Prof. Chinua Achebe was a literary giant who used the power of erudition to project persuasive and powerful political points.
.
Little is known today of the sharp disagreement between the late Prof. Albert Chinualumogu Achebe and the late Senator Barkin Zuwo in the days after the controversial 1983 elections.
.
What is, however, known, and shocking to many, was that Prof. Chinua Achebe almost engaged in a physical combat with the late Zuwo over an unknown issue at a caucus of the Peoples Redemption Party, PRP in 1983 before the two were separated. It was the combat of brain and brawn!
.
That indeed was the last that was heard of Prof. Achebe's involvement in partisan politics. He had emerged as the national vice-president of the PRP after the party was registered in 1978 and became a close associate of the party leader, Mallam Aminu Kano, himself one of the most persuasive political ideologues of the colonial era.