Christopher Okigbo moved in 1962 from the lush, hilly terrains of Nsukka to Ibadan as the West African Regional Manager for Cambridge University Press. According to his friend Sam Nwoye, who later became the Librarian of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, he discerned no future for himself in pursuit of a career in librarianship at the university. But even more important, Ibadan was in a cultural and political ferment. Okigbo's move to Ibadan coincided with the founding of the Mbari Club, the artists and writers collective whose activities stimulated one of the most important cultural and artistic movements in postcolonial Africa. – ‘those magical years’ as Robert Wren described them. Okigbo became central in that ferment. Cambridge University Press had a small, but prestigious presence in Ibadan, and Okigbo inherited its symbolic stature.

Cambridge University Press did active business with the new universities in Nigeria. It originally established its office in Nigeria principally to supply the academic needs of the University College of Ibadan when it had been founded in 1948. It quickly established the same relationship with the University of Nigeria when it opened in 1960. Okigbo's duties at the library, which included procuring books and establishing useful contacts with numerous publishers and book suppliers, brought him in close contact with the book industry. He had established an amicable relationship with many of the international publishing companies in the course of his tenure at Nsukka.