Eme Awa

Who is Eme Awa?

Professor Eme Awa was chairman of the National Electoral Commission of Nigeria, appointed by President Ibrahim Babangida. He held office from 1987 to 1989, when he resigned due to a disagreement with Babangida.

Eme Awa was a professor of Political Science at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Talking about the ethnic unions which rose between the late 1920s and the 1950s, but were later suppressed, Awa said: "The great achievements of the associations in generating among Nigerians loyalty for an ethnic group of several million people, thus paving the way for a broader lotalty for the entire nation was relegated to the background. These organizations were the only ones that had made systematic efforts to instill into the minds of Nigerians ideas of nationality, but their activities had not been properly directed, and the movement had been shunted into regional instead of national lines". He defended democracy, saying that it was not alien to Africa but was based on long traditions, "the type we had in the city states where everyone came out in the market square and expressed their views, either by raising their hands or something like that".