Professor Acholonu is dead

Professor Catherine Obianuju Acholonu is dead.  Our source who is close to the family informed us that Professor Acholonu died on Tuesday 18 March 2014 after a protracted illness.

Professor Catherine Acholonu (1951 - 2014)

Born in Orlu on 26 October 1951 to Chief Lazarus Olumba, Acholonu attended schools in Nigeria and overseas and became the first African woman to obtain a Master’s Degree in 1977 and a PhD in 1987 from the University of Dusseldorf, Germany. She started teaching at Alvan Ikoku College of Education, Owerri in 1978.

Professor Acholonu was the author of 16 books, a lot of which are standard texts in secondary schools and universities in Nigeria as well as in African studies Departments in USA and Europe and was a founding member of the Association of Nigeria Authors, (ANA).

Her excellent works have enjoyed the support and collaboration of the United States Information Service (USIS), The British Council and the Rockefeller Foundation, which in 1989 culminated in her being invited to four educational institutions in the United States to deliver lectures on her works under the United States International Visitor’s Programme. She was also a member of the United Nations Expert Group on Women, Population and Sustainable Development.

From 1999 to 2002 she was the Special Adviser on Arts and Culture to President Olusegun Obasanjo. She resigned from that position to contest the Nigerian Presidency. Recently she was appointed the African Renaissance Ambassador by the African Renaissance Conference and was Nigeria’s sole representative at the Global Forum of Arts and Culture for the implementation of the UN Convection to Combat Desertification (UNFAC).

Until her death she was the Director of the Catherine Acholonu Research Centre, Abuja.

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