I hawked a few articles on a tray after school everyday, around the neighbourhood. There was no shame at all — Ayo Adebanjo

 

Apart from studying, I had to hawk a few articles on a tray after school everyday, around the nieghbourhood. There was no shame at all to it. Though my friends were mostly children of civil servants, well-to-do, no one looked down on me. So, for my mother, I sold candles and matches and all sorts, on the streets. I constantly manned the shop in Idumota. I made money on the side, and saved all I could. I was easily called omo alaje (a shrewd child who brings good fortune).

Sometimes I lent my mother money and regularly exchanged notes for smaller denominations for her. On a number of occasions, I tried to outsmart my mother, took some of her money. Whenever I was asked about it, I denied. But I never took anyone else’s things; not money, nothing whatsoever.

Discipline was all around me. Everyone was cautious, circumspect and avoided trouble. You minded your business, though you knew everyone else’s preoccupation.

Although you couldn’t describe my parents as learned (they never saw the four walls of any school), they studied on the streets. My father could read my report cards, and signed at the bottom every week (as it was the practice). You could not come back to school, on a Monday, with excuses regarding your report card not being signed. You would be punished. On one occasion when I forgot to show my father the report, I signed on his behalf. By the time Baba Ayo detected this fraud the following week, he pointed out, ‘Ayo, I didn’t sign this, you did!’ But he didn’t make a fuss over it.

At home, wastage was frowned upon and you could only put on your plate what you would finish eating without being seen as a glutton. My mother didn’t mind if you filled the whole plate but you must eat in a decent manner. She made sure we didn’t eat out of greed.

Education was paramount. Many agreed that it led to better opportunities. Everyone was concerned about it. At this time, I had moved from Holy Trinity (1937-1941) to Christ Church Cathedral School (where I was from 1937 to 1943, when E.B. Osibo was headmaster). I moved from one school to another because they were small and their classes terminated at particular levels.

Only Christ Church Cathedral School had Standard 5 and 6 classes at that period in the area. It admitted pupils from St John’s School, Aroloya, St Paul’s School, Breadfruit, Holy Trinity School, Ebute-Ero and St Peter’s School, Ita Faji. Standard Four was the highest level in these schools.

I was already becoming aware of who I would be, as a teenager. I was enjoying school. I was very anxious to attend secondary school; a number of my friends were already there.

I never contemplated learning a trade or craft, abandoning my education. Even having a passing interest in my father’s goldsmith outfit was unappealing.

I knew paying school fees would be tough on my parents. But I always believed there would be a way.

Not one to leave anything to chance, I summed up my savings, removed a large chunk of it, and bought the entrance examination form to CMS Grammar School, then on Odunlami Street, Lagos Island (not Bariga where it is now). I didn’t tell my parents though. CMS Grammar School (founded in June 1859) was the premier secondary school in Nigeria and many would do anything to attend the prestigious institution with a history of excellence in academics and sports. With its students immaculate in white uniform, seeing them everyday – on my way to school and back, many of them being my neighbours and acquaintances – made my mind up for me. I wanted to attend that school; the one the son of our landlord (of my mother’s shop in Idumota), Mr. S.K. Green – who worked at the Secretariat – attended (not minding the fact that the boy was later expelled and moved on to Ilesa Grammar School). I was eager to attend the school which two of my friends – Olumide Lowo and Funso Sobowale – who worshipped in the same church with me – were attending. I was anxious and dying to join them, though I would be two years behind.

Anxiety to go to that highly rated institution was the reason I used my pocket money to buy the admission form. I took the entrance examination, confident that I would pass. But when the result came out, my name was missing from the list pasted on the admission board.

I stood before the admission board transfixed! My face was abject with disappointment, despair and dejection. What could have happened? I studied hard enough, and there was no reason I shouldn’t have passed.

Carefully  going  through  the  list,  however,  I  saw  a Samuel Ayodele Adebayo. My mind journeyed back to the examination day. Was there a Samuel Ayodele Adebayo? I couldn’t recollect any such name. I became surer, more certain that there was no such candidate. My confidence began to return.

Basking in this confidence, I went home to tell my father my predicament. I narrated how I bought the form, took the examination and now my name is missing. I told him that I strongly suspected the name I saw on the board must have been misspelt.

Sharing my anxiety, he asked me if I was sure there was no Samuel Ayodele Adebayo that day. ‘You think you passed?’ my father, Pa Joel Adebanjo Adedairo, asked me. ‘I believe I passed,’ I retorted.

We rushed off to Canon Seth Irunsewe Kale’s house, on Beecroft Street, not too far away. The story was narrated all over again to the distinguished gentleman after an exchange of pleasantries and introduction.

Canon Kale (later Bishop of Lagos), the Principal of CMS Grammar School at the time, told us to go ahead of him to the school, and he soon followed on his bicycle. He checked his records and Adebayo was changed to Adebanjo. Right there on the notice board with a pen!

My bosom warmed, a glint appeared in my eyes, and I could feel my heart fluttering. I was more than excited. Exhilaration couldn’t even describe it. I felt like jumping and shouting. We thanked the Canon profusely, being glad about the turn of events.

But  the  euphoria  was  almost  short-circuited.  I  had not thought through how I would convince Mama Ayo to consider me worthy of being seen through secondary school; how she would part with huge amounts as school fees. She had already done enough, paid seven shillings and six pence per term for my elementary education.

So, because my mother had high regard for Mr. Green, whose son Abayomi donned with pride the all-white uniform of CMS Grammar School, and was already turning into a man, a handsome one actually, I decided that was the line to use. That was the only way I could tell her how important the school was. Already, my classmates in primary school who were congratulating me made my mother suspicious and drew her attention to my admission at CMS Grammar School.

To convince her, I played on the sentiment that the school from which our landlord’s son was expelled (because the standard of discipline was so high), was the one I had been admitted into.

That day I held my breath, swallowed hard and mouthed some prayers; prayers to soften her heart and make her accede to my request.

Before I finished with the details of the good news, she had broken out dancing with glee, rocking left and right, her right hand holding the tip of her wrapper; glad about my fortunes. And she said, ‘whatever it takes, you will be seen through secondary school.’

My mother began to ruminate about how to pay one pound ten shillings (£1.10) school fees every quarter. All of £6 a year, and £36 in the six years I would remain a student there.

That was outside of the uniform and sundry items that totalled up to make the school expensive. My mother ensured that my appearance was not inferior to that of my classmates.

She unfailingly paid £1.10 per quarter. When it turned to three times, we were paying £2 per term, for six years (1944-1949), it was around £36. In order to meet up with this commitment to ensure good education for her only child, she jettisoned the customary aso ebi (uniform dresses bought by friends and well-wishers to celebrate an event) and parties.

Mama Ayo didn’t belabour her mind. It was not difficult taking that decision. She would do anything to make me happy, and since this endeavour would lead to a brighter future, she didn’t consider it a burden.

Once she made up her mind, she decided to save every day. To ensure my school fees were paid regularly and on time, my mother started esusu (contribution of three pence a day which would amount to seven shillings and six pence a month). I took the coins to school to pay my fees. It didn’t matter to me in Class 1.

But I was the subject of mockery by my mates. I was labelled ‘Omo Iya Onisiga’ or ‘Omo Iya 2 by 2’ (a somewhat derisive appellation based on the form in which my fees were being paid). Later I told my mother that I would be paying my fees with notes. And from Class 2, I started paying with pound notes.

In January of 1944, I enrolled as a day student at the popular missionary institution, CMS Grammar School, on Odunlami Street, Lagos, among 30 others. I was in Form 1B (Those in Form 1A came from the preparatory school in the premises of CMS Girls’ Grammar School nearby).

The uniform was white shirt and shorts, with white socks and tennis shoes (what you could call plimsoles or canvas). CMS Grammar School was coveted, by those who valued high standards, who were aware of its tradition. There was a lot to learn, and the opportunity to mix with many young lads from different social strata – who would lead in future. There were sons of influential men and plebeians mixing together. Many of them my seniors or juniors between 1944 and 1949.

I remember Chief E.I.A. Banwo (who went on to become the Principal of Government College, Eric Moore in Surulere, Lagos), Dr. Lawrence Akinsanya, Borokini-Dada (who was admitted as Lasisi Salami), Prof. Fola Aboaba, Prof. Ayodeji Edwards, Dr. Bolaji Oshin (who worked with the Lagos State Government), Dr. C.O. Ojuri, Prof. S.O. Daniel, Chief Sobo Sowemimo (who was a prefect in school and senior prefect of the Boarding House), Prof. Ade Elebute (who led as senior prefect), Chief G.O. Sodipo (who was my bestman when I got married in London in 1960). Chief G.O.K. Ajayi, Elebute and Sowemimo were in the class of 1948.

I was already 15 years old when I enrolled at CMS Grammar School (not one of the oldest though, as there were older classmates not known to us at that time, such as Chief Banwo and Dr. Akinsanya).

I didn’t know until much later when I heard that Banwo celebrated his 80th birthday. I told him there that it was because he was much older that he used to excel. People around us started laughing.

We had a good time at the Grammar School, and whenever I remember those days, my skin glows and my eyes brighten up. The six years at CMS Grammar School were exciting and interesting.

While D.C. Igure (who later became a diplomat) taught us Latin and Literature, the Rev. F.O. Segun (later a bishop, he went on to Fourah Bay College in Sierra Leone to study) was the Mathematics teacher.

There were also S.O. Olagbaju, who taught us History (his brother, D.E. Olagbaju, was my teacher in the elementary school at Ebute Ero, and later joined the Customs; Chief I.A. Olowu, Geography (who, many years later, as principal of the school, admitted my son, Femi); and Pa E.A. Adeniji (who still taught my son in the school years later), our Yoruba teacher. Then Chief J.A.O. Odebiyi (who later became famous as a politician) also taught Latin and English Language.

The school environment was lively. Some of the students were living in the boarding house, by 1945. But it was a bit expensive.

I went from home everyday, from 1944 when I enrolled, till 1949. Sometimes from Idumota to Tinubu, I rode on the school bus operated by Zarpas Transport Service which charged one and a half pence – but allowed those with half pence change, two coins which totalled one pence, a free ride. I enjoyed that facility many times.

Naturally, I gravitated towards the Arts; because at the Cathedral School there was not much encouragement for the Sciences.

At the Grammar School, there was a senior Literary and Debating Society which I joined (the science students had the science society. We had to decide by the time we got to Class 4 where we were heading, whether arts or science.)

By this time, I knew I wanted to be a lawyer, and so took my Latin and Literature seriously (at this time female students from a sister school, CMS Girls’ School, joined us for Latin, and the Science subjects). I loved the subjects, enjoyed Drama and took part in a few plays, especially Macbeth, which we studied for the Cambridge exams. I played the lead role in Macbeth (with Miss Faderin, later Mrs. Buko, as Lady Macbeth).

It was the practice then for the school authorities to invite distinguished citizens, including Old Grammarians, who had made a name for themselves in various professions, to address final-year students on career prospects. Notable among them were Prof. Chike Obi (the renowned mathematician) and Prof. Adeboye Babalola (he was 80 in 2006, and he’s Derin Babalola’s father).

I must say that the Christian schools I attended had a lot of influence on my character because, in those days, character and religious training were part of the curriculum. We had dedicated  teachers  who  really  laid  emphasis  on  morals.

However, the morals and all the religious injunctions never prevented  me  from  condemning  infringements.  Fighting for justice and standing for my right, and protecting anyone oppressed, had always been a part of my persona. I just couldn’t condone oppression in any guise and from any quarter, irrespective of the individual involved. It irked me and pricked my conscience, enraged me and drove me to action.

At school, Christopher Olabisi Ojuri and Oniyide Sodipo were my best friends. Sodipo (later Chief ) and I travelled to England for further studies on the same boat, MV Aureol. He later spent his honeymoon in my house in Makun, Sagamu when I was organising secretary of Action Group for Remo Division. We went to the Cathedral School together. His father was also a goldsmith like mine and his shop was beside my mother’s in Idumota.

Apart from my studies, I became a keen sportsman. Bishop Kale, our principal at CMS Grammar School, was particular about you being engaged in one sport or another. He formed a football team dubbed the ‘Principal’s Team’ where I was captain. It was meant to serve as a training ground for potential members of the school team. We were recruiting and training footballers. I also played as half-back.

Time flew at the school where I was noted as a well- dressed student with an enviable style. Even in my early days, I had been nicknamed Spotless Banjus because of my immaculate white uniform, and sparkling white tennis shoes.

One of my teachers, Mr. S.O. Aderounmu (the Games and Scout Master) who also taught Mathematics, became fond of me and recruited me to be polishing his own shoes too, with the Nugget which I handled masterfully, conscious that the blue stripes round the soles were untouched, contrasted with the white of the Ronacan shoes, as they were known then.

I recall an incident when one of my classmates, envious of my neat dressing, used a pen to smear my dress. It was a provocative act, but I restrained myself from reacting sharply.

In my last days here, I became the Assistant Cub Master of the Wolf Cub [and Kayode Oyediran (later Prof.), who was one of the students in the preparatory class, was a member. He married Chief Awolowo’s daughter, Tola, and later became the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ibadan]. In Class 6, Citizenship was introduced by Bishop Kale with Current Affairs and General Knowledge as core areas.

As an avid reader of newspapers (especially West African Pilot through which I became an ardent follower of Dr. Nnamdi  Azikiwe,  particularly  his  column  titled  ‘Inside Stuff’ which I digested as if it was a study book), I was well informed. I had an idea of the subject.

There was a day Bishop Kale put a question to us: ‘What should I be doing that I’m not doing?’

I gave the answer, which was critical of the style of Bishop Kale. I enumerated a lot of areas that could be improved upon.

There was always an uproar in the Citizenship class. My mates complained that I argued too much!

Unknown to them, Bishop Kale noted the courage and in-depth knowledge I displayed of Current Affairs. When we were leaving the school, the Principal acknowledged my courage and contribution during Citizenship classes. I had the best testimonial of that set.

Overall though, I was an average student numbering among the best 10 in the class.

I prepared well for my exams, my Cambridge School Certificate, in History, Geography, Latin, Yoruba, English Language, English Literature, Mathematics and Biology, and looked forward to a bright future.

Being an outspoken person does have its merits too. I was duly acknowledged by the Principal, the Rev. Canon S.I. Kale.

His impression of me was reflected in the testimonial he gave me when I passed out in December 1949. It was the best for that period. He wrote: ‘A lad capable of understanding and appreciation of goodness and beauty, in morals and literary pursuits. He’s a strong character.’

Those who knew Canon Kale as not being generous with compliments began to regard me highly with this testimonial and this opened doors for me in later life. Although he had only a bicycle when I was admitted in 1944, Canon Kale had become a car owner by the time I passed out in 1949, I remember his blue Vauxhall car with plate number LA 5090 which he bought for about £480.

In December 1949, after six years as a grammarian (with the motto Nici Dominus frustra,  meaning ‘Without God everything is in vain’) I moved on.

Not to England or the United States of America. Not to study as a lawyer which I wanted to be so passionately. It was seven years of a totally different experience. Adventures I never planned.

But with Canon Kale’s testimonial in the kitty, I was encouraged to face the future with bright hopes.

 

Chapter 2

Launching into a Career

Getting jobs in those days was relatively easy. In secondary school, officers from the Labour Office visited and asked students in their final year where they would like to work when they graduated. I opted for the Judiciary because I wanted to use the Judiciary as a stepping stone to a career in Law. I was disappointed when I was posted to Medical Headquarters.

I started work as a third-class clerk in early 1950 at the Medical Headquarters on Broad Street, Lagos when Dr. Samuel L. Manuwa (now late) was the First African Director of Medical Services for the Federation (he later became Chairman, Federal Public Service Commission). He was the first Nigerian to be promoted director (which was a very top position in those days).

In the course of my service, I was posted to a section known as Registration of Births and Deaths. In the same building we had the Dental Department.

It was a monotonous job but I couldn’t complain. I filed records all day, registered all manner of correspondence. We wore shirt with a tie and a pair of trousers so that we could look like ‘big men’, throughout my short stint there from 1950 to 1952.

 

 

One day, an expatriate officer walked into my office and asked, ‘Where is the Dental Office?’ Without the courtesy of saying ‘Good morning’. Then I retorted, ‘Is that how you say good morning in your own country?’

He was taken aback, speechless of course. As an expatriate he went upstairs to report me to the senior expatriate officer, Mr.  Benasone,  who  was  the  Administrative  Secretary  of the Medical Headquarters. The Chief Clerk then was Mr. D. P. S. Shaw (now late) and his assistant was Mr. D.M.O.

Ogunmodede (who was one of the wardens in our church, Holy Trinity Anglican Church, Ebute-Ero).

It was on the strength of this report that Mr. Shaw, the Chief Clerk (who was a very strict man), issued me a query.

In my answer, I stated the case as it was. Both Shaw and Ogunmodede were surprised at the tone of my reply which showed no remorse or apology.

They both tried to persuade me to apologise so that the matter could be put to rest. They said that with the hope that I would tone down my reply before they would take it to the expatriate officer. I blatantly refused, insisting that the white man behaved that way because I was black.

When they took my reply to the Administrative Secretary a few days later, I got a letter of termination.

And so came an abrupt end to my civil service career after less than two years. My appointment having been so terminated, the next question was, ‘where do I get another job?’

By  this  time  in  1952,  I  was  already  in  Egbe  Omo Oduduwa (where I was Secretary of the Lagos Branch under Mr. Sobande), following Dr. Akinola Maja (who was president after Sir Adeyemo Alakija) and Dr. J. Akanni Doherty (later dubbed the ‘Generalissimo of Action Group’ or ‘Daddy’). There was also Chief Remi Fani-Kayode (who was a partner in the chambers of Thomas, Williams & Kayode Solicitors

– that is Bode Thomas, Rotimi Williams and Fani-Kayode), H.A.B. Fasinro, Justice Omololu, Justice Adedoyin, Issa Williams, Adeyemi Lawson and S.O. Gbadamosi.

At that time there was the Youth Association and the Lagos  Branch  met  regularly  in  Fani-Kayode’s  office.  He was the chairman and I the secretary. We were known as mosquitoes (which was our emblem).

I took my letter of termination to Dr. Akinola Maja and Alhaji S.O. Gbadamosi who were my political leaders at the time. They both agreed that, due to my political activities, it would be no use seeking appointment for me elsewhere in the Civil Service.

Dr. Maja therefore suggested to Alhaji Gbadamosi (who was then the National Treasurer of Egbe Omo Oduduwa and later Treasurer of Action Group), a first-class Yoruba patriot, that he should employ me in his firm, Ikorodu Trading Company (ITC), which then manufactured singlets. So, I was employed by the company, then at Balogun on Lagos Island where Financial Trust Bank was, and near the Chambers of Samuel, Chris and Michael (that is, Samuel Akintola, Chris Ogunbanjo and Michael Odesanya). Ikorodu Trading Company paid me about £10 (while I earned £7 at Medical Headquarters). Here too, I was a clerk.

I had already left home, got an apartment on Princess Street which I shared with a friend. The apartment was rented to me through Chief Bode Thomas, who was the Deputy Leader of Action Group.

The clerical job at ITC was temporary. But that was what they could find for me at the time. I was keeping records of  sales (and B.S. Ajenifuja, who later became a gynaecologist, as well as Mudashiru Gbadamosi, later worked with me).

While at the Medical Headquarters, the Enugu Coal Mines shooting incident erupted (many people had died at the mines). There was a National Emergency Committee (NEC) which decided to protect the rights of those who died in the Coal Mines. To mobilise Nigerians, the Nationalist Movement printed memorabilia, including emblems, to support the cause of the miners.

As a radical sympathetic to the cause of the miners, I bought one of the emblems of NEC and I usually pinned it to my tie.

Our Chief Clerk, later Administrative Assistant (Mr. D.P. Turner-Shaw) saw me one day while wearing the emblem and warned me: ‘You will be sacked, and Zik and Awo won’t save you.’ We laughed over it.

We had some young clerical officers, my seniors, also. I remember Mr. P.O. Bamgbose, whose signature was superb, and we talked about it endlessly. There was Mr. Denloye (our sectional head), who went on to study Law, whom I fondly called ‘Oga mi’ (my boss). I was already politically conscious, very nationalistic, even right from elementary school. Way back in 1941, when I was barely 13, I regularly bought and read West African  Pilot (Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe’s Pan-African newspaper which confronted colonialism).

I read it everyday, and even my teacher (Mr. Barber, who later became the headmaster of Christ Church Cathedral School after the late Mr. E.B. Osibo) read my copy (the teacher’s copy arrived around 10 a.m. while I bought mine earlier, at the break of dawn.

I used my pocket money to buy the paper. It cost a penny and that was a lot of money in those days. It was expensive.

In the shop, where my mother sold odds and ends at Idumota, nobody used the papers kept in a pile, my West African Pilot, to wrap anything. They knew there was a special place in my heart for the newspaper. No one wanted to draw my ire.

With that background, I always beat my classmates in General Knowledge.

Unlike some of my classmates, who went straight ahead to England or the United States of America, or stayed back in Nigeria to attend Yaba Higher College (now Yaba College of Technology in Lagos, established in 1932) and University College, Ibadan (University of Ibadan as it is now known, in today’s Oyo State, started in 1948), I had to work for some time, no matter my plans for education.

My  mother  had  seen  me  through  elementary  and secondary schools at great expense. Burdening her with the responsibility of bankrolling my professional training as a lawyer in England was unthinkable.

I had to find my feet financially, earn a living, for a few years, and save. That was the only way my dream of a brighter future could become real, tangible.

Luckily I did well in my exams when the results were released (with credits in all my subjects, except Mathematics in which I managed a pass).

Not long after I settled at Ikorodu Trading Company, the routine of the unexciting job of keeping sales records became unbearable. I was already looking elsewhere.

Journalism  appealed  to  me.  I  was  fascinated  by  the profession. My eye was on Daily Service  which started in 1938, owned by leaders of Egbe Omo Oduduwa. Chief S.O. Gbadamosi (one of its leaders) was the Managing Director while Dr. Akinola Maja and Adebayo Doherty were associated with the paper.

So, I told them I would like to work there. They obliged me and I then moved on to Daily Service, with its offices at Apongbon area of Lagos. At this time, Alhaji Lateef Jakande was the editor. Chief Bisi Onabanjo, who was the editor of Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation’s bulletin, joined the publication.  He  was  drawn  to  edit  Daily Service (which later became Daily Express under a new company known as Amalgamated Press, which was in partnership with a foreign company, the Ray Thomson Group of Newspapers).

Daily Service Ltd. was eventually acquired by Amalgamated Press with the Nigerian Tribune being its sister publication. Alhaji Jakande then moved to Ibadan as editor of the Tribune after the formation of Amalgamated Press. Chief Awolowo was the proprietor of the Nigerian Tribune, established in 1949.

I already knew Chief Onabanjo before my employment at Daily Service. We were both members of Fancy Club led by Tunde Amuwo. The club participated in carnivals in those days. It was based in Ijebu-Ode and known as the Royal Fancy Club.

Onabanjo and I had a very cordial relationship. We had been friends from youth (apart from our days in Ijebu-Ode). While he was at Baptist Academy, I was at CMS Grammar School, and he was under the guardianship of Rev. S.I. Kale, living in the premises of CMS Grammar School.

The Action Group Youth Association had some prominent members like H.A.B. Fasinro, Omololu Thomas (who later became Justice of the Court of Appeal) and Lateef Jakande. We regularly toured the country to mobilise youths for the Action Group.

The party bought us a bus to facilitate our tours, and the vehicle was under my care (I had to learn how to drive in Lagos, after Fani-Kayode got me a learner’s permit). We always toured the tough areas like Ilesa, and went as far as Ondo.

There was a senior police officer, Odofin Bello (who later became a Police Commissioner in the Western Region) from Idoani (Bode Olajumoke’s town) who had sympathy for the Action Group. So, Doherty instructed me to arrange a tour, and establish AG there.

At Daily Service, I started by covering crime, visiting the courts to get stories, and filing my reports. As a journalist, I was entranced by the performances of some leading legal minds at the time. I knew firsthand the leading lawyers, and witnessed many legal fireworks in courts. I was particularly fascinated by Rotimi Williams (the legendary Chief F.R.A. Williams who had returned from England and was already becoming a force) and J.I.C. Taylor (former Chief Judge of Lagos State, later Justice of the Supreme Court).

I was fascinated by journalism, and I enjoyed the job. If I wasn’t a lawyer, I would have remained a journalist. It was a profession I really liked. It exposed you; you met important people, and it compelled you to read. It broadened your knowledge.

Journalism is almost like Law, it is about enquiry. There is no subject that is not in Law. It is an advantage if you did Literature, History or Philosophy first (that’s why two of my children studied Philosophy first before Law).

Before long, I became the Commercial Editor of Daily Service (later Daily Express). I actually wanted to train and advance in the profession. I wanted to go to North Western Polytechnic in London.

Chief Bisi Onabanjo, my editor, who was a year older than me, was prepared to write a letter on my behalf to the college. Daily Express was exciting. I was in the hub of high society, mixing with the crème de la crème of Politics, Law and Business.

 

Chapter 3

 

Politics Beckons:

Appointment as AG Organising Secretary

Then I was recruited in 1954 by the Action Group (founded on March 21, 1951) as an Organising Secretary, that dream of being a journalist and

advancing in the profession, occupying a special place as a member of the ‘Fourth Estate of the Realm,’ was aborted. I started a new role in politics.

To be at the centre of the growing struggle for power in the country, to be, as it were, behind the wheels and propel change directly, suddenly seemed more appealing than a career in journalism.

Politics had always held me spell-bound from youth. I had moved and rubbed shoulders with the big wigs, even when I was in secondary school. I was already a member of Egbe Omo Oduduwa (a socio-cultural group meant to unite all Yoruba) from CMS Grammar School (having joined in

1949). Then I was a regular visitor to Chief Hezekiah Oladipo Davies’ house (in Idumagbo, Isale Eko).

 

Davies loved young people who were serious and passionate about politics.

As a young man, I went to all the political leaders then. I was familiar with the Nigerian Youth Movement. Whenever there was a strong political disagreement between S.L. Akintola and H.O. Davies, I went to them to talk about it (while Davies was an idealist advocating one Nigeria, Akintola, Maja and some leading activists differed in approach, maintaining that they shouldn’t forget who they were first, as Yoruba). Mr. Adewale Thompson, a brilliant political activist at the time (later a judge) was then the secretary of the movement.

This went on until the Action Group was formed, and we joined as members of the Area Council (which was a local political organisation in opposition to the then Herbert Macaulay-led Nigerian National Democratic Party, NNDP).

Before that time, there was this regular visit to Ilorin and Kabba. The Yoruba in Ilorin, Kabba and Igbomina, which were part of the Northern Region, were agitating for a merger with their kith and kin in the Western Region. They were led by Chief J.S. Olawoyin, Alhaji Sule Maito and J. G. Ekunrin respectively, under the umbrella of their organisation, the League of Northern Yorubas. When Egbe Omo Oduduwa was formed, the League embraced the struggle and so their organisation merged with the Egbe.

By the time the Action Group came into existence in 1951, most members of the Egbe became leaders of the Action  Group.  Chief  Obafemi  Awolowo,  who  was  the General  Secretary  of  Egbe  Omo  Oduduwa,  became  the leader of Action Group, strongly supported by the Egbe Omo Oduduwa organisation.

It should be noted here that the formation of Egbe Omo Oduduwa in Ile-Ife in 1948 was quite distinct from the political organisation known as the Action Group, which was formed in 1951.

 Egbe Omo Oduduwa was purely socio-cultural while the Action Group was political, although the latter had the former as its catchment area.

At the inception of Egbe Omo Oduduwa, Sir Adeyemo Alakija was the first President and Chief Obafemi Awolowo was the first General Secretary, while Chief Isaac O. Delano was the first Administrative Secretary. After the death of Sir Adeyemo Alakija, Dr. Akinola Maja became the President. As for the Action Group, Chief Obafemi Awolowo was its first leader while Bode Thomas was his deputy.

In order to firm up the relationship with the League of Northern Yorubas, we made regular trips to give encouragement to the Yorubas in the Northern Region. The leaders of Egbe Omo Oduduwa now made it a point of duty to pay frequent visits to the area to rally round the people just to show that the leaders of Egbe Omo Oduduwa shared in their aspirations to merge with the Egbe.

Among those who made the trips were Dr. Akinola Maja, Dr. J. Akanni Doherty (Generalissimo), Sir Kofo Abayomi, Chief J.A. Ajao, Alhaji Issa Williams (father of Justice Fatai Williams), Mr. A.B.O.O. Oyediran (father of the former Vice-Chancellor of University of Ibadan, Prof. Kayode Oyediran), Alhaji Adesoye Onasanya (of Ijebu-Ode), Alhaji S.O. Gbadamosi, Chief Bode Thomas and Chief M.A. Ogun (alias M.A. Natural).

For the trips to the North, we used a Chevrolet Estate (with a bold inscription of Egbe Omo Oduduwa on it). The brand was new in the country at that time. We usually assembled in Dr. Maja’s house (on 2, Garber Square, off Victoria Street, now Nnamdi Azikiwe Street, near Breadfruit Street on Lagos Island).

This was in 1950 and 1951, and I usually found excuses not to go to work whenever the trips were scheduled. I sat on a stool at the back, that is, the luggage compartment of the

Chevrolet on these trips. The colonialists were uncomfortable about our activities and objectives. Each time we went to Northern Nigeria, we were not given permit to organise rallies or hold meetings. Anytime we were allowed, they warned us not to say anything about the merger. To circumvent the order, Dr. Akinola Maja usually said to the audience, ‘You know why we are here. Your aspiration is our aspiration.’ And that carried the message.

Our effort to unite Northern Yorubas with their kith and kin in the West suffered a setback with the creation of states in 1967 when they were grouped as minorities in Kwara State (out of which Kogi State was later carved out). However, the agitation has persisted with the clamour of the people for an Okun State or a merger with adjacent Yoruba states).

After the general election into the Western House of Assembly in 1952, the Action Group decided to employ full- time organising secretaries in each of the 24 divisions, with two in Osun (being a very large division). Advertisements were placed in the newspaper to recruit candidates for the various divisions.

I did not think much of this position as I was then enjoying my job as the Commercial Editor of Daily Service.

But Chief Ladoke Akintola, who was one of the party’s leaders in Lagos, secretly advised Chief Awolowo that the party leadership should talk to me privately before the interview as he was aware that I would not like to do the party’s job as a paid official. I had just then been elected Secretary of the party at the youth congress and Chief Remi Fani-Kayode emerged as the Chairman.

So, I was invited for a private discussion (at the Party Headquarters in Ibadan) which had in attendance Chief Awolowo, Chief Akintola and Chief S.T. Oredein, the then Principal Assistant Secretary. Their mission was to convince me to accept the appointment, as they wanted a trusted person to take charge of the leader’s constituency (Remo Division). They believed too that I was someone who could work without supervision as the leader would be too busy to visit his constituency as regularly as others. It was with this persuasion that I was made to accept the appointment and posting to Remo Division.

The practice, normally, was to appoint a ‘son of the soil’ as organising secretary for every division. But in my own case, I was posted to Ijebu-Remo, even though I am from Ijebu Division. In any case, my area of operation included some parts of Ijebu Division, namely Odogbolu, Aiyepe and Okun-Owa.

One month after my appointment, I was yet to assume duty and Chief Awolowo had to ask Shonibare, who was the Managing Director of Daily Service, to release me. I was released about a fortnight later.

The headquarters of Remo Division was Sagamu and I resided there at Makun quarters (in the house of Chief Olusiji Osisanya, the Agbaje of Makun, who was a great supporter of AG) while my office was on Akarigbo Street in Offin quarters (My landlord’s brother was Abiodun Osisanya).

My residence was a storey building where I occupied a bedroom and a living room, while my office (also a one-storey building) was a mere five-minute drive away. But we later moved office to a bigger space also on the same major road. The office was a base for members. They came to suggest how to recruit and mobilise members for the party.

The position of organising secretary was very attractive and juicy as it came with a brand new car, a Morris Minor. The salary was £25 per month with a commensurate touring allowance! Many were jostling to be recruited; many young men wanted to be one of the two dozen organising secretaries from the 24 divisions in Western Region.

The star appointees then were J.J. Odufuwa from Ijebu- Igbo (Ijebu Division), who was a strong NCNC supporter before being converted to AG; Isaac Ositelu (Ikeja Division, which extended to Ikorodu at the time); S. A. Adeniya (Oyo); Richard Babalola (Ekiti) and another Babalola (Ondo).

Remo was one of the smallest divisions in the Western Region then, but it was very important for many reasons. Chief of these was that our leader, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, came from the division. So it was important that the organisation there be strong enough to render opposition to almost zero level. This actually happened during the various elections where opposition candidates lost their deposits.

I remember my gleaming black Morris Minor with registration number 000914 (worth about £500 then) was my first car. I never even owned a bicycle. Because of the country’s terrain, organising secretaries needed the cars.

The perks of office, the opportunity to help build a first- rate political party that could change the fortunes of Nigeria, make the dividends of governance more widely available, serve with pride and honour, made the position of organising secreatary all the more worthwhile.

Journalism, Daily Service and life in Lagos were sacrificed for the Action Group in 1954. The Princess Street apartment, a room and a parlour, and the glamour of the Federal Capital, were bartered for another new beginning. With my Morris Minor, and an apartment in Makun, Sagamu, I settled down to work with Nigeria’s most organised and highly disciplined political party (even till today).

My major roles were to recruit more members for the party, campaign for its candidates and settle disputes among members. Many NCNC (National Council of Nigeria and the Camerouns) supporters came into the fold of Action Group.

Because  AG  had  a clear-cut  manifesto,  ‘A Contract with the People,’ they could categorically say what would be done if elected. But NCNC didn’t have any. They only said, ‘Give us a blank cheque, we’d tell you what we’d do when we get there…’

 

 

 

Politics Beckons                ||   57

 

 

This full-time job as organising secretary was different from the passion for politics and activism that burnt in my heart. It was more than the protest I engaged in, chanting,

‘No  coronation;  McPherson,  no  coronation,’  when  the crisis in the Federal House erupted over the McPherson Constitution, when Action Group ministers resigned en masse. The incident brought the youths of AG and NCNC together, and they jointly demonstrated against the idea of celebrating ‘Coronation Day,’ to mark the ascension to the throne by Queen Elizabeth II on June 2, 1953 like they did

‘Empire Day’. Some of the leaders arrested by the colonial government were on trial, and I followed them to the gate of Broad Street prison.

This was real politics in all its hues and colours, under the best political leader Nigeria ever produced, the enigmatic, charismatic and altruistic visionary, Chief Jeremiah Obafemi Oyeniyi Awolowo.

Recruitment for organising secretaries was very businesslike. To be eligible for employment, the minimum qualification was school certificate, or its equivalent. But field secretaries were recruited with lower qualification. They (field secretaries) were equipped invariably with motorcycles and bicycles (and used speed boats in riverine areas). Field secretaries were in charge of specific areas within the division and each time the organising secretaries were coming for a meeting in their areas, they would be the ones to prepare the ground for such meetings.

The duty of organising secretaries was to visit every part of their operational area to explain the party’s manifesto, present its achievements and what the government was doing and intended to do for people of the area. In other words, their main roles were to galvanise support for the party and present it as a better alternative to the opposition party, the NCNC. To this end, regular meetings were held with the people, and not only when election was approaching. Organising secretaries also had the responsibility to draw up an itinerary of activities to promote the party and recruit new members, and forward such schedules to the headquarters.

It was during one of such trips in 1954 that I enrolled Sir Olaniwun Ajayi into the party. He was then a supervising teacher for Methodist schools. This was the beginning of our friendship which blossomed till his death on November 4, 2016.

Although their duty was mainly to mobilise membership for the party, organising secretaries were to also mediate disputes where they existed within their areas of operation.

But  where  they  couldn’t  handle  such  disputes,  they were to bring such issues to the knowledge of the secretariat.

I remember one of such disputes I mediated at Ode-Remo which the then Akarigbo of Remo (Oba M.S. Awolesi, Erinwole II) had tried to settle without success. I resolved the dispute and, in order to give honour to the Akarigbo, I brought the disputing parties to the Kabiyesi for final settlement.

We didn’t allow the opposition to exploit the dissension within our domain, and so we quickly resolved the dispute.

That was in 1955.

The problem began during the contest to install the Akarigbo of Remo (after the reign of Oba Adeleke Adedoyin).

M.S. Awolesi contested the stool against Adeleke Adedoyin.

The NCNC northern caucus was supporting Adedoyin whom they nicknamed Sarkin Tulas (that he would be king by force). The community was polarised in their support for the two candidates. The dispute and the role that I played in resolving it were later reported to the leader (Chief Awolowo) by the Akarigbo when he visited the area sometime later.

By virtue of my position, I was friendly with all the traditional rulers, from the Odemo of Isara, Oba Samuel Akinsanya, to the Alakenne of Ikenne, Oba Awomuti. Even in Odogbolu where they had three kings (Elesi, Oremadegun and Moloda), I organised them in different sections. I had a good relationship with the three of them.

There was an occasion when Chief Awolowo was visiting Odogbolu. The school children lined up the streets, waving and singing. He addressed them on why education was important. He mentioned that politicians enjoyed popularity, an honour that money could not bestow. Awo illustrated this by saying that he was being honoured by obas, chiefs, school children and others because he was the Minister of Local Government and Leader of Government Business. He told them that if, on the other hand, he had been on a visit as a lawyer, only his colleagues and clients would recognise him.

‘There lies the difference,’ he said. It was like the proverbial saying among the Yoruba that ‘if you are looking for money and you come across honour, you should feel accomplished, because even if you get the money, it is honour you would use it to acquire.’

As organising secretaries, our claims (mainly for touring expenses)  were  submitted  every  month  to  the  Principal Organising Secretary, S.T. Oredein, for approval (and Deola Adigun was his assistant). He (Adigun) was a member of the House of Assembly, and later a minister in the Western Region. There was no occasion when I submitted a claim and it was rejected.

I was under the supervision of the Divisional Leader,

Chief M.A. Okupe, and later Chief M.A.K. Sonowo, Alisa

Owodunni. There was  organisation  and  discipline.  I  had

interactions with Chief Awolowo, as I had to report to him

anytime he came to Remo. There was no occasion when I was

disciplined for dereliction of duty.

My efficiency was acknowledged by the leadership of the party such that, often, I was asked to go and help other divisions during any local election.

It was in the course of this that I was posted to Oyo for a local government election in 1955 when Chief A.O. Adeyi, the pioneer principal of Fiditi Grammar School, was elected as Chairman of Oyo Southern Divisional Council and was later appointed a minister after the general election of 1956. I was also sent to Ilorin, at another time, to campaign for Alhaji Sule Maito who later became leader of the Northern House of Assembly under the platform of the AG/Ilorin Talaka Parapo Alliance. At that time, Alhaji Maito, leader of the local mass movement political organisation known as Talaka Parapo, was agitating for the merger of the Yoruba elements in the North with their kith and kin in Western Region. The organisation was a pain in the neck of the Sardauna and, on the formation of the AG, it entered into an alliance with the party.

While in Ilorin, I exploited my Muslim connection. There I recited some verses of the Qu’ran which I learnt when I was young (my mother was a Moslem). This often got the audience excited.

Another place where I went to serve in the North was in the Tiv and Idoma areas where I was involved in some mobilisation for the party.

My last posting was to Abak in 1957 (then part of the Eastern Region) to supervise the House of Assembly election. It was during this election that our candidate, S.G. Ikoku, defeated his father, Alvan Ikoku, who contested under the platform of the United Nigeria Independence Party (UNIP). The party was led by Udo Udoma (who later became a judge).

People voted on principle. No enmity ensued between the Ikokus as a result of the outcome. There was no violence, no ambush. It was a healthy competition. Elections were based on issues. Ikoku Jnr was popular because of the people’s yearnings.

I was there to monitor the elections. We also won some seats in Rivers. Wenike Briggs became a member of the Federal House (from Rivers). UNIP was a local organisation championing  the  cause  for  the  creation  of  an  additional state for the minorities in the East then known as the COR (Calabar, Ogoja and Rivers State). Because we were fighting for the same cause, there was a move to form an alliance between us; but the talks broke down and they decided to do it alone. At the election, however, our party defeated their candidates.

The AG was agitating for the creation of states across the country, to rectify the imbalance in the federation, but only the Mid-West Region was created, ostensibly to spite the party, thinking that by so doing, they would weaken the influence of Chief Awolowo.

At a time, when my assignments outside my constituency became so rampant, the party leader (Chief Awolowo) said he hoped my outside engagements would not negatively affect my performance in my primary place of assignment at the Remo Division (his home base).

For me, however, it was a joy to be a politician. It was an everlasting opportunity to meet important people in different areas, move with them and understand their aspirations.

The organising secretary of each division was the symbol of the party in that division. He was expected to be well informed about the principles and philosophy of the party, as embodied in its manifesto, and it was the knowledge of this that he used to mobilise members throughout the division.

As the representative of the party in power, the organising secretary was expected to be very conversant with the achievements of the party and keep the division well informed about these long before any election. To this end, he went on regular tours of the division, and was aided in this assignment by the field secretaries in their various locations. With these, the party kept the electorate regularly well informed on any issue in government.

In the course of this mobilisation, we got to know more about the needs of the people which we later transmitted to the party secretariat for appropriate attention. This contrasts with the present-day organising secretaries who are better known for issuing press releases as against real party mobilisation.

For three years (1954-1957), I distinguished myself and performed creditably. I was the secretary of choice whenever there was need for troubleshooting or more members were required for the party. Every corner of Nigeria was my constituency.

There were many beautiful and challenging episodes during my tenure as organising secretary. I remember my friend  and  neighbour,  Bolaji  Akodu  (a  staunch  member of NCNC) who, on account of our friendship, often accompanied me on some of the political tours, although not a member of the party.

The exposition of the party principles and manifesto, which he listened to during these tours, converted him to the party and he thereafter became a fanatic.

The programmes of Action Group were meticulously explained wherever we went, never telling our audience what we couldn’t do, or promising heaven on earth. Only what we planned to achieve were discussed with them.

Akodu always donned the emblem of the party thereafter. When he lost one of the crests, he was frantic and disoriented searching everywhere until he found it.

During elections, we had polling agents whom we gave honoraria (feeding allowance, et al). We recruited agents and compiled names, posted them to different booths. On one occasion in 1956, the polling agents offered to work for free. They rejected the honoraria and said it was an honour to represent Chief Awolowo during his election.

The money was returned to the coffers of the party, and Chief Awolowo was amazed. In appreciation, I wrote a letter of commendation to each of the polling agents. What was impressive was the spirit which they adopted in serving the party. Chief Awolowo was very appreciative too, and he commended me for returning the money.

I loved the job. There was what you could call job satisfaction. For someone who was politically minded, it was the right job. If anyone did what I did then, he’d want to be a minister, deservedly. But the fact that I was working in Chief Awolowo’s constituency was enough satisfaction for me. I never had any ambition to contest election at the regional level. But my ambition was to serve under Chief Awolowo as a minister if he got elected at the federal level as prime minister.

I wanted to learn from the sage, to be closer to him, know the nitty-gritty of running a credible government, and lavishing the populace with the dividends of democracy. As the Organising Secretary in Chief Awolowo’s constituency, I had garnered enough experience in running a regional government and there was no position in the region that had any attraction for me.

One incident I can’t forget during my days as Organising Secretary was when I drew the ire of my Chairman, Chief M.A. Okupe (the founder of Agbonmagbe Bank, now Wema Bank). Chief Okupe was my Divisional Leader, and he was from Iperu, one of the big towns in the division.

In that town was a very influential age group which he (Okupe) had a disagreement with. I got to know about the age group because anywhere I saw prominent people, I challenged them, ‘Why are you not in AG?’ And Chief Oremule (a senior officer in the Lagos Judiciary, was the Giwa of the group.

In the course of talking to him about joining the Action Group, I reiterated that they had to go through Chief Okupe; that if it was possible for me to see to their recruitment, they would be glad.

 I went to one of the meetings of their age group in Iperu, and enrolled about 50 of them as members of the Action Group that day. When Chief Okupe (father of Dr. Doyin Okupe, who once worked as President Olusegun Obasanjo’s Special Adviser on Media, and again as Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs to President Goodluck Jonathan) learnt about the recruitment, he was livid, believing that I was undermining his influence in his hometown. He didn’t see the good side of getting members!

Okupe complained to Chief Awolowo about my activities, and he (Awolowo) invited me to Ibadan. Chief Awolowo invited me to dinner in his house at Oke-Ado, and as soon as we settled down at the table he asked me, ‘What’s the matter between you and M.A. Okupe?’ I explained to him that the prominent Iperu age group would do our party a world of good by being in AG. That my objective was to ensure that whoever contested election against him (Awo) would lose his deposit (candidates usually deposited money with the electoral body at that time, and if they failed to get an appreciable number of votes, the deposit was forfeited). Since I discovered this group, I encouraged them to join our party.

I told our party leader that as Organising Secretary, I was conscious of my loyalty to Chief Okupe, and I believed that recruiting more members for the party was to the enhancement of his leadership. But that he misunderstood my intentions, I was prepared to go and apologise to him.

At that time, it was easy and safe to travel at night. So, I went straight from Ibadan (after dinner with Chief Awolowo) to Chief Okupe’s Agbonmagbe House in Yaba, Lagos. I got there around 11 pm.

As soon as I got in, I prostrated. I explained to him that I meant no offence: that the recruitment was to the benefit of the party under him as Divisional Leader; that as an organising secretary, it was my duty to recruit more members for the party, and that the more members I recruited, the more his leadership would be enhanced in the division; that my overall objective was that anyone who contested against Chief Awolowo would lose his deposit.

This explanation disarmed him and he jokingly exclaimed, ‘You Ijebu people are very smart.’

Again in 1956, late Chief Onasanya Solanke also once complained about me to Chief Awolowo. It was during the crisis involving Hon. Stephen Oluwole Awokoya.

He (Awokoya) wanted to bid for another term in the Western House of Assembly (representing Aiyepe, Ago-Iwoye and Odogbolu axis). But Chief Onasanya wanted to replace him. I was campaigning for Awokoya (who was Minister of Education and who later established a school). He was a very good orator (in spite of his science background). Chief Onasanya, who studied confectionery-making in the United Kingdom, ran a popular bakery in Lagos called ‘Odus Bakery’ where he introduced the wrapping of bread in cellophane.

He (Onasanya) reported me to Chief Awolowo, accusing me of supporting a candidate (that as an organising secretary I should be neutral).

I explained to Chief Awolowo that, as a member of the party, I could support any aspirant. But the argument was that as an employee of the party, I could not openly support any aspirant.

At that time, Chief Awolowo already knew that Chief Awokoya was becoming increasingly unpopular. His people didn’t want him anymore. Chief Awolowo was preparing to make him a member of his cabinet through the House of Chiefs. But Awokoya rejected it, saying that he didn’t want to come in through the back door. He later established his own party, Nigeria People’s Party (with Mr. Babalola from Ekiti), contested and lost the election. Chief Onasanya won the election in 1956, and became a member of the Western Region House of Assembly.

This incident concerning Onasanya and Awokoya was to be misinterpreted by some students while I was in England. Dr Taslim Elias, who was not a fan of Awolowo, was relating this story to members of the Nigerian Students’ Union, in Denison House, Victoria, labelling Chief Awolowo a dictator who didn’t accommodate intellectuals such as Awokoya. He alleged that Awokoya had to leave Action Group because of Awolowo’s intolerance of dissent!

I told Elias that he was telling a story whose facts he didn’t know. That I was a character in the story, fully aware of all the details as they developed and were resolved. I explained to the audience that Awokoya dug his own grave, by refusing to accede to entreaties by Chief Awolowo who was prepared to bring him back into the government through the House of Chiefs. This the leader was doing when he discovered that Awokoya was no longer popular in his constituency (the party appointed members of the House of Chiefs).

This would follow the precedence adopted in the case of Rotimi Williams who was first appointed into the House of Chiefs before being made a minister. Even the Olowo of Owo, Oba Olateru Olagbegi, a member of the House of Chiefs as of right, was made a minister.

I then invited any member of the audience who was in doubt to follow me to see Chief Awolowo who was then in London for the 1958 Constitutional Conference. Among those who responded to this invitation was Tobi Dafe, then President of the Nigerian Students’ Union in London. We met Chief Awolowo in his St James’ Hotel room and he confirmed my story.

While serving as Organising Secretary, my ambition was to work for some years and then proceed to London to study Law. So, when the party came into power, and appointed Chief M.E.R. Okorodudu as the first Agent-General of the Government in London (an office that came into existence as a result of the 1954 Lyttleton Constitution which established federalism), I approached Chief Awolowo with a request to make me a private secretary to the Agent-General, to enable me go to London.

But he refused, saying that being Okorodudu’s private secretary wouldn’t be challenging enough. That I had many tasks ahead of me in Nigeria as an organising secretary, and a pillar and beam of the party.

‘When you are ready to go you will go,’ Chief Awolowo explained. I then gave up the idea, though I felt disappointed. It must be stated, however, that the appointment of Chief Okorodudu was not without controversy. This was because, apparently, other regions did not understand the status of this office under a federal system as did Chief Awolowo.

But not long after, the other regions followed suit by appointing their own Agents-General. I remember Alhaji Abdulmalik for the Northern Region and Chief F.O. Achara (Eastern Region).

I only knew Okorodudu at the party level. I didn’t have any special relationship with him. I wanted to be an attaché, just like the NCNC did for Matthew Mbu, who was sent abroad. He was not better than me when he was made the High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. Some members of the Ibo State Union later founded the NCNC (National Council of Nigeria and the Camerouns) in 1944. Herbert Macaulay became the leader of NCNC while Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe was secretary.

Zik used his articles in West African Pilot to promote the cause of the Ibos, above all else. So, there were claims and counter-claims as to which of Egbe Omo Oduduwa and Ibo State Union was a tribal association. These generated verbal bullets from the opposing sides; but there was no bitterness.

 

Chapter 4

Sojourn in the UK

ll the time I was working for the Action Group, I had always known that my stay was going to be short- lived. It was meant to source for money to fund the desire I had nursed since 1950 to study Law overseas.

In support of this ambition, my mother had promised that whenever I was ready to go abroad she would give me some assistance. She made good this promise.

With the donation made to me by the party chieftains at my send-off, I was able to travel abroad and even buy a house on mortgage in England.

I left the shores of Nigeria on December 31, 1957 and arrived the UK on January 13, 1958. I had become a far more mature man in 1957. At 29, I thought about my career and the future – and plotted to do something about it – something I had always wanted to do since 1950.

My ambition was to pursue my education, and be a party leader. From CMS Grammar School, I had always dreamt of becoming a lawyer. There were leading lawyers at the time; and when I became a reporter, my fascination grew. I enjoyed the court sessions, the performances of the lawyers. And they were well dressed.

Whilst in school, the leading politicians were mostly lawyers, which further intensified my interest. When I told Chief Awolowo this time that I wanted to go abroad to study Law, he welcomed the move. He was more than willing to let his faithful disciple and dependable ally improve himself. He gave his prayers. But some didn’t understand what a young man full of promise, already earning the salary of a crown counsel (what is today called state counsel), wanted abroad. But no one could talk me out of my mission.

In fact, I was attracted to stay. I had two cars at my disposal, a Vanguard Estate (bought for campaign) and Opel Caravan. When I was leaving, there was competition among organising secretaries to replace me. (There was Adeniya Samuel from Oyo Division and Olomola from Egbado Division).

Although I was Organising Secretary for Remo Division, I was everywhere, supervising elections in tough areas. I was very dutiful, didn’t need supervision. So, Chief Awolowo wanted someone who could cope with any situation.

They appreciated my service and knew they would miss me. At his Oke-Ado residence in Ibadan, then capital of Western Region, Chief Awolowo staged a send-off party for me.

Attended by high-ranking officials of Action Group, ministers and legislators (formerly called parliamentarians), and the movers and shakers of that era, it was an honour I cherished very much. There were about 40 guests at the party.

One of the ministers at the time, Chief Odebiyi, was amazed that Chief Awolowo was organising a party for me.

It was unusual for organising secretaries to be so honoured. I was the first to enjoy such adulation. We were supposed to be career organising secretaries.

Chief Awolowo spoke highly of me at the send-off party. This remark drew Chief Odebiyi’s admiration. He came to the conclusion that I must have performed so well to earn it.

I was regarded as a member of the Awolowo family. They treated me well in Ikenne and Ibadan. Anytime I got there late, they prepared food for me.

One of Chief Awolowo’s endearing qualities was the manner in which he treated everyone with courtesy and respect. He never saw me as an underdog. Even as Premier of Western Region, he was very civil to all. That amazed me to no end.

With the £300 my mother gave me and my savings (of about £600), the monthly contribution from the co-operative association which I joined with my friends, where we took turns as beneficiaries (with Ositelu of Ikeja Division using his own to start his house and Babalola from Ekiti investing his in a worthwhile project), I had quite a huge sum of money to begin life with. My mother had saved towards my trip, keeping money with one of her customers.

That was how I could buy a property in England (I wasn’t working, I only worked during the summer). I knew then through Sir Olaniwun Ajayi that you needed only £350 which you deposited for the mortgage. You would then pay every month.

On top of the encomiums at the residence of the Premier of Western Region, where I was eulogised and my efforts in the four years as Organising Secretary praised to high heavens, Pa Awolowo raised funds for me.

He wrote a letter to some leaders of the party to make financial contributions. The least amount I got was £25. The contributions came to about £500. It was a lot of money at that time. (Chiefs S. L. Akintola, Rotimi Williams, S.O. Gbadamosi, Akanni Doherty, Alfred Rewane, Obafemi Awolowo, J.O. Odebiyi and Dr. Akinola Maja, and members of the cabinet, contributed). Many members of the party did so too.

By the time I was leaving as Organising Secretary, I already had my own car which I got through a loan. I sold it when I was travelling. This extra fund came in handy. Well prepared for the trip to England, having given away things I would no longer need, I packed my bags, ready to board MV Aureol.

I   spent the night before travelling to England at Isale- gangan with Mosunmola Folarin, a timber merchant whom I met in Sagamu. He was a successful merchant who had lorries. I normally stayed with him anytime I came to Lagos. He was from Makun area of Sagamu (where I stayed then).

On December 31, 1957, at Apapa Port (Lagos), along with my bosom pal, G.O. Sodipo, we set sail. We (Sodipo and I) had already secured our seats on MV Aureol. We were classmates, and had always been friends. When I was at Medical Headquarters, he was with Government Press.

When he got married, he spent his honeymoon with his wife in my house at Sagamu. But he was not a party man, he was not politically inclined. He also studied Law in England.

There were only two passenger ships then: MV Aureol and MV Apapa. Travelling by sea to England took two weeks, it used to take a month. You could also board a plane; that took three days. But I couldn’t afford a flight ticket for MV Aureol ticket was between £50 and £100, which was affordable. I had got my passport in Lagos. The passport, a colonial travel document, was free.

Smooth-sailing, you could describe the trip on MV Aureol, the passenger ship that ferried humans and cargo on sea. For the two weeks that the voyage lasted from Apapa to Liverpool Port, there was no major storm or unusual turbulence. The journey was uneventful.

I had enormous time to plan my future, re-design my fate or at least try to influence it positively. There was my friend and classmate, Gabriel Oliyide Sodipo, beside me – and we exchanged stories and long silences. We ate, drank and spoke about everything under the sky. We also left many things unsaid.

On January 13, 1958, MV Aureol anchored. I headed straight to London by train that took only a few hours. Olaniwun Ajayi, my close friend since 1954, warmly received me in the city at Euston Station, along with Chief Olu Adebanjo (who later became Shehu Shagari’s Special Adviser on Information).

Our relationship blossomed after I registered Ajayi into the Action Group, and we had always been in touch, even when we were apart. We were like brothers.

When he (Ajayi) had his first child, a son (now Dr. Ola Ajayi, a medical doctor), I was not around in Sagamu. I was away in Ilorin, and when I heard, I brought a turkey from there for the christening. We did many things for each other, watched each other’s back, and lightened burdens wherever we were concerned without question. Now that Olaniwun Ajayi was in England ahead of me, to study Law, it was never an issue that I would be his guest until I settled down properly.

The city of London was far different from anywhere I had been. The roads were far wider, the houses more wondrous and beautiful, and the system far more organised beyond my imagination. There were faster and neater trains, while the buses and taxis were more easily accessible. I marvelled at the products of serious people, what focus and purposefulness, and genuine care for compatriots and country, could accomplish.

I settled at No. 187, Mayall Road, in South-East London (in Brixton), and lived in Ajayi’s apartment (his wife was not there then), and never paid a dime throughout the four months I was there. It rekindled our friendship and bonded our brotherhood. We had been like 6 and 7 ever since.

Mortgage was easily available over there and the amount of  deposit  necessary  was  just  ten  per  cent,  which  was affordable.

While still living with Mr. Ajayi, he made a constant contact with his agent, who informed him of the availability of an apartment near him at No. 233, Mayall Street, for£3,350.

We  quickly  visited  the  apartment  and,  having  been satisfied  with  its  condition,  jumped  at  the  offer.  I  was particularly  delighted  because  it  would  afford  us  the opportunity of being close to each other.

So, I paid about £350 through a mortgage company while the rest was spread over 20 years. I then moved into the apartment.

During our sojourn, a high standard of cleanliness was maintained through a roster of cleaning the common access, the corridor and the bathroom among the tenants. As a result, we hardly had any vacant room in the house. Whenever anyone moved out, new tenants quickly moved in because it was a neat apartment. At the end of my sojourn in England, I sold the apartment in 1962, paid the balance of the mortgage and used part of the proceeds to buy some furniture which my wife brought home from England.

Among my tenants, I remember M.O. Bello (whose son, Lekan Bello was Commissioner for Finance in Ogun State in Gov. Gbenga Daniel’s first term, 2003-2007). We knew ourselves from Nigeria. He contacted me when he was coming to England that he would like to stay with me. He came around 1959 or 1960, after being a manager at UAC.

He came to study Accounting. Then, there was Olomola who succeeded me as Organising Secretary in Remo Division.

My major concern, as soon as I got to England and found my bearing, was to conclude my GCE ‘A’ Level (in Economics, History and British Constitution).

I was conscious of the fact that at almost 30, I was an old man studying. So, the moment I got to England, I became rather more serious. I concentrated all my energy on my studies at Westminster College. It was an evening school.

Tunde Ogunnaike, another old friend from Lagos, who was a customs officer, took me to the college for enrolment. Westminster College was an international school, and he was the only Nigerian there at the time.

I did my studies during the day since I was a full-time student. For the first nine months, I read hard, until my eyes ached and my back throbbed. When I took the exams I had no fear. I passed the GCE exams well. I was also conscious of the fact that I had a limited amount of money, and so could not afford to fail. This made me frugal. I had a white girlfriend, Sylvia, but the relationship didn’t last long. That was in 1959, the same year I met my wife, Christie.

Apart from the extra income I made from rent, I sustained myself with a summer holiday job at Unilever. I worked there as a clerk, on the recommendation of Chief Obafemi Awolowo who gave me a letter (drafted by Chief Folarin  Coker’s  wife,  Apinke,  who  was  Awo’s  secretary). The additional income came in handy and conquered many challenges.

Qualifying as a lawyer was my next major preoccupation after passing my GCE ‘A’ Level. I registered at Lincoln’s Inn (the oldest of the Inns of Court and the most popular among Nigerians in the latter part of 1958).

There are four inns of court, namely: Lincoln’s Inn, Gray’s Inn, Inner Temple and Middle Temple, whose members attended lectures at the Council of Legal Education. In 1960, I took the Bar exams at Lincoln’s Inn.

There were three exams in a year, and you could take any – in May, September or December. Students were required to take eleven subjects in three days, and await the result.

And the rigours of taking such number of papers in a short time was scary. Everyone dreaded the exams and the result.

There was a programme; so you knew when the exam was, and when the result would be released. The calendar of the Council of Legal Education was such that both the time of the examination and publication of the result were contained therein. I failed the first time because I rushed my studies. I thought it was easy, the way I took my GCE. The subjects were varied and it made lawyers very versatile. Meanwhile, politics never left me, even in London. I was the Secretary of the Action Group’s London branch (with Chief Z.O.K. Adetula as chairman, Ben and Tunde Oluwole, Chief Olu Aboderin and Mr. S. P. Ajibade as members, among scores of other Nigerians).

The Action Group always had a branch in London and it was natural I joined them. When I became the Secretary, I organised a weekly ‘Any Question about the Action Group?’ Session for members in London.

This weekly briefing kept members of the party in London  abreast  of  the  party’s  activities  back  home.  So, any  leader  that  came  would  meet  the  members  who  in turn asked them questions about the party and politics in Nigeria. Whenever members of the party came from Nigeria, I hosted and organised their itinerary, ensuring that they graced scheduled meetings and honoured appointments. They were briefed about goings-on in England. Even Chief Awolowo came on a number of occasions, especially during constitutional conferences.

During these visits, I was always honoured by Chief Awolowo who gave me the privilege of hosting him in my house on Mayall Road.

I always prepared the food myself. I learnt cooking through Sir Olaniwun Ajayi. He was a good cook, being a product of Wesley College, Ibadan where, as a teacher training institution, cooking was part of their grooming. Ajayi later crowned this by having a master cook as his wife.

I also played host to Chief Ladoke Akintola and his wife Faderera whenever they were on a visit to London.

On one of Awo’s visits during which he was accompanied by his son, Segun, who was studying Law at Cambridge at the time, Chief Awolowo showed how much of a disciplinarian he was when he scolded Segun for not greeting me. Unknown to him however, Segun had greeted me at the reception.

When I got to London, both Ajayi and myself joined Ijebu Students’ Union (Egbe Omo Alare). Dr. Tai Oworu was then the president. The Ijebu students of the time organised a reception for Awolowo.

Most of us who were members of the party in England often benefited from financial gifts from our leaders whenever they came on a visit from Nigeria, in particular Chief Alfred Rewane. On the occasion of my wedding, for instance, I remember Chief Rewane gave me a cheque for £30. He often

showed affection for me anytime because of my activities in the party. It was natural for Chief Awolowo to address us (members of the party) as his friends and colleagues without any air of superiority. He always called many of the members by their first names. He had a pet name for many of us, his colleagues.

For  example  A2  (Abraham  Adesanya),  Ayus  (Ayo Adebanjo), LK (Lateef Jakande), Bisi (Bisi Onabanjo), Bola (Bola Ige), Alfredo (Alfred Rewane), SOS (Shonibare), MA (Michael Ajasin), to mention a few.

However, I was one of those sponsored to attend the Independence  celebrations  (on  October  1,  1960)  on  the invitation of the government of Western Region of Nigeria.

With  an  allowance,  hotel  accommodation  and  a  car,  all arranged by the Agent-General, we were treated like foreign guests in Nigeria. Even members of the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) were invited by AG. Tobi Dafe was President of the Students’ Union. The Western Region invited him and some others for the independence celebration in Nigeria. He came with me and Z.O.K. Adetula; Vincent Egbarin, who was chairman of the London branch of NCNC, was also invited.

We were here for a few weeks, participating in the various ceremonies staged to lower the Union Jack and fly high the green-white-green flag of Nigeria (designed by Michael Taiwo Akinkunmi, who beat three thousand other contestants at a competition in 1959).

While I was here, my wife was delivered on October 6, 1960, of a bouncing baby girl (Adeola, now Mrs. Azeez). We were still celebrating in Nigeria when I received the news by cablegram.

The official activities in Nigeria over, I returned to see my daughter for the first time. The naming of Adeola was done when I got back to London. Mrs. Awolowo was the godmother and Mrs. Tola Oyediran, her daughter, represented her at the christening ceremony. Adeola was born at Annie McCall, Stockwell, South London, and was christened at Herne Hill (an Anglican church). Party members in London attended the christening.

With the euphoria of the christening over, I awaited my fate at the Bar exams. Because no one could really say with any certainty how the result would swing, Ajayi and I decided not to tell my young wife the exact day the full list of those who sat for the exams and their grades would be published.

We gave another date, one long week after the results would have been known.

I was at home that day, and Ajayi sneaked away to buy the paper (London Times) at midnight, the day the result was expected. He rushed back and screamed, ‘You made it!’ Then my wife heard the noise and asked what the matter was. I couldn’t hide it again. I said it was the Bar exams’ result. That I made it – and we all jubilated.

 

 

 

When the result of the Bar exams came, it was special. I passed with no reference. My result was good in constitutional law, criminal law, contract and tort, land law, and equity.

It was the practice in the form before you were enrolled at the Bar to state where you came from, not knowing that such details would be published along with your results. So, I listed Ogbo/Okelamuren.

Back home, the name Okelamuren in a foreign paper elicited great joy and pride from my townspeople. They were so proud of me.

Even among the political parties in Nigeria, there was no animosity at that time. We as members of opposing parties were more or less facing the colonialists, and we were progressives. This was reflected among the students’ community in London.

The cordiality that existed between the AG and the NCNC, London Branch, was such that at the time I was returning to Nigeria, the Chairman of the NCNC London Branch, Vincent Egbarin (father of Mrs. Joko Abebe, nee Egbarin) organised a send-off party for me at Western Nigeria House in London.

Before I finished my exams, there was crisis at home, and there was pressure from Chief Awolowo that I should come back home in late 1961. I was called to the Bar in June

‘61, and came back home in November. In November 1961, with my wife left behind in London to conclude her studies, and heavily pregnant (with our second baby), I headed home finally; this time on a plane and I arrived at the airport in Lagos.

I was met at the airport by M.A.K. Shonowo (one of the  leaders  of  Action  Group  from  Remo  Division  who’s also a friend), and my parents (Salamotu and Joel Adebanjo Adedairo). When I went to my village, Okelamuren, they lined up for me on the streets, organised a party; happilychanting and dancing. Now qualified as a lawyer, and more politically savvy, married and a father (of three children), I came home to make a mark, improve my country and myself, in all the ways I could.

 

Chapter 5

Starting a Family

Long before I was self-conscious, very mature and in search of a woman, I had always been particular about my appearance. I gave it more than enough attention,

I took dressing very seriously. Spotless Banjus, the nickname I was called by my classmates and some teachers, right from Form 1 in 1944 at CMS Grammar School, was not for nothing.

I elicited admiration, and many looked at me more than twice. Gazes trailed me.

So, anytime I was on holiday (from CMS Grammar School in my senior years), I went to Ijebu-Ode where I had my eyes on a cute, young lady, Bimpe Dina. She was herself a student of Ijebu-Ode Girls’ School, and was my neighbour, living opposite my uncle’s house on Gbelegbuwa Street, Iyanro.

We enjoyed each other’s company and spent quite a lot of time together. When both of us left secondary school, we remained very close. Everyone knew we had the hots for each other.

 By the time I was working at Medical Headquarters as a clerk, Bimpe and I had become an item. She was training to be a nurse at the General Hospital on Broad Street, Lagos.

Living together was the next best option, but we had to become man and wife first, legally. In 1952, at a registry, St. Anna Court, Tinubu, we signed the ‘dotted lines,’ became Mr. and Mrs. Ayo Adebanjo.

Princess Street, Lagos, in my bedroom and living room abode when I was barely 24, was where we made home. She was pregnant at the time, and we looked forward to a new tot. When a boy was delivered shortly after our nuptials, we were high-spirited.

But the boy only lived for a few days! We were devastated, inconsolable. It took sometime before we acknowledged the radiance of the sun and accepted our fate. Two years later, in 1954, a child, a daughter (Ayotunde, who later became a teacher), came into our lives.

Work, activism and politics took me around, and Bimpe was not comfortable with my constant absence.

When I was appointed as the Organising Secretary of Remo Division by the Action Group in 1954, and moved to Sagamu, she didn’t leave Lagos. She didn’t come with me to the place I made home for the next three years. She stayed back in Lagos, and only left when she was transferred to Ibadan.

Our marriage became strained. She was becoming intolerant, agitated and unpleasant. The union became painful and joyless. We began to have disagreements over minor family matters. Bimpe filed for divorce in 1955, alleging adultery.

Not quite shocked about the turn of events, I received the divorce papers in Sagamu without any bitterness. I didn’t contest the divorce nor did I go to court to defend myself; so, Bimpe went her way, barely three years as Mrs. Adebanjo.

During my tour of many cities and towns as Organising Secretary, I ran into a lot of women. And in Ibadan, I met an attractive and very neat lady, Aduke (a relation of Mr. J. A. Akinlotan, the party’s Financial Secretary) who had come on a visit to her uncle. We began as friends, and later lovers. In no time, she became pregnant. Adeseye, another girl, was born in 1956. However, the relationship with Aduke ended by the time I left for England.

When I got to England, I was unattached and unmarried. Very matured, with ample experience under my belt, I was ready again for matrimony, and this time for keeps. I wanted an enduring and eternal union. I was looking for more than a friend and companion. I wanted a soulmate and an ‘alabaro’ (a confidant). Olaniwun Ajayi, my host in London, already found a lady who would turn out as a perfect match for me.

After all, he knew me well, and was aware of what I desired from the ‘bottom’ of my bosom. Olori Stella Yetunde Gbadebo, too, put in some good words for her. She came highly recommended. Christiana Anoko Magnus-Lawson was on federal government scholarship, on the recommendation of Dr. Moses Adekoyejo Majekodunmi who was then the Chief Gynaecologist at Massey Street Dispensary (now Hospital) and who later founded St. Nicholas Hospital, Lagos. A nurse she was, and the ward of Prelate Bolaji Idowu of the Methodist Church, Nigeria.

Christiana had come with Olori Gbadebo (whom she was staying with in London) to visit the Ajayis. In the course of their discussion, they agreed that if she was unattached, she’d be good for their friend; for me. I was not around, though.

When I returned, Ajayi told me about my good fortune. On their second visit, I was not in too. But they made a phone call to me and I rushed back from a social engagement to see the lady everyone couldn’t stop talking about. My heart pounded, and I was full of expectations on the day set aside for our meeting and matchmaking.

I wanted it to go right so fervently. I had a picture of a better half, and I hoped and prayed that she fitted that portrait.

Christiana was herself nervous. She brooded and agonised about how events would turn out. However, she trusted the Ajayis enough to believe that there was ample chance that the new relationship would fly. How far, she wasn’t sure.

Everything turned out as if it was well scripted and acted,  with  gifted  performers  on  stage.  Christiana  came well-packaged. Her background, a ward of Prelate Idowu was enough to make any man swoon. On top of it, she was cultured, beautiful beyond my imagination. We started on a good note, discussing safe subjects.

I arranged to take her out (this was in late 1959), and we fixed another date. We went to a cinema and took it off from there, spending time together, and building a dream, a future, as a pair.

It was a jolly time full of sunny and bright moments. Events cascaded into a pool of happiness and laughter with marriage as the destination of choice. But it wasn’t that easy. Prelate Idowu’s approval had to be sought and granted. And when he came to London, Christiana informed him about me. As I had anticipated, he demanded that he wanted to see the young suitor.

The meeting was arranged, and I ‘reported’ myself at Methodist International House where the clergy lodged. He interrogated me and asked if I was married before, and I told him I was, but divorced. The Prelate was taken aback. And he thundered, ‘Who was the guilty party?’

‘Sir, there is no use talking about that now, because there is no way you can corroborate what I tell you. The fact of the matter is that the divorce was undefended.’

 Prelate Idowu went on, ‘Don’t you think it’s too much of a risk for her to marry a divorcee?’

I didn’t hesitate. ‘I bear the greater risk because I cannot afford another failed marriage. If this marriage fails, I’m culpable in the eyes of the world. It is mandatory that I ensure it works…’

Prelate  Idowu  was  quiet,  and  didn’t  say  anything again. (When Christiana and I saw thereafter, she told me the comment of the Prelate: that I would be a tough guy, difficult to handle by the way I answered a seemingly difficult question).

On the eve of my Bar exams, I was also occupied as a Secretary of the London branch of Action Group. In 1960, when activities were frenetic at home about Independence and a new dawn, we fixed our wedding for May 7. But we had to postpone it till May 14 because Princess Margaret (the Queen of England’s younger sister) was getting married to  Anthony  Armstrong  Jones  (first  Earl  of  Snowdown) that day, and many of the guests, Nigerians attending the Constitutional Conference in London, were also invited for the royal wedding.

But the May 14 ceremony almost never took place. It was discovered at the Registry, Lambert Registry, that I was officially still married unless I produced the divorce certificate of the previous marriage.

In the marriage form, I had stated that I was married. They asked for the divorce papers – which I had never set my eyes on. I had to send a registered mail to my friend, Mosunmola Folarin (a timber merchant I had known in Sagamu) to help procure the papers which were posted to England in time before the May 14 date.

Those who were attending the Constitutional Conference in London and also the wedding of Princess Margaret, stayed on to grace our nuptials. There were many high-ranking party officials and Western Region government functionaries.

The wedding took place at the Anglican Church at Ann Hill, London with Oniyide Sodipo, (also a law student at that time and father of Prof. Kole Sodipo), my childhood friend, as bestman. This was followed by a reception at the Agent- General’s house, 15A Kensington Palace Gardens, West London. It was a high society event with Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola (the then Premier of Western Region) as chairman of the reception, and Chief  Toye Coker, who was then the Agent-General, as master of ceremony. (Kensington Palace Gardens was, and still is, London’s most exclusive address and had one of the world’s most expensive residential streets, with embassies and residences of ambassadors). The property was bought by the Action Group Government under Chief Awolowo when M.E.R. Okorodudu was the Agent-General. (The military later took it over from Western Nigeria and converted it to Nigeria House). Also in attendance were Chief F.R.A. Williams (Attorney-General of Western Region), S.O. Ighodaro, J.A.O. Odebiyi, among many other dignitaries from Nigeria. Chief Awolowo was not in England at the time.

The wedlock,  blessed  with  four  children,  two  male and two female, has lasted over 50 years already – through the valleys and peaks of trials and triumphs as a politician, activist, lawyer, businessman and elder statesman, apart from the years of exile, detention and imprisonment.

It  has  survived  all,  with  beautiful  children  who  are now parents. There is Adeola, born in 1960, a lawyer and banker; Obafemi, 1962, who studied political science, and is doing business in London; Olusegun, 1968, a lawyer in New York; and Folasade, 1972, a medical doctor and currently a consultant.

Chapter 6

The Treason Trial, Exile and Detention

Then I qualified as a lawyer, coming home was non-negotiable. It was what I always planned. To come back to Nigeria, practise law and engage in

politics. Immediately I returned to Nigeria, I enrolled as a solicitor and barrister and began practice.

About a year later, when I was just settling down, I became a fugitive, running from the long arms of the law, avoiding arrest and detention, and a long trial which had a predetermined judgement. I had become a wanted man accused of plotting a heinous crime.

It was a very turbulent period: of treachery and all the seven deadly sins (lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride) in full operation. Politics was becoming warfare, full-scale battle where all evil and maleficent tactics were admissible as fair. Events, and alarming scenarios, took place in rapid succession, fresh things happening before previous dramas were resolved. There were many long, dark nights and so few bright days.

 The government of the day at the centre, led by Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, the Prime Minister of Nigeria, and overseen and manipulated by the Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Alhaji Ahmadu Bello (Premier of Northern Region and Leader of Northern People’s Congress) wanted the opposition, particularly Chief Obafemi Awolowo (Leader of Opposition and Action Group) smothered, silenced and asphyxiated!

From early 1960, long before independence, they had tried to ‘put him in his place,’ disgrace him thoroughly, and hound him into oblivion. Throughout the ceremonies that heralded the October 1, 1960 lowering of the Union Jack and hoisting of the green-white-green flag, Chief Awolowo and the Action Group (AG) were banished to irrelevance in the centre, in Lagos. No official role was assigned the party or its officials. We were positioned far away from the hub of activities.

This humiliation was the smallest part of it. There were more daring and damning plots. The ruling party used its position to tragic ends. They had willing tools (which they exploited) and persons (who were devilish accomplices) in the structures. Their allies in the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) and Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe all turned a blind eye, or manipulated the system to frustrate the AG and its leaders.

It was a very difficult period for democracy, the system which guarantees freedom for all, encourages and nurtures the framework which assures the greatest good for ‘almost’ all. The arrangement that promises a level playing field, where the minority could have their say, and the majority their way. The Action Group, our party, was willing to play fair and square, continue to undertake the role of opposition in the centre with dignity and a sense of duty that was difficult to fault, hoping to encourage good governance, and a better polity.

But how far can you go when your opponents adopt every  necessary  evil  means  to  annihilate  you?  There was already trouble in the West. Chief S. L. Akintola (who became Premier in 1960 after Chief Awolowo) had become insensitive to party proclamations, was dining with enemies, and there had been widespread violence leading to deaths and loss of property.

There was pandemonium. The enemy was determined to railroad AG off-track. A state of emergency had been declared in the West on May 29, 1962, and an administrator (Dr. Moses Adekoyejo Majekodunmi) installed.

Whispers of a grand plan to implicate leaders of AG, the cream and prime movers of the party, in treason, a forceful overthrow of a legitimate government, were everywhere.

The Coker Commission of Enquiry had earlier been inaugurated, and it was working to a macabre script. It was investigating the activities of Nigerian Investment Property Company (NIPC), which took a loan from the Western Nigeria Marketing Board (WEMABOD) to accelerate development of the region.

NIPC (with Shonibare, Maja and Rewane on its board), was a private company being run on behalf of the Action Group (AG). The proceeds of that company were meant to support the party.

Awolowo was working at establishing a strong political party, with independent sources of income. He had said he didn’t want 10 per cent from contractors, and would not encourage kickbacks, bribery and corruption in whatever guise.

Chief Shonibare had started his estate earlier in his career, and built a strong company (Shonny Investment and Property Company, SIPC) which we all admired. He got a loan from Barclays Bank to bankroll some of his property (in Shonibare Estate and Elephant House both in Lagos, just to mention two).

Chief Awolowo was in love with Shonibare’s managerial skills, and set up NIPC. He then called Shonibare that he wanted him to replicate the feat of his estate by building NIPC into a strong platform.

So, NIPC was set up as an estate development company, with the sole aim of providing finance for the party (using SIPC as a role model). The capital was raised from a loan obtained from the Western Nigeria Marketing Board.

The loan was at a higher interest rate than the prevailing bank rates, and was used to build a number of landmarks, from  Cocoa  House  in  Ibadan  to  Western  House,  Unity House and Bristol Hotel (all in Lagos), among others.

The Marketing  Board’s  interest  rate  was  comparable to what Gilt-Edged Securities charged. The Action Group borrowed from WEMABOD at 5 per cent more than the prevailing  market  rate.  All  these  properties  came  under the management of the Western Nigeria Marketing Board following the Coker Commission of Enquiry.

NIPC operated above board, never took bribes from contractors nor did anything under the table. There was nothing  irregular  or  fraudulent  about  the  relationship between the Western Region and NIPC. They couldn’t prove any fraud! From its terms of reference, it was obvious that the Coker Commission of Enquiry was a witch-hunt targeted at the NIPC which Akintola had wickedly leaked to the Balewa government as the source of Action Group’s finance.

It  was  no  surprise,  therefore,  that  the  Commission recommended  the  acquisition  of  NIPC  properties  which were used as a collateral for the loan granted the company by WEMABOD.

The Coker Commission of Enquiry’s report was very unpopular and, when it was published, it was met with hostility in the minds of the people who made a bonfire of it. The crisis in the AG led to a no-confidence motion in the Western House of Assembly against Chief Ladoke Akintola, calling  for  his  removal  as  Premier  and  replacement with Alhaji Dauda Adegbenro, one of the leading members of the party at that time. The motion was signed by majority of the members and sent to the Governor of the Region, Sir Adesoji Aderemi, (who was also the Ooni of Ife).

When the motion was to be moved, however, a supporter of Chief Akintola, who was from the same Ogbomoso Constituency with him, jumped on the bench of the House and said, ‘There is fire on the mountain.’ This action caused an uproar in the House; hence the motion was signed by majority of the members. The governor then removed Akintola as Premier and announced Adegbenro as his replacement.

In the ensuing commotion in the House, policemen entered and shot teargas into the packed hall which caused a  stampede.  The Balewa  government,  as  if  acting  out  a script, seized on this development and announced that law and order had broken down in the Western Region. Balewa then declared a state of emergency in the West, dissolved the House and appointed Dr. Koye Majekodunmi, his personal physician, as administrator.

The action of the federal government was patently unconstitutional under a federal system. It was therefore challenged  by  the  party.  The then  Chief  Judge  of  the Western Region, Quashie-Edum, a Ghanaian, acting unconstitutionally too, transferred the case to the Supreme Court in Lagos. The Supreme Court, presided over by Chief Justice Adetokunbo Ademola, decided in favour of Akintola.

But the AG now appealed against this judgment to the Privy Council, which was the highest court of appeal under the constitution at that time. The Privy Council reversed the judgment of the Supreme Court and confirmed the appointment of Alhaji Adegbenro.

However, instead of implementing this judgment, the Balewa government maliciously passed a new bill in the House making the Nigerian Supreme Court the final court of appeal in the country, thereby nullifying the Privy Council judgment.

Sequel to the appointment of Majekodunmi as Administrator of the Region, leaders of the AG were sent on detention in various parts of the country. The party leader, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, was put under house arrest in Ikenne, his hometown. But before the Coker Commission of Enquiry started sitting, Awo was moved from Ikenne to Bell Avenue, Ikoyi, where he was also placed under house arrest. From there, he was charged with treasonable felony, and the rest is now history.

I was ‘Accused Number 30’ (while Chief Awolowo was ‘Number 27’). When we were being rounded up and hauled in detention, I was away in Ghana on a mission for Chief Awolowo. I had already been declared wanted, along with Anthony Eromosele Enahoro, Samuel Goomsu Ikoku and James Olubunmi Aluko.

I returned and offered to give myself up, and face the music of fabrication composed, arranged and orchestrated by  the  Northern  People’s  Congress  and  its  cohorts.  But when Awolowo heard, he sent word through Alhaji M. O. Owodunni who had access to him and who saw him everyday during the Coker Commission of Enquiry while under house arrest in Lagos, that those who were yet to be arrested should go  on  exile  so  that  the  campaign  against  tyranny  could continue (in order to make the world aware of the devilish machinations of  the  Balewa  government  in  Nigeria).  He directed that I should return to Ghana (I had been visiting Ghana since 1957, understudying the strategies of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah’s Convention People’s Party, especially how they contained thuggery and rigging at elections). He (Awolowo) said I should not submit myself under any circumstance.

Owodunni told me that some of our colleagues had been arrested, and that I had been declared wanted. When I came to Owodunni’s house in the middle of the night, he was surprised to see me. He then told me that Papa had instructed that I should return to Ghana, and not allow myself to be arrested.

I just packed the few things I could take, passed through Dahomey, and landed in Ghana. I went by public transport. I had no choice. The beautiful thing was that the masses and law agents here at home were sympathetic to our cause and so co-operated with me, just as they led Tony Enahoro too through a secret route.

I returned to Nigeria in 1961 as a qualified lawyer, and I had made Ibadan home, but couldn’t even get there to pack anything. I was in Lagos, in the Jibowu area, at Alhaji Owodunni’s house when I had to go on exile that same day, in the night.

My mother, Madam Salamotu Odubanke Adebanjo, went to my house in Ibadan to pack a few clothes, odds and ends which were sent to me later. All my savings, from the time I returned in November 1961 till 1962 and the emergency funds reserved for my wife’s homecoming, were with me. I even took some money from my father (Pa Joel Adebanjo Adedairo).

I stayed in M. O. Owodunni’s house in Jibowu area of Yaba whenever I was in Lagos; and once he relayed Awolowo’s message, I knew I had to leave the country immediately.

Papa Awolowo directed me to call on one of our supporters in Dahomey (now Republic of Benin), to give me easy passage. The supporter was a politician and the Deputy Mayor of Dahomey (whose people were agitating to join Western Region). He was from the Yoruba-speaking part of Dahomey.

I left Lagos the second day through the motor park. Owodunni dropped me at the park. He later told my parents that I had to leave for Ghana urgently because I was declare wanted by the government. I had some money to sustain me. When I got to Dahomey, the man I was directed to see by my party leader was a popular politician. When I met him, he was warm and friendly.

At the border, they asked me where I was going. I told them I was visiting my in-laws in Togo. I had my documents with me.

The challenge was moving between Nigeria and Benin Republic. The moment I left there, I was in safe hands. The Deputy Mayor gave me accommodation for the night and the next day I proceeded to Ghana (by road).

In Ghana I was a guest (along with two others, S. G. Ikoku and James Aluko) of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah’s government. We reported to the Bureau of African Affairs (headed by Mr. Bardein) as soon as we arrived Accra. The Bureau was the political outfit of Dr. Nkrumah which looked after political refugees.

As a lawyer and a former journalist, I was attached to Radio Ghana as a features editor while S.G. Ikoku was made editor of Spark, a revolutionary journal of Dr. Nkrumah whose editor-in-chief was Kofi Batsha. I was already very familiar with Ghana. Members of Action Group were being instructed by Nkrumah’s Convention People’s Party (CPP) on better ways of organising a party.

We had developed a relationship with CPP after the 1956 Western Nigeria general elections. The AG had organised a tour of Ghana for 12 organising secretaries led by Chief S.T. Oredein, the Principal Organising Secretary of the party. The tour was organised as a way of appreciating the secretaries in

various divisions of the party.

Members of the team included Richard Babalola from Ekiti, Isaac Ositelu (Ikeja), Ayo Soremi (Osogbo), Ladipo Olisa (Owo), Ayo Adebanjo (Remo) and J.O. Lawanson (Ilesa). After our arrival in Accra, we were eventually settled in a housing estate (Cantonment Estate) near Star Hotel (opposite the residences of Kofi Bako, Ghana’s Minister of Defence, and John Tetegah, the Secretary-General of the Trade Union Congress).

I stayed in a whole house. I was there alone until James Aluko joined me (he was a staff of the secretariat). Aluko later became a leader of the party in Ekiti.

The three-year sojourn in Accra, Ghana was at the Cantonment Estate with James Aluko. S.G. Ikoku was in another location in the town.

If anyone had told me when I was returning home after being called to the Bar in 1961 in England, and being registered to practise as a barrister and solicitor in Nigeria, that I would have to flee, escape from injustice of a malevolent kind a year later, I would have labelled the prophecy the prediction of a futurologist who visualised ill will towards me and my progress.

When I was returning from England, there was more than hope dancing in my bosom. I was determined to attempt to surpass all benchmarks of success. I acknowledged that I had to work hard to make a name in the legal profession.

It wasn’t difficult to make a choice of where to begin my odyssey. The chambers of the sage in Ibadan, known as Obafemi Awolowo & Co., was where I kicked off my career as a counsel. Adesina Odedina was the senior lawyer then. I didn’t practise there when it was Awolowo & Akerele.

Abiodun Akerele was in partnership with Awolowo, and the partnership had been dissolved long before I joined the firm. With Adesina Odedina (a nice man who was also in London at the time I was studying Law) managing the firm, many briefs landed on our laps. We worked on cases for UAC and Leventis, and represented some land owners in Ilaro (the present headquarters of Yewa District of Ogun State) who were being compensated by the government. The firm also engaged in general litigation.

I was fast finding my feet as a lawyer, and playing politics on the side as a staunch member of the Action Group. I was even jealously referred to as a top gun of the ‘Ijebu mafia’ (because some respected party members were from the area, including the leader, Chief Awolowo who was from Ikenne in Remo Division). This time I didn’t hold any party position.

One significant thing I remembered while I was practising in Ibadan was my relationship with the Iges (Bola and Atinuke). On one occasion, Atinuke and I appeared before Magistrate Ovie-Whiskey. Thinking I was senior to Atinuke at the Bar, Ovie-Whiskey said ‘Ladies first,’ contrary to the practice at the Bar of seniors mentioning their cases first. And she (Atinuke Ige) said, ‘It’s not a matter of ladies first, it’s a matter of seniority.’ She was my senior by a year or two (although we were contemporaries at the CMS Grammar School) and CMS Girls’ Grammar School respectively.

There were two different cases. So, she appeared first. I was popular as a politician before becoming a lawyer. When we got home I told Bola Ige, ‘See what Tinuke did today!’

By early 1962, things were looking up. I had my own apartment at Oke-Ado (the house was owned by Mr. E. B. Osibo, my former teacher), a beautiful place where I called home, where I was preparing for my wife — away in England rounding off her studies in nursing, with two children (Adeola, barely two years old, and Obafemi, named after the leader, then just a few months in the world).

I didn’t bargain for this level of treachery and hatred, this horrendous animosity and destructive campaign against good governance and accountability.

My law practice in Ibadan was short-lived. I didn’t spend quite a year there.

Rumblings had been going on between Chief Awolowo and Chief Akintola. (Akintola was Premier, and Awo, Leader of Opposition).

 Mrs. Awolowo was a trader, factory agent and distributor for several firms in Ibadan, including Coca-Cola, long before her husband became Premier. During the crisis between Awolowo and Akintola however, many people suggested erroneously that the cause of disagreement between both of them was because Mrs Awolowo did not want to relinquish distributorship to Mrs Akintola. They had thought this was part of the perks of office. The estranged relationship between both of them deepened.

Meanwhile, after the federal election, there was agitation for the Action Group (AG) to work with the Northern People’s Congress (NPC). This argument pitched the party into two camps.

Awo said there was no invitation from the party and posed, ‘Do you want us to beg to apply?’ He now sent Ayo Rosiji (who was one of those agitating that the AG should work with the NPC) to go and discuss terms with them.

While this was going on, Akintola was organising an insurrection against Awolowo (because there were complaints that Akintola was not implementing party policies; administering Western Region with many unpopular decisions).

It must be noted, however, that, ab initio, Akintola was not Awolowo’s choice to succeed him as Premier of Western Region. His choice was either Rotimi Williams or Gabriel Akin-Deko.

His view was that Akintola couldn’t run a government. That he could be a deputy, but not capable of being a leader in a government. But the party leaders at a caucus meeting didn’t agree with Awolowo.

When he was defeated, Awo had to yield and agree that Akintola should become Premier. This was after the 1959 federal elections.

The people  (Doherty,  Maja  and  Gbadamosi,  among others) who had worked with Awo in the cabinet had ruled that Akintola should be the choice of Premier.

Chief Awolowo was overwhelmed. He had to obey the decision of the party.

Akintola was a darling of the party leaders. He was very friendly and cordial. The only problem was his over-ambition. He was a good deputy. I knew this because I served under him. He was carried away by ambition.

When his father died, I organised the funeral reception. At that time I was Organising Secretary for the party in Remo Division, and he got permission from Chief Awolowo that I should come and supervise his reception. So, they were pals. He was also chairman at my wedding reception in London.

But the point of departure from Chief Awolowo was his ambition and disloyalty. He wanted the AG to go into alliance with the NPC. But Chief Awolowo said, ‘How can we? What have we got in common? We haven’t got the same ideology and our manifestoes are different.’

There was no meeting point. All the rancour that existed between their wives (Awolowo’s and Akintola’s) had nothing to do with it as claimed by people. It was all bunkum. Their quarrel was purely ideological.

So, when it got to a point that people were saying the NPC wanted to work with us, but the leader would not allow it, Chief Awolowo now said, ‘Do you want us to write an application to them to admit us?’ He now mandated Ayo Rosiji and one other person to go and talk to the NPC. They came back and reported to the party. And Chief Awolowo said, ‘Dare to be a Daniel.’

So, by the time the AG crisis started, and people were resigning from the party in droves, it was such a shock for Chief Awolowo. People from the periphery like Benue and other places, who were disloyal to the party, he now expelled from the party. Since then, there was no shock for Chief Awolowo.

It was because the NPC was in government and the NCNC had formed an alliance with them that Akintola and others wanted us to also join the government so that we would benefit from it.

It is important to say that those who criticise Awolowo for not willing to work with the government at the centre should realise that he had even offered to serve under Azikiwe. I was one of those who believed Akintola should be Premier until he canvassed for us to join the Northern People’s Congress.

He believed AG should work with NPC, instead of NCNC. The NPC was however conservative, while the AG was very progressive. All NPC activities were anti-people. They ran a fiefdom, with the Emir deciding everything, and ruling through the Dongaris.

After Akintola became Premier, he took certain unpopular decisions which made the party unpopular. Meanwhile, there were internal wranglings. For instance, when Awo said he wanted to tour Western Region to know how acceptable the policies of Action Group were, Akintola offered to follow him. Awo refused.

In the process, they called a meeting at Oke-Ado to consider whether or not to work with the Northern People’s Congress where some strong party member like Adeyemi Lawson spoke.

We agreed that it was impossible to work with people who had not invited us.

Then the rumour came that Chief Awolowo was organising a coup. I couldn’t fathom why anyone would come up with such spurious and spiteful allegation capable of terminating lives and making dreams blow up in smoke

– allegation of the gravest magnitude, of stockpiling arms and ammunition and training dissidents to overthrow a democratic government.

There was nothing like a coup. To suggest that we all took an oath of secrecy is arrant nonsense. We never took any oath. We never planned a coup. There was utmost loyalty to the leadership of Action Group.

Of course, the Action Group was regarded as a cult by our opponents because of the unanimity with which we (as members) spoke on national issues. But that was all. The point was that the internal democracy within the party made people think it was a cult.

Whenever I thought about the scenarios that played out, I likened the drama to a farcical play meant to entertain — a Hubert Ogunde masterpiece, a fictional portrayal. But this farce was real.

The February 24, 1966 coup which took place in Ghana and  ousted  from  power  the  Convention  People’s  Party (CPP) led by Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, who was fondly called

‘Osagyefo’ (the saviour) was a turning point in the history of that country. It also abruptly terminated our exile in Ghana.

A few days after, Gen. Roy Ankrah, who came into office as a result of the coup, sent his soldiers to collect me and my colleague, Samuel Goomsu Ikoku, from our different locations and deposited us at the Usherford Prison in Accra.

By the time of this ‘unholy visitation,’ our other colleague, James Aluko, with whom I was sharing an apartment, was not around.

Recall that the three of us had ‘fled from the law’ to Ghana in 1962 at the beginning of the treasonable felony trials in Nigeria. We were there for about four years before our repatriation to Nigeria in 1966 and landing in Lagos from where we were taken by train to Kaduna and driven straight to Kaduna Prisons.

Our journey into exile became prophetic when those who stayed around were tried by Justice G.S. Sowemimo and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment with only two, Chief S.O. Shonibare and Chief Alfred Rewane, being discharged and acquitted.

Those of us not in the country for trial at the time, including Chief Anthony Enahoro, had been strategically directed by Chief Awolowo to leave the country to be able to tell the outside world about our struggle for a democratic Nigeria.

Our leader, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, was sentenced to 10 years in jail. Chief Anthony Enahoro, with whom we sojourned in Ghana before he left for Britain, was arrested in London and extradited to Lagos for trial. He was tried by Justice S.O. Lambo and sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment.

Ten years with hard labour was what the first Premier of Western Region and Leader of Opposition at the House of Representatives got for his efforts to make Nigeria a better place!

The coup in Ghana was possible because Dr. Nkrumah was away in Hanoi (Democratic Republic of North Vietnam) at the invitation of President Ho Chi Minh. His government was unpopular with the Western world because of his Pan- African policy. The slogan of his government was ‘The freedom of Ghana is meaningless without the complete liberation of Africa.’

Those sympathetic to Nkrumah’s cause, namely his ministers and government functionaries in Ghana, were arrested and clamped into jail. Of course, as beneficiaries of his Pan-Africanism, we also fell into this category, and suffered the same fate.

At the open prison, we were treated like common criminals, and herded with perpetrators of petty and major crimes. For a month, the luxury we had enjoyed for the past four years was terminated.

In no time, the government of Nigeria, led by Major- General Johnson Thomas Umunakwe Aguiyi-Ironsi, requested that we be repatriated. He had been made the Head of State after the termination of the First Republic. There had been a bloody coup on January 15, 1966, and quite a number of politicians and senior military officers were murdered. Among them were Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa (Prime Minister), Sir Ahmadu Bello (Northern Region Premier), Chief Ladoke Akintola (Western Region Premier), and Chief Festus Okotie-Eboh (Minister of Finance).

But those who led the mutiny, Majors Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, Tim Onwuatuegwu, Emmanuel Ifeajuna, and Captain Nwobosi, did not succeed in taking over government.

Ikoku and I were airlifted to Lagos from Accra Airport. The day we were repatriated, the soldiers were cruel to S.G. Ikoku. They beat him up for no reason. He was severely beaten, and he sustained some bruises.

Kaduna Prison was where we spent many months as detainees. The prison was uncomfortable and stifling — and we were not allowed visitors. Ikoku and I were in adjacent cells, and we could converse through the bars, or whenever we were allowed in the ‘yard’ (until we were locked up again in our cells by 6p.m).

The cell was small and inhabitable. My sitting room was the toilet box, and my bedroom, the small bed at the other end. Though we were not allowed books or writing material, I had a small transistor radio which was my companion. Jokingly, S. G. Ikoku regularly taunted me, ‘What’s the latest news? You are the one who listens to all the stations.’

The imprisonment was, however, more humane than the subsequent one, during Abacha’s tenure.

I was allowed to write letters (which were vetted by prison authorities) to my wife who also visited once. The censored missives dripped with courage and unrepentance. I wrote repeatedly that they could only imprison my body, not my spirit. Everyone was worried on my behalf, convinced that I wouldn’t regain my freedom easily.

Unknown to me, all my letters were being censored. Mrs. Toun Nwandei, a colleague of my wife’s who was related to Pedro Martins, an army officer, told my wife to advise me to stop writing revolutionary letters. I was writing revolutionary things to the effect that my captors wouldn’t be there when I leave prison. My wife stopped replying, and got word to me that the authorities were reading my letters.

My uncle (Chief J. O. Oluwole, the Advert Manager of Daily Times, who was then the Baba Ijo of St. Phillip’s Church, Isanya-Ogbo, before me) arranged for my wife to visit me in Kaduna Prisons. She came in a Daily Times circulation van. I saw my wife again after many years apart. We spent a few hours holding hands and talking about everything, palpably worried about how the other was coping.

Prisoners then were still treated with some humaneness. Osagie was the Director of Prisons, and he gave my wife permission to visit.

When my wife came and saw me, she was pleasantly surprised. She said, ‘you’ve gained weight, while those of us at home are in agony, losing weight.’

‘I’m at peace with myself,’ was my reply.

My wife stayed for a day in Kaduna, and returned with the van.

The prison officers were friendly. They played scrabble with us. It was there I learnt how to play. S.G. Ikoku and I played for hours to while away the time, and keep our minds off our predicament.

We were allowed to wear our own clothes, not prison uniforms. But I was only allowed correspondence with my wife, not Chief Awolowo. Even in Kaduna, the food was good. They asked me whatever I wanted. I used to enjoy Anchor butter. We were well fed.

All through our time in Kaduna Prisons, we were neither tortured nor interrogated. It was while still in Kaduna Prisons that the July 29, 1966 counter-coup took place and Lt-Col. Yakubu Gowon became Head of State. The coup was led by young army officers (Murtala Muhammed, Theophilus Danjuma and Martin Adamu).

The new  authorities  apparently  encouraged  my  wife to write and intimate me with the new development in the country, especially the massive support enjoyed by the AG.

While  in  Ghana,  we  received  reports  that  the  1964 Federal elections in Nigeria were inconclusive. In 1965, there was the Western Regional election, which was also massively rigged. This led to the wetie tragedy, where many houses were burnt and destroyed, and a lot of people were either maimed or killed. After the rigging, Akintola was vilified and was using an ambulance to move about, hiding from the masses. The confusion was still raging when the January 15, 1966 coup took place. He and his supporters had rigged the election with the concomitant effect of a series of petitions after the election.

Chief Rotimi Williams was defending Akintola’s party (The Nigerian National Democratic Party, NNDP). However but when it came to the petition filed by Chief (Mrs) H.I.D. Awolowo, who was also a victim of the massive rigging, having contested election to the Federal House of Representatives, he failed to appear. The case was still in court when the January 15, 1966 coup was staged.

The counter-coup of July 29, 1966 was largely welcomed by Nigerians. After many weeks, Ikoku and I were transferred to Kirikiri Prisons in Lagos. Here, I was in the company of other  important  detainees,  including  Prof.  Wole  Soyinka (who mentioned me in his prison memoirs, The Man Died).

I was watching one night when they came for Soyinka, and I shouted, ‘I see you o! Don’t go and kill him, and say he was trying to escape…’

I repeated, ‘You have come to take him alive, he can’t disappear. So, don’t ever say he was trying to escape, and you had to kill him.’

Soyinka and I became friends in prison. I called him Sapagiri after the food we ate there. It was some kind of concoction.

Many political activists were detained at that time in various prisons across the country.

Soyinka was the one who went to Broadcasting House in Ibadan, during the crisis in Western Region, to broadcast a pre-recorded message to the effect that the election had been massively rigged, and Akintola should not have declared himself winner of that election.

The new regime of Lt-Col. Yakubu Gowon gave a general amnesty on August 3, 1966 to Chief Awolowo and his colleagues in the treasonable felony trial. Gowon later invited Chief Awolowo to his cabinet as Vice-Chairman of the Federal Executive Council and Commissioner for Finance.

Awo, who was sentenced on September 11, 1963, was then in the Calabar Prison, having been transferred there from Broad Street Prison in Lagos.

Meanwhile, for some time after his release, there was no news about our own release (that is, Ikoku and I), and my wife became agitated. But she was repeatedly assured by Chief Awolowo that the release would happen soon. To confirm this, we read it in the papers how he had been pressing for our release.

My wife visited Chief Awolowo regularly at the Ministry of Finance.

Unknown to her, however, Chief Awolowo himself was apparently frustrated with Gowon not fulfilling his promise about the release. This became evident when, on one of her visits to him, Awo gave vent to his feelings by telling my wife that he was not talking to Gowon about it anymore. This was not well received by my wife who naturally felt that Chief Awolowo should not give up but continue to press for the release of her husband.

But on December 23, 1967, while the detainees in Kirikiri were making preparation to celebrate Christmas in prison, some prison officials came and asked us (Ikoku and I) to pack our luggage. We then enquired, ‘Which location are you taking us to again?’ They told us there was an order to release us. This was sudden, and unexpected, and we had to bid our colleagues a hurried goodbye.

We were later conveyed out of the prison in one of their vehicles and Ikoku was dropped off at his house on Adeniyi Jones Avenue, Ikeja, next door to Chief Erogbogbo’s (father of Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa) house.

I was later taken to my wife’s rented apartment in Shyllon Street, Palmgrove area, which was owned by a popular Ijebu- born hotelier known as Nowoola. He was the proprietor of Palace Hotel on Broad Street, Lagos. It was a storey building. My wife occupied the ground floor. The rent was being paid by leaders of the party, through Chief Shonibare. But when Chief Shonibare left for London, the rent accumulated.

My wife faced the greatest tribulations and ordeal. Apart from raising two young children, she worked as a nurse at Island Maternity to support herself and the children. She also had me to worry about. An absent husband in exile at a time, or in detention and prison.

Once, my wife came home to a rude shock. She and our children had been locked out of her apartment by the landlord. Her rent had been due for many months, and the landlord, who insisted derisively that he didn’t build his house with the proceeds of politics, didn’t want stories anymore. Mr. Nowoola was fed up.

He sent my wife and children onto the corridor. It was a very difficult period. She ran to her brother-in-law Mr. Caesario Dalmeida (father of Doris Ogunsanya, a legal practitioner)  who  bailed  her  out  before  Chief  Shonibare later refunded the rent, and she was allowed back into her apartment.

At this time, something remarkable happened which showed how forgiving Chief Awolowo was. Dr. Moses Majekodunmi, who administered the Western Region during the period of emergency, and was cruel to Awolowo, was opening St. Nicholas Hospital, Onikan (Lagos) in March

1968. He invited Chief Awolowo, who graced the occasion to the consternation of his sympathisers and followers.

My wife was furious. She didn’t understand why Chief Awolowo should honour such an invitation, considering the fact that Majekodunmi had been responsible for ordering the detention of Chief Awolowo and his fellow members. I celebrated the yuletide at home, in Palmgrove (Lagos), with my wife and children (Adeola, then seven, and Obafemi, five).

While I was in exile in Ghana, my elder brother, Lawrence Adebisi Adebanjo, had been staying with my wife, and he was keeping late nights and always knocking the doors loudly at odd hours. On such occasions, a co-tenant, Mr. Kukoyi, a staff of the Central Bank of Nigeria at that time, came to her rescue. Thereafter, as a result of pressure from the family, my brother had to leave.

After my release in December 1967, my wife and I visited Chief Awolowo in Ikenne. He was very happy to see us. He related the story of how my wife was deeply worried, and repeatedly asked him to influence our release from prison.

Awolowo was himself unhappy that his lieutenants were still detained when he had been released and working as Vice- Chairman of Gowon’s government. He wanted us out of detention immediately! But he had to wait until government approved our release.

I was really, deeply concerned about my family all through the ordeal. I left a young wife in London in November 1961 and was waiting for her and the children when the treason trial began in 1962.

It was in Ghana, at Tema Port, that I again saw Christy, Adeola and Obafemi, on their way back to Nigeria. The reunion was tearful. We were together for a few hours at the port and then at my apartment at the housing estate in Accra, until they were again taken to the port for the journey to Lagos. I was seeing my son, Obafemi, for the first time.

Pius Okigbo who later became a renowned economist, was on the ship with Mrs. Christie Adebanjo. The people were nice to my family. The ship first berthed in Sierra Leone and Ghana (Takoradi Port).

Chief Enahoro also came to welcome my family in Accra, explaining to my wife the troubles in Nigeria which forced us into exile.

‘You have to go home. You are not going to disembark here. When you go home, CID will be after you. Don’t be afraid,’ he encouraged her. Everyone was apprehensive.

My  wife  and  children  had  a  lot  of  luggage  because they were coming back home to resettle after many years in England. At Apapa Port, my wife was shocked by the ill- treatment from the security officers. They were simply hostile as if acting out a script. Meanwhile, many people had come to welcome my family back home.

There was a 24-hour surveillance at one point. Someone noticed  the  change  of  guards.  They were  recording  all the numbers of cars, and monitoring all the travellers disembarking from the ship. They searched everywhere. My family members were the last people to leave the ship and the port.

The cheque I had given my wife had to be torn, and destroyed. She chewed and swallowed it, for fear that they would use it as an evidence that she had seen me in Ghana.

Predictably, they asked her if she had any contact with me in Ghana, and she said no.

What broke my wife’s heart most was when a security guard just took a stick and stuck it inside the specially wrapped and packaged birthday cake that she had brought back with her from England. That was the first time she broke down since the horrendous episode which made me a fugitive. She was so upset that she confronted the security agent, ‘Why did you have to destroy this cake?’

‘We were looking for guns,’ was his rather callous reply. They foolishly assumed she was given some arms and ammunition,  or  secret  messages  capable  of  bringing  the Balewa government to its knees. She was nearly stripped at

Apapa Port. They were looking for arms in her underwear!

Her abode at Palmgrove became a target of constant

raids and searches throughout this period.

When Enahoro was arrested, a lorry load of policemen

also came to my wife’s house. They said they heard Chief Ayo

Adebanjo was coming home.

She was apprehensive. The soldiers knocked and entered, and  surrounded  everywhere.  The  next  day,  my  family became heroes. The Action Group had supporters (from the neighbours visiting).

Even my father was not spared the agonising and inhuman treatment. His house in Ijebu-Ode was also targeted. It was searched painstakingly for ‘subversive materials.’ My father was detained for nine months at Alagbon Close (now called Force Criminal Investigation Department) in Ikoyi, Lagos.

He was arrested in Ijebu-Ode, and hit fiercely on the head with a baton. ‘Tell us where your son is,’ he was constantly harangued. My father never failed to retort, ‘Does your father know where you are now in Nigeria?’

Even  my  sister,  Mercy  Aduke  Onajinrin  (mother  of Otunba Sunday Onajinrin, a retired Customs officer) was also not spared this harassment as her house in Ososa, near Ijebu-Ode, was vigorously searched on several occasions.

One Mr. John Lynn (a white man) was the investigating officer. My father was taken from Ijebu-Ode and moved to Lagos. While in detention, he told my colleagues who were brought there the methods of the investigators: ‘they’d harass you, but don’t tell them what you don’t know.’

Chief Awolowo admired my father’s courage, and when he wrote one of his books, he autographed a copy for my father.

All through these harassments, nothing incriminating was ever found. The government was scared, jittery and very suspicious. High-ranking officials of the government of the day were united in destroying and hounding the families of those arraigned and convicted for ‘treason.’

Even when my mother passed on in 1963, the funeral was infiltrated by soldiers and policemen. They were searching for me, hoping that I would attend my mother’s burial. The woman, who gave everything to ensure that her only child, her son, got good education, couldn’t revel in my care and attention in her twilight. She never even enjoyed the fruits of her labour, never benefited from my new status as a lawyer and gentleman with appreciable means.

The treason trial was reported everyday, by Horatio Agedah, on a news segment on radio called, “Today at the Treason Trial”. My mother listened to it religiously.

She was alone in her final hours, without me by her death bed. She was buried without me performing the traditional dust-to-dust rites. My mother was buried in Ijebu-Ode, and coming for her funeral was inconceivable.

But thank God for a good wife, and a loyal friend in the person of Alhaji Moshood Ola. Owodunni who rallied my friends and colleagues to the funeral. He also placed his Chevrolet car at my wife’s disposal during the funeral. He was a pillar of support.

Somehow, I knew my wife was really taking care of the children, being a nurse. I wasn’t bothered about their safety because I knew we had enormous support.

Even during the trial, everyone (apart from those who sympathised  with  the  Tafawa  Balewa  government)  knew as a matter of fact that it was all a farce. No treason had been committed. There were a lot of misconceptions at the time. The government was aggressive and very intolerant of opposition. There was no doubt that we had our own tough boys who protected us during elections.

We were critical of the government; we were the main opposition, and the whole world knew. But it was not true, when late Prof. Sanya Onabamiro claimed he heard Chief Obafemi Awolowo talking about a coup.

Before the treasonable felony trial, the Coker Commission of Enquiry (headed by Justice G. B. A. Coker) had indicted Chief Awolowo over the handling of Western Region funds. So, they were obviously looking for all means to tarnish his image.

The treasonable felony trial itself ended on September 11, 1963, when the accused were sentenced to varying jail terms. Awolowo bagged a ten-year jail term which was later reduced to seven. Chief Anthony Enahoro (who had been repatriated  from  the  United  Kingdom)  got  his  15  years reduced to ten. But three of us (Ikoku, Aluko and I) were never tried because we were not available for trial, though we were declared wanted.

During the trial, my colleagues and I had settled well in Accra benefiting from the hospitality of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah (the ‘Osagyefo’) who treated us as political refugees. I was given a suitable accommodation in a highbrow area of town (with domestic staff to attend to my needs) with ministers (including Kofi Bako, Minister of Defence) and high-ranking government officials as neighbours. With a very good job as a features editor in Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (then Radio Ghana) I earned enough to buy a brand new Peugeot 403 saloon car in Ghana which made moving around easy and comfortable. I had enough money to keep me going.

My boss, Rowland Aghozo, an Ewe man, was favourably disposed to me when he discovered that my wife was from Togo; besides, he appreciated my commitment to the cause I was fighting.

I was a producer, organising interviews and contacting people who would talk on various topics. The job exposed me to the leading lights in Ghana, the intelligentsia and the elite.

I got on well with them. My current affairs programme was very popular.

Ghana at the time was the seat of anti-colonialism. All countries that were not independent had their base in Ghana.

Articles  about  the  emancipation  of  the  African  race were popular on my programme. We also looked for patriots whom we could invite to speak on the evils of colonialism.

1. G. Ikoku worked with Spark newspaper, a publication of the Bureau of African Affairs as the Editor. (Kofi Batsha was Editor-in-Chief ). Spark was a revolutionary paper of Nkrumah.

Aluko was doing clerical work in the Bureau.

Nkrumah had this set-up for freedom fighters. People from South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Malawi (then known as Nyasaland), they were all there.

Life was good here. I arranged that my wig and gown should be brought. I had to be registered at the Ghana Bar before I could practise as a lawyer, and it was taking longer than I thought. At a time I registered in the French School.

In  1963,  the  annual  OAU  (Organisation  of  African Unity), now AU (African Union) conference was scheduled to be held in Ghana. The Prime Minister of Nigeria, Alhaji Tafawa Balewa, said he would not be able to attend the conference as long as we were there as Nkrumah’s refugees.

To satisfy him therefore, Dr. Nkrumah organised a political tour for us to the Soviet Union and Eastern Germany for the period of the conference. The trip, for us, turned out to be a blessing in disguise as it offered a most enlightening and educative experience.

We were treated as tourists in Moscow and Berlin. Nkrumah had told them we were freedom fighters. They received us well and we visited important historical sites.

But I still felt lonely and afraid. I was alone in a foreign land (though I had a few people I could call friends). The only way I could communicate with my wife was through letters – and we exchanged correspondence regularly.

The deputy mayor in Dahomey (the man who saw to my easy passage from Cotonou to Accra, and accommodated me) organised a courier between me and my wife in Lagos.

He would come to Ghana, collect my letter, and deliver it to Olu Adebanjo, who was editor of Daily Express (Sunday). Both of us were friends.

I had known Olu Adebanjo from Nigeria, long before I went to study in England. He was one of the beneficiaries of the Action Group (AG) government scheme to study journalism abroad. In fact, it was the same MV Aureol that took me to England that also brought him back to Nigeria.

He was one of those in the welcoming team on my arrival at Easton Station from Liverpool and followed us to my friend’s (Mr Ajayi’s) house where he helped in preparing my dinner.

It was through my recommendation that he became editor of Daily Express. He was from Idowa near Ijebu-Ode, and a member of AG. During the Western Region crisis however, he became an Akintola follower, and joined the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP). That was when I stopped using him as courier. That link was broken when he (Olu Adebanjo) was suspected of being a double agent.

Throughout the period of my exile in Ghana, from 1962 to 1966, my wife was only able to visit once. She came with Deola and Obafemi. While I was in Ghana, Pa Adesanya also visited us. (He was a junior lawyer during the trial, with Mr. Dingle Foot, a highly regarded British lawyer, as the lead counsel for Chief Awolowo).

Nigerians in Ghana who were sympathetic to the cause of Action Group made life comfortable for us. I remember Chief E. A. Abimbola, Aderanti Ademuyiwa, J.O. Ogunwunmi and Ebun Sonowo.

They ensured that we were not lonely; they visited us and made living in Accra less stressful and burdensome, until we left Ghana in 1966 after the coup that toppled our host, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah.

The battle had been long-drawn, ferocious, and exhausting; a full-scale combat with victims, casualties and prisoners of war. The soldiers of fortune, executors of the operation, were cold-blooded, heartless and unkind – wicked!

The Action Group, our leaders (all the 31 accused persons, and their immediate family members) and sympathisers, were subjected to various forms of harassment and harm, such as physical assault and the destruction of their properties.

Curiously, our enemies, busy rejoicing over their temporary victory, didn’t get wind of the whispers of their own dirges, until the elegies became louder, more than a din, performed by an orchestra – and the perpetrators of the perfidy became the losers, footnotes of history.

These last five years (1962-1967) were more than harrowing for many. My fate and steps took their own wings, and flew to ports I never planned. I didn’t bargain for what befell me – being declared wanted, framed as a dissident plotting to maim and kill, and bring the government of the day down, fleeing and living in exile, and later detained and imprisoned.

 

Chapter 7

A New Beginning

Then I returned a free man, I bounced back to life and tried to catch up. I cleaned my wigs, laundered my gown and dusted my law books. I had to settle

down fast, as a professional and family man, with a young wife and two children, a young girl and a toddler.

We didn’t stay long at Palmgrove, the house where my wife (Christie), daughter (Adeola) and son (Obafemi), lived while I was away. Immediately I regained my freedom, I started to look for a flat.

Early in January 1968 as I set out on this task on my way to Lagos, Senator Lere Adesina (now deceased), who had been a friend in London and was then a senior staff at Shell Petroleum Company on the Marina, saw me at the bus stop (Palmgrove) and gave me a lift.

During our conversation, I told him I was looking for a flat. He told me there was a house in his care (it belonged to one of his staff who had gone to the East as a result of the civil war, which broke out in May 1967).

 

 

That was how I got the house at No. 10, Shofidiya Close, Surulere, about two weeks after I came out of prison. The transaction was easy.

In a few months, we relocated and settled in the house. My wife still worked at Island Maternity. A better and more befitting accommodation it was; a pad where one could begin anew, and re-model a future after the interruption by the treason trial and its consequences.

Almost next door, with only a building separating us (owned by Gab Fagbure, a renowned journalist and former press attaché in the Nigerian High Commission in London), was Moshood Abiola. He was always very respectful and pleasant to me; as was his wife, Simbiat.

Abiola and Simbiat often had loud altercations, and I usually found myself having to intervene as peacemaker. When Abiola later got the ITT job, I was one of the first persons he informed about it. I rejoiced with him and advised him that such a high office compelled more understanding with his wife.

There were other neighbours – Architect Olumuyiwa (who was my senior at CMS Grammar School and who later moved on to Ikoyi; his wife, Gladys Olabisi was also my wife’s colleague at Island Maternity); Mr. Yemi Buko (a senior official at the Nigerian Ports Authority, who later became a priest); and Alao Aka-Bashorun (the lawyer who later became President of Nigerian Bar Association, during which time the body was more dynamic).

When I first moved to the close, Aka-Bashorun and Buko frequently gave me rides in their cars to Lagos (before I could afford to own one).

When the landlord returned in 1972 after the civil war, he was happy about the condition in which he met the house. He however expressed the desire to repossess the house, but I asked for a few months before he could take possession to enable me complete my own house which was then under construction. He willingly granted this request.

In early 1968, the memories of the gales and blizzards of the previous months gave rise to a surge of optimism, of giving life my best shot. My childhood friend, one of the people I had known the longest, provided the platform to practise. I started my practice in the law firm of Alhaji M. O. Owodunni (M. Ola. Owodunni & Co.), who accommodated me in his office; and 48, Docemo Street, Lagos, was our base.

Alhaji Owodunni was my senior at the bar and I learnt so much from him. He gave me many cases to handle, especially when he couldn’t attend the trials himself. He had a lot of briefs, and allowed me to handle some – and the clients paid me directly. We later moved to 34, Hawley Street, also in the heart of Lagos.

Early in 1979, I moved my own chambers to Western House on Broad Street, Lagos (first on the 13th floor, and later on the 3rd). I was the principal partner of Ayo Adebanjo

& Co., but I had some junior lawyers, particularly during elections in 1979 (including one Mr. Omotayo, whom I later learnt came from a neighbouring village, Odoagamegi).

By the grace of God, I had a good practice as a lawyer. I built my very first house in Surulere on Nuru Oniwo Street, Aguda, and it was declared open by Chief Awolowo in 1973. I also rebuilt my mother’s house at Mushin, on Tade Lane, in

1978.

All  the  property  I  have  today  were  acquired  and maintained from the income I made as a lawyer, as I have never enjoyed any political appointment.

I worked hard as a barrister and solicitor and concentrated largely on land matters. I can say that a lot of my possessions were from land matters which was very lucrative. I didn’t turn other cases down though, I did criminal cases too. I was very frequent and regular at the high courts, and sometimes at the magistrate courts.

One case stands out in my memory: Adiatu Ladunni vs Oludotun Adekunle Kukoyi. It was a landmark case, with me representing Surveyor Kukoyi against ‘Timi the Law’ (Chief F.R.A.Williams) – and I defeated the legend in court. The case has become a reference for injunctions. Justice G.B.A. Coker read the judgement at the Supreme Court, with two other justices (Atanda Fatai-Williams and G.S. Sowemimo) sitting on the matter at the Supreme Court on Friday, March

3, 1972. The land in question was at Ikeja, on about two plots.

In all, although not a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), by the grace of God I was blessed in legal practice. Law was fascinating enough, but I had incomes through other sources. This came about when I became involved with a company known  as  Impo-Expo  Nigeria  Limited  through  some  of my  friends:  Messrs.  M.O.  Owodunni,  S.O.  Olaniyan and  Oladimeji  Gbolade.  The company  specialised  in  the importation of cement and other merchandise and in time we joined the big league of cement importers like Yinka Folawiyo, Ayo Fasanya and other companies.

One of our foreign suppliers was a Belgian company known as Cobec, whose chief executive was Mr. Schweppes, who occasionally visited Nigeria because of the volume of business we did with him. As a matter of fact, I was not originally a member of the company. The promoters were looking for overdrafts, and they had approached me to help them get one at National Bank, after unsuccessful attempts through other banks, including Co-operative Bank.

Late Chief Olu Aboderin was then the Chief Accountant of National Bank. (Aboderin was a first-class nationalist and an active member of the London branch of AG when I was Secretary of the branch). So, I went to him, and told him my friends wanted an overdraft.

He asked if I was a director, and I said no. He then said that without me being a director and a co-signatory, he wouldn’t grant any overdraft. Although my friends had properties to use as collateral, Aboderin said he would depend more on my integrity for the repayment of the loan. I reported these conditions back to my friends and they willingly accepted, hence I became a director of the company.

It was a lot of money required from the National Bank to open a letter of credit for the cement business we were involved in. We were importing shiploads of cement.

When the business was booming, my friend Owodunni encouraged me to go and start the development of my landed property in Aguda, Surulere, which I had earlier purchased through another friend and colleague, Z.O.K. Adetula, who was the Chairman of the London Branch of the Action Group while I was the Secretary.

Adetula was the solicitor to the Nuru-Oniwo Estate, owners of a large parcel of land in Aguda. I took his advice and, with my share of the proceeds, I was able to start my Surulere house, buying cement at cost price.

The house was completed with the earnings from my law practice and the financial support of my wife who raised a housing loan from service and committed it entirely to the project. The loan was defrayed some years later with her retirement benefits. Because we were making a lot of money from the business, we invested some of our profit by buying shares in several companies.

The third floor of Hawley Street was big enough to accommodate the chambers of Owodunni & Co., Ayo Adebanjo & Co. and the office of the Managing Director of Impo-Expo, Mr. S.O. Olaniyan. The building was owned by Mrs. Duro Emmanuel. Because of my political connection with her, I approached her and she readily let it to us.

Chapter 8

Prelude to the Second Republic

I never left politics. I was never discouraged, and there was no time I decided to leave politics. In 1976 I even contested for councillorship in Ijebu Division and won, although I had no intention to contest in the zero-party local government election.

The 1976 local government election was on a non-party basis. The ban on political parties had not been lifted. This was during the military era, when Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo was Head of State (after the February 13, 1976 coup in which Gen. Murtala Muhammed, the then Commander-in-Chiefof the Armed Forces and Head of State, was murdered).

Chief Awolowo advised that in order to sustain the imageof the party, those of us who were his close lieutenants all over the region should contest. So, Chief Bisi Onabanjo and I ran for the Ijebu-Ode Local Government Council election. We both won and Onabanjo became chairman of the council and later emerged as the first Executive Governor of Ogun State in 1979.

 Meanwhile, Chief Awolowo’s political machinery was being lubricated, and the Committee of Friends met regularly in Ikenne (Ogun State), especially during Awolowo’s birthday on March 6 (He was born in 1909). Many issues were tabled and logically resolved with positions the house agreed to (by simple majority).

One issue on top of the agenda was the formation of another party, since Action Group had been banned. Then, announcement  had  been  made  that  democracy  would return in 1976 (and Awolowo had resigned from Gowon’s government in 1971).

Chief Awolowo directed us to contest, to forestall the rumour that pro-military candidates for the local council election might pass a resolution that the military should not return the country to democracy. So, with the politicians controlling the local government councils, this fear was allayed.

At Ijebu-Ode local government council where I emerged councillor, with Chief Bisi Onabanjo as chairman, there were

22 councillors, among whom the chairman would be elected. I represented Ogbo. There were 10 councillors from Ijebu- Ode township and 12 from the district.

Councillors from the district supported the candidature of Amos Olorunfunmi Oredugba (from Ilese) who was a retired deputy permanent secretary. Because they formed a majority in the council, if they had voted en masse for their candidate, he would have won.

However, in order to tilt the pendulum in favour of Chief Onabanjo who enjoyed the total support of Ijebu- Ode councilors, we needed two additional votes from the district. Therefore, coming from the district and being a close associate of Onabanjo, I used my influence over another candidate from the district to tilt the election in favour of Chief Onabanjo.

 The councillors from the district did not take kindly to my support for Onabanjo. But after the election, the council worked in unison.

Ijebu-Ode Council then had many graduates and professionals, among whom were Surveyor Okusanya (from Ososa) and Onafowope (an accountant from Itamapako).

At the period of the election, I had a commercial bus which operated in Lagos. Voters from my constituency who were living in Lagos had requested that I provide my bus to them for free to enable them come home to vote. But I refused.

I told them that voting was their civic responsibility. That if they cared about democracy and believed in my representation, they should support me freely without any inducement whatsoever from me. And I asked, ‘If another candidate of your choice in the future does not run a transport service, would you not come home to vote for him?’ This got them persuaded, and having made my point I thereafter contributed to the cost of their transportation.

One of them had the effrontery to ask for money in later years. I lambasted him. Even my polling agents didn’t get a penny before the election. It was after. The political experiment lasted two years. The council was dissolved and there was an interim council, a caretaker committee to oversee the local governments.

The experiment was interesting. The programme we were executing was populist-based. We were looking at the defects of the military and thought about how we could improve democratisation. We improved roads, built markets (the present Ita Osu market was initiated during our tenure).

We made it different from a nominated council. Because we were elected, our programmes were related to the yearnings of the people. The councillorship was on a part-time basis. I never abandoned my practice. I’ve never lived on politics.

We were earning an allowance, though. But the allowance was not up to the salary of my driver. It was not a monthly salary, maybe sitting allowance. It was only the chairman and supervisory councillors that were on a salary.

We had ideas about how local government programmes could be run. We wanted to demonstrate how a progressive party would perform.

There was no acrimony. We agreed on most things. In 1978, during the Constituent Assembly elections, I expressed interest in being a member. I discussed with Onabanjo who initially consented but later expressed the desire to run too.

I told Onabanjo that he had given me his word that he’d support my candidacy for the Constituent Assembly.

But his excuse was shocking. He claimed that those from the Ijebu districts said they wouldn’t vote for me since I didn’t support their candidate in the chairmanship election in 1976.

I was crestfallen and alarmed. I didn’t want any rancor with any colleague, so I reported the matter to Chief Awolowo who found Onabanjo’s excuse baffling.

Chief Awolowo upbraided Onabanjo. But the campaign was far gone and not much could be done, and so I yielded to him and supported his candidature in order to avoid conceding victory by default to a candidate who didn’t share our political beliefs.

In the primaries leading to the 1979 gubernatorial election in Ogun State, Chief Onabanjo was conscious of his action of the previous year. The electoral college choosing the candidate for the Unity Party of Nigeria had 20 members from Ijebu/ Ijebu Remo Divisions, another 20 from Egba, and 10 from Yewa (Egbado). There were four contestants — Soji Odunjo, Bisi Onabanjo, J.A.O. Odebiyi and Tunji Otegbeye.

At a meeting where delegates were being chosen from the Ijebu Division, Onabanjo (who chaired the meeting) seemed determined to ignore me, and so he just went on choosing others.

 ‘I’m here, that’s my constituency,’ I reminded him when he got to the turn of choosing delegates from my own district.

He was compelled to nominate me. I believe he deliberately wanted to avoid me, thinking that with my inclusion, I would retaliate at the electoral college, and not vote for him. But if I did he would have lost. He was more than pleasantly surprised therefore that I could be more magnanimous than he thought.

During the elections, Odunjo polled 20 votes, Onabanjo 20, Odebiyi 6, and Otegbeye 4. Yewa had already promised us their votes if there was a second ballot.

However, if I hadn’t voted for him, there would be no need for a second ballot. Odunjo would have won with 21 votes, and emerged the Governor of Ogun in 1979. Onabanjo would have polled 19 votes.

Onabanjo and I had come a long way. We were childhood friends; we were in the Royal Fancy Club together (our Captain was Tunde Amuwo).

Then he was in Baptist Academy. When he was in Radio Nigeria, he always visited my office (as Organising Secretary of Action Group) in Offin, Sagamu (on Akarigbo Street). We were at Daily Service together before then (around 1953).

Meanwhile, the Committee of Friends was meeting and discussing politics in Chief Awolowo’s house, in anticipation of the lifting of the ban on politics in 1976 as promised by Gowon. But this was not to be because the 1975 coup, which gave birth to the Murtala Muhammed military regime, scuttled the lifting of the ban on politics in 1976.

Awolowo was holding informal meetings all through this period. But, curiously enough, Gowon announced in 1974 that 1976 was ‘no longer realistic.’ This statement provoked a lot of criticism from the general public. But when Gowon was away in 1975, a coup took place and Murtala Muhammed came into office.

 It was in an attempt to start democratic government that Murtala began the zero-party local government administration. However, while the council experiment was on, Murtala was assassinated in 1976 and Obasanjo, who was the then Chief of Staff, became head of state by default.

To his credit, however, Obasanjo didn’t change the transition programme for return to civilian rule in 1979. He therefore constituted a 50-member Constituent Assembly, including Chief Obafemi Awolowo but spitefully nominated, as Chairman, Chief Rotimi Williams (who was a minister under Awolowo’s premiership between 1952 and 1959). Chief Awolowo declined the nomination, hence only 49 members served on the body.

When the ban on politics was eventually lifted in 1978, we were ready with our manifesto, symbols and slogans and also the name, Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN).

The        Constituent        Assembly            produced            the         1979 Constitution. I have never considered political office as a matter of life and death. My satisfaction has always been to be identified with a party that has a people-centred programme.

The formation of UPN was preceded by meetings of a committee of friends who were old members of Action Group (AG). We could have called it AG. But the government had prohibited the naming of political parties after any of the parties in the First Republic. As many as 90 per cent of those who were in UPN were old members of AG.

In the course of lifting the ban on politics and forming a new party, Chief Awolowo now started a tour of the country to sensitise our old members. On one occasion, Obasanjo learnt that we were meeting in Kwara State and got a security report. He stopped us. On another occasion, we were on tour of the then East Central State (precisely in Abakaliki) in 1978. The police confronted us and asked Chief Awolowo to go back to base.

Awo’s entourage included M.C.K. Ajuluchukwu, Kanyinsola Ajayi (now SAN, son of Sir Olaniwun Ajayi) and myself.

In compliance with the directive, Chief Awolowo returned to Lagos after passing the night in Enugu. He however directed me to lead the rest of the delegation to complete  the  sensitisation  of  our  supporters  nationwide since we had previously informed our members that we were coming to talk to them.

The  government  having  prevented  Chief  Awolowo from forging ahead with his sensitisation tours, our private meetings continued in Lagos (Apapa) to formulate the party policies.

We met sometimes in Apapa and at other times in Ikenne. Lateef Jakande, Bisi Onabanjo, Bola Ige, Alhaji S.O. Gbadamosi, Chief Abraham Adesanya, Otunba Sholanke Onasanya, Alfred Rewane, Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, Chief Adekunle Ajasin, Chief Wunmi Adegbonmire, Ganiyu Dawodu, Michael Omisade and Alhaji Solomon (Senator Ganiyu Olawale Solomon’s father) were among those invited to such meetings. (Most of us who were involved in the treasonable felony trial were there). At this time, Segun Osoba was the Editor of Daily Sketch, the mouthpiece of the then Western State Government.

We had formed the UPN before Ebenezer Babatope was  employed  as  an  organising  secretary.  I  became  a member of the highest decision-making body of the party, the  National  Executive  Council  (having  been  nominated by Chief Awolowo). Unity Party of Nigeria was not much different from Action Group in terms of political ideology and discipline.

We had the opportunity of working under the same leader, who saw to the discipline, uprightness and proper ideological orientation of members. It was indeed a meeting of like minds who believed in the philosophy and ideology of Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

On  founding  the  UPN,  the  democratic  socialism programme of the AG was translated into the four cardinal programmes of compulsory free education, free health care, integrated rural development and full employment.

This had to be so because, during the Action Group crisis,  Chief  S.L.  Akintola  mischievously  misrepresented democratic socialism to the people as having ‘buba’ without a pair of trousers (or if you had ‘buba’ you wouldn’t have a cap). This compelled the spelling out of the ideology into the four cardinal programmes of UPN to avoid any ill-motivated future misrepresentation.

The  elections  were  near  and  Chief  Awolowo  was contesting the Presidency. Along with Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, I went on campaign tours (at our own cost and expense and in our cars) soliciting for votes from Nigerians.

The 1979 Constitution was fashioned after a presidential system of government with a distinct legislature and executive.

The Unity Party of Nigeria won only five states (Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Ondo and Bendel) during the gubernatorial elections, losing the Presidency and many states largely to the National Party of Nigeria.

The president (with a vice on the same ticket) would have full executive powers with a retinue of ministers (who were not legislators or parliamentarians, unlike in a parliamentary system as practised in the First Republic), the Senate, dubbed the upper house of the National Assembly with the lower house labelled the House of Representatives. The states would have executive governors and commissioners (approved by their respective Houses of Assembly).

The animosity of Obasanjo towards Awolowo had been demonstrated in many ways before the election. For instance, he told some supporters of Chief Obafemi Awolowo in Egba Division that the party that would win the election had not yet emerged. This was against the background that at the time Chief Awolowo announced his party (UPN), no other party had been announced.

When later the NPN was formed and Shagari emerged as its presidential candidate, it was clear to political watchers that he was not a match to Chief Awolowo. And to disabuse the minds of such people, Obasanjo, in an open prejudice against Awolowo, announced in faraway South Africa that ‘the best man may not win the election.’

The election was riddled with malpractices, and rigging was  widespread.  Alhaji  Shehu  Usman  Aliyu  Shagari,  the reluctant  candidate  of  National  Party  of  Nigeria  (NPN) who only wanted to be a senator, was said to have polled 5,688,587 (33.8 per cent of total votes cast) and Awolowo 4,916,651 (29.2 per cent).

Awolowo  challenged  the  results  on  the  ground  that although Shagari won an overall majority, he didn’t win 25 per cent in two-thirds of (the then) 19 states of the federation, (which is 13, since there is no fraction of a state). In that situation, a rerun would have been ordered in line with the constitution which provides as follows:

A candidate for an election to the office of the President shall be deemed to have been duly elected, where, there being more than two candidates for the election (if ) (a) he has the highest number of votes cast at the election; and (b) he has not less than one-quarter of the votes at the election in each of at least two-thirds of all the states of the federation.

However, instead of ordering a rerun election, the then electoral body declared Shagari elected. It took them a whole of five days to make this announcement!

 Chief Awolowo objected to the declaration and filed a petition at the tribunal. He  lost at the Election Petitions Tribunal which amazingly ruled that 12 2/3 (twelve two- thirds) was what Shagari needed. Since he won marginally in Kano, the tribunal ruled that he should be declared the President.

Then Chief Awolowo went on appeal to the Supreme Court which amazingly upheld the tribunal’s judgment. However, in the split decision, the minority decision by Justices Kayode Esho and A.O. Obaseki insisted that 13 should be the two-thirds of 19 states.

One bizarre aspect of this judgement, was the pronouncement by the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Atanda Fatai-Williams, that the judgment was a closed precedent, which meant that the case couldn’t be cited in future! That put paid to the matter.

It was a landmark decision which earned Chief Richard Akinjide, the NPN lawyer who argued in their favour, the sobriquet ‘Mr. 12 2/3 (twelve two-thirds)’. Chief Awolowo described the judgment in one of his memoirs as ‘Judalex Coup’. This judgment and the comment of the Chief Justice who delivered it cast a dark shadow on the image of the judiciary. The UPN became a strong opposition in many states and Awolowo still had a large followership.

 

Chapter 9

Why I am a Committed Awoist

Pople have often asked why, of all his associates, I seem to be one of the few consistent followers of Chief Obafemi Awolowo (Awoists) and I make no apologies over that.

First,  I  am  awed  by  his  candour,  discipline  and forthrightness.  Then, as  a  politician  and  party  leader,  I strongly  admire  the  programmes  of  Chief  Awolowo  for developing Nigeria.

In the programmes of Chief Awolowo under the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), we had what we called the ‘four cardinal programmes’. What did they stand for?

Free education – which stood for the development of the people, making man the centre of development; free health – by this, the health of the masses was to be taken care of: a strong man in a strong body; this was conceptualised in a way that it was not only the rich people that would have access to good medical care, it was meant for everybody, and we had free medical care for people up to the age of 18 years; integrated rural development – to get food for the people, and once there was abundant supply of food, there would be less agitation by the common man; then full employment – these were all social services for the people.

When we talk of free education, it was really qualitative education, not the type of education where there would be no chairs in the classroom, and the people who canvassed this would send their own children abroad.

In the case of Chief Awolowo when he started free education, his two children who were still within free education age then attended the free schools. Free education was a major policy of the party signposting its welfarist philosophy which we as the party’s organising secretaries used to canvass support from the masses.

As a demonstration of his leadership by example and not by precepts, Chief Awolowo ensured that he practised what he preached. For instance, Tokunbo, who later became an ambassador, and late Mrs. Soyode were products of public schools (they attended St. Anne’s/UMC Demonstration School in Ibadan). The quality then was such that from there they were admitted to secondary school.

The policy behind free education was that it would make the children of the poor to have access to the highest level of education in the world.

When we introduced free primary education, we also introduced  200  scholarships  to  tertiary  institutions  every year in the whole Western Region which has produced so many prominent Nigerians in all spheres of life today. I can mention Prof. Oloko, Prof. Onitiri, Prof. Ojetunji Aboyade, Prof. Akin. Mabogunje and Chief M.K.O. Abiola, who were all products of Action Group scholarship.

It is important to state that the idea of awarding scholarships in Western Region was actually introduced by Egbe Omo Oduduwa when it noticed that the standard of education was not as high as envisaged because there were not enough graduate teachers in our secondary schools. Hence, it introduced scholarship for teachers to bridge the gap. Some of the beneficiaries were Prof. Akin. Mabogunje, Rev. Osinulu and Mr. Ogunyemi.

When  the  Action  Group  was  formed,  the  party adopted the scholarship scheme by increasing the number of beneficiaries to 200.

However, when the scholarship scheme was to be introduced, the colonial education officers tried to discourage Chief Awolowo by saying that he wouldn’t be able to get enough students to qualify for scholarships. But they were later proved wrong when the number of applicants overwhelmed the available number.

As a matter of fact, Chief Awolowo’s philosophy encompassed all my beliefs about human life. That was why I spelt out Awo’s four cardinal principles – free education, free medical services, integrated rural development, full employment – and their implications on life. This is because when you talk of integrated rural development, it is not the type of farming we are used to, because if they were not educated they would not be able to go into the mechanised farming we were introducing. By the time you had this education that we were talking about, there was no length you could not go and that would affect every common man.

Even at that time, the products of free education and scholarship to universities we introduced were so massive that by the time the federal government started to appoint ambassadors, we had to release a lot of scholarship students to Awolowo on request. Chief Awolowo then said to them, ‘I won’t compel you to serve the federal government.’

I think I should mention this: When you talk of the four cardinal programmes of the AG, originally we called them the socialist programmes. It was during the crisis of the party that the late Chief Akintola bastardised the word ‘democracy’. Our programmes were encapsulated under a philosophy called ‘democratic socialism,’ but during the crisis with Chief Akintola, he bastardised it to the Yoruba people to say that democratic socialism meant that if you had a pair of trousers you wouldn’t have buba (top), and if you had buba you wouldn’t have a pair of trousers; and if you have this you won’t have that.

So, after the crisis, by the time we came here in 1979, we didn’t use democratic socialism, we now spelt it out. What did it mean? We now came out with four cardinal programmes.

What this shows is that I am an original Awoist, because all those who have given up did so after Awoism had taken off in the old Western Region. The passion that made us to be so particular about the policies of the AG were not there. By the time Chief Awolowo came into this country the system then was a unitary form of government. Chief Awolowo, it was, who introduced federalism. The colonial agitation then was in favour of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe who was preaching unitary form of government. But when Chief Awolowo came, he went to great lengths to explain the fact that due to the heterogeneous nature of this country, the unitary system was inappropriate; and that if we really wanted to live together in peace, the only system that we needed was federalism. He gave an empirical example in his books, ‘Thoughts on the Nigerian Constitution’ and ‘The People’s Republic’. It was all this that got me convinced that Awo’s thoughts for a better Nigeria were appropriate.

These two publications further strengthened the case for federalism as the right type of government for Nigeria. I was onvinced because, by culture, by religion, by everything, we are different in this country. But we also appreciate the fact that bringing us together either by force or otherwise in 1949 had the advantage of numbers. So, with that we must get rid of the inherent iniquities or imperfections by forming ourselves into a federal government to make every federating unit develop at its own pace.

So, what Awoism stands for is simple. The name stands for itself. Awoism is the collective doctrine of the philosophy of   Chief   Obafemi   Awolowo,   his   political   philosophy, practice and political integrity that he was known for. All the philosophies spelt out in his doctrine are free education, free health, integrated rural development and full employment. All these philosophies that help the common man to become somebody, these were the things that attracted the masses to him and that made for Awoism. Anybody that deviates from these principles by word or deed is not an Awoist.

Awoism is not personified by the cap Awo was wearing or any other mannerism of his, neither does wearing a replica of his glasses make you an Awoist.

What does is the way you behave, your integrity, what you practise and your public image as a politician, because Chief Awolowo was somebody who did not believe that politics is a dirty game. He believed that it is those that practise it who make it dirty… that politics itself is a clean game, and people must attempt to play it clean. That was his philosophy.

So, many of those who claim to be Awoists today cannot be so described. How can you be an Awoist and be fraternising with Obasanjo, Babangida and Abacha?

 

 

Awo, a Democrat

Three years as a politician in the best tradition, under the guardianship of the master, was engrossing. Time flew by, election after election. During those days, I knew how the party was run. I got an insight into how the Action Group operated, its modus and ethos.

In the days of Awolowo as Premier, before budget presentation on the floor of the House of Assembly, there would have been a Parliamentary Council meeting (at least, one week before).

It is at the Parliamentary Council meeting that the budget was discussed in detail. The Parliamentary Council had as members House of Assembly lawmakers, ministers, executive members of AG, divisional leaders and organising secretaries.

The programme of the party was also first discussed by the Parliamentary Council. Even new programmes were analysed and dissected. The party programmes embodied in the budget were also debated at the Parliamentary Council. This was democracy in action.

Chief Awolowo was always a democrat. His action exemplified the principles and spirit of democracy. When we won the election in 1952, the proposal for the introduction of free education showed how democratic Chief Awolowo was.

The party manifesto stipulated free primary education (primary 1-6). By the time it was to be implemented, some radicals, who were in the majority, said it must be compulsory. It was a heated debate. But it was only Awolowo who said we shouldn’t make it compulsory. This debate informed our position as a party.

During the 1954 general elections, the opposition used it against us by deliberately and mischievously misinterpreting the law to the people that Awolowo had passed a law that anyone who failed to send his children to school would be sent to jail. So, one of the reasons we lost, apart from the capitation tax (which we introduced to finance the free education programme) and using educated candidates against popular aspirants, was ‘compulsory’ free education. Thus, the Action Group became the first political party in power to lose an election.

 After we lost the election, we came to the party executive and Awolowo said we should review our position. Then we adopted free education without the compulsory tag.

As a result of our losing the 1954 federal elections, the NCNC, which won the majority from our region, chose Adegoke Adelabu, J.M. Johnson and Kola Balogun as ministers at the centre.

Chief Awolowo had calculated the cost of financing free education and found that the finances of the region could not adequately support it without raising extra taxes. One of such taxes was capitation tax. It was very controversial. Chief Awolowo explained that payment of this tax by both male and female would enable every family to educate their children, no matter the number.

But the opposition NCNC cried foul, that it was not possible. They argued that all the AG intended to do was sell Mapo Hall (which he knew Ibadan people had sentimental attachment to). Adegoke Adelabu was one of the greatest antagonists of the AG on this matter.

This propaganda was, however, debunked when, in January 1955, free primary education became a reality throughout the Western Region. The party won with a landslide.

Another evidence of Awo’s democratic nature was when a new cabinet was to be formed after the regional election of 1956 and Chief M.S. Sowole, who was from the same division like him, was pencilled down for a cabinet position against his opposition.

Chief Awolowo opposed Sowole’s nomination on the ground that both of them, from the same Remo Division, should not be made ministers. But this argument did not impress the party leaders, among whom Chief Sowole was very popular. So, Awo’s objection notwithstanding, he was compelled to forward Chief Sowole’s name to the Governor as a minister. However, on the eve of the assembly’s inauguration, before going for the ceremony, prominent leaders from the Lagos Division (which comprised Lagos and Badagry and was part of Western Region under the Lyttleton Constitution) led by Chief Dr. Akanni Doherty, came to Chief Awolowo in his Oke-Ado residence demanding that the list be adjusted. They submitted that the party had made a mistake by not accommodating anybody from the Colony axis.

Chief Awolowo pondered, ‘What do we do?’ He said a name must be removed from the list to make room for somebody from the Colony. And they quickly suggested Chief Sowole because he was from the only division that had two ministerial nominees.

Having been previously informed about his nomination, the issue of who would now tell Chief Sowole of the plan to drop him as minister became a problem for the party. Chief Awolowo then asked, ‘Who will tell him that his name would now be removed?’ And Chief M.A. Ogun promptly responded, ‘Who, of course, but you the leader?’ The party leadership therefore unanimously nominated Chief Awolowo to break the news to Chief Sowole.

Thereafter, Chief Awolowo had to meet the Governor with the withdrawal and substitution of the new name.

Early in the morning, before the inauguration, the Governor was approached to inform him of the development. Governor Abrahall of Western Region had to ask Chief Awolowo, ‘How many times will you change your list?’ Chief Awolowo responded, ‘As many times as there is a superior argument.’

Thus, C.D. Akran (from Badagry) was made to replace Sowole. Sowole, a contemporary of Chief Awolowo, was expectedly bitter for being dropped as a minister. He was a trade unionist (Nigeria Union of Local Government Workers) and reportedly exchanged hot words with Chief Awolowo when he was dropped. But in public, Sowole kept his grievance to himself.

Chief Sowole was compensated by being appointed as head of the London office of the Production Board; and he later acted as Western Region’s Agent-General in England.

Again, when Chief Awolowo was about to yield the Premiership of Western Region after he became Leader of Opposition, he had to bow to party supremacy.

He vehemently opposed Akintola as his successor, but instead preferred either Rotimi Williams or Gabriel Akin- Deko.

He hinged his argument on the belief that Akintola could not, on his own, successfully run a government, even though he could cope well as a deputy. However, the other party leaders thought otherwise and said so at a caucus meeting.

Chief Awolowo had to bow to the wishes of the majority in the party and so supported Akintola’s candidature as Premier. This was after the 1959 federal elections.

My Relationship with the Awolowo Family

Charismatic and charming, Chief Jeremiah Obafemi Oyeniyi Awolowo (March 6, 1909-May 9, 1987) was a looming figure in my life. Ever since I came across the visionary I fondly called, ‘My Leader’ in 1951, I remained glued to him, in private and public, sharing many of his views and ideals, living and practising his ideas, ideals and philosophy.

The closeness began in the early 1950s when I joined the Action Group. But you could actually trace it to Egbe Omo Oduduwa’s early days when I was still a student at CMS Grammar School, then on Odunlami Street, Lagos Island. I was very keen on learning the politics of the day and being an active participant in its unfolding history.

Ever since I became a member of these organizations founded by Chief Obafemi Awolowo largely, I have been an earnest disciple who remained loyal till the very end.

We shared a bond many could hardly understand. Though there was a 19-year age difference, we were kindred spirits. Dutiful and conscientious, my industry and dedication attracted the sage who enjoyed having me around.

Since 1954, when Action Group was still very young, my sense of accomplishment had been noticeable, winning me many ardent fans, including Chief Awolowo. My performance as the Secretary, AG Youth Association influenced Chief Awolowo to demand my being posted to his division (Remo) against the normal run of things whereby secretaries were normally natives, and I not being from that division. The division was one of the best managed and organised among all the divisions. Whenever the leader came to Remo Division, I doubled as his ‘personal assistant.’

Over the years, the bond became firmer, and I was easily referred to as ‘Awo’s other son.’ I quickly and seamlessly became a member of the household. Chief Awolowo’s friends called me ‘Omo Baba’ (Baba’s son). Even when I was studying abroad (between 1958 and 1961), I was treated like a son. Whenever food, our local foodstuff and condiments, were ferried to the United Kingdom to Segun Awolowo (who was then a student at Cambridge University and who died in a car accident in July 1963 during the treasonable felony trial), Mama (Yeye Hannah Idowu Dideolu Awolowo) packaged my share alongside her first son’s, the father of Segun Awolowo, Jnr (now Chairman, Nigerian Export Promotion Council).

After graduation, when I was called to the Bar and registered as a barrister and solicitor in Nigeria, it was easy for me to settle in Ibadan, at Awolowo’s Chambers to work, as a counsel and confidant (though my principal was busy in Lagos as the Leader of Opposition).

The relationship never suffered any major hiccup. In the early 1970s, when Papa Awolowo resigned from General Yakubu Gowon’s cabinet as Vice-Chairman, in preparation for partisan politics, I was always by his side.

The preparation started with the Committee of Friends which met regularly in Ikenne and sometimes in Apapa (Lagos), especially during Awo’s birthday. Apart from organising the ceremony, discussing its nature and details, its members talked about the future.

The Committee of Friends eventually metamorphosed into Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) – and the party existed all through the Second Republic (1979-1983).

Even outside party politics, I had a wonderful relationship with Chief Awolowo. Every year, I still led the organisation of the sage’s birthday celebrations.

Like all mortals, Awolowo had his flaws. But those flaws were actually strengths. Once he believed in you, he never doubted you. He didn’t believe in what others said about you, especially behind your back. He was strict to a fault. He also believed there could be honesty in politics. His conviction was that Nigeria is a heterogeneous society made up of nations, not tribes. He believed that by culture and education, the Yoruba race was more developed and advanced. That we were better, culturally civilised. He explained that one of the reasons was our early access to Western civilisation and education.

Awolowo was a strict disciplinarian. You could not go to him to backbite. He would ask you, ‘Can you repeat this story in front of the person?’ And any story you couldn’t repeat in the presence of the concerned party, never say it to Awolowo’s hearing.

One of the things people often complained about him was that he was too blunt. He didn’t know how to pretend. He was unlike Akintola, who didn’t like to offend anybody by telling the truth. Akintola was more diplomatic. If there was a dispute between two parties, Awolowo wouldn’t pacify any group. He would analyse and resolve the dispute without fear or favour. He called a spade a spade!

 When Chief Obafemi Awolowo passed on in 1987, apart from being in the thick of coordinating the funeral, I was as shattered as any of the family members. I shared in the grief firsthand. I was in Isanya-Ogbo when I heard the news. It was my vicar who informed me that he heard a broadcast where Awolowo’s death was announced.

We (Chief Awolowo and myself ) were to meet at the wedding of Senator Olabiyi Durojaiye’s daughter in Ijebu- Igbo. But he didn’t come. I went on to another wedding from there. Ordinarily, I would have stopped by his house to find out why he didn’t turn up for the wedding. But I didn’t.

So, from Ogbo, immediately I heard the sad news, I went to Ikenne, overwhelmed and distressed. The lieutenants began assembling there, teary-eyed and confused. But they managed to hold meetings and eventually staged a carnival of a burial for their departed leader weeks later.

Even after the death of our political leader, I remained close in a special way to the family. It couldn’t have been any other way. Everyone knew how dear I was to ‘My Leader,’ how Awolowo was the most influential person in my life, more than a mentor. I was close enough to even be a welcome guest in his house, many times sleeping there in a room I could bank on as mine.

Whenever we had functions in Ikenne that I had to pass the night there, I slept in that room. The room was opposite his (Awo’s) own room upstairs. It was the room I stayed during the burial ceremony.

Before Papa rebuilt the house, each time we marked his birthday, I’d go the night before in order to participate in the early morning communion service. Then, I’d just sleep either on the chair or anywhere there. He saw this regularly, and now said I should be sleeping in Segun’s room (his grandson who was away in school, and lived mostly in Lagos whenever he was in Nigeria). So, when Awo died, and during the annual posthumous birthday celebrations, I still slept in the room.

I had never failed to show where I stood on any matter, even where Mama was concerned. All I did was accord her enormous respect whenever there was a disagreement or point of departure from each other’s positions.

For instance, on one occasion marking Awo’s memorial anniversary, the church (Obafemi Awolowo Memorial Church, Ikenne) had planned to honour some of us whom they regarded as ardent followers of the late leader. I readily accepted  the  offer when  names  like  Chief  G.O.K.  Ajayi and Chief Adebayo Adefarati were mentioned. However, a few days before the event, the Nigerian Tribune published a full list of the honorees, which included someone whom I believed could not be placed on the same pedestal of loyalty with the other honorees, in view of the despicable role he played during the Abacha regime. It was on this ground that I declined to be honoured along with him.

I now drove straight to Mama, and explained to her why I would not be able to attend the ceremony. How could I stand with a man who voted that Sani Abacha should continue as Head of State forever? The same man who unashamedly joined PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) which he had earlier vilified under the leadership of Obasanjo?  Such a person couldn’t be regarded as a faithful loyalist to Chief Awolowo in the same category with the other honorees.

Mama didn’t like it, and said I should have told her earlier. I said, ‘But you didn’t tell me before. The other names you mentioned, I was comfortable with them. But I’m not comfortable with this one!’

I mentioned it to (Chief ) G. O. K. Ajayi that I wasn’t attending for this reason. He tried to persuade me to come. I told him that I didn’t want to take him by surprise that was why I informed him. I couldn’t get through to Chief Adefarati.

 I believe that if events had been better managed and principles adhered to more strictly and fervently, history would have recorded far better scenarios.

Until her death on September 19, 2015, I had a good rapport with Mama. I still went to visit her regularly and I still organised Papa’s birthday every year (with other party faithfuls).

When we were to celebrate 100 years of Chief Awolowo’s birth in 2009, as we did annually, Afenifere sent a delegation which included Okurounmu, secretary of the group, to Mama with a view to integrating our programme with that of the Awolowo family. Although not opposed to the plan, Mama wondered how we could work together with the division in the leadership of Afenifere and AD. They then told her that we had tried to resolve it without success. Mama now asked for a list of people to invite for the reconciliation, which included the AD governors, namely Chief Segun Osoba (Ogun), Senator Bola Tinubu (Lagos), Hon. Lam. Adesina (Oyo), Chief Adebayo Adefarati (Ondo) and Chief Niyi Adebayo (Ekiti).

Mama thereafter called series of reconciliation meetings, which were not attended by the other party to the dispute, except on one occasion when Lam Adesina came and said he was representing the other governors. But I strongly objected to this representation, since we, the other leaders had always been present at the meeting.

During one of these reconciliation meetings, Senator Tony Adefuye, a member of the group opposed to Afenifere under the leadership of Papa Abraham Adesanya, had made a ridiculous claim that he dreamt and saw Chief Awolowo who told him that one of the reasons we were having crises in Afenifere was because we no longer held our meetings in Ikenne.

On another occasion, Lam Adesina, who was present, canvassed for a change of name from Afenifere. Their objection was sentimental. After Chief Awolowo, they detested having us – Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, Pa Abraham Adesanya and myself, being all Ijebus – as leaders. They couldn’t say it out, but showed it in their attitude towards us. It was after they failed repeatedly to honour her invitation to meetings that Mama now decided to meet them privately.

Then, after about a year, Mama reported to the meeting that all her invitations to Tinubu and others for the meeting were rebuffed.  She then suggested that, as a way of carrying everybody along, we should form another body. But the leadership of Afenifere found it repulsive that we should abandon this group founded by our revered leader in order to accommodate people who refused to subject themselves to party supremacy.

That was the origin of the Yoruba Unity Forum under the leadership of Mama H.I.D. Awolowo.

Mama had always been revered like our late leader, but it was obvious that if she had played her role as Papa would have done by standing firmly on principles, she would have resolved the dispute by directing the erring members to fall in line instead of adopting a pacifist role of forming another group in order to accommodate them.

In spite of everything, my relationship with the Awolowo family has remained firm. There is mutual understanding, at least. We are all aware that our disagreements are hinged on principles.

 

Chapter 10

The 1953 Constitutional Crisis

My fascination with the sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, was heightened when I began to read and listen to his thoughts and ideas on federalism

and  nationalism.  I  admired  the  lucidity  and  intelligible arguments of the great soul.

I was enthralled by the discipline of Action Group members. In 1953, during the Macpherson Constitution when Chief Anthony Enahoro moved the motion for self- government in Nigeria, my admiration grew more.

At the time, federal ministers were appointed from the regions (from the Houses of Assembly). From the Western Region were Bode Thomas (Deputy Leader of AG), Chief Samuel Akintola, Arthur Prest and Oba Adesoji Aderemi.

Macpherson  said  no  member  of  his  cabinet  should take part in the debate for self-government in 1956. When the discussion came up, members of Action Group in the cabinet refused to adhere to this directive. They insisted on participating in the debate to discuss Nigeria’s future as a federal union.

Macpherson was uncomfortable with Enahoro’s motion. To show his displeasure, he said any member of his cabinet who insisted on taking part in the motion for self-government should  either  resign  or  be  sacked  from  the  cabinet.  He said, however, that it would pain him if he had to sack Sir Adesoji Aderemi who was a Knight of the British Empire. But Sir Adesoji Aderemi, though a traditional ruler, was an uncompromising nationalist. In pursuance of this and in loyalty to the party that nominated him into the cabinet, he told Macpherson that he (Aderemi) would save him the pain of being sacked by resigning, which he did.

So, all the Action Group members in the cabinet, who had agreed on a stand, resigned en masse.

There was so much party discipline then. Party men, after discussing and agreeing on a position, usually stood as one group. After the mass resignation, the government attempted to replace the ministers by asking the Western Legislature to send new names to represent them in the cabinet. But rather than send fresh ones, the AG sent back the same names.

The Governor-General, Sir John Macpherson turned down the nominations and the cabinet was now left without representation from Western Region. And thus began the constitutional crisis of 1953.

Consequently,  the  Colonial  Office  in  the  UK  had to summon representatives of the political parties to a constitutional conference to discuss the constitution.

Hitherto, the Macpherson Constitution being operated was a quasi-federal constitution without autonomy for the regional government. At the time too, Chief Awolowo was the chief advocate for full federalism and it was on that plank he stood at the conference. On the other hand, the NCNC, led by Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, canvassed for unitary government.

The Northern People’s Congress (NPC), under the leadership of Sir Ahmadu Bello, after the self-government motion, advocated confederalism under its 9-point programme. Both Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and the Sardauna claimed there were no minorities in Nigeria to warrant the creation of an additional region or state.

However, on Chief Awolowo’s Western Region delegation to the conference were representatives of minority groups from all parts of the country. Prominent among them were J.S. Tarka (from the Middle Belt), J.S. Olawoyin and Sule Maito (from the Yoruba-speaking part of the North), Ibrahim Imam (North-East), Wenike Briggs (Rivers) and I.I. Murphy (Ogoja).

With that he was able to debunk the claim of Zik and Sardauna that there were no minorities in Nigeria. At the end of the conference, Chief Awolowo won the day for federalism if Nigeria must remain a united country.

Consequently, the principle of federalism was established in the constitution with the creation of the position of premier as against leader of government business, and autonomy for the regions with the constitutions written separately.

As for the minorities, the Willink Commission of Enquiry was set up to look into the problem with a view to making appropriate recommendations that would allay their fears.

It was a glorious day for Nigeria on the return of the delegates from the conference when Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, who went to the conference as a unitarist, exclaimed at the airport, ‘Federalism is imperative.’

The Action Group, in demanding a truly federal constitution, wanted more states created for the minorities, pointing out that the federation then was structurally imbalanced. This was a situation whereby a region (the North) was bigger than the two other regions constituting the federation put together.

Thus, the Macpherson Constitution, which was expected to last five years from 1951, lasted for only three years.

 In 1954, the constitution was changed to the Lyttleton Constitution. The office of premier was established under this constitution which was truly federal with regional autonomy. The 1954 Constitution gave the regions residual powers and exclusive powers at the centre. The new constitution now compelled the leader of the NCNC, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe to resign from the Western House of Assembly and contest in the Eastern House of Assembly in order to become premier of the region.

It must be put on record that, contrary to the claim that Egbe Omo Oduduwa was a tribal organisation, when in fact it was formed to unite the disparate Yoruba race, the Ibo (now written as Igbo) State Union, which promoted only Igbo interests, had existed before it. The NNDP, which metamorphosed into the NCNC, was mainly patronised by the Igbos.  Under the leadership of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, the Ibo State Union was helping kinsmen to further their studies (especially abroad). It had high-ranking nationalists like Mbonu Ojike and K.O. Mbadiwe as members.

 

Chapter 11

The Night of the Long Knives

The years rolled by, and the difference between states governed by our party, Unity Party of Nigeria and the others became glaring. Things worked, many pupils

and students were back in school, and legions who would have been deprived of education were enrolled under the free education programme. There was a new revival in agriculture, health and the economy of those states.

Our  party  had  a  good  image  and  was  perceived  as doing well. But there were bickerings and rows among the leadership, especially in the states where the party ruled.

The powers of the governors, the chief executive officers, were awesome. They could literarily do anything. Some of them behaved in ways not consistent with the ideals of the party. There was therefore an opposition to the automatic return of some of them during the 1983 general election.

Instead, the party now canvassed for full primaries for the election. This was eventually held at the National Theatre in Lagos.

Chief Obafemi Awolowo, as the leader, said there should be no primaries for the return of the governors seeking second term in office at the election. I advised the leader against this, saying that people would label him a dictator.

My argument was that if any of them was popular, he would be re-elected. But Papa’s contention was that if any of them was not sure of re-election, he would not pursue his own (Awo’s) federal election faithfully. I told the leader that these people he was defending would be the same people that would later call him a dictator; and that those who wanted to contest against them would ask why there should be no primaries. I said, ‘Papa, we shouldn’t give the impression that there are some blue eyes in the party. If anybody wants an election, let him go for an election, and let the people decide.’ Surprised by my line of argument, Chief Awolowo said, ‘Ayus, I thought I had discussed this matter with you in private?’ Then I answered, ‘Yes sir! But I had also disagreed with you in private.’

However, when the agitation became very strident, he had to agree to the primaries being held, as he did in 1979.

Their agitation took root in 1978, spearheaded by Chief Bola Ige who wanted to be governor of Oyo State. They had chanted then, ‘governorship or nothing’, which led to the shadow election where he defeated his teacher, Canon Emmanuel Alayande (though Chief Awolowo and many leaders of the party believed Ige should have yielded grounds and allowed his teacher a go first). Ige ruled Oyo as executive governor between 1979 and 1983.

By 1982, they wanted full-blown primaries. But Awo thought that for him to win the Presidency, the party must be united, and support the sitting governors and elected officials. He wanted them returned unopposed. Many didn’t agree with the proposal. Even Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande, the

‘Action Governor of Lagos’, rejected the idea.

The issue was creating animosity. And camps were emerging. In Oyo, it was very bad, and it almost led to the expulsion of Chief Bola Ige in September 1982.

It was in Yola during a NEC meeting (between September 8 and 10, 1982) that the battle reached a head. Dubbed the ‘Night of the Long Knives,’ Chief Bola Ige and Chief Sunday Afolabi  (the  deputy  governor)  were  accused  of  meeting General Olusegun Obasanjo (rtd) in Ibadan, to settle a party dispute. The events were captured by Dare Babarinsa in his book, House of War (pp. 113-114) thus:

Adelakun accused Ige and Afolabi of holding a nocturnal meeting with General Obasanjo at the latter’s residence on Osuntokun Avenue, Bodija Estate, Ibadan on June

27, 1982. Adelakun said the secret meeting was at the instance of Obasanjo, who was Afolabi’s schoolmate at Baptist Boys’ High School, Abeokuta and a friend of Ige. The former Head of State had sought to persuade Afolabi to allow Ige a second term. After six hours of discussion, the meeting, which was also attended by M.D. Yusufu, Obasanjo’s Inspector-General of Police, and General Muhammed Inuwa Wushishi, ended in an impasse as Afolabi maintained he would contest the governorship against Ige. No issue about the presidency or the ambition of Chief Awolowo was discussed. Adelakun, who spoke through an interpreter, said Afolabi narrated the story to him.

Both Ige and Afolabi were kept standing for several hours, defending themselves. Ige was later to refer to the Yola meeting as the “Night of the Long Knives”.

What the two men did was akin to heresy since Obasanjo was regarded as an ‘arch-enemy’ by party men who placed the blame for the UPN loss of the 1979 presidential elections on the retired general. Some of those who spoke had even recommended that the two men be expelled but Chief Awolowo had prevailed, saying that he vouched for the loyalty of the two top stalwarts. A resolution was passed at the Yola meeting condemning the Obasanjo initiative as ‘a dangerous, an unwarranted and intolerable intervention in the internal affairs of the UPN.’ It also concluded that ‘the conduct of the two leaders was most reprehensible. In particular, the council considered that the chairman of the party in Oyo State (Ige) was more to blame for the ill- motivated meeting.’ The two leaders were censured, but were allowed to go. It was the last time Ige and Afolabi would stand on the same side of the fence. It was at the Yola meeting, too, that the decision was taken to hold the October special conference.

The episode left a sour taste in the mouth. Party leaders were enraged; that Bola Ige who knew so well that Obasanjo never pretended to be sympathetic to Awolowo or his cause could commit such an infraction.

Alhaji Jakande moved the motion to expel Ige from the party but Awolowo didn’t want that, especially since Ige swore that it never happened.

Chief Awolowo stopped the motion of Ige’s expulsion from being moved. And as he was swearing with his son’s name, Papa said, ‘No, don’t involve your son in this matter. Let the matter end there.’

Later, we asked him why he took the decision not to allow Ige to be sanctioned. He said, ‘A kii gbo riwo riwo n’ile agbalagba l’emeji.’ (This means literally that there should be no uproar in an elder’s compound twice). When we asked him privately what he meant by this proverb, Awo referred to the dispute between himself and Akintola and would not like a repeat of an open conflict with another prominent member of the party. Because of the crises in the 1960s involving Akintola (his deputy) he said, ‘what they did was wrong, but I leave them to God.’

Unity Party of Nigeria was rocked by so many disagreements that, by the elections of 1983, we were losing ground and faithful loyalists. We lost some states under controversial circumstances, and Awolowo himself didn’t win the presidency.

Before the elections in 1983, Awolowo made a statement that if the elections were rigged, our generation might not know democracy. Chief Awolowo had confidence, and believed that among all the candidates, he was the most prepared for Nigeria’s leadership. He had solutions to the problems of the country which he had proffered through various  channels,  including  some  of  his  books,  such  as, Path to Nigerian  Freedom (1947); Thoughts on the Nigerian Constitution (1966);  The People’s Republic (1968);  The Strategy and Tactics of the People’s  Republic  of Nigeria (1970); The Problems of Africa (1977) and Voice of Wisdom (1981). He believed he could rule well.

That led to the famous statement that while he busied himself at night with thoughts on how to make the country better, his opponents were ‘frolicking with women of easy virtue’.

Chief Awolowo was always making constructive criticisms, offering solutions to the country’s multifarious problems. He was not an armchair critic.

The country was drifting under the NPN leadership, and on December 31, 1983, the soldiers struck again. Major- General Muhammadu Buhari became Head of State, and the politicians were sacked, with many of us either imprisoned or exiled.

I remained in Nigeria, because I was not directly involved in any government. Many were not enthusiastic about the coup, regardless of Alhaji Shehu Shagari’s famed ineptitude. Chief Awolowo was not happy about the coup. At this time I was a middle-aged man, already going on 55, and I faced my law  practice  and  private  business  following the  ban  on partisan  politics.

 

 

Chapter 12

The Betrayal of AD

The strong party many thought would provide the platform  for  progressives  and  advance  the  cause of  ordinary  Nigerians  was  disunited  almost  from

inception. It just rolled along, tottered and eventually collapsed.

The Alliance for Democracy (AD) tragedy has many interpretations. For me, a group of people, led primarily by Chief Bola Ige and Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, were the undertakers who presided over the funeral of AD, after they had plotted and supervised its sickness and death.

As far as I am concerned, the moment Bola Ige joined Obasanjo’s government, following his loss of AD’s presidential primaries where he polled 6 votes against Chief Olu Falae’s

17, marked the beginning of the end for the party. In my opinion, these are the scenarios which led to the collapse of AD.

Bola Ige didn’t join us in Action Group until 1961. We met for the first time when I was living in England. He was also a student there at the time.

He was elected as the publicity secretary of Action Group shortly after, in 1961, and also one of the lawyers that defended those standing trial in the treasonable felony case of 1962/63.

He  served  as  a  commissioner  in  the  government  of Major-General Adeyinka Adebayo in the Western Region in 1967. In 1979, he became the Governor of Oyo State, a position he held until 1983, under the banner of the Unity Party of Nigeria.

However, I had known Mrs. (Atinuke) Ige before I met Bola; we were contemporaries at the CMS Grammar School, and CMS Girls’ Grammar School, Lagos respectively. At that time, the students of CMS Girls’ Grammar School attended science lessons at the CMS Grammar School. In fact, in all the years when we were having political party meetings in Ibadan, I came from Sagamu and lodged in Bola Ige’s house.

Our families were very close.

Nobody  was  against  Bola  Ige’s  candidacy  in  the presidential primaries of Alliance for Democracy in 1999.

Awolowo was no longer there to contest election as presidential candidate. Somebody must lead. I was neutral in the primaries, though I had my views.

Bola  Ige  could  be  rightly  accused  of  undermining Afenifere and plotting the eventual collapse of the AD. Ige’s excuse that he was betrayed at the party primaries was not tenable. After all, he was among the people who selected those who conducted the primaries, to the extent that when we nominated Lawrence Omole, Ige objected to his nomination and we dropped him.

It won’t be fair, as alleged by Bola Ige, to blame elders of the party for his loss in the primaries of the Alliance for Democracy. In the first instance, he took part in nominating the body that constituted the Electoral College.

I had said it when he was still alive. Even at the meeting of the party leaders which took place in my office in Lagos, Pa Solanke Onasanya was opposed to his presence there. He said, ‘Since you are one of the candidates to be interviewed you have no right to be here.’ But he insisted that as deputy leader he must be there. I think it was Tinubu who said that even in a company meeting when a person was interested in an issue he would excuse himself. When he still insisted, Pa Adesanya ruled in his favour that he could sit down and be part of the proceedings. So, we started the nomination.

In carrying out the exercise, we wanted only members who would be neutral, without any connection whatsoever with any of the contestants. It was in trying to ensure this that we mentioned Lawrence Omole, but for one reason or another, that was unknown to us, Bola Ige opposed him. We then proposed Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi to be a member of that body as a replacement for Omole, because we were giving it divisional representation.

Ige accepted Akinyemi’s nomination. I had made the statement before when he was still alive, and he couldn’t oppose it.

After the election, Bola Ige himself told some people, including Ambassador Oladapo Fafowora. Fafowora told me that Ige had boasted that it was going to be a walkover for him at the primaries. He had a right to think so, because about 6 of the 23 members of that committee were his former commissioners. They included Chief Emmanuel Alayande, Chief Bisi Akande, Justice Adewale Thompson, Lam Adesina and Senator Akinfenwa. But he had a handicap. We had chosen governors of states as members of the electoral body.

Neither Pa Abraham Adesanya, Sir Olaniwun Ajayi nor myself was a member of that body; we inaugurated the body and left. Segun Osoba was a member too.

I don’t think I remember who said I told him not to vote for Ige. He was so sure of winning that he told Fafowora. When this was published in an interview I had with the press, Fafowora felt so embarrassed because they are both Ijesa. But unknown to Ige, unfortunately, many of those he thought would vote for him had grudges against him which they kept to themselves waiting for an opportunity to vent their spleen on him.

Talking about me, it’s true we had a meeting in Kaduna or so and we lodged in his wife’s apartment. That was at the initial stage of AD. I think we went for a conference there, and he asked us to support him. I told him pointedly I would not. I said, ‘As the acting chairman of the party, if I should support you, then I would be partisan.’

While others gave him assurances of support, I bluntly told him I would not. When they were trying to settle the matter between us, I said I didn’t learn this type of system from Awolowo. How can I be the chairman of a party and set up a committee to go and find out something for me and I am already in support of one of the candidates? So, that was my offence. That I didn’t support him alone and told him why.

‘You are very qualified; you are very efficient, there is no doubt about that. But I have to be neutral.’ When he even raised the question of his being deputy national leader as enough reason for us to have appointed him, I asked, ‘Did you make that point before submitting yourself to the committee? We all decided together on having an electoral college. As a lawyer, how can you submit yourself to a board of enquiry and then be objecting to the findings of the enquiry?’ These were some of the things that baffled some people about his image.

Again, I don’t think people knew that Ige didn’t pay his nomination fee. It was after the election that we found out that he didn’t pay. He explained that he didn’t know which account to pay his nomination fee into. Nobody expected a statement like that from a deputy leader.

He was supposed to pay the N500,000 nomination fee. The account we used was Pa Adesanya’s. The other candidate, Chief Olu Falae, paid into that account.

We didn’t want to open an account for AD because of our experience in AG. The same happened to UPN. Because if anything happened, the account of the party would be frozen. There were some things we knew that Ige never knew. One of the things I knew, for instance, was that he was relying on some people who would never vote for him. One of them confided in me. Bola had offended some people who kept quiet.

He really thought he would win. I mentioned it to Obasanjo during Ige’s lifetime. When Pa Adesanya and I met Obasanjo on a private visit, Obasanjo said Pa Adesanya should settle the quarrel between Ige and myself. Obasanjo claimed that Bola Ige alleged we held the primaries when he was away on holiday abroad. I told him, ‘That can’t be true, he is still a member of your cabinet. Go and ask him.’

When Ige was travelling abroad. Pa Adesanya told him not to go, saying, ‘Suppose those who are conducting the primaries say they want to interview the candidates?’ But Ige insisted that he was going on medical appointment. ‘How can he now come and accuse us?’

The problem with the late Bola Ige was that he didn’t really know his friends from his enemies. As I told him at a meeting where they wanted to settle the matter, where he was to be appointed a minister and we were opposed to it, he made allegations against some leaders of the party. He even said he didn’t know what he had done to me that I was opposed to him.

Then I told him why. ‘I always tell you the truth; something others would not tell you.’ That was at a meeting in Ijebu-Igbo where Pa Emmanuel Alayande was the chairman.

So, when the result came out, he was baffled. He was devastated, having thought he could boast that his victory at the party primaries was achieved when he was not even in the country. He told somebody that he was sure of 13 out of the

23 votes. I said at an interview later that when his 13 became 9 he should have examined himself.

Unfortunately, some intelligent people, close friends and party associates of Bola Ige insinuated that we were culpable for his death. How they reason I don’t know. These people who could have wondered at the mysterious murder of the nation’s chief law officer despite the heavy presence of security personnel around him thus foreclosed investigation into other areas because of their prejudiced minds.

We were opposed to Ige joining Obasanjo’s cabinet. But he accepted the appointment to spite us; oblivious of the fact that Obasanjo was not inviting him in good faith. This was because of previous scurrilous criticisms he (Ige) had leveled against Obasanjo which the latter had not forgiven.

There was a time Pa Emmanuel Alayande attempted to settle the matter between us and Ige at a private meeting. That was before Ige went into Obasanjo’s cabinet. But his opinion was that we didn’t like Ige. He said we prevented him from becoming president, yet we didn’t want him to be a minister. But that’s not correct. It was the primaries that he lost and not the control of the party.

Well, I stood my ground, since we had taken a decision in the AD that if it was true we would take Obasanjo’s offer, we would meet in the executive of the party and nominate who would join. That was not just an Afenifere affair. It involved the Eastern Mandate Union who were members of the party at that time. That didn’t take place.

When I was giving the procedure to those who had said these things on the platform of Afenifere, they now said, ‘You too, Bola, go and write to inform your chairman.’

So, he complied. I said, ‘You are now informing me after you  have  taken  an  appointment,  when  they  had  already discussed whether you should go to the ministry of power or communication.’

I  remember  at  that  time  Bola  Tinubu  advised  that he should take power while some said he should take communication. I was not interested.

Before then, we had a party meeting in Kaduna; his wife, Justice Atinuke Ige, was then the President of the Court of Appeal. To show you how close we were, we lodged in his wife’s house in Kaduna (myself, Pa Abraham Adesanya, Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, and, I think, Chief Ayo Fasanmi). It was in that place, before the primaries, that he intimated us that he was going to contest for the primaries and was soliciting our support. I told him point-blank, ‘You know my position, Bola. As the chairman of the party, it would be immoral of me to do that.’ That was when he knew that I was not supporting him.

We were still contesting the legitimacy of Obasanjo’s government in Abuja. I, as the chairman, was still in Abuja with our lawyer when Prof. Sam. Aluko told me, ‘What are you talking about? You are wasting your time. Your deputy leader, Bola Ige, is already a member of Obasanjo’s cabinet.’ I couldn’t believe until we came back to Lagos and Ige complained to Pa Alayande that we were opposed to his election.

It came as a surprise to Ige that I was not supporting him; but because of the sentiments of the period, it was convenient for him to assume that everybody was on his side. However, when a meeting of the party was later summoned and they said he had now informed us, they then canvassed support for him. The party members said, ‘If he had informed you, you would not have chosen Bola Ige.’

On the question of nomination into the cabinet, Obasanjo told us at that time that he was going to form a national government, and my own stand was, ‘If you were going to form a national government, you would ask us as a party to send a candidate and not choose one for us.’

My quarrel with Obasanjo had been on a matter of principle. I told Obasanjo, ‘We are going to cooperate with you, but we will send a candidate of our party.’ Somebody said he wanted Bola Ige and he knew that, left to the party, we would not release him.

Knowing the type of cabinet Obasanjo was likely to form, I wouldn’t want Bola Ige to go and give credibility to that cabinet. It is like a member of a first-class troop going to join a third-class troop.

There was another meeting at Ikeja where party members put me to task, and I told them why I said that Ige didn’t consult me as a leader of the party, and that if he had done so, I would have said no. If you dropped a pin on the floor that day, you would have felt it. There was absolute silence. They were shocked when I said no.

I asked, ‘Is there an Ekwueme in that cabinet? If there was, I wouldn’t mind releasing Ige to join the government.’ Bola Ige was my front liner, but with that cabinet, which had people like Oladapo Sarumi and others, that was a third-class cabinet and I had such people I could send there, not Bola Ige. When I said this, there was absolute silence.

Bola Ige didn’t need Obasanjo; it was Obasanjo who needed him. That was my analysis. I said all of those who were criticising me didn’t even know how close Bola Ige and I were. Anytime I had to go to Ibadan for a meeting, I always stayed in Bola Ige’s house. We were good friends. We only disagreed on matters of principle. His wife Atinuke and I were contemporaries.

Therefore, I had known the wife before knowing Bola Ige. So, there was no cause for animosity against him. It was all a matter of principle. Anytime I said this, he had no defence against it.

I believed that with the soaring popularity of AD, if Bola Ige hadn’t joined Obasanjo’s cabinet at that time, I don’t think that government would have lasted six months. Again, how can you go to the cabinet of a person who disparaged our leader in a book by saying that all he (Awo) was looking for he got on a platter of gold?

How can you leave your party and go and join somebody you know does not have a good word either for our party or our leader in his lifetime and after?

There’s no love lost between Obasanjo and Chief Obafemi Awolowo till today, notwithstanding all the camouflage of choosing his daughter, Dr. Tokunbo Awolowo-Dosunmu, as an ambassador during his tenure. For eight years, tell me any record of his speech in which he paid tribute to Chief Awolowo? So, how can you fraternise with someone who hates your leader and does not hide it?

Bola Ige told someone that when he wanted to contest the primaries, and he consulted me, Olaniwun Ajayi and others, I bluntly told him no. This is quite true!

I  have  no  regrets.  Why?  As  acting  chairman  of  the party, would it be fair or right on my part to already support a candidate before the primaries? That was not what Chief Awolowo taught us. That was my offence. He was expecting me to address party members that I supported him. The fact that he was not around during the primaries was his fault.

Obasanjo deliberately chose Bola Ige in order to destroy AD. It was not because he loved him. But Bola Ige should have known that. He thought he alone was Afenifere. He had forgotten that all of us make up Afenifere.

A tree does not make a forest. Even Chief Awolowo never claimed to be an oracle or superior to Afenifere and Action Group or Unity Party of Nigeria. He always acknowledged publicly that it was a collective wish that made him the leader. It was that element that Ige didn’t cultivate in Chief Awolowo that constituted his predicament. Bola Ige was brilliant, one of the greatest Awoists, but for his vaunting ambition.

If it was not ambition, Bola Ige would not have joined Obasanjo’s  government.  He  knew  what  Obasanjo  stood for. It was ambition that blinded him. If he had kept the solidarity within the AD, and remained, we would have provided a formidable opposition to Obasanjo’s government. The moment he joined, the opposition was weakened. There was nothing in Obasanjo or the PDP that should have attracted Bola Ige to join that government. Nothing at all. The antecedents of Obasanjo and PDP members, juxtaposed with Bola Ige, did not align or tally. They had nothing in common. Nothing, except that ‘my colleagues disappointed me, and I’m leaving them. I’ll go and join our enemies to fight them.’

Obasanjo even once said that he knew if he approached our party, and said he wanted Bola Ige in his cabinet, that we wouldn’t oblige him. He was right. If they had consulted us, we wouldn’t choose Bola Ige. I wouldn’t put my first eleven in his team. That was not the place for him. What could he do with strange bedfellows? What was Obasanjo’s philosophy? What programme did he tell Ige to come and implement which was consistent with Afenifere’s philosophy or principle? There was none.

The moment Bola Ige made up his mind to join the Obasanjo government, the centre could no longer hold for the AD. It was consensus we used in managing the party. The moment one of us left, took the governors along, what would happen? The governors found solace in the leadership of Bola Ige, and he started holding meetings with them at Esa Oke (his hometown in Osun State). That was the beginning of the problem.

Ige still attended Afenifere meetings. He was the deputy leader all through his ministerial appointment.

Members were going to sanction him at one of our meetings, but Pa Adesanya said he must be present before he could be sanctioned. He wasn’t around that day. When he attended the meeting, those who raised it had no courage to continue. He gave the impression that his colleagues hated him, and didn’t congratulate him (on his appointment as Minister of Mines and Power, and later Attorney-General and Minister of Justice). He mentioned me by name in his column (in Tribune), and I didn’t reply because I didn’t want any press controversy.

I told him, ‘I will never congratulate you because I don’t like the company you are keeping.’ Why should I congratulate him? I even refused to reply that write-up. What would have made me happy about the appointment? I couldn’t have been persuaded to congratulate Bola Ige. He betrayed the party. He knew Obasanjo’s role in the 1979 elections. When he wrote the article, I called Pa Alayande to say that Ige had done it again!

It was Bola Ige who was instrumental in Dupe Adelaja’s (Pa Abraham Adesanya’s daughter’s) appointment as minister, in order to embarrass Pa Adesanya who had earlier opposed his (Ige) joining Obasanjo’s cabinet. When it was discussed at a caucus meeting, Bola Ige tried to persuade Pa Adesanya that he should allow his daughter to serve under Obasanjo. Pa Adesanya was upset and he flared up.

‘Don’t repeat it to me,’ he told Ige.

Pa Abraham Adesanya didn’t ask his daughter to take that appointment.

Why did Bola Ige form the Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE)? It was after he lost AD primaries and joined Obasanjo’s government and wanted to use that platform to diminish the influence of Afenifere in Yorubaland.

As an evidence of this, two weeks after forming YCE, he led its members to Obasanjo in Aso Rock Villa.

Temporarily, he succeeded. If he had succeeded in the long run, he would have been able to gather all the people of Yoruba descent under one group.

It’s not good to destroy the house that you laboured with others to build. It is not to your credit that the house you built is no longer standing. Though everybody lost, to the detriment of the nation, we must not lose sight of why we lost, and who caused the loss. We even heard that Ige said some of us were jealous of him. But there is no record to show that throughout his career there was an occasion where both of us had to settle a quarrel.

The election (party primaries) has since come and gone. Falae was elected. Although Ige claimed he was campaigning for Falae, it was after the election that I knew then, as chairman of the party, that Bola Ige was not loyal to the leadership of Senator Abraham Adesanya.

During our campaign with the plane loaned to us by Harry Akande, whenever we landed at an airport, the party leaders there and the candidates would customarily meet us at the airport or at the point of entry. But when we got to Ibadan, Bola Ige refused to come and meet Senator Adesanya. Because of the prejudice and the bitterness from that election, he was just following the team; he was not really with us. We stayed in his house because he should have joined the campaign in Oyo State as the party leader there.

Lam Adesina, the governoship candidate, instead of driving us straight to Mapo, said he was taking us first to Bola Ige’s house on the day of the election, which was not the custom in our party. Not only that, Bola Ige didn’t even meet the leader of the party, Senator Adesanya, at the door. He sat down in his room. We came in and met him before he could stand up to greet us. I felt this was the height of contempt.

Here was a man who was highly regarded in the party now involved in an act of disloyalty and insubordination to the party leader. ‘The man who is your leader now comes to the town; he first of all has to pay a courtesy call on you before he can hold a rally. He followed us to the rally though. But at the time we landed in Ibadan, he should have met us at the airport from where we would all go together to the rally.

It was because we were just being tolerant and we didn’t want any internal crisis at that time. Until now, I don’t think many people knew what happened, because we only acted as if nothing had happened. Bola Ige’s desperate ambition for leadership had been known to Chief Obafemi Awolowo even during his lifetime. All along, Papa knew the rivalry for succession between himself and Lateef Jakande, that they were not conscientious about winning in an election. But he said none of them would use him to achieve his ambition.

So, it was no surprise that Ige and others who were opposed to Afenifere went on to form rival groups, thinking that by so doing they would bring down the organisation. One of such was the Imeri Group formed by Olajumoke, Babatope & Co. They wanted to rival Afenifere, but didn’t have the name to use.

We (Afenifere) are the authentic leaders of the Yoruba. But because we didn’t agree with them they went on to form the Imeri Group. In any case, the Yoruba know their leaders.

Awolowo didn’t become Yoruba leader because he won an election. By the time he became Yoruba leader there was no election. General Adeyinka Adebayo (rtd) had confirmed that. So, when we saw them, we said that for our own credibility we couldn’t join those who were known backers of the military regime which we were opposed to. That was why we backed out of Group 34 which they formed.

They formed the All Progressives’ Party (APP). They now changed the name to All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) after the AD pulled out of the alliance. We found that the programmes of the two parties (APP and AD) were almost identical.

Why we pulled out was because those who were already known with Abacha, who were prominent in his government, were part of that body. We said people wouldn’t take us seriously. These were the people who were complaining about Abacha yesterday. Are you saying that they are now forming a new party? Lamidi Adedibu (the strongman of Ibadan politics) was one of them.

However, what AD stood for at that time was purity and consistency in politics. Whatever success we achieved, however minor, will prove to the public now that we can’t reprobate and approbate. We can’t be found in the same political party with people who were associates and backers, and who colluded with the military that we fought against.

The AD itself was later bastardised by those we put in positions who later turned against the leadership of the party. We left them and went to form the Democratic People’s Alliance (DPA). But we were financially handicapped because the people we put in office were in government. They changed the party’s name to Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and members of the party who even shared our views, because of the political offices they were occupying, went their own way.

Of course in Nigerian politics today, without money you cannot go anywhere. Those of our members who had no jobs had been spoilt by political appointments. That’s where we are today.

These developments have made me disenchanted with Southwest politics today. Knowing where we are coming from, I find it disgusting that the people who would associate with the principles of Awolowo and all that he stood for are people I would regard as latter-day Awoists. They can’t be as passionate about the ideals of Awolowo as I would, because many of them joined us when we were already in office and through that they became very relevant. It was that relevant position they were occupying that we despised. But we didn’t become prominent as a result of being in public office. This is because we have become known and prominent in Nigerian politics because of the ideals we stand for; hence, we frown at anybody bastardising Awo’s philosophy, or who is not a true advocate of those ideals. We don’t feel comfortable in their midst.

The protem National Chairman of AD then was Mamman Yusuf to whom I was Deputy. But because Bola Ige and others knew that Yusuf did not support him, he engineered Ahmed Abdulkadir, sponsored him, and held a convention of the party.

That was what led to the court action requesting that INEC (Independent National Electoral Commission) should not recognise Abdulkadir because the convention was not constitutionally summoned. The case is still in court today, undecided!

The Abdulkadir that Bola Ige chose as chairman of the illegal convention was never a member of our party. He was put there by Obasanjo to destabilise Alliance for Democracy (AD).

Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Patricia Olubunmi Etteh, played a prominent role in ensuring that Abdulkadir was there.

Bola  Ige  was  enthusiastic  about  the  move  because he wanted someone to checkmate me and others. He said anybody could be there but Ayo Adebanjo. Because he was in government, Obasanjo supported him. It was whatever Obasanjo said that INEC did. That was how their group was recognised. The governors controlling Alliance for Democracy states (Olusegun Osoba, Ogun; Adeniyi Adebayo, Ekiti; Lam Adesina, Oyo; Adebisi Akande, Osun and Bola Tinubu, Lagos) were with him for their selfish interest. The only exception was Chief Adebayo Adefarati of Ondo.

Bola Ige propounded the theory that the party was different from Afenifere.

The governors knew that if the party and Afenifere were separated they could control the party in their respective states. That was their objective. He used human weakness to get the support of the governors.

It was in the course of attending these meetings that all the state governors who were hitherto taking instructions from the leadership of Afenifere now grew wings; they no longer wanted to take instructions. They too knew that the centre could no longer hold. Ige encouraged them to sideline the leadership of Afenifere and take over the control of the party in their respective states. That was the beginning of the weakening of Afenifere.

After that incident, and in the process of weakening and killing of Afenifere, Ige sponsored the Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE). It was Justice Adewale Thompson who championed the cause. Unknown to us, however, Pa Alayande had switched camp and later became the group’s first chairman. At the initial stage, Alayande was very firm with Afenifere.

On one occasion when we were coming from a function in Ilorin, we paid him a courtesy call in his house in Ibadan and he received us well. He told us about the council and we asked him if there was anything wrong with the party (AD). We said he should come and reform it in Afenifere, arguing that there was no need for proliferation of Yoruba organisations. He was convinced, and all the papers he was preparing for YCE he gave to Ayo Opadokun. That was the end, but later on the council surfaced again.

Thereafter, the governors of the Alliance for Democracy (AD) became less active until they went to found the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). Among them all, it was only Adefarati that was known to be consistent with us.

Although Osoba did not openly identify with them, his claim to be with us was doubtful. Some party members said that of all our five governors we had only one and a half with us. When Osoba heard this, he flared up and I asked him,

‘How are you sure you are the one they are referring to as the half-governor?’

However, in the desperation to retain power, Obasanjo succeeded in deceiving the AD governors into supporting his candidature for the 2003 presidential election.

Since the AD governors wanted to spite the leadership of the party, they were often not comfortable with the party that put them in office. So, for their second term, they wanted to say they had a platform on which they contested election without our support. This led them to Obasanjo, but not so directly. It would therefore be unfair for them to say that it was the party that asked them to go.

At that time too, Obasanjo had a problem with his party. He was a leader accredited by the party, but he had no foothold in his state. So, he needed support, more so that we heard that they wanted to scuttle his second term bid and put a northerner there. Our attitude then was that, ‘Whether we like him or not, Obasanjo is still a Yoruba man; and we would not allow you to deny him a second term. So, if it comes to that we would not support your plans.’

It was Osoba who came to us to say that Obasanjo wanted to see us as he needed our help for his second term bid in the party. Well, the leadership accepted. We had nothing to demand other than that we were anxious about a sovereign national conference. Because we knew that we were not friendly with Obasanjo, we mandated Cornelius Adebayo and Femi Okurounmu to speak on our behalf at that meeting. So, we all went there.

The campaign of Osoba against me at that meeting happened this way: When we got to that meeting and we spoke, we told Obasanjo, ‘None of the party leaders wants any perk or benefit from you, but we want you to convoke a sovereign national conference for the restructuring of the country.’ Then he said (this is the catch here), ‘That’s easy, you go and work on getting the support of other regions so that it would not appear as if I am supporting my Yoruba people.’ We said, ‘that’s fine.’

So, when we left the meeting with Obasanjo and we were having a discussion in the hotel, we said, ‘So, Obasanjo has changed o; he wants us to do this thing, if we must get the support of others!’

Osoba now played on that statement which I made that Obasanjo had changed and I retorted, ‘You are just being mischievous.’ That was the ground on which I made that statement. This was a man who never wanted to hear anything about sovereign national conference now asking us to get the support of other regions. ‘Is that not a change of position from him?’ This is why they would say I am too rigid.

Even the agreement at that time was to support Obasanjo for the presidential election, which did not mean we were not going to have our own candidate for the election.

So, it was the governors who bargained with him. Maybe Obasanjo tricked them by saying ‘I won’t put any candidate against you,’ so that they would have an easy ride back to power. Then they were looking for a system whereby they would be restored to power without the support of the Afenifere leaders.

To confirm that, I recall at that time there was to be a local government election before the primaries of the parties. Obasanjo was anxious that if we didn’t hold the primaries before the local government election, it would expose his position in the West and the governors did so.

So, when later Osoba said it was the leadership that asked them to support Obasanjo and they did, I asked him the question, ‘Why did you not hold the local government election at the time you were supposed to?’ When, after the election, he said Obasanjo was a traitor, I then asked, ‘How?’

 The truth of the matter at that time was that Obasanjo was not talking directly to us. It was Osoba who came to say that Obasanjo wanted to see us. We didn’t want to see him, because Osoba had been talking directly with his government.

Maybe we made an error of judgement at that time because these people (governors) often said that anything they wanted to say we didn’t want to listen to them. With hindsight now, we probably thought that we didn’t want them to see us as an obstacle to their moves.

Before then, I had been warning Osoba that he was too close to Obasanjo, which he couldn’t deny. So, I think we were just too nonchalant about the attitude of the governors to say that ‘if they want to go, let them go,’ not knowing that they would exploit it the way they did.

Some people have blamed us that we knew Obasanjo in character; that this was a man who couldn’t be trusted. That since we had accused him of scuttling the presidential ambition of Chief Obafemi Awolowo in 1979 and 1983, and if he was now flying a kite or throwing a bait, we shouldn’t have fallen for it.

But that was one side of the story which is right. Another side is that, we say we support the Yoruba interest, and here is a Yoruba man in office whom others want to deprive of a second term, just as we were accusing Bola Tinubu of not allowing the lady from Oyo State (Akande) to be the Speaker of the House of Representatives. He used his people to scuttle what the PDP wanted to give him.

When Osoba quarrelled with Tinubu and left the ACN (he was a member of the Confab), we now invited him and asked, ‘why don’t you join us in fighting these people?’ And he said he couldn’t join SDP because it was being financed by Gbenga Daniel and the Chairman was Falae. He said he couldn’t trust Daniel. We told him we were leaders of the party and that both he and Daniel were coming in as members. But his argument was that Daniel already had his own party (PPN) and that we should allow him to form his own party too.

Our thinking then was that Osoba could team up with Daniel to defeat Amosun who wanted to discredit him politically. All along, we had not been talking about forming a party until later when he told Olaniwun Ajayi. Whereas all our interest at that time was to get rid of Amosun, Osoba was taciturn and didn’t come straight until we learnt that they did not register a party.

The AD governors then, including Osoba, believed that I was too procedural and too rigid in my approach. He now had to join our party but he was campaigning on the platform of the party (SDP) solely without putting us in the picture. He now said in a press interview that we were the ones who supported Jonathan without consulting him.

What an insult! You that came to join us now wanted to dictate to us. You didn’t come to the party meeting to argue why we shouldn’t support Jonathan. Our argument was that it was better to support Jonathan because to do otherwise by supporting Buhari would adversely affect his (Osoba’s) own campaign. That it would have a bandwagon effect. He didn’t believe that. He now insulted us in that interview by saying that we went to support Jonathan without informing him; that he was the one on ground and knew the political leaning of the people. He told us it was Sir Olaniwun Ajayi who made him to join the party whereas he had no choice at that time since he had already left the ACN and his party was not registered.

Ajayi called me to say he wanted to broker peace between me and Osoba, but I said I had nothing against him, other than that when he was going to negotiate with the other party, he didn’t inform us.

I was merely acting on principle. But people didn’t see to see it that way. They would say, ‘This man is too rigid, he’s fighting with Tinubu, he’s fighting with Osoba.’

By the time we were having the elections, I was the acting chairman of the party, Ambassador Mamman. Before then I was deputy to Ambassador Tanko Yusuf. Bola Ige couldn’t be his deputy because of his presidential ambition, neither could Pa Adesanya. So, that was why they settled for me as deputy.

However, just before we had the local government election, Yusuf resigned. They now asked me to act as chairman until we would have the party congress. So, my emergence as the party chairman was circumstantial. I was there holding fort for the West in the party. I had no presidential ambition.

As regards the case in court, all we did was support our claims with relevant portions of the party’s constitution, to show that their own convention was illegal. Till this day, the court has not decided that case, yet INEC recognised the illegal group.

It was the man elected under the unconstitutional convention (Abdulkadir) that extolled their defeat in 2003, saying they had no cause to complain that the election was rigged.

He was the chairman of AD then when PDP rigged them out, and that was how he became a minister under PDP to show you that he was planted there. When he was brought in, most of us opposed the move. But out of spite for the leadership of Afenifere, they couldn’t see the principles behind our objection.

They allowed a strange bedfellow to infiltrate our party just because Bola Ige lost the primaries to Chief Olu Falae. They didn’t care. They cannot quote the membership card of Abdulkadir till today. We are talking about a chairman!

How could someone I didn’t know become chairman? Even if you said you were recruiting him! How can a newly recruited soldier in the army suddenly become a general, on the same day? And chief of army staff? How could he get the plummiest job in the party in no time? Mainly by Obasanjo.

And at the time, we knew Abdulkadir was in United Nigeria Convention Party (UNCP) with Niyi Adebayo and Patricia Etteh (during the Abacha years). These were the people who sponsored the man. We even heard at the time that Bola Ige asked, ‘Who is this Abdulkadir?’ But Etteh said he would talk to Bola Ige to convince him about Abdulkadir’s desirability.

Obasanjo was bent on liquidating the party. He deceived the governors (of AD) to agree to cooperate with PDP, and not put up any candidate against him in the 2003 presidential election. But the truth of the matter was that the leaders of Afenifere were never put in the know. Even Osoba admitted that the discussion had gone on before they came to party leaders.

The impression we were given was that they just wanted to cooperate with Obasanjo so that he could have a second term as a Yoruba man. But we said there were certain conditions the party should lay down upon which we would cooperate. There was no time we agreed that we would not present candidates.

Their grand plan was that if they had won elections, they would have said they did it without the leaders of Afenifere. (AD lost all the states in 2003, except Lagos, to PDP — Gbenga Daniel won in Ogun; Ayo Fayose, Ekiti; Rasheed Ladoja, Oyo; Olusegun Agagu, Ondo and Olagunsoye Oyinlola, Osun).

What could have been Bola Ige’s performance as a minister? What performance? To show he was in a wrong group, he made certain recommendations in the Ministry of Power and Energy, and nobody executed them. He said there were some individuals who had to be removed, before any serious work could be done. But instead of removing them alone, Obasanjo removed him along with them. He was working in a strange environment.

Bola Ige in his lifetime never said I had anything personal against him. But I wouldn’t deny that I often disagreed with him on issues of principle. One of it was when he stated that the doctrine of Afenifere was different from that of AD. I said no, it was a self-serving exercise. That argument came after he lost the primaries. He had also claimed to be the founder of Afenifere. Afenifere dates back to 1952. So, how can somebody say he founded it in 1994?

There are records to show that Afenifere was founded in 1952, people even used to chant then, Afenifere, Egbe Omo Olope (Afenifere’s symbol is the palm tree). There’s nobody in the Western Region that would say Bola Ige founded Afenifere.

What I found very ridiculous was the write-up in a book written in honour of Pa Adesanya where Ige wrote in the ‘Foreword’ that what Awolowo founded was Afeniferere, not Afenifere. It was laughable.

I often disagreed with Bola Ige openly. If he did anything wrong,  I  told  him  to  his  face.  We  never  had  personal problems. He was present at my father’s funeral in 2000. We had a robust personal relationship. Our families were close, to a large extent.

 

Chapter 13

Awolowo, Obasanjo and the Yoruba Nation

The odious years had long gone, though its stench hung here and there. Many were willing to forget the travesty of the treasonable felony trial which remotely

led to the two coups of 1966 (January 15 and July 29), and snowballed into the Civil War (of 1967 – 1970).

The country was regaining its strength, especially with the three Rs (Reconstruction, Reconciliation and Rehabilitation). We were getting back on our feet.

In spite of everything, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the target of the evil plot, went and came out of prison a hero, pronounced the leader of the Yoruba and served as Finance Minister and Vice-Chairman in the cabinet of General Yakubu Gowon (between 1966 and 1971). His stature and renown gained more acclaim, and he was easily regarded as one of the builders of modern Nigeria. The Yoruba of the Southwest idolised him, regarded him as their saviour.

That reputation hovered around him. You could feel, see and touch it. And when Major-General Olusegun Obasanjo became Head of State following the assassination of Major- General  Murtala  Mohammed  on  February  13,  1976  (in a bloody coup plotted by Lt. Col. Bukar Suka Dimka and others), many had thought that the cause of the Yoruba would be protected and advanced.

Leaders of the defunct Action Group and allies of Pa Awolowo as well as many progressive minds went to work. They mentioned that since northerners, especially their politicians and elders as well as their elite, always supported any of their own that occupied the seat of government, encouraging and fighting for dividends that benefited their people, Awolowo should do the same with Obasanjo.

The old man had worked with the soldier before he interacted at close quarters with him (Obasanjo), especially during the civil war years, and tried to talk his disciples out of it.

They didn’t give him respite.

‘Ignore  whatever  you  thought  about  him  or  your perception of him. Act in the interest of the larger group and your people, and table our demands and expectations before him. He’s our son, and he should know where he’s from. Please, seek audience with him, so that he won’t give the impression that it was you who abandoned him.’

The debate went on and on, and Awolowo eventually agreed. His lieutenants had impressed upon him to seek a  one-on-one  audience  with  Obasanjo;  and  he  did.  He thereafter booked an appointment with the new Head of State at Dodan Barracks, Ikoyi (Lagos), the official residence and office of the Head of State and Commander-in-Chief of Nigerian Armed Forces and the appointment was granted.

On  the  day  of  the  appointment,  however,  to  the embarrassment of Chief Awolowo, instead of the one-on-one meeting he had envisaged, he met Major-General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua (Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters, Obasanjo’s deputy) sitting comfortably.

 With the situation he met, Chief Awolowo changed the subject of the discussion he had intended to have with Obasanjo and instead discussed the cassava processing project (known as ‘Gari Ilaju’) he had in Ibadan.

When Awolowo returned to narrate his ordeal, his lieutenants were confounded and surprised that Obasanjo could treat Chief Awolowo in that manner. But Awolowo was not the only victim. A senior officer also found himself in such an embarrassingly awkward situation when he came to see his Commander-in-Chief.

General Olufemi Olutoye had gone to Obasanjo to discuss the ethnic bias against the Yoruba in the Army. And after listening to his homily, Obasanjo surprisingly invited General Yar’Adua and asked Olutoye to repeat what he said. Olutoye was stupefied, but he courageously repeated all he had said before Yar’Adua!

There were many incidents to show that Obasanjo was anti–Yoruba. He has no interest in, or sympathy for, the Yoruba cause; he only has his own interest for everything he does. That is my conclusion, and I have copious evidences to prove it.

Many have even said that Obasanjo detested Awolowo in his lifetime, and did all within his power to truncate his dreams or ambition. They readily cite the elections of 1979 (which his government conducted to usher in the Second Republic, 1979-1983) largely believed to have been won by Awo (as discussed earlier in chapter 8 under ‘Prelude to the Second Republic’).

And in his book ‘Not My Will’, he confirmed everyone’s long-held belief that he held Awo in contempt. He derisively stated that everything Awolowo fought for all through his life and didn’t get, fell on his (Obasanjo’s) lap.

The polity was heated after the release of the controversial book   in   1990.   Awolowo’s   allies   fired  back.   Gbolabo Ogunsanwo (the famous journalist who edited Sunday Times at a time) and I wrote a rejoinder to the reference to Awolowo in Obasanjo’s book, through an article entitled ‘Not His Will’, in which we castigated Obasanjo for impugning the integrity of a revered national leader.

Ebenezer Babatope (who at a time was Director of Organisation of Unity Party of Nigeria) also wrote a book to harangue the ingrate (‘Not His Will: The Obasanjo Wager’). It became clear that Obasanjo had no kind words or feelings for the man (Awo) or his ideals and philosophy. And the battle line was drawn.

Whatever he could do to diminish and destroy the legacy of Awolowo, Obasanjo attempted. Whenever his disciples were united and fighting a common cause, he poisoned the atmosphere and planted seeds of discord.

All through the years, he never wavered. He wanted to be seen as the anointed messiah, and anyone who stood the chance to overshadow him, he belittled, diminished and humiliated.

A typical example of this was the annulment of the June 12, 1993 Presidential Election won by Abiola. Obasanjo, in his characteristic manner, ridiculed Abiola, whose election had been hailed by most Nigerians, by saying in faraway Addis-Ababa that he (Abiola) was not the expected messiah.

The  transition   programme   supervised   by   General Abdulsalam Abubakar (Head of State from June 8, 1998 to May 29, 1999) threw up many political parties – Peoples Democratic  Party,  Alliance  for  Democracy,  All  Nigeria Peoples’ Party.

When politics kicked off, General Olusegun Obasanjo (rtd) was drafted from prison to contest for the Presidency by many powerful retired generals, who wanted him, being one of their own, to cover their tracks. He eventually contested under PDP and won.

The intention was to pacify the Yoruba who had been aggrieved by the annulment of the election won by Chief M.K.O. Abiola, which had been widely acclaimed to be the freest and fairest in the country’s political history. The earlier appointment of Chief Ernest Shonekan as leader of the Interim National Government (ING) following the decision of President Ibrahim Babangida to ‘step aside’ failed to do this.

When Obasanjo was sworn in as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on May 29, 1999, one of his first major actions was to weaken the opposition. To this end, he invited Chief Bola Ige, the deputy leader of Afenifere, under the façade of forming a ‘Government of National Unity.’ Bola Ige, already bitter over the primaries of the AD, was an easy prey.

Ige joined Obasanjo’s cabinet, and influenced the appointment of children of prominent members of Afenifere into the government, namely; Mrs. Tokunbo Awolowo- Dosunmu and Mrs. Modupe Adelaja (daughter of Pa Abraham Adesanya, the leader of Afenifere). The stature of Bola Ige in that cabinet boosted Obasanjo’s government. Expectedly, Obasanjo gloated and, was elated at achieving his purpose.

Another attempt to woo Alhaji Ganiyu Dawodu, also a prominent member of the AD did not succeed. On several occasions when Obasanjo invited Alhaji Dawodu to his Ota residence, he was oblivious of the fact that the typical AD loyalist informed the leader of Afenifere, who encouraged him to go and listen to what Obasanjo had to say.

As soon as Alhaji Dawodu landed in Ota, people phoned Pa Adesanya, thinking they were giving him a hint. They were, however, surprised when the latter replied that he was aware of Dawodu’s mission.

The man who carried on as if he was the all-in-all failed woefully on all counts as the President. His eight-year tenure (1999-2007) was a tragedy. His scorecard was nothing to write home about. What did he do in eight years? Before he came we were buying fuel for N20 per litre, and crude oil was

$23 per barrel. In 2007 under his regime, we were buying fuel at N75 per litre, and crude oil was between $65 and $75. In the worst days of Abacha, one dollar was N85. In 2007, our income had risen, the dollar was over N120.

No president has ever earned what Obasanjo got in terms of revenue. What have we got to show for it? What about our roads, education and health facilities? You tell me. The glorious years of Awolowo in Western Region were only seven years, 1952-1959. Up till today, we are still talking about his achievements. What did Obasanjo do in eight years that you can remember in years to come?

In practical terms, Nigerians were worse off. How much were we buying a bag of rice before he came in? What was the inflation rate, what was the employment figure? What were the redeeming features? If I had N10,000 before Obasanjo came in, how much was it worth by the time he left Aso Rock?

When you talk about economic programmes, it must have an effect on the ordinary man. It must reflect on his life. The highest cost of petrol before he got to power was N20 per litre, and this rose to N100 under his regime. During his first tenure in 1976-1979, he built three refineries, but after eight years (1999-2007) he couldn’t build one neither could he repair the ones he built earlier.

His claim as one of his achievements as head of state under the military was that he built these refineries; yet when he came back as president during his eight-year tenure (1999-

2007), he could neither build a new refinery nor make the existing ones functional.

And up till today the problem is still there, because when he was in government, he employed a tailor to do the work of a carpenter. People he gave the contract to refurbish the refineries were not professionals.

How much was the cost of a car before he came in 1999? Take the question of education. What was the position of our universities at the time he left in 2007? None was listed among the top 1,000 in the world. If you saw the classrooms, they were nothing to write home about.

Our primary schools had 60 or 70 pupils in a class. If we had a free and fair election, nowhere would PDP have been returned in the country.

What did they do to make them worthy of being returned? How much was a bag of cement before Obasanjo came in? What was the unemployment figure?

Do you know how much money he kept in foreign reserves when our people were suffering?

His tenure was a calamity. Obasanjo is shameless! Obasanjo had not disputed that he had only N20,000

in his account by the time he was drafted to contest in 1999. He had never disputed that (Abubakar) Atiku and Oyewole Fasawe saved him from bankruptcy.

Obasanjo was offered the presidency under the PDP. It was he who destroyed the party. He made the PDP to change its constitution on who should become chairman of the Board of Trustees (BOT) in order to favour himself. That was why he said anybody who would occupy that position must be a former president.

For all the negative things people have said about Obasanjo, which he could not refute, if it were to be in any decent society, people like him would not feature in public life again. This was the kind of thing that militated against Edward Heath when he was contesting as Prime Minister of Britain.

Look at the man who says he is clean. How did he build his Presidential Library Complex in Abeokuta? I am sure that when a real government of the people comes into power, they would take it from him, because he twisted people’s hands to build the edifice.

In spite of Mike Adenuga Jr’s generous donation to his university (Bells University of Technology, Ota) and the construction of his library, Obasanjo still callously sent the EFCC to harass him for refusing to confirm the allegation that Atiku Abubakar had financial interest in Globacom. This harassment forced Adenuga to relocate to Ghana on self-exile!

How can such a man be accusing everyone of being corrupt when his own hands are soiled? I have never believed in Obasanjo’s leadership for the little that I know about him. I can’t remember what he stands for on any issue of progress in this country. What has been his performance? Both his wife number one and wife number two, his children number one and number two have nothing honourable to say about him. What amazes me is that people give him undue prominence in spite of his known character. Such a whited sepulchre!

His entire landed property all over the country, his ownership of a private university, and his investment in several blue-chip companies, including Transcorp, put a question mark on his claim to incorruptibility.

 

Chapter 14

Afenifere, NADECO and the June 12 Struggle

There has been a lot of misconception and misrepresentation of the role of Afenifere in the nation’s political history. It is therefore important

that I put the records straight, more so as a lot of people have labelled it as a Yoruba political organisation.

Afenifere is not any special organisation other than the Yoruba interpretation of the AG, and because AG cannot be defined as such, we spelt it out in the socialist policy of free education, free health services, integrated rural development and full employment. So, the Yoruba word ‘Afenifere’ means somebody who likes good for himself and for others; that was how the name came about.

Afenifere is not a Yoruba organisation; it’s just the name of the catchment area where it was founded, when it was founded and that is the AG. We have branches all over the country. The Middle Belt group was in alliance with us. We also had a minority group in the East (called the Calabar, Ogoja, Rivers State Movement). And that’s why we won election in all these areas. So, when people are accusing us of being sectional and tribalistic, they are just stigmatising us.

The NCNC which claimed to be national at that time hadn’t got the national spread in the legislatures of the country as we had. We were the government of the Western Region; we were the opposition at the centre; we were the opposition in the East; we were also the opposition in the North: the North led by Alhaji Maito; the East by Dr. S.G. Ikoku; and Chief S.L. Akintola leading the federal legislature. So, how much more national can you then be?

Our status is what we stand for; we are not standing for an election. The philosophy on which we stand is what any political party we support will preach. We are not changing our status. What we were founded for is what we are. We are not a tribal or cultural organisation. We can say we are culturo-political; cultural in the sense that we are from Yorubaland. But the real philosophy of the organisation is the AG philosophy. We wanted to interpret the philosophy to the people of Yorubaland at the time the AG was founded.

This means in the East there’s Afenifere; in the North there’s Afenifere; in the Middle Belt there’s Afenifere in their respective local parlance. In fact, they had the names they called them: in the East they were called the Eastern Mandate Union (founded by Arthur Nwankwo). When we were founding the Alliance for Democracy I explained all of this.

NADECO (National Democratic Coalition), on its own part, was a child of circumstance. Following the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential elections by Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, there were spontaneous protest demonstrations on  the  streets  of  Lagos,  involving  various  civil  society groups like Campaign for Democracy (CD), Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) and the Campaign for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR). Others were Afenifere, Movement for National Reformation (MNR), and Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP). These protests, which were spearheaded by CD, got the support of many ordinary Nigerians who saw it as an opportunity to vent their anger on the government for such insensitive action.

As a result, there was general disenchantment with the military over its role in aborting the return to democracy.

So, the desire of Afenifere was to restore sanity in the governance system.

In furtherance of the struggle for the return to democracy and the de-annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election which was won by Chief M.K.O. Abiola, the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) was formed on May 15, 1994. As its name suggests, the body is a coalition of civil society groups and other political and non-political associations that were committed to this cause.

NADECO was to get rid of the military. And all of us who did not believe in the military came together. There was Afenifere. In fact, all those parties that claimed to be progressive came together, because we said if we were all fighting the military, we shouldn’t work at cross-purposes.

With the benefit of hindsight, some people now came to believe that the two-party system introduced by the Babangida government (that is, the National Republican Convention and the Social Democratic Party) was designed to fail ab initio. Their argument was hinged on the fact that those whom Babangida allowed to be recruited into the two parties were people who were pliable.

All the things we wanted done, many of them didn’t even understand, not to talk of believing in them. All they wanted was a platform to become minister, governor and all of that. But while we were talking to them about principle, it was after the whole thing had failed that many of them started to see what we too saw, just as it is happening now.

If you recall, there were two primaries, but the first primary elections were annulled. We expressed some reservations as a group at that point, but these were unheeded.

The army was in control, and those people who ought to have raised reservations were those people Babangida put forward for political positions. And at that time if you told any aspiring member not to go, he would say ‘oh, this man doesn’t want me to make a name because he has had his own time,’ until the whole thing collapsed.

I remembered someone, during the local government election, in my area. He said, ‘why are you bothering yourself about local government election? There’s no money in local government. The allocation of revenue is not there. They will give you a paltry amount of money, and you won’t be able to develop.’

So, all the collapse or the imperfections or inactivity of the local governments that you still see now started from the military. The military was merely allocating money to the local government councils to do whatever they liked. But local  governments  were  controlled  from  the  centre.  That was the time when Augustus Aikhomu was in charge, and everybody was cooperating, because the military wanted to control the grassroots. That was why they were particular about controlling the local governments. Those who were beneficiaries of the largesse believed that was the best form of government.

In fact, when we were supporting Abiola at that time, we asked him, ‘are you sure this man is going to conduct this election?’ But we were misguided, thinking that he, being a close friend of Babangida, would know. Abiola then assured us that Babangida had told him that the election would take place. Then he said we could go on. We got that information directly from Abiola.

All we wanted was to have a civilian there, particularly when that civilian came from the west, more so because we had been complaining that no Yoruba man had been head of state. That was why we supported Abiola. When they annulled the election, it was in an attempt to pacify the Yoruba that they brought in Shonekan. But we said ‘no, the Yoruba we want is one of our choice and not of your own choice’.

In fact, within the military then there was no consensus. Abacha had his own ambition, that ‘if Babangida goes I must be there.’ So, in no time he toppled Shonekan. That was what gave birth to the regime of Abacha. The regime came to be an absolute military regime.

Before his decision to ‘step aside’ on August 17, 1993, Babangida had put in place an Interim National Government (ING) headed by Chief Ernest Shonekan with a 28-member cabinet having General Sani Abacha as its only military member. He then backed it up with Decree No. 61, which included a booby trap that ‘in the event of death or resignation of the Head of the ING, the most senior member of the cabinet should assume the reins of power.’

This provided an opportunity for Abacha, as ‘most senior member of the cabinet’ to instigate Shonekan’s ‘resignation’ and take over ‘the reins of power’ on November 17, 1993, following an earlier Lagos High court ruling on a suit filed by Abiola declaring the ING illegal.

Earlier on, Abiola was then in the NPN, while we were in the UPN. All that time we told him, ‘these people are just exploiting you,’ but he didn’t want to listen. All the time he said that Shagari promised him he was going to spend only one term, and that was why he supported Shagari. After the first term, they now asked Abiola, ‘where are you?’ It was then his eyes opened. Then he later left the NPN. That was it. In fact, he was so bitter against Chief Awolowo that it was he who raised the question of Maroko (360-plot land deal). But he got it all wrong.

I told some people at that time that the property I had at Surulere was a form of payment to me by clients whom I

 helped to recover their land from trespassers. So, this is just the tradition of lawyers. But Abiola did not know this and he used his Concord newspapers at that time to besmear the image of our leader. After some time, however, his eyes were opened. But when the question of election of Abiola came, we didn’t pay him in his own coins.

It must be stated that NADECO came to support Abiola, as a result of the annulment, not before the election. When I was arrested by the security agencies in the heat of the June 12 agitation, I told them the principle of supporting Abiola was not my own kettle of fish; that it could have been any other person, even an Abubakar or a Chukwuemeka.

The arrest was another twist in our struggle to actualise June 12. Three of us, Pa Abraham Adesanya, Alhaji Ganiyu Dawodu and I were arrested on June 17, 1996 by the police over the bizarre allegation that we were suspects in Mrs. Kudirat Abiola’s gruesome murder on June 4, 1996. This allegation was ridiculous because, prior to her assassination, we all (Afenifere leaders and Kudirat) had been in the vanguard of the fight for the restoration of Moshood Abiola’s mandate. In spite of this, however, we were kept in detention for over four months, often sleeping on bare floors.

I was part of Afenifere that joined the coalition of pro- democracy agitators. I didn’t join NADECO as an individual, I joined the group fighting for democracy and for the removal of the military. Our own organisation was in the forefront. We were using Afenifere at that time because the AG and other political associations had been banned. So, it was that cultural and political organisation that we used to form NADECO with other parts of the country.

NADECO had the name for being in the front line in the fight for democracy. So, for all others that joined we didn’t discriminate against them. Once we all agreed that the military must go, everybody came on board.

For those who were saying NADECO was fighting a Yoruba cause, it was after the annulment that they said those who remained consistent against the annulment were the Yoruba. But I insisted that that was not so.

When the annulment was made, Adamu Ciroma also said, ‘Abiola won fair and square, I was one of those who were fighting for him.’ But where the Yoruba became the only ones who remained in NADECO was where the Yoruba became consistently constant. When the others chickened out, we remained. That was why I answered those who were accusing NADECO of being a Yoruba organisation: ‘You are not being fair to yourselves. If you have been accused of being inconsistent and you chickened out in the battle comes, why should you blame those of us who continued the fight? If we too had chickened out the way you did, there would have been no NADECO, there would be no getting rid of Abacha.’ By the time the battle was fierce, all those who formed NADECO   chickened   out;   those   who   now   remained championing the cause were from the minorities and the Yoruba. The Yoruba were in the majority, which was what gave them the leeway. The antagonists just gave us that name

to justify their cowardice.

Our stand in favour of Abiola spelt this out completely, because everybody  in  Nigeria  knew  that  Abiola  was  our political enemy. He was one of those who prevented Chief Awolowo from becoming president. But that didn’t disturb us because the teaching that Chief Awolowo gave us was that ‘anything that is good for Nigeria, no matter who initiates it, you must support it. That was the principle under which we operated.’

When Shagari sent Abdurahman Shugaba packing in the northeast, we were vehemently opposed to it and fought the injustice. During the Tiv riots, it was the Yoruba that rescued Joseph Tarka. Even when the NPN deposed Balarabe Musa as Governor of Kaduna State unjustly, Chief Awolowo sent Chief G.O.K. Ajayi and myself to go and defend him. Therefore, our fight for democracy has been irrespective of whose ox is gored.

The most significant achievement of NADECO is the fact that it ended military rule. We fought them to a standstill. It was however not those who fought for it that got into power thereafter. That’s one of the regrets. In fact, it was those who supported Abacha that became governors and other political leaders because they now had money. Even one of the most prominent members of his government, Ebenezer Babatope, moved the motion that Abacha should rule forever!

When it comes to the question of being labelled, many of these people have forgotten their roles, that many who were known to be progressives in the days of the AG or during NADECO became ministers under Abacha; this is the undoing of L.K. Jakande for joining the Abacha government. It ruined his reputation forever. And Babatope’s. It brought them down. We warned them.

I remember Babatope coming to my office in Western House over this matter, saying ‘if you ask us to go we would go.’ Even when they started to kill our people in Lagos and we warned them that they would get killed and asked them to get out of the government of Abacha, they didn’t. Even Chief (Mrs) Mojisola Osomo who was recommended by Papa Ajasin, and whom we saw as his protégé, all refused to adhere.

Take also the case of Dr. Olu Onagoruwa, who had warned in 1994 (front page of Daily Times) that if Abiola had been allowed to rule, Nigeria would have gone in ruins. If I remember Onagoruwa’s position very well, he was in NADECO with us. Papa Awo had such confidence in him that even before 1979 when we were asked to nominate candidates for electoral positions, it was he (Papa) that nominated Onagoruwa to represent the UPN.

During the NADECO days when Anthony Enahoro was our leader, we were all meeting together in Rewane’s house. That was when Abacha came into power with Oladipo Diya, and before Onagoruwa was made a minister. We were asking for restructuring and the convocation of a national conference when Diya detained me in Abeokuta on assumption of office.

Onagoruwa  was  there  and  he  asked,  ‘Haa!  why  did you detain this man?’ ‘What is the complaint against Chief Adebanjo?’ Onagoruwa asked, ‘why all the fuss about this man?’ He said, ‘that is the man o!’ By the time Diya said he wanted Onagoruwa as the Attorney-General and we doubted whether he should accept, he (Diya) gave us the false impression that, knowing that we were the agitators for a national conference, by choosing him as a minister, it meant that the government was going to have the conference. That was the bait.

So, when he got there now and he was sitting under Abacha, and we did not see the prospect of any national conference taking place, and asked him to resign, he said if he should resign, that government would not last one day longer. He made that mistake. Later they sacked him and also killed his son. When all these things happened to him, he was no longer associated with us.

Sometimes they say I am too rigid, but this has always been based on principle. Take the case of Ebenezer Babatope for  instance.  As  one  of  the  young  disciples  of  the  late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, whom I held in high esteem, his reactionary behaviour during the Abacha regime and his later joining of Obasanjo’s party (PDP), greatly disappointed me. This is responsible for my cold attitude towards him ever since.

For instance, when Obasanjo wrote ‘Not My Will’, in which he maligned our leader Chief Obafemi Awolowo, he countered it with a scathing rejoinder in his book, ‘Not His Will’. This, I thought, was a demonstration of his continued loyalty to the leader; but having now jumped ship, he can no longer claim to be one of us.

I can’t see someone who says he is an Awoist and is comfortable with Obasanjo, Abacha and Babangida and keep mute. He moved the motion that Abacha, despite all his atrocities, should continue in office. Is that consistent with a progressive person? I have been in this party now for over

65 years and people know me for the principles I stand for. Whether we won election or not, I have remained consistent. It was when we won the election in the UPN that Babatope was employed as Director of Organisation, and when the military took over, he chickened out, and still wants to be accorded the respect of an Awoist. This I object to.

He feels very uncomfortable with this, and often goes about maligning us by saying that we don’t have a forgiving spirit. But people should ask him whether there was anytime he came to Afenifere meeting and we walked him out.

When there was a crisis in the party and he said he was going to the United Kingdom to study law, and sought financial help from me through his wife, I readily came to his help, not with a loan that he asked for, but with what I could afford to give. This was in keeping with the tradition of our party where the leaders were very supportive, just as Chief Rewane also supported me by paying my house rent when I was in detention.

What Babatope expected of me was to facilitate a return to his old position in the party which I turned down, because somebody else had occupied that position after he left. Ayo Opadokun’s son was his assistant who rose with Afenifere and NADECO, and I informed him we couldn’t have reserved the position for him. That has been my problem with him.

 

Chapter 15

My position on the 2014 National Conference has been very clear. This is to the effect that President Goodluck  Jonathan’s  initiative  in  calling  the

conference is commendable. The quality of representation was quite high and evenly spread. The recommendations made by the conference were far-reaching, and, if implemented, would solve many of our problems as a nation.

There is a saying that half-bread is better than nothing. I am not one of those who make too much fuss on the word

‘sovereign,’ because what sovereignty means is that whatever decisions are taken at the conference are not subject to any amendment except to a referendum. But if we did not use the word ‘sovereign’ and after the conference we see that there was nothing wrong and we get what we wanted, I believe that we shouldn’t quarrel about semantics. My thinking was that we should allow the subject to take place first, and then we can be talking about the predicate, whether sovereign or not.

 The word ‘sovereignty,’ which I even argued with Obasanjo, means that it rests with the people. All we were saying was that we didn’t want the government to handle it the way they did the 1979 constitutional conference, where Obasanjo inserted the Land Use Decree, which was never recommended, in the decisions, and then another military administration came and amended the constitution. We didn’t want that. That was why we condemned the present (1999) constitution as a military constitution. If it is going to be the people’s constitution, only the National Assembly, and the people should say yes or no.

Even if we use the word ‘sovereign’ now, and you convoke the conference, let us have the subject first and people talk. Then we can debate whether there’s sovereignty now or later, so far it is a matter of execution of proceedings.

So, what I said about those who argued that we should make it sovereign was that we shouldn’t quarrel about that. Let’s have the conference first. Even the question of whether it should be sovereign or not was later dropped because we had pressure from all quarters that the conference should take place. After the pressure and the conference was held, the issue that arose again was whether the outcome should go to the National Assembly or not.

Many of us were opposed to the idea of the recommendations going to the National Assembly, because the National Assembly itself was part of the problem that we wanted to solve. That was our stand. Our belief was: let us first solve what we were going to sovereign upon and when we have it the debate would resume. At the end of the conference, we now agreed that our recommendations should only be subjected to a referendum.

Those were my expectations. Even up till now, I still earnestly desire that those recommendations should be implemented. I remember that before the election, one mainreason our own group supported Jonathan was the promise that he would implement the recommendations. Although some people say that we shouldn’t rely on what he had said, my own take is that ‘here is somebody who says I will do. But Buhari says he has nothing to do with the conference.’ So, that was why I said ‘half-bread is better than nothing,’ and that was the basis for my support of Jonathan.

At least 80 per cent of my expectations were achieved during the conference. For instance, regionalisation of the police, devolution of powers, rationalisation of the local governments in each region. Revenue allocation (fiscal federalism) was reduced and passed on to the state, and local government was put under the state government. Central power was drastically reduced.

One of my very few expectations at the conference which was not achieved is regionalisation. This was because some minorities in the north felt that it is good for the people in the southwest to talk of regional autonomy. They argued that they were put under slavery in their region because they were treated like paupers (second-class citizens). That if they have their own autonomy, like having their own state, which would lead to creating more states, then we can talk of regionalisation.

That they have joined a region of their own choice on an equal basis. That was why, in the recommendation of the confab, we called for the creation of more states and put a provision that states of like minds can join together for common services. They can also pull out, if they like, by conducting a referendum. So, we made the recommendation for eventual regional autonomy. But that, for now, everyone should be free to say ‘I am in this or that region by having their local governments.’ Right now, what we have is the devolution of power to the states; whereas if we had regionalism, it would have been devolution of power to the regional governments.

We have a lot of lessons to learn from the First Republic in this regard.

The Independence Constitution we had was the type of federalism we wanted. To the extent that when we had self-government in 1959; in the north and two years earlier (1957) in the south, they all had their constitutions written differently. And that was how we carried on, and we would have had independence then but for the north which said they were not ready, and so we waited until they had their own self-government in 1959; self-governing regions then came together to have independence for Nigeria in 1960. That was what we had up to 1963 when Nigeria became a republic, because we had a really federal constitution. But with the 1966 coup, the military centralised everything.

That was why during the NADECO days and during the military era, those of us who fought for independence were talking of restructuring of the country. As a result of the incursion of the military in 1966, they restructured the country by the system they set up, that’s why we are still fighting up till now. All the problems we are now battling with we had solved before independence. Unfortunately, while the country was doing well economically, the political field was tumultuous.

From my own delegation at the 2014 Conference, we are advocating a return to the parliamentary system. We came to this conclusion having observed that we are not ripe for executive presidency as practised in the United States of America.

Parliamentary system is more democratic, less expensive, and the system of changing leadership is much easier. Executive presidency can make the president very autocratic. That’s why, till today, the Nigerian President is the most powerful president in the whole world. But, unfortunately, a majority of the people at the conference have enjoyed the advantages of this system because many of them are from the north. So, we didn’t allow that to break the conference. In fact, we wanted to insert in the conference report that each region can adopt a suitable system. But we believed by evolution we can fight that out later.

But principally I am a parliamentarian. I believe in the parliamentary system more than the executive presidency system. It is important to state firmly that the parliamentary system did not fail in the First Republic as some people claim. The Western Region crisis was ignited by Akintola’s agitation to join the NPC. He was the Premier of Western Region at that time. The story of what transpired and eventually led to the Western Region crisis had been told earlier and does not bear repetition here.

I  remember  very  clearly  that  something  like  the hybrid system (that is, a mixture of both the parliamentary and presidential systems) was recommended at the 2014 National Conference. But, as for me, I still believe in a purely parliamentary system.

As I asked at the national conference, ‘is what we have now a purely federal constitution?’ For instance, one of the iniquities in the present constitution is that you say you are federal, without any regional police, that means you are not following the American pattern of federalism.

Have you ever heard of an inspector-general of police in America? Everything we are doing, as late Chief Rotimi Williams said, ‘our constitution is a fraudulent document.’ It was never made by the people nor is it federal. Whereas the preamble says, ‘We the people of Nigeria…,’ we the people of Nigeria didn’t make this present constitution, it was the military. That’s why we are insisting that we must make a new constitution.

We  must  restructure  the  country  on  a  truly  federal basis where each region will develop at its own pace. There must be regional autonomy and all those conditions under the First Republic that allowed the late Chief Awolowo to perform all the wonders he did in the Western Region. He had the freedom to do them under the constitution. Even at that time, we had a representative in London. There was fiscal independence.

When he introduced free education, he didn’t have cause to go to Balewa for subsidy. We all knew how much would come to the region. He fought for derivation which we now call resource control. It was Chief Awolowo that fought for it at the 1956 Constitutional Conference. It was maintained up to the time we became a republic, even after oil was discovered in Rivers. The allocation of revenue was based on 50 per cent.

It was the military that distorted all these things. That’s why we are insisting on going back to the drawing board and having a purely federal constitution to solve all these areas of conflict.

 

Chapter 16

My Adorable Soulmate, Christie

My dream of having an enduring union and a soulmate and confidant has been fulfilled in Christiana (Christie, as I called her).  Right from the time we were in the UK, she has been a pillar of support.

As the secretary of the London Branch of the Action Group, my wife ensured that the report I wrote was rewritten by her, saying my handwriting was very poor, and wondered how I could be struggling to read my own handwriting at a public gathering of the AG. So, because she couldn’t type, she would take the trouble to write my report all over again in her own beautiful handwriting which is very legible.

Since Chief Awolowo described his wife Hannah as ‘A Jewel of Inestimable Value,’ it appears that a lot of people have misused that statement. I am in a position to say that my own wife Christie is ‘a jewel’ in her actions, behaviour and my treatment.

Upon her return to Nigeria, she came into the political troubles of the time. When I left her in London, it was withthe hope of having her join me later after establishing at home. But contrary to our expectations, the political trouble of treasonable felony arose before her return.

By the time she returned, I was already in exile in Ghana, So, I had to go and meet her at Tema Port, to bring her to Accra where we were then living at Koko-mule-mule, opposite the house of the then Minister of Defence (under Nkrumah), Kofi Bako. She was shocked to meet me at the Port.

She told me it was no sooner they left Liverpool than they learnt that there had been a coup in Nigeria. So, I told her that after that coup, the Balewa government was after some of us.

Then from the little money I had in a bank in Ibadan, I wrote a cheque for her. The cheque almost exposed her because we didn’t know that she was going to be met by security agents.

While in Ghana, they had an affection for my wife. She  was  distinctive,  and  I  still  cannot  find  another woman that thinks that way. In one of her letters, she told me, ‘Ayo, you can do what you like with women, but don’t produce a child!’ That statement shocked me! Among the correspondence we had while I was in exile, that one really stood out.

When she got back home after our meeting in Ghana, she was looking after the children solely on her income.

Again, I recall that while we were in London, I was regularly sending some allowance to my father. Unknown to me, she had taken note of this and continued to send the allowance to my father from her own income while I was in exile. She never knew my father then, but because of the condition that I was in, I often told her that I didn’t know who would be taking care of my father in my absence. She used her monthly scholarship allowance to continue sending this allowance to my father regularly, which I was not doing until I met her. In this way, she endeared herself to my father.

 Before I married her, I had two other ladies I was interested in. I sent the names of the three of them to my father for prayers. My dad got back to me to say that the one I told him was not a Nigerian was the one endorsed. When my father came back with his report, it matched perfectly with my wife.

My wife is from the famous Lawson family of Togo. In fact, she is now the head of the family in Lagos, as a result of which I hosted the Togolese King and other members of the family in my house at Lekki, Lagos in December 2015. When we were getting married in London, Chief Ladoke Akintola, who was the chairman of the occasion, joked that it was an international marriage, because my wife was from Togo.

The devotion of my wife to the marriage really came to play during the treasonable felony crisis. She was fully devoted to me during this period, and she was a great pillar of support to my parents. When my mother died in 1964, she stood in and played my role as if I was around. At this occasion, she also talked of the highly commendable role of my bosom friend, Alhaji Moshood Ola Owodunni, who placed his Chevrolet car at her disposal and this facilitated her movement during that period.

Before this time, since her arrival, she had been subjected to police harassment almost on a weekly basis. They would come to the house to search it thoroughly, thinking that I hid some incriminating things in the house. Her experience during the treasonable felony crisis was like a baptism of fire for her.

During Buhari’s military administration, I was employed in a private company as a non-executive director. The company had some contract with the Ogun State Government and the government had not even given them a kobo under that contract, but I was put in detention in Abeokuta simply because they found my name as one of the directors. My wife had to be bringing me food in Abeokuta.

 For a woman who had lived too much of a Christian life with a minister of religion, one would understand why political activities were anathema to her; but my wife has accommodated me and my political vocation, till today, particularly after returning to Nigeria.

Each time we were engaged in our usually long political meetings with Chief Awolowo, her friends often asked her, ‘Are you sure your husband is really with Chief Awolowo and not in any other place?’ But she would reply, ‘I know where my husband is. I know about his programme.’

The period  we  spent  at  political  meetings,  we  kept it strictly out of the home. When her friends doubted my whereabouts, my wife would say, ‘I trust my husband.’ Some of them would say, ‘Your husband is very handsome, don’t let him go to any function without you being there.’ But later on, doubting friends, came to realise that I was a loyal husband.

On the domestic front, I had no driver initially when I was practising. At the close of work, I would drive her to the market to buy some things for the house. She would never complain, because the income was very meagre. In fact, we pooled our individual incomes for the family’s upkeep.

The confidence we had in each other started in England when I made her a co-signatory to my account. When I was to buy my first piece of land in Surulere through my own friend and former Chairman of the Action Group in London, Chief Z.O.K. Adetula, I requested for two plots, one for me and the other for my wife. But by the time we were given the plan for my own plot, we found that the plan could not be accommodated in one plot. So my wife said, ‘Why don’t we just use the two plots for the building?’ I told her, ‘that’s your own land, I don’t want to combine it with mine, in order to accommodate her own plan.

Luckily, however, I had a friend who was in charge of lands, and I asked him, ‘Where can we get a substitute?’ He told me, ‘incidentally, the one adjacent to your land is also free.’ So, we had to buy that land.

Not only that, when we started to build the house, I asked her, ‘which one do we build first, is it the one on your plan or my own?’ I then offered to her, ‘let’s build the one on your own plan, so that if I can no longer finance it, you can raise money from the Civil Service to complete the house.’ She was shocked when I said this; and my prediction came true. By the time we got to a certain stage of the building, we had run out of funds, and she was to retire from service. So, she had to take a loan from the Civil Service to complete it, such that by the time she was going to retire, she had to use her retirement benefits to offset the loan.

I remember that some of my friends were mocking me by saying, ‘You have a joint account with your wife and you also bought a piece of land in her name.’ But to the glory of God, I must confess, I have no regret for everything that I did for her. And I bless the day I met her.

For what she has been to me, I will forever be grateful to the Ajayis. As I said earlier on, one of the good things that happened to me, when I was Organising Secretary for the Action Group in Remo Division was my meeting Olaniwun Ajayi in Sagamu and also registering him as a member of our party. To the glory of God, ours has been a match blessed through their own (Ajayis’) instrumentality.

Although my wife is a Togolese, all my family members admit that even if I had married an Ijebu woman, they may not have become as fond of her, as they have of Christie. That’s to show you how much she has acclimatised and wormed her way into the hearts of my people.

When I was practising as a lawyer, I did not know any eating house (canteen or restaurant) because my wife always prepared my food from home everyday.

During the Abacha regime, in the heat of the June 12 struggle, some of us were clamped in detention, but she was never worried. One incident that surprised my friends was when we (NADECO people) were holding a reception for former US Ambassador Walter Carrington in my house and soldiers stormed in, and broke my gate to disturb the event. We initially fixed the reception for Chief Onasanya’s house but prepared another place as a decoy when we anticipated a security breach. But no sooner had we settled down at Onasanya’s house than they came to disperse us. We now went to my house, but they traced us there to disturb us again. At that point, Pa Abraham Adesanya dared them to shoot him. On that occasion, the wives of our colleagues were all there for the reception.

A mild drama ensued while the police were there harassing us: my wife went up, packed all the things that I would take into detention, including my medicine. Then the policemen asked her, ‘Where are you going?’ She answered, ‘I know you will soon take him away.’ That showed her courage.

She always stood firm and was never a source of discouragement in my political activism in this country, although she believes now that I should pipe down on account of age. As for disposition to my friends and family, she is always welcoming, wears a permanent friendly look, and is a perfect hostess all the time.

With all sense of humility, not only is she beautiful, my wife has excellent sartorial taste. Up till today, even in her old age (I am only two years older), my wife ensures the cleanliness of my underwear… my singlets, pants, and even handkerchiefs. She supervises them up to the detergent and the water they will use for washing.

 

Chapter 17

Honour from Far and Near

was not exactly averse to chieftaincy titles, I was just not keen enough to start looking for one. I was not desperate to attach Chief to my name. I was content with being

Mr. Ayo Adebanjo. If nothing at all, I was particular about ensuring that my name was neither tarnished nor brought into disrepute. I inherited a good name, and the best I could do was to ensure that I made it more respected.

Adding Chief to my name wouldn’t necessarily guarantee a good legacy. But there were pressures from my friends and associates, kinsmen and family to become a titled man. And from 1979 till now, I have quite a handful of titles from the Geregbedun of Iken-Ogbo;  Bajulaiye of Ife; Baba Ijo of St. Philip’s Church, Isanya-Ogbo; Asiwaju of Ibido-Ogbo and Baba Oba Alamuren of Okelamuren-Ogbo.

Geregbedun, 1979

Being honoured as the Geregbedun of Iken-Ogbo was an honour I never sought. I was decorated by surprise in my house. The king just sent three chiefs to my house one early morning in 1979. One lady and two chiefs came to my house in Okelamuren when we were getting ready to leave for Chief Bisi Onabanjo’s swearing-in ceremony. Chief Onabanjo had won the election as Ogun State Governor, and he was to take his oath of office in Abeokuta, the state capital.

They had been looking for me for sometime, to surprise me with the honour. But I had a hunch about their intention.

The lady amongst the trio was carrying the calabash (one of the items used during chieftaincy title installation). I was coming out in fury to see who was disturbing me and they just put the beads around my neck. I was taken aback by such beautiful gesture from the king and his people.

The  title   of   Geregbedun was   from   my   paternal grandmother (my father’s mother). It’s a title named after a river. Some worship the deity, believing it brings peace and prosperity to the community. They gave me the calabash and beads that morning, and out of deference to the wishes and yearnings of my people, I accepted. Every year, they ask for money and I give them. I don’t participate in any of the rituals since I am a Christian.

Geregbedun has become an honorary traditional title.

Bajulaiye, 1986

My decoration as the Bajulaiye of Ife on May 3, 1986 was a big ceremony in Ile-Ife (Osun State), regarded as the cradle of the Yoruba race. The then Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade, told me he wanted to make me a chief. The king had been a friend; even before he became king; we had known each other well, and related as friends.

He went through Chief Obafemi Awolowo and his wife Chief (Mrs.) H.I.D. Awolowo to persuade me to accept the title. Chief Awolowo invited me to Ikenne. And I went. He informed me that the Ooni wanted to make me a chief; that he had accepted on my behalf, and had fixed a date.

 I was taken aback, made excuses, but Chief Awolowo refused. I wanted it postponed…and the sage said, ‘Those made chiefs, what have they achieved that you haven’t?’

I made more excuses about not completing my house, and Chief Awolowo said he had been there, that the building was habitable.

We had roofed it, and was only waiting to make it more habitable. I was already living there in Ogbo (and I was developing it gradually). When he said he had accepted and fixed a date on my behalf, there was nothing I could do.

It was the first time the Ooni installed a man and his wife as chiefs on the same day. My wife became Yeye Elere of Ife. The last Bajulaiye was about 200/300 years before. It’s a title that has historical significance, hence the Bajulaiye is one of the respected chiefs of the Ooni. Chief Awolowo had told the Ooni that he didn’t want a social title for me. That he wanted a title with history.

The ceremony in Ile-Ife was joyous and wonderful. That day my wife and I, as well as Mrs. Animashaun (her husband had been earlier installed a chief ) were decorated, and given our symbols of office, in the presence of Chief and Chief (Mrs.) Awolowo, in the palace of the Ooni.

Baba Ijo

I succeeded Chief J.O Oluwole, after his death as Baba Ijo of St. Philip’s Anglican Parish Church, Isanya-Ogbo, a long time ago, but I was not installed. Prior to that time, I had been the Balogun of the church. My installation as Baba Ijo was delayed pending a facelift of the church. The vicar then Rev. I. O. Olusanya (now late) made me the chairman of the fund-raising committee.

So, we fixed a fund-raising day to renovate the church. The response I received from associates and admirers was amazing. We raised about N200,000.

 

Chief Awolowo was to preside at the fund-raising ceremony, but he died before the event. We had asked him to fix a date. He picked August/September 1987 (Chief Awolowo died on May 9, 1987).

When we eventually fixed another date, Chief Alfred Rewane was the chairman of the fund-raising. He alone donated N50,000 (through Alhaji Ganiyu Dawodu). At the event, Otunba Michael Subomi Balogun, Aare Arisekola Alao and Chief Laniwun Ajayi were present.

(Balogun attended personally. He flew into the country to be able to attend that ceremony). Dr. (Mrs.) Tokunbo Awolowo-Dosunmu was one of those recording the donations and she also represented her parents, Papa and Mama Awolowo. The amount raised was so encouraging that we decided to build an entirely new church from the scratch.

Chief C. P. Odunsi (one of the leaders of the church) said he had a property he could bequeath to the church. Arc. Afolabi Kuku (from Ijebu Ode), drew the plan of the church. He was the Diocesan architect. He recruited the services of Engr. Adeoye Fowora. Their services were free, with no charge whatsoever. The Quantity Surveyor was Otunba T. B. Adebayo who also rendered his services free.

The church was under Ijebu-Iwade Archdeaconry, under the then Venerable Ayo Odukoya. He was an accountant. What’s interesting about the Archdeacon was that his suggestion can never be forgotten. He asked us to expand the size of the building with about two more windows. He said a church is never completed in one’s lifetime.

We expanded it, and every time I think about his advice, I am happy that we heeded it. It took sometime to complete the expansion. It was during this period that I celebrated my

70th birthday.

My father was advanced in age; I was praying fervently that it would not be a funeral that we would celebrate first in the renovated church.

 In 1998, on my 70th birthday, I issued a letter of appeal that, instead of giving me money, my supporters should buy one window or two. That was done. I called a quantity surveyor to cost the windows.

Five years before my 70th birthday, in 1993, I celebrated the wedding of my daughter Adeola, at the uncompleted church. There were no windows; we rented benches and everything. I always wanted my in-laws to know my daughter’s hometown. That was why we opted to have the wedding there. At that time, the church had been roofed. The wedding engagement was held in Lagos. So, during my 70th birthday in 1998, more funds were raised, and all the windows were completed. But all the aluminium on the altar and the rail were donated by me. There were other contributions by some other groups.

With the church dedication on May 1, 2009, the chiefs in the church were installed. I formally became the Baba Ijo of St. Phillip’s Church, Isanya-Ogbo.

 

Asiwaju of Ibido-Ogbo

The Baale  of  Ibido-Ogbo  just  declared  me  the  Asiwaju, with the consent of the chiefs. No formal ceremony other than the declaration. It was just to show that they recognise and appreciate my services. Ibido-Ogbo is one of the towns comprising the Ogbo community.

Baba Oba Alamuren of Okelamuren-Ogbo

There used to be eleven towns in Ogbo area, known as Ogbo Mokanla. Now, there are about 16 (which are prominent). More towns have developed, and now people say they are all claiming Ogbo heritage.

The traditional ruler of Okelamuren, Oba Oguntayo was installed by Gov. Gbenga Daniel who gave him the staff of office. He declared me the Baba Oba. This declaration was in August 2010. There was no big ceremony. The Baba Oba title is at the discretion of the Oba.

In  Yorubaland,  especially  in  the  earlier  days,  chiefs were  often  made  from  respected  and  prominent  citizens of the community. Some of the titles are historical and hereditary. But men and women of valour, who contributed to the development of any community, were rewarded with chieftaincy titles. When we were developing democratic socialism as the political philosophy of the AG, we found out that chieftaincy conferment was ingrained among the Yoruba. It was the then Ooni (Oba Adesoji Aderemi) that made Chief Awolowo the Adole of Ife.

A title is a recognition for the services of an individual. I accepted the titles in good faith, promising to do more for those who found me worthy of the honour, and Nigerians at large.

 Chapter 18

Random Thoughts

This concluding chapter is a reflection of my thoughts on various issues ranging from politics and governance structure to building enduring political institutions, among other issues.

…On Colonialism and Successive Governments in Africa

Several years of colonialism have left me with the conviction that the white man has not been fair to Africa, particularly to Nigeria, because the awkwardness we are having in Nigeria today was planted by the colonialists. It was them who deliberately handed Nigeria over to the northern people, in spite of their inadequacies. This was because they believed that by handing over to the north, they would still be able to control the territory even after their departure; it was only for their own self-interest.

Let us consider, for instance, the population of the north which they said was higher than that of the south. Nigeria is the only country in the world where the more you go from the forest area through the savannah, to the desert area, the higher the population!

I think with continuous educational progress, (but it’s unfortunate that they are now cancelling the study of history, particularly in our country) and with more production of historical facts, Africa shall rise again, because there has been the dampening of enthusiasm after the death of Nkrumah, who championed the African nationalist spirit, with his famous statement that ‘Our independence is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of Africa.’

In the nationalist crusade that swept across Africa, the British always played a prominent role in undermining the real progressives of the country. Go to southwest Africa, you always find the British supporting the reactionaries against the progressives. That was one of the good things Murtala Muhammed and Olusegun Obasanjo did when they came into office, in 1975. They made Africa the centre-piece of our foreign policy.

But it’s unfortunate that so many despotic leaders have now emerged in Africa… people who want to perpetuate themselves in office. I believe the antidote is that those of us who have been liberated democratically, just like the role Nigeria is playing in some other countries where there has been military uprising, will refuse to cooperate with any military administration. That was what led to the formation of the Organisation of African Unity, OAU (now African Union, AU), as well as the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). If the spirit of those organisations is in force and the leaders who emerge there are conscientious, we shall get somewhere.

No doubt, the slow pace of development in Africa, Nigeria in particular, is attributable to the problem of leadership. Here in Nigeria, we have not been lucky to have the right type of leadership since independence. The irony is that those who fought for Nigeria’s independence never got into power. Take the first military coup, for instance, those who took part never got into power.

Those of us who read a few books about socialist principles and communism, I remember particularly when we visited Eastern Germany during the Cold War when we were in exile in Ghana. The tour was arranged to coincide with a conference of African leaders in Accra because Balewa insisted that as long as Ikoku and I were in Ghana they wouldn’t come there. Then Nkrumah promised that he would make sure that we were not around. How can we be a threat to a head of state coming to Ghana when he was under the protection of our party leader Chief Obafemi Awolowo? To satisfy him, Nkrumah arranged that we visit the Soviet Union during the period of the conference in Ghana. At that time in the Soviet Union, even up till today in the present Russia, no matter what programme you were pursuing, you must first of all go to the school of political philosophy. That was how the proletariat suffered before they brought the country up to that stage.

When I begin to see a lot of the things that are happening in our country today, I am amazed that those who were beneficiaries of the old struggle for independence, the moment they get into power they become the people who oppress the underdogs. They have forgotten that some people fought for that freedom they now enjoy.

…On Nigeria in the African and Global Context

The rottenness in Nigeria today does not augur well for leadership in Africa; but I want us to purify ourselves first, in order to be an example to the African continent. During our days in exile in Ghana, what bound Nkrumah and Awolowo was their fight against the enslavement of Africans in their own land, referring to the role of whites at that time in South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Kenya, and so on.

We should not put ourselves in a position where people would say, ‘What is the situation with Boko Haram in your country?  What  is  the  position  of  Niger  Delta  militants?

What about Biafra agitators?’ It is the degree of political independence that we have that will reflect on our trade policy. Whatever industrialisation we have in the country today was done after independence in 1960. We have to decide on how to shape our destiny. That’s why I quarrel with all those who are misusing the opportunity today.

…On the Military and its Role in Truncating Political Development in Nigeria

When we are alarmed about the degree of corruption in Nigeria today, this can be put squarely at the doorsteps of the military.

Lack of courage from some politicians who wanted to be in power at all cost without struggle also contributed to it.

One of the reasons we objected to Obasanjo at the return of civil rule in 1999 was because we said, ‘How can you say you are bringing back democracy and give us a military man as president? Does that mean that those of us who have been clamouring for civilian rule are not capable of ruling ourselves?’

The partisan nature of the January 15, 1966 coup led to the pogrom in the north.

I must remark that Gowon was the best of the military rulers. He brought Awolowo from Calabar Prison and made him the second-in-command under his government as Vice- Chairman of the Federal Executive Council and Minister of Finance. Many other military leaders under him were corrupt, but he himself was not.

 On Buhari, I am disappointed that he has not disappointed me, because I want him to do those things I accused him of. As a democratic leader now, I expected that he would do those things I had accused him of before his election; but he is yet to vindicate my stand.

Under his watch, the cost of running Aso Rock, the official seat of government, is astronomical. It should be reduced by at least 25% if his government’s mantra of ‘change’ is to be taken seriously.

…On Party Supremacy

The principle of party supremacy is fast disappearing in the country.

One of the causes of crisis in the AD was the personalisation of the party by Tinubu and some of his colleagues, which the leaders objected to. Under him, the principle of party supremacy was abandoned, and the governors assumed the overall control of the party without reference to its leadership. This led to elected offices and government appointments being at his exclusive control as governor.

Unfortunately, this trend cut across all the political parties in the country. This was what made political office holders to become dictatorial as they failed to obey party leadership. The governors especially, now used largesse to practise nepotism and favouritism. Until this is removed from the party system, political parties will never get out of crisis.

Party supremacy is the vehicle for exercising internal democracy within the party; and wherever this does not exist, dictatorship thrives.

…On Selfless Leadership

We cannot talk about this without putting all the blame on the military. The military didn’t allow political succession to be orderly after independence. If it had been orderly, whether we did it rightly or wrongly, whether we voted for the right person or not, democracy should have been allowed to purify itself. The military didn’t allow that, but instead imposed a one-line rule on us for over 30 years.

So, the succession that could have taken place under democratic rule was not allowed. By the time they wanted to allow it now, they came with all kinds of restrictions. Babangida proclaimed a two-party system (one to the right and one to the left) and asked everybody to fall in line. He wanted to prevent all of us who were old politicians from taking part because he knew that we would question his rationale for doing this. That was how he was able to woo the so-called new breed which now became the ‘new greed.’

This is the basis for the degeneration of political purity in the country. It was the military that spoilt that crystal, holistic democratic institution in Nigeria. Those who came to the world at that time only knew the regime of the military; hence, only very few Nigerians can appreciate it when we talk of the Awolowo regime, the Azikiwe regime, the Sardauna regime, where there was healthy competition for physical development. When Awolowo built Liberty Stadium, the Sardauna built Ahmadu Bello Stadium.

In both Britain and America, they have two dominant political parties which evolved not by fiat but by an enduring political culture. You should not legislate the number of parties. That is not democratic. You should allow people to decide on the number of parties they want. That was why, at the 2014 Constitutional Conference, we also made room for independent candidature. It is part of democracy. And the illustration we gave was that if in this area I want to serve my people, why must I belong to a political party to do that?

The military is an aberration. It is at best an intervention force, an interregnum to clear the Augean stable. That was what Gowon said until he became so obsessed with power that he refused to go. Earlier on, he had promised to return the country to democratic rule, but later changed his mind when he made that infamous statement, ‘1976 is no longer realistic.’

…On Corruption

It is a thing of regret that all the things we fought for in this country have been demolished. At the time we were fighting for independence, up till the time Balewa was there in the First Republic, we were accusing the government of corruption over 10% contract bribe. With the situation in the country today, however, where political office holders are engaged in corruption on a massive scale which pales into insignificance the level of corruption in the First Republic, one is tempted to conclude that they were indeed saints! Those of us who were accusing the Balewa government of corruption should now apologise to them, going by the current trend.

Having said this, it is important to emphasise that the arbitrary forced retirement of civil servants under the Murtala/ Obasanjo military regime in 1975/76 promoted massive corruption in the country. Under this draconian action, top civil servants, mostly permanent secretaries and even judges, were retired merely through radio announcements. This action unwittingly destroyed the security of tenure which characterised the civil service hitherto. This made corruption thrive, as civil servants now engaged in corrupt practices while in employment as a way of securing their livelihood after retirement.

One way to fight corruption is by going to the roots. If the civil servants who are accused of being corrupt by amassing so much wealth, so that when they are retired suddenly they will have something to fall back on, have job and social security, even in retirement, I do not think they would be predisposed to corrupt tendencies.

That is why judges have been paid handsomely well; that is why also, even when they retire, they are paid their salary for life, just to show them that there is no reason to be corrupt.

When the salary you earn cannot guarantee you a future, you have to find other means. There are so many things that are wrong with government that encourage corruption. Take the issue of non-payment of pension and gratuity that is so prevalent in our country today. This never occurred until the military came into power.

When Chief Awolowo was Premier, no file that came to him for action would spend two days on his table. The ministers knew this. That’s why all the wonders you read about Awolowo as Premier of Western Region were possible within seven years (1952-1959). This was made possible, to a large extent, by a dedicated and incorruptible civil service which we had at that time.

Still talking about corruption, it is regrettable that the electorate also corrupt their leaders. Rather than insisting on the implementation of their party’s election manifesto, the electorate now pester them with various demands for personal needs, like payment of children’s school fees, financial assistance for burial, marriage and other mundane things.

Again, by the time the voters themselves accept bribe as an inducement, they are no longer sending the contestant on an errand. He has already bought their votes, and so, by the time he gets elected, he no longer feels obliged to implement the election manifesto which constitutes his social contract with the people. These are all the things that encourage the people to be corrupt.

When we talk of corruption in Nigeria today therefore, it is among the leaders and the followers. After all, it takes two to tango.

 

And one way to minimise corruption in this country is to make elective positions less attractive. Pay the legislators only sitting allowance. It’s only those who genuinely want to serve that would go there.

A situation where a councillor who barely has basic education earns more than a professor in a university is unjust and inequitable. If we make public office less attractive financially, it will make those who want to serve genuinely to emerge.

Again, the amount of money demanded from politicians, beginning from the level of primaries, is scandalous. It does not make for a level playing ground for all contestants. Ab initio, it is designed for those who have deep pockets. When you ask a councillor or a chairman of council to come and deposit two or three million naira before he can contest a party primary, or even a governorship candidate being asked to produce 10 million naira, how would you now say he should not find a way to recover his money if he gets elected? It is impossible. This is merely laying the foundation for corruption, because, in the course of contesting the primaries, contestants spend a lot of money to influence voters, to the extent that only the highest bidders get elected.

The statutory deposit to qualify for election is also very high. And people expect such a candidate to be clean when he gets into office! Even Buhari himself, who confessed that he had to borrow money (27.5 million naira) to contest the party primary one would have thought that would be one of the first things he would look into when he got into office. As long as such a position exists in any political party, this would always predispose to corruption and prevent less endowed candidates from being elected.

…On the Ideal System of Government

Parliamentary system of government is my way any day because all those who were in the assembly with us, were all beneficiaries of the old National Assembly. Nobody can deny the fact that the presidential system of government predisposes to corruption.

Under a parliamentary system, the prime minister is first among equals. So, the presidential system is not only too expensive, it is too powerful for the kind of system we have in the country today.

…On Political Reforms

As stated earlier, one major political reform I want for this country is a reduction in the amount of money demanded from political office aspirants.

Secondly, under the present unitary system, our President is the most powerful in the whole world; and, of course, as it is said, ‘power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.’ To avoid this therefore, federalism is imperative.

Thirdly, our constitution is lopsided. Why? It favours the north against the south. It was under the military that they created more local governments in the north than south. And it was under the military that the allocation of revenue from the Federation Account was based on obnoxious conditions, namely landmass, number of local governments (which were arbitrarily created), among others. So, ab initio, the south is already short-changed.

Fourthly, the source of the massive corruption we are now talking about in the country is the constitution. There is too much money and power at the centre!

The implications are seen in the emergence of such pressure groups as the Egbesu Boys, Niger Delta Avengers, Biafra Agitators, as the voice of the minorities who feel they are not being fairly treated within the Nigerian federation.

If you are in a club and you feel you are getting some advantages there, you won’t want to leave that club; but if it’s otherwise, you will begin to ask what you stand to gain from your continued membership.

I believe the government should listen patiently to all these agitators.

We all believe in economies of scale. We are a big country and there’s a big advantage in remaining united. Coming together is an advantage to all of us, but if staying together is not beneficial to any part of the country, they would rather opt to stay alone. That’s why we are having all these claims of marginalisation all over the place.

I don’t support the Biafra agitators who are clamouring for the state of Biafra now. All they need to do is to join forces with those of us who are canvassing for a restructuring of the country for fairness. For where there’s no fairness, there can’t be peace, equity and justice. And where there’s no peace, there can’t be progress.

It is the cause of the people’s agitation that we should look into. That was what late President Umar Yar’Adua wanted to do through the amnesty programme. If there’s any defect in that programme in the Niger Delta, rectify it and there will be no more Biafra or Niger Delta agitators. The amount of money spent on military operations in that area would be used to make peace and we will have progress.

On  the  cost  of  running  government  generally,  we need to scale down on a number of areas. For instance, the federal constitution makes provision for the appointment of special assistants, but we can step this down on the ground that we cannot afford it. Nobody will quarrel with that. The constitution that continues to draw us backward, you are following it; yet you say you want a ‘change’.

Also in the case of ministers, even though the constitution stipulates that there must be at least one from each state, the President can say he can afford not more than 24 ministers and nothing would happen.

 

The sum total is that we return to federalism. This entails devolution of powers, state police, among other components, as obtains in other multiethnic countries practising the federal system of government. Each state or region must be homogeneous or contiguous.

All these problems had been solved before independence, but it was the military that brought us to where we are today, having set aside the independence constitution when it first seized power in the January 15, 1966 coup.

The confusion that is being introduced by those who don’t want restructuring is unnecessary. What we are asking for is that the country be restructured back to federalism instead of the unitary system the military imposed on us.

…On the Legislature

Although,  going  by  the  constitution,  the  legislature  is independent, the ruling party has the power to control what goes on there. There are policies you expect your members in various agencies of government to implement.

Our constitution needs a surgical operation, not a mere amendment.

The reason  why  people  in  government  now  cannot do anything to change the system is because they are all beneficiaries of the inequities within the system.

The military  used  landmass  as  the  basis  for  revenue allocation, without any concern whatsoever as to whether the land is yielding any revenue or not.

That’s why we agreed that revenue allocation must be based on derivation.

We agreed at the 2014 National Conference that the 13per cent derivation fund given to oil-producing states is too small. The other states did not agree with us initially on this, but we defeated them by saying that, ‘by the time the mineral in your state is discovered, you will also be a beneficiary.’ It was at that point they agreed. We also recommended that 5% must be given to states to develop their mineral deposits separately.

The Buhari government should revisit the 2014 constitutional conference recommendations with a view to implementing most of them. With the implementation of those recommendations, I don’t care who the president of the country is.

…On Education

It’s such a pity that the legacy the AG left behind in free education has totally collapsed due to bad governance. The situation  is  so  bad  that  successive  governments,  instead of rectifying the system, encouraged people to found their own universities for selfish ends. Obasanjo founded his own; Atiku and Babangida also. Having ruined public schools here, they send their children abroad or to very expensive private institutions here in Nigeria which the ordinary man cannot afford.

I had an experience here recently when I told a visiting governor, ‘your children can’t go to that public primary school there,’ because I walked him down this area up to our community primary school. On one occasion when I visited the school myself, the teacher told me that it was by sheer luck that the wall did not collapse on one of the children recently. It has become so dilapidated. That didn’t happen during the Awolowo era in Western Region.

The people who are elected to take care of us don’t feel obliged to, because of the way they get into office. So, the earlier people begin to vote for candidates that they know can deliver the better for them.

…On Nigeria’s Future

We cannot remain united in peace under the present system. The system must be restructured to reflect a truly federal constitution.  That’s  the  only  thing  that  can  guarantee peace and unity; and that’s the only thing that we can do for the progress of the country. We must be federal in all its ramifications.

Again, the government needs to divest itself from many of its assumed roles and responsibilities.

Take, for instance, agriculture. What has the federal government got to do with agriculture? Where is its land? Why should there be allocation of funds from the federal government to the local governments?

Under the Independence Constitution, in agriculture, solid minerals, education and other sectors, the federal government was only there to set standards. All the regions were autonomous. That was what enabled Chief Obafemi Awolowo to start the University of Ife (now named after him as Obafemi Awolowo University), Sir Ahmadu Bello, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria (from the then College of Arts and Science), and Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. That is the practice in all federal constitutions all over the world.

…On Marriage

I cannot claim to be an ideal man, to talk about marriage philosophically, but what I can talk about positively is that the type of influence it had on Chief Awolowo’s life was what it had on me due to my early close association with that family.

The way I held marriage was different. I was a divorcee. I met my present wife in England; I had married in Nigeria before. My first daughter (Mrs. Ayotunde Atteh) is over 60 years old now. She attended the Univesity of Ibadan and was from my first wife. We were legally married and legally divorced.

As a matter of fact, I didn’t take marriage so seriously in my early life, so that by the time I even met my present wife, I had parted with this woman here in Nigeria. We had sued for divorce; we had gone to court.

I had another relationship with another lady with whom I had another daughter. That was when I was organising secretary for AG. She was an Ibadan woman who was related to one of the officers of the party known as Akinlotan. He was  our  financial secretary.  He  regularly  visited  us.  And the daughter then has had five children now and one of those children already has a child, which makes me a great grandfather.

As said earlier, I didn’t take marriage seriously in my early life. But during my work as organising secretary which brought me close to the Awolowo family, the way Papa treated Mama and my relationship with them, to be a responsible young man you couldn’t but be influenced by the expression of love that was exhibited in their relationship… the loyal, honest relationship.

Being very fanatical about the leadership of Chief Awolowo, and I believed that if I really wanted to be near him, and the way he was holding me, I was very careful that I shouldn’t be as flippant as I was before.

As the organising secretary of his party at that time, I was held in high esteem in the community. As a matter of fact, he had to remark on an occasion that, ‘as a young man, I am surprised that they have never reported you in this area that you were messing around with their wives.’ I just laughed. He didn’t know that I was into some secret affairs at that time. Because of the respect I had for him, I had to be very discreet about my amoral relationship.

Papa too, as a man of the world, knew how to deal with young men. Even some elderly people there too like Chief Rewane and others, when we went on tour and Awo wanted to harass and discipline them, he would say, ‘Alfred, you will stay with me in my room tonight,’ and Rewane would say, ‘No, no, Papa…’ So, many of them like that… Alfred, Tony, they would like to stay outside where they could be free anytime we went on campaign tours.

Papa had a very strong moral influence on his followers and those of them who otherwise could have been so reckless had to moderate their actions in awe of Papa. It was leadership by example, personified in all respects. So, I can say that he (Awolowo) and the Late Revd S.I. Kale (my principal at CMS Grammar School) were the two people who most influenced my life.

At that time, we had what was called citizenship in our classes (current affairs and all that). So, in the last year of our leaving school, Kale conducted a class called Civics, and he asked, ‘If you were the principal of this school what would you do?’ And I said, ‘if I were the principal there are certain things you are doing which I would not do.’ ‘Like what?’ And I gave examples. But after the lecture that day, one of my classmates now told me, ‘You are arguing with the principal, you will see your testimonial.’

Read Also: Three headless bodies found in Ondo river

I had the best testimonial of our set; it was so well cast. (See chapter 1). He was one of the most disciplined principals around at that time… himself, Ransome-Kuti, Oyediran and others. So, anybody who had a good testimonial from Kale at that time was sure to get good attention anywhere he went.

…On What I Want to be Remembered For

I would like to be remembered for service to my God and as a very consistent political advocate. Since I joined the Action Group in 1951 as a youth, I have never been identified with any other political party. I started with the area council in Lagos, then I joined Egbe Omo Oduduwa, and when the AG came into existence, I was one of its early members.

My regrets today are that I should be resting now and enjoying myself all over the world by going on holidays; but unfortunately, I am still in the trenches because those things I was fighting for have not been achieved. So, instead of resting, I am still in the battle.

Politically now, I should be watching those who are doing it, but unfortunately all the simple things that we achieved under Chief Awolowo as a result of his socialist policy have been frittered away.

…About Life and Living

I think life has been kind to me generally. Like Chief Awolowo once said, if I have a second chance, I’d like to come back as a Yoruba man and indeed as an Ijebu man.

I’ll attribute my longevity simply to God’s grace. Again, I don’t indulge in dubious issues; issues that my conscience cannot defend (that militate against my conscience). I am a contented fellow. For instance I have only two houses, the one I live in here in Lagos and the other in my country house at Ijebu-Ogbo. I am neither a beneficiary of any government patronage, nor have I held any political post. All I have achieved in life has been through legal practice.

As for food, I avoid a lot of carbohydrates. I feed mainly on fish and chicken, plenty of fruits, and plenty of vegetables. I also do my regular exercises, at least one hour daily walking.

My advice on healthy living is based on what people say that ‘you are what you eat.’ Eat well and do a lot of exercises. I have a strict daily diet and exercise regimen.

Moreover, I am very lucky to have a very good wife, who has been very supportive since we got married in 1960.