Author: The Nation

By Fassy Adetokunboh Yusuf

Never in the near 1,000 years of Ijebu Kingdom has any king reigned for 60 years. However, Awujale Sikiru Kayode Adetona, Ogbagba II, paramount ruler of Ijebuland of the Anikinaiya Ruling House has broken every known record having ascended the throne on April 2, 1960 thus, incredibly clocking near 70 years as the monarch of the Ijebu nation- a no mean feat, and still marching on in the service of his people as the custodian of their culture and tradition, and the quintessential monarch of unequalled status and stature.

With his nearly seven decades on the throne, Oba Adetona has seen the good, the bad and the ugly aspects of the Nigerian polity. No wonder, he bestrides the traditional institution like a colossus. A sagacious, courageous, charismatic, dependable, and reliable traditional ruler, a statesman and an incorruptible monarch, Awujale Adetona is known to always damn every demagogue. Indeed, he is providentially always on the side of history and has weathered many storms that would have consumed lesser mortals.

In his seminal book, The Ijebu of Yorubaland (1850-1950): Politics, Economy, and Society, the late Emeritus Professor Emmanuel Ayankanmi Ayandele (1992), stated that ‘in any computation of human excellence and ability to make the best of any situation, the Ijebu stand extremely high in Africa in general and in Nigeria in particular. … Internally, in the bewildering power politics of Yorubaland … held their own in a spectacular fashion, the Ijebu kingdom being the only survivor of the large-scale cataclysmic eruptions that shattered other Yoruba states in the nineteenth century’.

The Lagos Times of May 9, 1890 was right when it wrote that ‘Ijebu is about the only province now in what is commonly described as the Yoruba country that has not lost its original seat from the vicissitudes of inter-tribal warfare, which has sorely affected the land’.

Oba Sikiru Adetona who personifies the attributes of Ijebu that include fierce and sturdy independence, candour, sagacity, objectivity, sincerity, entrepreneurial spirit, reliability, and resoluteness was born on Thursday, May 10, 1934. He variously attended Baptist School, Ereko, Ijebu Ode; Ogbere United Primary School; and Ansar-Ud-Deen School, Ijebu Ode between 1943 and 1950. For his secondary education, he was at Olu-Iwa (now Adeola Odutola) College, Ijebu Ode from 1951 to 1956. Between 1957 and 1958 he took up appointment with the then Audit Department of the Western Region, Ibadan. The charming prince resigned his appointment in 1958, to pursue further studies in Accountancy in the United Kingdom. He left Nigeria by sea from Port Harcourt in late December 1958 and arrived England in January 1959.

Since 1960, Oba Adetona has succeeded in raising the status and reckoning of his Ijebu people. He is known and perceived as one of the country’s greatest monarchs, dead or alive. A philosopher and social scientist, his fame and popularity extend beyond the shores of Nigeria.

Awujale Adetona is loyally and devotedly committed to the Nigerian state having built bridges across Rivers Niger and Benue. He admonishes his people to be thoroughbred wherever they find themselves. No wonder that the Ijebu people have not only comported themselves wherever they are but it is on record that no inter or intra ethnic clash has been recorded in Ijebuland since he ascended the throne (in 1960).

He was in the forefront of finding a national solution to the political logjam of 1993 to 1999. Oba Adetona consulted widely and hosted several fora. He was never a sell-out. He brokered peace and concord in 1998 and 1999, and the current major actors in the nation’s main political parties will readily attest to this. The incorruptibility of Oba Adetona is unsurpassable as spoils of office cannot corrupt the monarch. He is just, transparent, and equitable. Oba Adetona loathes indecency and eschews corruption like the plague. He has been known to chastise corrupt leaders and quite often to publicly denounce them. Woe betides any Ijebu person who gets his hands soiled while occupying a public office because such an Ijebu has no home to return to. His long and enviable reign has not made Oba Adetona to decay nor decompose.

During the Abacha era, he was amongst the few leaders that stood to be counted on the side of history on many occasions including the issue of the phantom coup involving the then Chief of General Staff, Lt. General Donaldson Oladipo Diya and many other senior officers. Time has indeed vindicated him. Oba Adetona, to paraphrase Josiah Gilbert Holland (1819 to 1881), is one leader whom the lust of office does not kill. A leader whom the spoils of office cannot buy. A monarch who possesses opinions and a will. A king who has honour, who will not lie. A legend that has always stood before a demagogue and damned his treacherous flatteries without winking.

He is a monarch among monarchs that successive administrations in Ogun State and indeed, Nigeria hold in high esteem as a manifestation of his incorruptibility, transparency, objectivity, and sagacity. He has immeasurably succeeded in bringing about religious harmony among his people to the extent that religion does not dichotomise as the Ijebu as Christians live in harmony with Muslims. The traditionalists are equally not isolated. The common saying in Ijebu is that religion cannot divide us.

.The revival of the Ijebu Age Grade system (known as Regberegbe), the building of the gigantic palace and the Ojude Oba mini-stadium, the novel and unique Ijebu Development Board on Poverty Reduction, the unsurpassable multi-billion-naira Awujale Adetona Professorial Chair in Good Governance at the Olabisi Onabanjo University, the granting of coronets to many communities in Ijebuland are some of the everlasting legacies Oba Adetona is bequeathing.

One issue agitating the mind of this quintessential monarch is the injustice being meted to his people with the denial of a state of their own. Out of the old provinces, it is unfathomable that it is only Ijebu Province that is being denied a state of their own. The lumping of Ijebu Province with Egba Province to produce Ogun State is unjust and insensitive. The necessity of creating an Ijebu State out of the present Ogun State is the only logical thing to do, if the Ijebu are to have a sense of belonging in the Nigerian project.

To preserve history, Oba Adetona published on the occasion of his Golden anniversary as Awujale and Paramount Ruler of Ijebuland and to coincide with his 76th birthday his autobiography with the title Awujale: The autobiography of Alaiyeluwa Oba S. K. Adetona, Ogbagba II. The 17-chapter book with seven appendices tells it all. It is a masterpiece and a must read for anybody interested in the history of the Ijebu of Yoruba nation and monarchy in Nigeria.

Here is a unique opportunity to salute the living legend, the great and amiable monarch as he soldiers on the throne of his forefathers and marks his 87th birthday on Monday, May 10. May his reign continue to be peaceful, progressive, and beneficial to Ijebuland and indeed, our dear nation.

• Dr. (Chief) Yusuf, former Ogun State Commissioner for Information and Culture, is the Baagbimo of Ijebu.

By Issa Aremu

“When men are ruled by fear, they strive to prevent the very changes that will abate it.” – Alan Paton, South African writer

“When fear comes in the door, logic goes out the window”.-Ina Perlman.

Chief Robert Clarke is a respected Senior Advocate of Nigeria, (SAN). Last Sunday, he unsettled many of his compatriots inclusive of this writer. He curiously and magisterially declared (hold your breath for the slander!) that “Nigeria may not survive the next six months”.

While lamenting the spate of insecurity in Nigeria on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, the senior lawyer in loud sound and fury declared that, “Many things are happening and I swear by my father’s grave, if care is not taken, Nigeria will collapse in six months’ time.”

It is strange that an octogenarian would ever swear for an apocalypse rather than pray for peace. It is even a scandal that an elder would swear with a late father resting in the grave. Who then would guide “our youths the truth to know” (the national anthem) when our leaders are as misguided and xenophobic?

The late Fela Kuti in his grave would have exclaimed “Just like that”! It’s really a “wonder”! or Wonderfulment” as Fela put it in his Just Like That album. It’s simply unfathomable that a Senior Advocate of Federal Republic of Nigeria would verbally assault a republic, (without which he and other current fashionable nation- building skeptics would not have been known).

Paradoxically by his own reminiscence, Chief Robert once disclosed that he “ was .. privileged to be a classmate to the late Fela Ransome-Kuti, later known as Fela Anikulapo Kuti; his brother, the late Beko Ransome-Kuti”. As a fan of the Kuti brothers, particularly Fela and Beko, I bear witness that never in their moments of documented frustrations, did they whimsically give up on Nigeria to the point of wishing and swearing for the collapse of a country of 200 million Africans. On the contrary, up to his death, the legendary, Fela inspired hope for a strong united Nigeria, Africa peaceful and inclusive world. Fela bemoaned with his legendary saxophone, the perennial crisis of governance since independence manifesting in serial revelations of “Authority Stealing”, police and military brutality and shortages of water, light and food but never betrayed faith in a united indivisible, just and fair Nigeria and greater Africa.

At times like this, certainly late Gani Fawehinmi, (another SAN like Clarke) just like late Fela Anikulapo Kuti would not have declared a distasteful post-dated “collapse” of Nigeria. Fela, by the way, was not so honored like Chief Clarke who “took the Silk” which on his own account nurtured him from orphanage to a remarkable and enviable position of statesmanship in his own deserved rights. But he was a standing patriot to the end.

The consolation is that there are once positive quotable quotes of Chief Clarke beyond last Sunday’s hysterical outburst. The worthy life and times of Chief Clarke on his own account belie the doomsday hysteria that Nigeria would collapse. Indeed, his profile underscores the fact that Nigeria has come of age, survived two world wars, lowered the British Union Jack flag in 1960, survived unfortunate three years’ civil war with its human devastation; survived prolonged military dictatorship and so far is deepening democratic process in the last two decades with all the challenges of insecurity. Of dual British father and “Hausa/Fulani” (in his own words), mother, Chief Clarke, born on July 11, 1938, “later fostered…to a Yoruba family”, (in his own words!) attended the best of public primary and secondary schools, graduate schools with scholarships at home and abroad.  He was once the lawyer to the late President Shehu Shagari!

At 80, Chief Clarke should be attributed with motivational words for his children and grandchildren in a prosperous, peaceful Africa. Not unhelpful fear and tele-phobia about a doom. As we have seen with the consequences of collapse of former USSR and Libya, collapse of states is better imagined than being experienced. The recent fashionable but unhelpful verbal and physical attacks on Nigeria point to the degeneration of the Nigeria elite in addressing the crisis of nation- building. Certainly, it’s time Nigerian elite organizes their thoughts about Nigeria and stopped open agonizing of dubious value.

There must be a collective realization that we are dealing with legacy problems of underdevelopment, mass poverty and inequality which in turn fuel current youth unemployment and violence of varying dimensions. Yes, the current challenges might be “overwhelming” but the solutions are not in anger and addictive baseless fears. I agree with Desmond Mpilo Tutu, the South African Anglican cleric and theologian, that “Resentment and anger are bad for your blood pressure and your digestion”.

Lest we forget the “bitter heart devours its owner”. There   is a Yoruba received wisdom that we should not “…run the world hastily; Let us not grasp at the rope of wealth impatiently; what should be treated with mature judgement, let us not treat in a fit of temper”. To allude to a collapse of one’s country is a slander: we dare not repeat such slander; compatriots should not even hear it; for it is the result of unhelpful “hot temper”. Happily, “a stone thrown in anger never kills a bird!

I agree with Jackie Mason, the American author/comedian who rightly observed that in the final analysis, all “Predictions are preposterous”!

Indeed, most negative predictions about Nigeria, with the benefits of hind sights are at best absurd and ridiculous, and at worse, foolish and laughable. False predictions about Nigeria include that of the German author, Karl Maier, ‘a native of Louisville, Kentucky’ who according to his 2000 book ‘lives in London’ (not Lagos!). In his provocative controversial notorious book with the title; ‘This House Has Fallen’, Karl Maier concluded long before year 2000 that Nigeria would collapse as a nation state!

In late 1990s, it will be recalled that Nigeria was in the crisis of transition from military dictatorship to democracy with coups and counter coup plots, serial deaths of political notables such as General Shehu Yar’Adua, Chief Moshood Abiola and General Sani Abacha. The subsequent “sharia” crisis of 2001, 2002, and the serial bloodletting across some major cities of the North increased the noise level of Maier’s predictions. Thank God and resilience of Nigerians, this house called Nigeria has NOT fallen contrary to the doomsday scenario of Karl Maier.

Another celebrated false hysteria about Nigeria came from a former American ambassador to Nigeria (2004 -2007), John Campbell. In a hysterical preview of his book entitled; ‘Nigeria: Dancing on the Brink’ he had claimed that “The 2011 elections in Nigeria, scheduled for January 22, pose a threat to the stability of the United States’ most important partner in West Africa”. Of course, in 2005, we recall a so-called CIA Report according to which Nigeria would be a failed state in 2015. It is again to the eternal resilience of Nigeria and Nigerians that Nigeria weathered the political storms of 2011 and indeed the most challenging of all, in 2015! The challenge today is that of democratic consolidation, war against banditry and criminality which is only possible with national consensus and solidarity. Notwithstanding the current challenges, Nigeria has shown that like most nation-states, the challenges of development are always there. The issue is the capacity to overcome them. Things may occasionally fall apart, but with determination, things can fall in place.

• Aremu is member, National Institute (mni), Kuru, Jos.