I lost a father figure on December 19. Many knew him less by his given name than by the name of his life’s work—MicCom—a neat coinage drawn from Michael and Comfort, the English names he and his first wife bore. In that fusion of names sat the story of a marriage, a business and a way of living that seemed to perceive partnership as destiny.
I met Pa Michael Tunde Ponnle some months after he lost that first wife, Comfort Olufunke Ponnle. I was then a mid-career reporter who had made a costly mistake. Assigned to write about her burial programmes, I published the story a week early, creating a wrong and painful impression. My editor at the time, Mr Gbenga Omotoso—now Lagos State Commissioner for Information and Strategy—gave me Baba Ponnle’s number and asked me to call and explain the oversight.
I called with trepidation. But what I met was grace. He was fatherly, disarming, kind. In the course of that first conversation, we bonded over a shared wound: I had lost my own father the same age his wife died, that same October of 2012. Something seemingly settled between us from that moment.
When next he was in Lagos, he called me to come see him at a hotel in Ikeja GRA, where he was staying because there was no one to help with chores at his Ogudu GRA home. He hosted me more than once at his MicCom Golf and Resort in Ada, Osun State. He checked in regularly by phone. Any time he was in Lagos (before I relocated to the United States about four years ago) Baba would ask after me. Quietly, steadily, he occupied the space of a father.
He shared stories with me, stories about his life, about his work and about his children. And of course, about Olufunke, the woman whose death affected him tremendously. He also passed on lessons life had taught him, lessons that will remain with me until I become an ancestor like him.
Pa Ponnle was a man of substance without noise. Former Chairman of the Board of West African Portland Cement Plc (now Lafarge WAPCO), founder of MicCom Wires and Cables, and a philanthropist of uncommon reach, he wore his achievements lightly.
Born on December 24, 1939, to the family of Chief Job Ponnle, the Alawe of Ada, and Madam Oyaweola Awele Ponnle, he hailed from the Oludele ruling house. He attended Baptist Primary School, Ada, where he excelled. His mother died in 1948, when he was still a child, and he was raised by his father in a polygamous household.
“I was like a candle in the wind,” he once recalled. Yet his father anchored him. “He would cuddle me and pray for me,” Ponnle said. “He treated me specially without spoiling me.” That model of firm affection became his own template for family life. “He was my first mentor,” he said—words that explained much about the man he became, one who at a time donated one of his kidneys to his dying son, and it took him time before recovering from the experience. But, he was happy he was there for his son.
After primary school in 1953, secondary education was not straightforward. Though he passed entrance examinations to Kiriji Memorial College, Igbajo, and Baptist Boys’ High School, Iwo—no small feats at the time—financial constraints redirected him to a Teachers’ Training College. He later took courses with Rapid Results College in the UK, passed his science subjects including mathematics at Ordinary Level, earned his Grade II Teachers’ Certificate, and taught briefly.
Then came the pivot. He moved into engineering, a decision he later described as “the most valuable I ever took.” In 1962, he was admitted to The Polytechnic, Ibadan, to study Electrical/Electronics Engineering, later transferring to the Posts and Telecommunications Training School in Oshodi. After training, he worked briefly there before marrying Olufunke Fabunmi on April 26, 1966, in Ibadan.
A job at the Ibadan branch of the then University of Ife followed and with it, frustration. Two superiors made his working life unbearable. His wife, pregnant at the time, went to plead. It did not help. Ponnle left, choosing survival over bitterness.
Providence met him at the Osogbo Trade Centre, where he was hired as a technician and later asked to establish the Electronics and Television Department. At a symposium organised by his department, the Commissioner for Education, Dr Omololu Olunloyo, noticed him. Questions followed. So did an invitation to Ibadan—and a scholarship.
In 1969, Prince Ponnle travelled to the United Kingdom to study Electrical/Electronics Engineering at the Polytechnic of North London. He returned in 1972, graduating with honours, a Graduate Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, and holder of an Advanced Diploma in Electronics and Communication Engineering.
Back home, after brief stints to gain experience, he and Olufunke built MicCom Engineering Works, which grew into MicCom Cables and Wires Ltd, one of the country’s quiet industrial success stories.
Their philanthropy was equally deliberate. Through the MicCom Foundation for Education Development (MIFED), they funded the education of thousands. They built and renovated churches and mosques in Ada, extended electricity with transformers, provided water schemes, donated science blocks to universities, instituted prizes at Obafemi Awolowo University, established scholarships at WAPCO, reconstructed palaces, and supported schools, seminaries, and communities across Osun State and beyond.
“We were inspired by concern for humanity and responsibility to God,” Ponnle said simply.
Death ended his marriage to Olufunke on October 29, 2012, when she died of cancer in Cardiff, United Kingdom. In her memory, he established a foundation focused on curtailing the spread of certain cancers, donating its centre to a university—turning grief into service.
When he turned 80 in 2019, he donated his mansion in Ada to the Osun State government for the use of the state-owned university.
Prince Ponnle later married Titi Laoye-Tomori, former Deputy Governor of Osun State. He is survived by his wife and children—Yetunde, Biodun, Temitope, Kola, and Olubukola.
My final take: For me, he will always be Baba MicCom: proof that success need not shout, that kindness can be structural, and that fatherhood is sometimes chosen, quietly, and for life.
