PROFILE

of

HON. CHUKWUDIFU AKUNNE OPUTA

(CFR, KSM, KT.CSS, KT SGG)

Rtd. Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria

Chukwudifu Oputa was born on September 22, 1924 to Chief Oputa Uzukwu and Mrs. Nwametu Oputa. His father was an elegant tall man of over six feet who cared deeply for humanity. In those days, polygamy was the order and a man’s wealth was measured among other properties by the number of wives he had. Chief Oputa had 10 wives, and Chukwudifu Oputa is the last of his children. Pa Oputa Uzukwu passed on when Chukwudifu was only three months old, while his mother died when he was barely six months old. They were highly successful traders and farmers.

Since Chukwudifu’s parents passed on while he was still an infant, one cannot say they had any direct influence on him. However, Justice Chukwudifu Oputa’s grandmother, Ogonim Enesha, in the 1890s and the early years of the 1900s was a notable trader with the Royal Niger Company. She was therefore wealthy and made provision for young Chukwudifu.

Sylvester, as he is called by his friends, attended the Sacred Heart School, Oguta from 1930-1936, and (C.K.C) Christ the King’s College, Onitsha 1937-1940. His godfather at that time was a catechist who instilled a sense of discipline in him and provided the necessary Christian upbringing.

After secondary school, Chukwudifu Oputa got admission to study at the then Higher College, Yaba, Lagos. However as a result of the emerging World War II, Chukwudifu was moved to the famous Achimota College, in the then Gold Coast (now Ghana) where he obtained the B.Sc degree in Economics in 1945. It was also at this same period that through the quest for hard work, he studied at home to obtain the B, A (Hons.) degree [in History] from the University of London.

On his return to Nigeria from the Gold Coast, he took up a post as a teacher. His first port of call was the Africa College, which also had on its staff prominent Nigerians like Chike Obi, the famous mathematician, and the late Dr. Pius Okigbo. Later on he transferred to the K.N.C. (Kalahari National College), Buguma where he was made the principal. Some of his pupils included Professor Tamunotonye David West, a former Petroleum Minister in the Federal Republic of Nigeria and Honourable Justice Adolphus Godwin Karibi-Whyte – a serving Justice of the Nigerian Supreme Court, These former students of Justice Oputa still address him whenever they meet as ‘Principal’ or ‘Teacher’.

From 1949-1951 he served as an administrative officer at the Nigeria Secretariat, Lagos. He was privileged to be among the few Nigerians to be appointed to such a position, which was before then, the exclusive right of the British colonial officers.

Young ChukwudifVs quest for knowledge, however, spurred him on to leave this lucrative job in Nigeria in order to study law in England. In June 1953, his ambition of becoming a gentleman of the bar paid off. He received his LL.B (Hons.) degree, and was called to the English Bar – Grays Inn, London on 26 November 1953. His background in the humanities, set the stage for a successful, brilliant and outstanding legal practice.

He returned to Nigeria in 1954, and enjoyed a highly successful private legal practice for the next twelve years. As a legal practitioner, he appeared in virtually all the magistrate and high courts of the then Eastern Region of Nigeria, as well as the court in the Region of the Cameroons. He also made regular appearances before the West African Court of Appeal, the Federal Supreme Court and the Supreme Court of Nigeria. He was the leading counsel in the Harcourt Commission of Inquiry into the Oguta Chieftaincy Dispute (1958/59), an inquiry the Hon. Justice Oputa recalled with nostalgia.