‘A
Guided Life’
The autobiography of Col. Lambert Ogbonna Ihenacho
mni
‘The Last Biafran Field Commander’
REVIEWED BY Ralph
Igbo and Ebere Inyama
Published by Strive
Books Nig. Ltd. no. 1 Strive Street Ext., Owerri, Imo state, Nigeria. Phone
+2348033323514, +2348034004306, +2348034276894
Prologue
The book, ‘A Guided Life’ is the autobiography of
Colonel Lambert Ogbonna Ihenacho. In
this 339 pages of documented history, one of Nigeria’s brilliant and fearless
army officer, Colonel Lambert Ogbonna Ihenacho, who hails from Imo state, Nigera, narrates the story of his life beginning from the period he joined the Nigerian
Army in 1957 till he retired from active service in 1990.
Like Ademola Ademoyega’s ‘Why
We Struck’, ‘A Guided Life’ captures
the scenarios that played out in the Nigerian Army shortly before, during and
after the failed coup of January 1966; the book went further to discuss the
Nigeria – Biafra war in detail, the events that followed after the war and the
travails of the Nigerian polity. And
like Chinua Achebe’s ‘There Was a Country’, the author made good use of his
amazing descriptive power to put events in their proper perspectives.
Lambert Ogbonna Ihenacho was
a Lieutenant in the Nigerian Army before the Nigeria/Biafra Civil War. He was
serving at the 5th Infantry Battalion Nigerian Army, Kano. Back in
Eastern Nigeria, he joined hands with Governor Odumegwu Ojukwu and other Igbo
elites to fight for Biafra Independence.
During that war, Ihenacho
employed all the training he received to command Company, Battalion and Brigade
effectively in various sectors. He gave details of the various battles he
fought in the war. He recaptured large
territories occupied by the enemy which helped Biafra to remain afloat for such
a long time. He ended as a Lt. Colonel.
After the war, Ihenacho was
reabsorbed into the Nigerian Army where he served in various capacities before
he was compulsorily retired in 1990 as a Colonel.
Colonel Ihenacho had a close
shave with the coup of 1985. When the dust settled, his friend, Lt. Colonel
Bitiyon was found guilty and was executed alongside Gen. Mamman Vatsa and
others. Again, he narrowly escaped execution after he was wrongly arrested for
the coup plot of April 1990 alongside Major Gideon Okar and others.
In this book, the author
narrates his exploits when he commanded Nigerian troops in Lebanon between 1980
and 1981. Towards the tail end of the book, Ihenacho who was nominated as a Deputy
Governorship candidate for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Imo state in
2007, narrates his experiences as a politician. He also talks about his
spiritual life with greater emphasis on his contact with the Grail Message.
Lambert Ogbonna Ihenacho is
a blend of the military and the intellectual, a man with the sword in one hand
and a pen in the other. He is a fearless warrior who dared to challenge any
misdeed or atrocity committed by anybody including his superiors in the army,
many of whom are still alive today.
Read the 45 pages review here
https://globalnewsalerts.blogspot.com/2019/06/autobiography-of-biafras-last-field_0.html
💙👏🙏
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