OGAGA EMONGWANRE AICMC: THE BAR'S LOSS, HEAVEN'S GAIN. | Douglas Ogbankwa Esq.

It was the British Best Selling Novelist and Author-J K. Rawlings, the author of the Epic - Harry Potter posited thus:

To the well-organised, death is but the next adventure.

Sometime around the 2000s, at Standard Lectures in Benin City owned by Pastor Mike Omoregbee, I was teaching Government in the JAMB Class, when I noticed a then bright young boy who was very brilliant and animated. I took to him and that is how I took him to the Programme "Can You Guess", on Edo Broadcasting Service, which I was privileged to present at that time. Ogaga Emongwanre excelled in the Programme seamlessly and took a bolder step to present the Programme "Did You Know", on Independent Television, (ITV), Benin. It was from there that Ogaga presented a series of programmes before he branched off into being a Compere and Comedian with the sobriquet "Ogaga Baba".

Ogaga combined his successful stint in the media with studying Law at the Prestigious University of Benin. He had an eventful sojourn at the University where he was a popular figure among his peers. He was called to the Nigerian Bar in January 2011 and Ogaga hit the ground running.

Together with his classmates Emmanuel Aisiriuwa and Julius Ikpefa (who are now both in the United States), Ogaga Emongwanre made a profound statement in his premium activities at the Bar, for which Ogaga was appointed the Publicity Secretary of the Young Lawyers' Forum of the NBA Benin Branch. In 2012, He served the Bar, both at the local and national levels, from one Committee to another, with raw passion and verve.

He had the privilege of coordinating campaigns for the last two recently successful Presidents of the Nigerian Bar Association, at the  Benin Branch of the NBA and the Midwest and he did the same creditable well.

It was Abraham Lincoln that said:

It is not about the years in life, it is about the life in your years.

Ogaga Emongwanre has lived a life of service to the Bar. Interestingly, I handed over to him as the Publicity Secretary of the NBA Benin Branch, where he gave out notices for the Bar and performed many other Publicity and protocol duties.

Ogaga was the Secretary of the NBA National Welfare Committee, which successful kick-started the NBA National Health Insurance Scheme, which is a novelty in the annals of the Nigerian Bar. He was also a personal aide of the President of the Nigerian Bar Association - Olumide Akpata Esq.

Ogaga will be sorely missed for his warmth, infectious smile and congenial mien. Benjamin Franklin the American Thinker said thus about the certainty of death: There are two things that are sure in life, tax and death.

It was no surprise that the whole of Nigeria was shaken yesterday by the death of one of the rising stars of the Nigerian Bar - Ogaga Emongwanre AICMC, the mouthpiece of the Lion Bar.

In the Play "Julius Caesar" by William Shakespeare at Act 11, Scene 11, Pages 30-31, Calpurnia, Caesar's wife says to Julius Caesar to dissuade him from going out on the Ides of March, thus: "When beggars die, there are no comets seen; the heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes."

Ogaga Emongwanre AICMC, you are gone, but your spirit lives on because to live in the hearts of those who love you is not to die. May your gentle and lovely soul rest in perfect peace, Amen.

Douglas Ogbankwa Esq.