Nnamdi Azikiwe, PC , usually referred to as "Zik", was a Nigerian statesman who was Governor General of Nigeria from 1960 to 1963 and the first President of Nigeria from 1963 to 1966 . Considered a driving force behind the nation's independence, he came to be known as the "father of Nigerian Nationalism".
Born to Igbo parents in Zungeru in the present-day Niger State, young 'Zik' learned to speak Hausa . Azikiwe was later sent to live with his aunt and grandmother in Onitsha , where he learned the Igbo language. A stay in Lagos exposed him to the Yoruba language; by the time he was in college, he had been exposed to different Nigerian cultures and spoke three languages . Azikiwe travelled to the United States where he was known as Ben Azikiwe and attended Storer College, Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania and Howard University. He contacted colonial authorities with a request to represent Nigeria at the Los Angeles Olympics. He returned to Africa in 1934, where he began work as a journalist in the Gold Coast. In British West Africa, he advocated Nigerian and African nationalism as a journalist and a political leader.
Wikipedia
✵
16. November 1904 – 11. May 1996
