Alor Crisis: Ex-PG, Igbonwa insists MacAnthony Okonkwo is deposed monarch

By Chuks Collins, Awka

Former President General of Alor Community in Idemili South Local Government Area, Chief Uzoma Igbonwa has insisted that Igwe MacAnthony Elibe Okonkwo has been deposed as traditional ruler of the community.

Igbonwa while responding to a question from journalists on the Alor matter said: “Mac Anthony Okonkwo was formally dethroned vide an Anambra High court judgment of Feb 17, 2022. His motion for stay of execution was declined by the High Court, but surprisingly, he has continued to parade himself/passing off as, dressing as and presenting himself as a traditional ruler of Alor both in private and in public.

“He refused to heed to the subsisting court judgment that dethroned him and the State Attorney-General’s recent advice and legal opinion notwithstanding.

“However, it was doubtful if the initial certificate of Recognition issued to him has been formally withdrawn, little wonder he was going around town parading as a monarch.”

This unwholesome situations, Igbonwa stated, “has elicited tension, confusion, agitations, and restiveness in the community, especially among the youths.

“According to the February 17, 2022 court judgment, Okonkwo was ordered to desist thenceforth from parading or presenting himself as a traditional ruler anywhere at all.

“It was on the strength of this court verdict and the absence of any other impediment that the community had in 2022 elected and enthroned HRM Igwe Collins Ebelechukwu Chukwumesili as Ezediohamma 111of Alor,” Igbonwa added.

He pointed out that, “Igwe Chukwumesili was chosen from Uruezeana village in Ifite Section, the rightful and appropriate area whose turn it was to present the new Igwe, as was copiously outlined in the operational Constitution of Alor and consistent with the judgment of the High Court.”

He said Chief Mac-Anthony Okonkwo’s surprising illegitimate and unfortunate emergence had remained tenuous and troubled because he hails from the last and youngest Umuokwu Village of Ifite Section of Alor.

“It was actually a journey to nowhere which had brought nothing apart from darkness, gloom and crises to Alor since he bulldozed his way and fouled the Chieftaincy selection arena, when he knows that his Umuokwu village was not in reckoning as far as the Alor Igweship stool was concerned presently, until it gets to her turn in many generations to come.

Some members of the community were blaming the commissioner for Local Government, Chieftaincy and Community Matters, Hon Tony Collins Nwabunwanne of masterminding the crisis by recognizing Okonkwo as monarch. But Nwabunwanne on his part has continued to insist that in every community in Anambra State, due process must be followed, and the constitution of various communities respected in treating issues arising there.

Alor is the community of the former minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige. He has also been accused by other sections of the community of working for the dethronement for Okonkwo.