The President of the Ijaw National Congress, Benjamin Okaba has mourned the death of elder statesman and leader of the Pan Niger Delta Forum, Chief Edwin Clark, stating that his death has left a major vacuum.
Clark died on Monday in Abuja, aged 97, according to a statement signed by Prof C.C Clark for the family.
Okaba who spoke to residents at the residence of the late Niger Delta leader in Abuja on Tuesday, said his qualities of integrity, courage, and the capacity to speak truth to power, were qualities that would be “very difficult to be replicated in anybody at all.”
He added, “The feeling is very bad, though mixed feelings. Because I’m the first place, he died an accomplished person, living up to 97. It’s not easy. If he had stayed on for another six weeks, it would have clocked 98 years.
“He played a leading role in the reunification of the South-South and the Middle East. He is that voice, that irrepressible voice, of not only the Ijaw people, but also the Niger Delta, and the minorities across West Africa.
“The issue of integrity, courage, the capacity to speak truth to power, the capacity to speak undiluted truth to power; these are qualities that are very, very difficult to replicate in anybody at all.
“Clark died leaving a major vacuum. But we have this belief in God that in the same manner that Clark was raised, was raised and prepared for leadership, there is no vacuum in politics, in life at all. So we also believe that the national process will follow, in bringing up a leader that will take over from him.”
Okada also disclosed that a process had begun to fill the “big shoe” left by Clark’s demise.
“How it will come, I don’t know; who will the leader be, I don’t know. But I know there is already a national process.
“There is an ongoing national process. We know that that vacuum will be covered, There is no doubt about it. It is a big loss, a big vacuum, and a big shoe”, he added
