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Category: Inside Bisi Akande’s Autobiography

Bisi Akande's Autobiography

  • ‘Tinubu refused to release Aregbesola to be my deputy’

    ‘Tinubu refused to release Aregbesola to be my deputy’

    Rauf Aregbesola, the Minister of Interior, would have been Chief Bisi Akande’s deputy in Osun State after the impeachment of Otunba Iyiola Omisore if the then governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu had not urged him to shelve the idea.

    Akande, in his book, ‘My Participations’, narrated how he came across Aregbesola and wanted him first as his deputy and possible successor.

    He said Mr. Ayo Afolabi and some of his colleagues introduced Aregbesola to him while he was serving as Commissioner for Works under Tinubu in Lagos, who pleaded with Akande to look elsewhere.

    According to Akande, he met Aregbesola when he was honoured in Ilesha Central Mosque.

    “He needed our support to host some of his guests from Lagos. So, we assigned a chalet to him at the Government House.

    “I attended the ceremony as a mark of honour to him. I thought I should encourage him to link up with us in Osun.

    “I was encouraging him but did not know how to say it. First, his background was not Osun.

    Read Also: Oyinlola: I’ve details of how Akande financed his reelection

    “Second, a Commissioner for Works in Lagos controls a far bigger budget than the Governor of Osun State.

    “Being a native of our state, he could be thinking of doing something different in future.

    “So, I started introducing him to people and encouraging him to be part of us. That was how we linked up with Rauf Aregbesola,” Akande recalled.

    When Omisore was impeached, he discussed with Tinubu about having Aregbesola as his deputy.

    “He promised to get back to me. We didn’t see often and the phone was not efficient in those days.

    “Tinubu had something doing in Seattle, in the western coast of the United States where he was to be honoured by his old American school. He invited me.

    “The second or third day, Rauf appeared in my hotel room. He said Tinubu said I wanted to talk to him. I asked him to take a seat.

    “I offered him the post of deputy governor which would be confirmed by the House of Assembly. Afterwards, I would be able to ease myself out.

    “He thanked me and said he would come back to me. Instead of him, it was Tinubu who came.

    “He said: ‘That boy is shy and he didn’t know how to put it.’ Tinubu explained that Rauf was holding an important position for him in Alimosho local government politics and that he would still need him for mobilisation leading to the 2003 general elections.

    “He apologised that it would not be possible for him to release Rauf. He said I should look for someone else and after my second term, we would think of the next step,” Akande said.

    He added that Tinubu said after the election, Aregbesola would come to learn more about Osun and its politics.

    “So, he chose Sooko Adewoyin, an elderly and experienced person from Ile Ife who was introduced to him by Prince Peter Ogunleye as his deputy.

    “At the appointed time, Rauf indeed came to Osun and he proved equal to the task, becoming the first Governor of Osun State to spend full two terms,” he said.

  • Oyinlola: I’ve details of how Akande financed his reelection

    Oyinlola: I’ve details of how Akande financed his reelection

    A former Governor of Osun State, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, has alleged that Chief Bisi Akande financed his 2003 re-election by collecting part payment from the contractor building the governor’s office.

    Oyinlola was reacting to Akande’s autobiography titled “My Participations”.

    In a statement, he said Akande levelled some unfounded allegations against him in the book.

    Oyinlola said he would respond to Akande in his autobiography, which is in the works.

    He said: “On the Osun State Governor’s Office (Bola Ige House contract), Chief Akande said I wrongly accused him of corruption in the construction of the Governor’s Office.

    “I did not level any false charges against him.

    “I came into office in May 2003 and discovered that the Governor’s Office complex which Akande commissioned for use after he lost the election was not completed.

    Read Also: My going to school was accidental, says Akande

    “The state government asked the contractor to come back to the site and complete the works, more so when evidence in government accounts showed that he had been paid.

    “But the project consultant shocked everyone with his claim that part of the payment was taken back to finance the 2003 re-election bid of Chief Akande.

    “The consultant said the contractor could not go back to work unless he was paid his full dues. One of Akande’s appointees confessed collecting money from this contractor for Akande’s re-election.

    “I consulted Chief Akande on this. He denied having any deal with the contractor and the consultant.

    “Some people were subsequently taken to court on a seven-count criminal charge. Stakeholders in the state and Alhaji Arisekola Alao later intervened.

    “I have the details of who collected how much in my forthcoming book.”

  • ‘My father rebelled against my grandfather to embrace Islam’

    ‘My father rebelled against my grandfather to embrace Islam’

    Former All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande has said his father, Lawani Bamgbose Akande, rebelled against his grandfather to embrace Islam.

    Akande, in his book, ‘My Participations’, said his grandfather was a Sango devotee.

    According to him, his father at some point decided to join a radical Islamic group known as Kewulere.

    “During the era of the Dispersal, many Ila citizens came in contact with Islam in Ilorin and other Igbomina towns that had come under its influence and they embraced the religion.

    “These new converts set themselves apart from the other citizens whom they derided as idol worshippers.

    “My father, who was born a Sango devotee (perhaps because he was an Abiku – being the last of the 21 children but first surviving son of my grandparents as at his point of birth), came under their influence, and he converted to Islam to the consternation of Papa Arinla Sangopidan, my grandfather.

    Read Also: How Tinubu and I came to trust each other, by Akande

    “My father joined a group of radical youths known as Kewulere (Islamic prayers have rewards).

    “They renounced their Yoruba traditional faith and were forceful in their behaviour,” he recalled.

    He added that it affected the relationship between the duo.

    “My grandfather was very unhappy with his son. My father’s colleagues in Kewulere supported him against his father.

    “There was no meeting point between them. My grandfather was a wealthy farmer who planted tobacco, cotton and other cash crops.

    “He had herds of goats and sheep. He was devoted to Sango while his son, my father, Lawani Bamgbose Akande, embraced the new religion of Islam.

    “The son also took to palm-wine tapping, the occupation that destroys the back and would not allow him to farm like his father and be prosperous like a real farmer,” Akande wrote.

     

  • No-holds-barred!

    No-holds-barred!

    THE book was meant to serve a purpose. First, to give a true account of his forays in politics and second, his interactions with fellow politicians and others from other spectrum of life. Now, Chief Bisi Akande is not garrulous neither is he reticent. He only speaks when there is need for it. It is a well known fact that when such people speak, there is a tremor.

    The earth has been shaking since the public presentation of  his autobiography, My Participations, in Lagos on December 9. I do not think that the author’s intention is to ruffle feathers. But how do you write such a revealing book without marching on toes. That would have given the Ila Orangun, Osun State chief goose bumps. He was not writing fiction, he would have thought. So, he damned the consequences by being factual, painting many of the politicians he knows in their true colours.

    Before the book presentation ended, it was already enmeshed in controversies. Trust the social media. It had started posting snippets of the book long before the chief guest of honour, President Muhammadu Buhari, left the venue of the event. Reactions by some of those mentioned in the book, including the President himself, through some of his unnamed aides, were swift and in some cases laced with anger. The controversies were foretold by the master storyteller and Africa’s first Nobel laureate in Literature, Prof Wole Soyinka, who wrote the book’s foreword.

    Akande, in the preface to the book, recounted his meeting in the United States (US)  with Soyinka, who told him: “With that book, Bisi, be ready for war”. How prophetic Soyinka turned out to be. As a master of the game, the Nobel laureate knew immediately that the book in his hands is explosive, and that the author would incur the ire of those whose “character attestation”, as our General Editor, Kunle Ade-Adeleye put it, he painted vividly. The author did not pull punches. He wrote from the heart, revealing the tendencies of many well known politicians in the land.

    Of course, those mentioned are not keeping quite. Akande too appears prepared for them. His lawyer-children went through the book with a fine toothcomb and approved its publication. That was after the warning by renowned diplomat, Ambassador Dapo Fafowora, that the revelations in the book might provoke litigations. What did he say about these people that is offensive? Is telling the world the true worth of a person an attestation or assassination of his character? Must an author lie in a book just to preserve the status quo? Will it be fair to do that? Should the author bare it all to clear misconceptions about people hitherto perceived as saints? Should he call villains by another name for fear of a backlash?

    An author treads a minefield. He has to decide for himself the kind of book he wants to write. A book of lies that a reader will pick up and hiss ‘what kind of book is this?’ Or a book of facts that the reader will pick up and say ‘yes, this is a book’. A book is not a book because it is abusive; it is a book because it is detailed and factual and hides nothing. Akande’s book has passed the integrity test. The reader cannot expect less from a man, who himself, epitomises integrity. He is not a saint and he cannot be because no man is perfect. The cacophonous noise over the book is expected.

    He should not bother himself about the din. It will soon fade away. Those affected will shout themselves hoarse and keep silent after exacting what they believe is their own pound of flesh from him by calling him names. Nobody, no matter how bad they are, want that aspect of their lives made public. We want our bad sides hidden and the good sides widely publicised.

    Akande has written his own book and it is making waves because readers can relate with the issues and personalities therein. They are enjoying the book because they find it so difficult to believe that the author can be blunt and unsparing in his character sketches of many of these people who are seen as untouchables. From the President to Chief Ayo Adebanjo, the late Chief Olaniwun Ajayi, the late Chief Ganiyu Dawodu, Chief Iyiola Omisore and Chief Ayo Opadokun, among others, the author had one or two things to say about them.

    The President’s unnamed aides have since reportedly  denied what Akande said about their boss. Adebanjo personally launched an attack against the author. But will these distractions remove anything from the book? No, as Omar Khayyam noted in his work, Rubaiyat: “The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it”.

    No matter the wailing of the aggrieved, it cannot change what is in the book. If anybody has anything to counter Akande’s great work, let them also put it in writing. But it should not be writing for writing sake in order to settle scores. It must be factual. That is the stuff of which great books are made.

  • How Tinubu and I came to trust each other, by Akande

    How Tinubu and I came to trust each other, by Akande

    A former All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande has explained the reasons behind his smooth relationship with ex-Lagos State Governor Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

    Akande, in his book, ‘My Participation’, said he and Tinubu used to argue over political discretions.

    He added that Tinubu trivially assumed that the political culture of Lagos could work in the rest of the Southwest.

    The ex-Osun governor said Tinubu always “absorbed my angry political tantrums as old-fashioned and with jocular snubs”.

    He added that he became close to Tinubu as a result of his excellent political and economic ideas at Afenifere and Alliance for Democracy (AD) governors’ meetings.

    Read Also: ‘My wife’s death left me emotionally empty’

    He explained that Tinubu’s wits, the largeness of his heart for smart arguments, his refusal to give up on him, and his penchant to pamper him made them allies.

    “While others hate his guts and fear his grievances, I cherish the enormity of the quickness of his wits and marvel at the largeness of his heart for smart arguments.

    “However, despite my constant talking down impudently on him with pontifications about my old-time political experiences, he has refused to give up on me.

    “He always makes me feel pampered. And we came, at last, to trust each other absolutely,” he wrote.

  • ‘I was bowled over by Awolowo’s sense of humour’

    ‘I was bowled over by Awolowo’s sense of humour’

    Former All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande has said he was introduced to the late sage Chief Obafemi Awolowo by the late Chief Ayo Fasanmi.

    He said he was bowled by Awolowo’s sense of humour, and mesmerised by his fatherly gesticulations in explaining difficult issues.

    Akande revealed this in his book, ‘My Participation’.

    He said after the late Fasanmi told him the late sage would like to meet him, he requested to discuss with his people in Ila-Orangun before the meeting.

    After the meeting with his people, he prepared his questions on what he considered to be contradictory in Awolowo’s postulations and the negative remarks of his adversaries.

    “I was ready to have an encounter with living history,” he wrote.

    He was accompanied to the meeting by Dr Oyeniyi Popoola (then a Mathematics teacher with the University of Lagos, Akoka), Mr Tunji Fadeyi (then a civil servant with the Department of Customs and Excise) and Bayo Adeniji (then a captain in the Nigerian Army who disguised as a trader).

    “They went to Chief Awolowo with Chief Fasanmi as guide and mentor.

    “When I met him, I reckoned that he was about the same age as my father or a bit younger. I just loved the grandeur with which he carried himself at that age of about 70.

    “After the pleasantries, he related how badly his party was received by Ila people in the First Republic and that Orangun Adetona Ayeni, Ariwajoye the First, was then the local leader of the AG.

    “He explained how he had been dodging all invitations to Ila to celebrate anniversaries of Adetona’s coronation to avoid another public resentment by association.

    Read Also: APC miracle would have been difficult without Tinubu, says Akande

    “I was flattered, humbled and shaken when he asked if I could accept to be his friend through whom he would then visit Ila again.

    “I said, ‘Yes!’ Perhaps intuitively, I had prepared for this moment and would not let it pass without achieving my objective.

    “I calmly brought out my note and with every decorum, announced that I had some questions.
    “He suggested, after my first question, that I should first ask all the questions together because he thought the answer to one might be applicable to some others.
    “At that point, Awolowo’s equally legendary wife, Mama, Chief (Mrs) H.I.D Awolowo, peeped in and whispered to him.

    “He nodded back and told her to my hearing that he would prefer not to be disturbed until he was done with my audience.”

    He went on: “We discussed for well over two hours. In the end, I was totally satisfied in my mind that Awolowo was the leader of leaders.

    “Within my simple assessment, I was marvelled by his intellectual capacity and his presence of mind about names, dates and historical events.

    “I was bowled by his sense of humour and truly mesmerised by his fatherly gesticulations in explaining difficult issues.

    “I loved him more when I and my colleagues had to take our leave that evening.
    “In my assessment since that encounter, Awolowo can be rated indeed, as one of the greatest intellectuals in the politics of his time.
    “Now that I had been admitted into the sanctum of the Awoist Movement, I felt energised and empowered.

    “My colleagues and I quickly and anxiously reported our meeting with Awolowo to the Ila Union in Lagos.
    “We, in the union, agreed in principle, to prefer Awolowo’s politics to any other.
    “Shortly after our visit to him, Chief Awolowo, accompanied by Chief Fasanmi, Chief Michael Omisade and Chief S.M. Afolabi visited Ila Orangun to hold a private meeting with our elders.

    “Awolowo had earlier sent Omisade to me with the itinerary of his tour to our division just a week earlier.

    “Chief Omisade, a lawyer, was among those jailed with Awolowo during the Treasonable Felony case of 1963.

    “He was used by Ife elders as an independent candidate to defeat Fani Kayode of the Action Group to become a member of the House of Representatives in 1959 when Ila was part of Ife Division. He hailed from Ile-Ife.”

    Akande, after the meeting, organised the visit of Awolowo to Ila-Orangun.

    “I carefully selected and arranged the audience for the Ila meeting. Among those I selected were a group of men, led by Tijani Ologundudu, that remained influential for having participated and been jailed in the Hunters Riot of 1944.

    “They were the Muslim Youths in my father’s time known as Kewulere. I also invited the cream of Ila local politics, those who controlled our grassroots.

    “They were impressed with the coming of Chief Awolowo.
    “In their presence, Chief Awolowo invited me to the immediate next meeting of the Committee of Friends.
    “At the meeting of the Committee of Friends, I first saw Chief Awolowo in action among some intellectual giants like Professor Sam Aluko, Professor David Oke, Professor Banji Akintoye, Chief Ayo Fasanmi, Chief Bola Ige, Chief Omisade, Chief Phillip Umeadi, Chief Wumi Adegbonmire and others. I respected him the more.

    “Awolowo’s coming to Ila brought me into the emerging trend of politics in Oyo State and the consequential role I was destined to play in it.

    “I was still involved in the intrigues at the Constituent Assembly, but my heart was now on the future of Oyo State and our burning desire to get Awolowo elected as the President of Nigeria.”

  • ‘My wife’s death left me emotionally empty’

    ‘My wife’s death left me emotionally empty’

    Former All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande has said the death of his wife, Mowumi, left him emotionally empty.

    In his book, ‘My Participations’, he said despite the care from his children and friends, he has not been able to get over his wife’s death.

    “Since my wife’s passage, despite the constant kindness and support from my friends, associates and relations and even, inspite of the intensive care and love that my children enthusiastically expressed, I have never felt as empty and as emotionally deserted as I am today.

    Read Also: ‘Friends used my home for romantic escapades’

    “Sometimes I move round my room in lonely soliloquy with the imaginary sentiment that my wife would suddenly answer me.

    “At least, in her usual wont, she has not once joined me in any conversation or in searching for my misplaced reading glasses, handkerchiefs and wristwatches.

    “She must have been busy preparing a place for me close to herself in heaven,” he said.

    He added that the way his children celebrate their mother makes death inviting to him.

    “And I have been praying to die such a painless death and for my funeral to be as glorious as that of my wife,” he wrote.

  • ‘Friends used my home for romantic escapades’

    ‘Friends used my home for romantic escapades’

    As a young man, friends used the home of former All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande for romantic escapades.

    Akande revealed this in his autobiography, ‘My Participations’.

    He said though he was earning a good salary at the British Petroleum Marketing Company in Lagos, he was always broke because he roamed about, drank with friends and spent beyond his means.

    It took his marriage to Mowumi on December 26, 1966 for his life to change.

    He met Mowumi in Ila-Orangun on a day a policeman was threatening to pounce on her.

    “It appeared to me however that marriage made me so responsible that friends who used to use my apartment for their romantic escapades stopped and began to treat our home with respect.

    Read Also: APC miracle would have been difficult without Tinubu, says Akande

    “Soon, I began to have savings and investments.

    “Throughout my stay in BP, she kept my home intact and happy despite my numerous trips across Nigeria and my overseas training programmes.

    “During weekends also, I was often travelling to Ila to participate in local activities and contribute to the development of my home town,” he wrote.

    He said his wife was initially against his decision to run for Osun State governor but caved in because of the late Bola Ige and other party leaders.

  • ‘Soyinka told me to prepare for war on my autobiography’

    ‘Soyinka told me to prepare for war on my autobiography’

    Nobel Laureate Prof. Wole Soyinka foretold the controversies being generated by ‘My Participation’, the autobiography of ex-Osun State Governor Chief Bisi Akande.

    Akande, in his preface to the book, narrated how he met Soyinka in Glendale, California and he told him: “With that book, Bisi, be ready for war!”

    Soyinka, in his foreword to the book, said: “There are books whose very handling must be done with heavily insulated gloves since, virtually every page sizzles with contradictions between attestable reality and impudent claims, attempts to cover past crimes and dodge responsibilities. Not so, this contribution from the Wise One of Ila-Orangun.

    “If there is any sizzling, it is simply the fire of truth’s passion that leaps at the reader from between the covers. Akande’s fire prurifies, being a flame of illumination carried over from real life to brighten the pages of saga of service to Nigerian humanity.”
    Aside Soyinka, Ambassador Dapo Fafowora also observed that the revelations in the scripts might provoke litigations.

    “He quickly constituted a committee of our children: Oluwafemi Akande, Esq., Oyewole Akande, Esq, and Ayobamidele Akande, Esq who are lawyers to have a second look at my presentation of facts,” Akande wrote in the preface.

    Among many revelations, Akande claimed that the nonagenarian Afenifere leader Chief Ayo Adebanjo’s Lekki home was built for him by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu. He also said President Muhammadu Buhari reneged on his promise to make Tinubu his running mate in 2015.

    He also had harsh words for former President Olusegun Obasanjo and ex-Deputy Governor Iyiola Omisore. He added that N-PDP members snatched the leadership of the National Assembly in 2015.
    The author also revealed how former Vice President Atiku Abubakar was nearly stopped from joining the then fledging APC by his former colleagues in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who had decided to team up with the new party in 2012 ahead of the 2015 elections.

    Read Also: Akande: I never gave, took a bribe in public office

    “When the party (APC) was ready and we were going around to all the leaders, someone reminded us that we had not seen Obasanjo and Babangida and asked them to join us.

    “We also decided to extend the same courtesy to Atiku Abubakar, being a former vice president. But we were a bit reluctant about Atiku because he was being avoided by the new-PDP.

    “In the end, we decided to meet him. The team met him in Abuja. He did not make any demand on us. He participated actively in all the congresses and tried to help the APC grow in his area.

    “We wooed all the leaders of the new-PDP and visited all of them. They told us they needed to hold a meeting and take a decision.

    “Nyako of Adamawa told us at a stage that he would leave them behind and join us on his own.

    “Some of them felt they were being stampeded.

    “One morning, Tinubu and I were in Abuja and we learnt that the leaders of the new-PDP were meeting at the Kano House, Asokoro, which was not far from where we were staying.

    “We decided to join them. We phoned Buhari to join us too. Ogbonnaya Onu joined us too.

    “When we got there, it became a joint meeting between the APC and the new-PDP. It was a day of our National Executive Committee meeting and all our people were waiting for me at the APC national headquarters.

    “When we got to Kano House, the New-PDP leaders had prepared a document listing conditions under which they would accept to join us. They gave us a copy. Tinubu read it and said all these were unnecessary.

    “He reduced the two-page paper to one page of about three sentences. After some discussion, it was agreeable to both sides. We reduced the agreement to a communiqué and both sides signed it.

    “Though he also attended the meeting, Governor Babangida Aliyu of Niger State escaped and was not there when we were addressing the press. That was how the new PDP joined the APC,” he wrote.

  • APC miracle would have been difficult without Tinubu, says Akande

    APC miracle would have been difficult without Tinubu, says Akande

    Ex-All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande has said the feats achieved by the party in the 2015 polls would have been difficult or impossible without ex-Lagos State Governor Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

    Akande, in his autobiography, ‘My Participations’, said Tinubu’s contributions to the formation of the party, his business acumen, his courage in politics, his readiness to forgive those who betrayed him and his steadfastness to his friends were among the reasons President Muhammadu Buhari admired Tinubu and considered making him his running mate in 2015.

    He added that Buhari and Tinubu became so close towards the 2015 election that anytime the president was in Lagos he would have his breakfast, lunch or dinner in Tinubu’s Bourdillon Street, Ikoyi home.

    Akande said Buhari felt comfortable in Tinubu’s home even when the ex-Lagos governor was away.

    “This became more so after he escaped an assassination attempt in Kaduna. ‘I prefer to eat where I will not be poisoned,’ he said. It appeared they trusted each other,” Akande wrote.

    He added that Buhari offered Tinubu the running mate slot in 2014 even when he had not secured the party’s ticket. He explained that this was done in the presence of Governor Aminu Bello Masari.

    “So, when Buhari tabled the matter, I cautioned them that this must not get out beyond the four of us. ‘How could he be talking of a running mate when he had not secured the ticket?’ I mused.

    Read Also: APC didn’t have ‘restructuring’ in its 2015 manifesto, says Akande

    “I thought such information if leaked to the general public, might affect the conduct of the party’s congress at the presidential primaries, if not its choice of candidate.”
    Akande said after the primaries Buhari insisted on Tinubu but other interests started coming up, adding that Admas Oshiomhole’s position was that Buhari should be allowed to choose his running mate.

    He said at a point Buhari asked for three names from which he would choose from.

    “I was angry with him. ‘General, this was not what we agreed upon,’ I said in annoyance. ‘You are changing our agreement?’ He knew I was getting angry. He said he was under pressure from some governors from the North, including those who were Muslims.

    “I told him the slot belonged to the Southwest and to the Yoruba, religion is not a factor in leadership. ‘That is the burden the North has brought to national politics!’ He did not like my remark but kept quiet about it.”
    Akande said ex-Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole and ex-Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola came into the venue of the meeting and Oshiomhole said it would be unfair to renege on the agreement.

    “Buhari now said he never meant it that way. What he meant originally was that Tinubu should partner with him,” he wrote.

    He said Tinubu became angry with Buhari and refused to join a discussion on the running mate initiated by Senator Ibikunle Amosun.

    “I don’t trust Buhari anymore. Even if we give him names, he may decide to go outside the list. So, let him choose on his own,” Akande quoted Tinubu to have said.

    Akande later discussed with Tinubu on phone and he mentioned Prof. Yemi Osinbajo’s name as the one suggested to Buhari during the 2011 race. The name was written on a sheet of paper for Amosun and Aregbesola to present to Buhari.