Kenneth Keazor

Kenneth Kola Abiola Keazor is a Nigerian lawyer and jurist, was born in Lagos (Nigeria) on the 12th of April 1935 to Eugene Akosa and Anne Abiola Keazor. His father, Eugene Keazor was a Senior Police Officer who retired as a Commissioner of Police in Colonial Nigeria in 1964- one of the most Senior African Policemen of his time.

Kenneth Keazor studied Law at the University of London and was called to the Bar at Grays Inn in 1962. He met and got married to his wife Victoria in October 1960. He returned to Nigeria in 1963, where he joined the Ministry of Justice in the [Eastern Region of Nigeria, till 1967 when the Nigerian Civil War broke out and he joined the Biafran Army rising to the rank of Major.

His frank and outspoken nature as well as his indepth knowledge of Military History and Strategy did not go down well with the Biafran authorities - as well as his mixed parentage (his mother was a Yoruba from Nigeria) which soon resulted in his being unfairly targeted -alongside Majors Banjo and Ademoyega (his close friends and also of Yoruba origin) and charged and tried for "Treason". Whilst Banjo was executed by the Biafran authorities, he narrowly escaped execution after a Kangaroo trial by jumping out through a Cell window and walking over 80 miles in the bush to locate and be re-united with his young family. He then crossed to the Nigerian side of the conflict and returned to Lagos, the capital in 1969.

He joined the Nigerian Board of Inland Revenue as Legal Adviser in 1969 and then the Ministry of Justice as Principal State Counsel. He worked in the Nigerian Civil Service in several capacities but most notably as Counsel to the Government of Nigeria in the Massive Joint Venture Warri Refinery Project. He retired from the Federal Civil Service as Deputy Solicitor General of the Federation from where he joined Cadbury PLC as Legal Counsel and Company Secretary In 1981. He returned to Public service with his appointment as Attorney-General of Anambra State in 1988. He was later appointed a Justice of the State High Court in 1989, a position he remained till his second retirement in 1990.

He was also a Pioneer Course member of the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies in Nigeria in 1979. The country's high-level think tank on National Policy, whose membership has produced three of Nigeria's Heads of State. His course papers on a Foreign policy strategy for Cuba by African countries and a proposed Missile Policy for Nigeria, remains an important reference work in State Policy in Africa. He remains active in the Alumni Association of this body, having variously occupied the positions of Secretary-General and Regional Chairman.

Generally regarded as a being of high moral Integrity by his peers, he has remained active after retirement, acting as Chairman of an Election Tribunal in 1991 and currently sits as Chairman of an Investigative Panel into Fraudulent Contracts awarded in the previous Administration in Anambra State, Nigeria.