By Anietie Akpan, Calabar
The remains of the foremost feminist and leftist, co-founder, Girls Power Initiative (GPI) and renowned Professor of Botany, Professor Bebe Madunagu has been laid to rest.
Bene who was the first and only Chairperson of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU-UNICAL branch) and member, National Executive Council of ASUU was lowered at about 11.30am at the GPI premises after a brief eulogy in a congregation of the Nigerian left, academics, freind’s , associates, family members and others.
Before the interment on Friday,there was the Feminist Converging celebrating “The life and times of an iconic Feminist Prof Bene Madunagu at Transcorp hotel, Calabar; a Funeral Conference at the University of Calabar (UNICAL) and a Social/Funeral wake at same UNICAL, all on Thursday.
In a special tribute captured in a biographical notes at the funeral converge on January 17, her husband, Dr Edwin Madunagu said “ our journey together began in 1973 at the University of Lagos, Nigeria. That year, our subject, Bene Madunagu (then Miss Benedicta Michael Afangide), was a graduate student of Botany residing in the Main Campus’ Female Hostel. I, Edwin Madunagu was a graduate student of Mathematics residing in the Main Campus’ Male Hostel.
Later, but still in 1973, I introduced Bene, still a mere political collaborator, to two non-campus leftist groups – Nigerian Youth Action Commitee (NYAC) and Society for Progress (SOPRO). By the middle of 1974, we had joined the revolutionary Marxist Anti-Poverty Movement of Nigeria (APMON) and could address ourselves and were addressed as revolutionary socialists, Marxists and communists. And I can also confirm that by the middle of 1974 Bene and I had become lovers, in addition to being friends and comrades.
We became wife and husband two years later.
Now, let this point be made clearer and more explicit: though I introduced Bene to socialism and radical politics following our entry into the Postgraduate Students Association, University of Lagos, in 1973, my own consciousness was at that stage undergoing a rapid revolutionary transformation. Put differently, my revolutionary consciousness was being rapidly and fundamentally – transformed as I was introducing Bene to socialism and Radical politics. It can therefore be proposed, and I do propose that Bene and 1 moved into explicitly revolutionary consciousness – away from mere radical consciousness – together
and, I would add, we moved together through the instrumentality of the same set of critical events and experiences.
The following year, in 2013, she also retired formally from all Executive Board – in Girls’ pow initiative (GPI) Nigeria, a girls’ and young women’s empowerment organization she co-founded in 1993/1994.
He listed her attributes as a revolutionary to include :
( I) Revolutionary courage, creativity and brilliance
(ii) Revolutionary generosity, simplicity, humility and humour.
I have searched around and reflected on Bene’s life in retirement and ill-health.
I finally setled on the Introduction to the 2021 book, “Edwin Madunagu at 75: Tributes and Reflection edited”, introduced and put out by Comrade Chido Onumah. The relevant part goes like this: “This publicaioon is the outcome of the conference that held on May 15, 2021 – the 75th birthday of Edwin Ikechukwu Madunagu (Eddie, to comrades, friends, and associates). Two of the highlights of the conference was (1) the reaffirmation of the long-standing commitment of Comrades Eddie and Bene to “Marxism, Socialist Revolution in Nigeria and world-wide and to Revolutionary Internationalism,” and (2) the decision by Comrades Eddie and Bene to transfer their “Combined Archives and Libraries”, built up since 1973, to the Nigeria Left.
“Following this decision, an 8-member Board of Advisers (BOA), chaired by Comrade Professor Biodun Jeyifo (BJ) was established to manage the Combined Archives and Libraries on behalf and in the name of the Nigerian Left. In the months since the May 2021 conference, the Combined Archives and Libraries of Edwin Madunagu and Bene Madunagu have morphed into the Socialist Library and Archives (SOLAR). Work is actively going on to make SOLAR a reference library/archives not just for the Nigerian Left but for researchers, students, academics, and the public.”
Even in ill-health Comrade Bene Madunagu challenged herself on several occasions to remember several events, participate in the reorganization and authenticate several processes that made possible the transfer of our “Combined Archives and Libraries” to the Nigerian Left. She has also continued to inspire the Leftist and Leftist – Feminist Movements, their various formations, organizations, leaders and members.
in May 2021, as I turned 75, I said in an essay, Looking back: Forty-five years ago: “My life as a professional revolutionary since 1977 has been tough. Inevitably, life has also been tough for that person who, in addition to having to share my life as a wife, a comrade and a lover, also has .to live her life as an academic, an intellectual, a mother, a social activist, a leftist feminist, a revolutionary socialist and a Leftist internationalist.
If there is any one person who, since 1977, has kept me on my feet, stood with me as equal, pointing out what can be done today in anticipation of tomorrow, and correcting my frequent tactical and strategic errors, that person is Comrade Professor Bene Madunagu. It was my fervent hope, as well as that of Bene’s numerous comrades, compatriots, collaborators, colleagues, students, friends and family members – Nigeria and outside Nigeria – and, in particular, her colleagues and students at the University of Calabar, an institution that she joined in 1976 at the age of 29 and the Girls’ Power Initiative (GPI) Nigeria that she co-founded in 1993/1994 and thereafter led for 20 years that she recovers fully from her current ill-health and continue her selfless,productive, happy and inspiring life and revolutionary work.
On attributes of Bene – Eddie relationship, Madunagu said, “let me at this point isolate and underline three integral attributes of the relationship between Bene and myself:
(l) Revolutionary compatibility (
ii)Revolutionary complementarity
(iii)Faith and Love, where Love is understood in a total and comprehensive sense as used, for instance by Saint Paul, the Apostle of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 13:1-13)
The first two attributes are necessary – and, indeed, irreducible – for a cell in a revolutionary movement. But a revolutionary cell which, in addition, is endowed with internal love has an added advantage of high degree. Bene and I have constituted such a cell in the Nigerian Left since 1975.
The contents of this revolutionary union of Bene and myself have included the following: All major decisions in our organizational, political, professional, occupational, financial and family lives since 1975 have been taken together and executed together – sometimes with one person above ground and the other underground.
Sometimes we creatively follow the revolutionary dictum: “March separately but strike together agreeing on where to strike and when to strike”.
Beyond this, everything that can be called property (which, excluding literary acquisition, is very limited) is collectively owned in a revolutionary sense (that is, with individual authority to use or deploy) – but with the formal ownership residing with Bene. Division of labour , where this is inevitable, also follows the revolutionary principles that are continually moderated by our 1978 decision to have one joint foot in the existing bourgeois society, and the other outside of it – a duality that, under our subsisting historical circumstances, is inevitable in the life of a genuine revolutionary, individual or cell.
For the oldest and long standing Nigeria Left, Comrade Biodun Jeyifo in his tribute said, “Bene you were Amazonian, a revolutionary, a warrior, a female revolutionary and warrior but you were also pharmacon. The poison that is also the cure, the foundation of Bitany, the queen of all sciences, poison cured, neutralized.
“You forcefully confronted poison without its remedy. You Bene Madunagu, essence of cure for poison…we will not forget you, we dare not forget you, Amazon and pharmakon!”
Comrade Kayode Komolafe, popularly known as KK, Comrade James Ibor, Comrade Jonathan Abang Ugbal, Hon Nkoyo Toyo, Comrade John Okam and many others graced the occasion.
