the late sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, of 55 years, Chief (Mrs.) Edith Olayinka Fowora, who stood by him like the rock of Gibraltar, is no doubt diminished and famished by his exit; likewise, his three children (Adetola, Adeola and Olufemi (Jr.), grandchildren and the rest of us shall sorely miss him and his contribution to the building of the nation’s foreign service.
To paraphrase Anne Lamott, ‘we have lost someone we can’t live without, and our hearts are badly broken, and the bad thing is that we shall never completely get over the loss . . . . But, this is also the good news- Ambassador Fowora shall live forever in our broken hearts . . . .’ According to Psalm 147:3, ‘God heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds’. Also, in Matthew 5:4, we read that ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted’.
According to the classical author, Thucydides, ‘’What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others’’.
It is the responsibility of all of us to proclaim it to the whole world that ‘’Every life is noted and is cherished, and nothing loved is ever lost or perished (Madeleine L’Engle). Those who served this country with all they had should never be forgotten since they must have left indelible footprints on our hearts.
As Rossiter Worthington Raymond puts it, ‘’Life is eternal, and love is immortal, and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothing save the limit of our sight.’’
If the lives and times of great patriots, nationalists and extra-ordinary Nigerians are regularly brought to the fore, perhaps the psyche of our people would be positively affected and more of them can be reproduced.
Indeed, the exit of Ambassador Fowora is a transformation to immortality.
