Unveiling The Mystery: Chyke Fussion, Voice Of The Apostles

A chorister in the church
A truant in school
A music meastro
A cultural ambassador

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CHIEF CHINWEIKE OKORO
a.k.a. CHYKE FUSSION

Burial activities of the late musician that rocked southeast in the 70s and 80s

Shakespeare’s long-held belief that some people are born great, while others achieve greatness through hard work, including Chief Chinweike Okoro, also known as Chyke Fussion, is correct.

On September 19, 1949, Chinweike Okoro was born into the average family of Elder David Onwubiko and Madam Lucy Ahunna Okoro, both of Umuokoro Compound of Okoro Okpaegbe kindred Umuobiakwa in Abia State’s Obingwa Local Government Area.

He completed his primary education at S.D.A. School, now known as Amaise Central School, where he graduated in 1963. He then enrolled in Collins Commercial School Aba, where he learnt typing and shorthand before the unfortunate Nigeria-Biafra war ended his education. At the end of hostilities in 1972, he was admitted to Wilcox Memorial Secondary School in Ogbor Hill, Aba, and graduated in 1976.

Long before securing the Wilcox admission, he began displaying and demonstrating great musical traits based on talent, during which time his equally late uncle Chief John Ngozi Nwaehibe, also known as Johny Fleming, began grooming him to near perfection.

Johny Fleming is remembered as one of the most prominent pop stars of the past, having played and sung with bands such as Wavelengths in Enugu and Rock 28 in Onitsha before joining the Wings in faraway Maiduguri. At that point, Johny Fleming could be said to have dropped Fussion halfway into musical paradise.

Following that, the living High Chief Walton Arungwa selected the young lad and provided him with all of the necessary theoretical and practical musical lessons, resulting in Fussion blossoming into a serious musical reckoning.

Following Walton Arungwa, who had recently returned home to Calabar after years of musical sojourn and expedition, provided an opportunity for Chyke Fussion to join and thus become a founding member of Super 7 during its formative stages. Super 7 eventually evolved into what became known as Apostles.

At that point, there was no stopping Chyke Fussion, who has since become a confirmed truant at the highly disciplined Wilcox Memorial Secondary School, where he frequently skipped class to devote more time to his musical interests.

Both his parents and the school authorities punished him multiple times for failing to follow domestic rules and existing school curricula and threatened to expel him if he continued his truancy, all of which fell on deaf ears.

While the threats persisted, Chyke Fussion’s reputation grew rapidly beyond Aba and throughout East Central State. The Apostles recorded their debut singles “Down-down the Valley” and “Battery Rock” in 1974, establishing the group as a permanent fixture.

But when it went ahead to pacify, condole, and sympathise with the government and people of Nigeria, particularly the Igbos of the East Central State whose shops were raised down in that regrettable early morning fire that gutted them all in a pathetic musical note was all the Apostles as a band and Chyke Fussion as a person and vocalist of the tune “Enyim Lee” and “Mmeregini bu Ogu” among other well thought out, well composed, well played, and well-blended lamen

As a result, we are here today not only to bury him, but also to praise him, because, while he was a hard-working young man, he was also the stubborn and no-nonsense type who pursued his musical career with vigour and passion, winning corresponding musical accolades for himself and the Apostles, the Ngwa-land, and the Igbo nation, prompting entertainment journalists and editors to refer to the Apostles as “Ndi Nkwa.”

It is safe to assume that the Apostles could not have accomplished everything without Chyke Fussion applying and bringing to bear his God-given talent.

Chyke Fussion, as he was known, was one of the most flamboyant floor show vocalists in Nigerian music. He was a good family man, married to Miriam, and had three children: Adaeze Chizurumoke Confidence Okoro (daughter), Michael Chinjikem Okoro (son), and Noble King Chiedozie Okoro (son), as well as numerous other relatives who mourned him.

Chyke Fussion slipped off his bathroom floor on Wednesday, April 17, breaking the bone in his left leg, and died painfully on Wednesday, May 15, 2024, after several Western and Orthodox medications failed to cure him. He had several musical albums under his belt before his death. He was also an active member and stakeholder in the PMAN.

On May 1, 2002, His Royal Highness Eze C. D. Nwajiogu, the Ala Ukwu I of the Isiala Ukwu Autonomous Community in Obingwa, honoured and installed him as the Akaji Nkwa I of Ngwa-land in recognition and appreciation of his contributions to the development of Ngwa and Igbo land in general through music.

He has been described as the greatest singer-musician to emerge from Ngwa-land. And, because he loved music, he passed up or rejected numerous opportunities to travel abroad for further studies, preferring to stay here and pursue his musical ambition to its logical conclusion.

While he may not have made all of the money, he did make enough name and goodwill to support those he left behind if he lived in a society where love, peace, probity, and accountability thrive unhindered. Although nature abhors a vacuum, the Ngwa-land may not see another ebullient singer/performer like Chief Chinweike Okoro, a.k.a. Fussion, shortly.
As a result of his death, his family, the Umuobiakwa people of Obingwa Council, and Abia State, in general, have lost one of their greatest sons and the Apostle of the Apostles of our time.

Adieu, Daddy.

Adieu, we loved and cherished you, but God loved you more.

See you on the resurrection morning, when we will be reunited forever.

Michael Chinjikem Okoro (son)
For the family.

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