Chris Asoluka tribute reflecting on mentorship, intellectual discipline, and the promise to continue writing inspired by the late economist

There are debts that cannot be quantified.

Also read: Tawa Ajisefinni celebrates mother’s birthday with heartfelt tribute

They are not financial. They do not accrue interest. They send no reminders. Yet they settle quietly on the conscience and refuse to leave.

This is one of them.

Some people also enter your life almost silently, almost accidentally, yet leave impressions so enduring that you only recognise their depth in their absence.

Dr. Chris Asoluka was one such person.

Dr. Asoluka, who passed away on 10th May 2025, at age 70, was an economist, a public servant, and a technocrat of rare intellect.

He served as a member of the House of Representatives in the Third Republic and as commissioner for finance and economic development in Imo State from 1994 to 1996.

Later, he became Chairman and CEO of Nipal Consulting Network, a firm that provides strategy and policy development for national and subnational governments.

He bridged public service, private enterprise, and intellectual engagement — a rare combination of principle, precision, and practice.

The first time I encountered his name, I did not meet him.

I was a postgraduate student accompanying a course mate – whose name now escapes me – to his kinsman’s residence in Festac Town, Lagos, to collect books for a thesis. It was my course mate who mentioned, almost casually, “This is Chief Chris Asoluka’s house.”

He was not home. We collected the books and left.

The name lingered, then slipped quietly into memory.

Shortly after, I joined ThisDay newspaper.

I found myself in the orbit of Professor Pat Utomi — political economist, restless intellectual, and at the time a faculty member at the Lagos Business School.

As part of a book project on him, we drew up a list of key voices to interview.

Chris Asoluka’s name resurfaced.

That was the beginning of a relationship that would quietly shape my understanding of accountability, leadership, and intellectual rigour.

My fuller interaction with him deepened during Professor Utomi’s first presidential bid ahead of the 2007 election.

By 2006, the Lagos Business School had become a hub for strategy sessions — long hours of debate about economic direction, governance, and the temperament leadership requires.

Dr Asoluka was the arrowhead driving the entire strategy. He was measured and precise. He was never theatrical, never one to dominate a discussion for effect.

But when he spoke, arguments gained structure. He anchored them in evidence, numbers, and logic.

He demanded clarity where enthusiasm risked becoming vague and challenged assumptions politely but firmly.

It was my first sustained exposure to technocratic discipline applied to politics — and it permanently shaped how I perceive leadership, strategy, and responsibility.

During those Lagos years, our interactions extended beyond formal meetings. Asoluka’s office in Apapa was not far from ThisDay office, and I often dropped in, sometimes with purpose, sometimes simply to converse.

He welcomed dialogue without pretence. Our discussions ranged from policy and economy to literature, ethics, and society.

I served as Features Editor at ThisDay for over five years. For three of those years, I wrote the Saturday back-page column, a space to reflect, interrogate, and provoke thought beyond breaking headlines.

It was during this period that Dr Asoluka began reading my work.

He responded, sometimes briefly, sometimes analytically, often with questions that sharpened thought.

When someone of disciplined intellect reads your work, you write more carefully. You test assumptions. You refine conclusions.

He did not flatter; he engaged. That engagement was accountability.

While in ThisDay, I was head-hunted to Truetales Publications Ltd, publishers of Hints magazine, as CEO/Editor-in-Chief to lead a turnaround team.

It was a brief but pivotal period. The challenge was organisational: reviving structures, restoring focus, and implementing strategic corrections.

From Truetales, I moved to BusinessDay as a member of its Editorial Board, where I resumed opinion writing, this time on Wednesdays.

The platform changed, but the discipline of thinking aloud remained. It was from BusinessDay that I relocated to Abuja in 2011.

Distance altered rhythm. Writing slowed. Columns became occasional, then irregular, then silent. Life, with its multiplicity of responsibilities, filled the spaces once devoted to thought.

Writers rarely stop dramatically. They taper. They postpone. They drift. I drifted.

In 2024, at the Congress Hall of Transcorp Hilton in Abuja, our paths crossed again. Time had left its mark: there was a walking stick to aid his movement.

Yet his mind was sharp, his speech measured, his curiosity intact.

After pleasantries, he asked a simple question:

“Why did you stop writing?”

It was not accusatory. It was observational. He had noticed the silence. He had been reading me, following my work, and he expected the continuity of a voice that had once spoken publicly and consistently.

I offered explanations – distractions, responsibilities, the usual language of postponement. None satisfied me.

In that moment, I felt the weight of quiet expectation, not from a critic, but from a mentor who believed that a voice once committed to reasoned discourse should not drift casually into silence.

I promised to resume.

I did not keep that promise in time.

When news of his passing came, the unfinished promise returned with unusual force. There is a grief attached not merely to a loss, but to deferred action; to knowing that a debt to someone who shaped your thought remained unsettled.

Dr. Chris Asoluka was more than a technocrat. He was what the Italian philosopher, Antonio Gramsci, called an “organic intellectual” – one embedded in society, shaping institutions, translating abstract principles into applied practice.

In a society like ours, where noise often outpaces nuance, the organic intellectual performs an indispensable function.

He tempers passion with evidence, insists that arithmetic matters, and reminds power that clarity must precede charisma. He insists that personality shapes policy, temperament informs decisions, and values must guide action.
Asoluka expected consistency.

That expectation lingers.

Our national conversation obsesses over events. Beneath every event lies personality. Beneath every policy lies character.

Every decision emerges from a constellation of pre-formed values. Institutions matter, yes – but the people who inhabit them matter more.

We do not always control the circumstances that interrupt us. But we control whether interruption becomes abandonment.

That is one lesson I have learnt.

The question he asked in that Transcorp Hilton hall has not faded:

“Why did you stop writing?

Today, I answer not with explanation but with action. This column is not just my answer; it is my commitment.

This first edition of The Sunday Stew is my attempt to honour that debt, not through nostalgia, but through consistency.

It is my way of responding to a standard quietly set before me.

This column will examine faith, leadership, culture, personality, and the unseen forces shaping our society’s visible outcomes. It will appear every Sunday, unhurried, unfiltered, and thoughtful.

Some weeks it will challenge you.
Other weeks, it may unsettle you.
Occasionally, it may simply provoke a smile.
But it will always be honest.

Addendum
That this debut aligns with March 8, International Women’s Day, is unplanned, yet fitting.

If this column speaks of influence and accountability, it must acknowledge that many of Nigeria’s most enduring influences are steady and formative, often embodied by women whose contributions sustain our institutions without spectacle.

Tomorrow, March 9, marks the first anniversary of my mother’s passing. Lolo Angela Iheomahialam Amuchie departed on 9th March 2025.

Her life, like that of many women of her generation, was not performed on public stage. It was lived in quiet consistency — in faith, discipline, sacrifice, and the shaping of values long before they found expression in public spaces.

The lessons she taught, alongside my father, the late Chief Emmanuel Ikonne Amuchie, still guide the steps of my siblings and me.

Influence needs not be loud to be lasting. It is visible in the mentors, the colleagues, the educators, and the family members whose work shapes lives quietly, profoundly, and consistently.

Also read: Tinubu pays stirring tribute to Murtala Muhammed

Therefore, as this column begins, I honour not only mentors like Chris Asoluka who sharpened my thought, but also those — like my parents — whose diligence, insight, and steadfast values quietly shape society in ways that often go unacknowledged.