IN today’s political arena I am certain that Chief Clarke would have been sued – for not being a Nigerian!
Chief Clarke’s father was an Englishman, a Civil Engineer who came to Nigeria in the early 1930’s and settled in Jos. There he fell in love with and married a Hausa Fulani Muslim lady from Bauchi, and together they had four children.
Robert Clarke was the last, and four months after he was born, his father died. His very young mother remarried and her late husband’s British friends took the children from her to live with their Nigerian friends. These friends decided to foster the young children. And so, at six, along with his eldest sister, Robert Clarke became a member of the family of the late Venerable Archdeacon Jadesimi in Lagos. Clarke has said that the Venerable and his wife took them as their own children and ensured they two lacked for nothing. Young Robert Clarke quickly replaced his spoken Hausa with Yoruba language, to add his spoken English.
In Lagos, he attended CMS Grammar School, where one of his classmates was the former Head of Government, Chief Ernest Shonekan.
Clarke later left Lagos for boarding school in Abeokuta. There his classmates were the iconic Fela Kuti and his activist brother Beko Ransome Kuti. They were all at Abeokuta Grammar School.
Chief Robert Clarke has always been passionate about speaking up for the voiceless and underprivileged in society. This led him first into trade unionism, and then to studying law. Chief Clarke’s gifting is Advocacy; it is no wonder to all who know him that he is a respected Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN.
Self-driven and very hardworking Clarke returned to school to study law as a Second Degree at Unilag – at the ripe old age of 32! The button-nosed Clarke also describes himself in his own words as a playboy (in his times).
Incidentally, his wife, also a lawyer was his senior as the bar. But today they live happily together in his favourite Surulere, Lagos axis (they do have a Lagos Island country home they sometimes retreat to). Out of his three children, one is a lawyer. Clarke’s first daughter practices in England.
Concerning his working life, which continues to be a life of service, Clarke has worked as a legal officer at the Nigerian Ports Authority as well as serving six years at a private chambers. He later became late President Shehu Shagari’s lawyer in 1979. He was also the sole counsel for the National Republican Convention (NRC). His private chambers in Ikoyi has just clocked its 39th year of operation.
Chief Clarke is one of those Nigerians who have actively witnessed practically all political transitions in Nigeria. He says his one regret is that Nigeria is retrogressing.
He states unequivocally: “Nigeria changed for the worse when the military took over”.
Chief Clarke is however not one to simply call down fire and thunder on politicians, he has made several suggestions for improvements in our mode of government.
Unsurprisingly, all his suggestions have been ignored.
For instance, he has advocated that the post of Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice now be separated into two ministries, for obvious reasons. He argues that even the jurisdictions where Nigeria got the practice from have themselves changed and separated the two. Clearly, these other countries have also come to realize the grave danger posed by having the Attorney General, who is Chief Law officer, as a politician.
This point was part of recommendations to the 2014 National Conference. But the two consecutive Nigerian Presidents who have handled that document have tossed those recommendations overboard.
Nonetheless, nothing it appears would dampen Clarke’s love and passion for Nigeria and her progress.
Clarke has remained vocal and expressive, hardly ever talking about himself; always speaking out on the way forward for Nigeria.
Hear Chief Clarke, “the system of governance we have in Nigeria today is the problem. The system allows corruption and insecurity”.
Chief Clarke wants Nigeria to return to the parliamentary system of government. That way he says, the cost of election would not be prohibitive, the way it is now. This always results in elected officers converting public funds to personal funds – to recoup all that was spent on coming into office in the first place.
In September last year, Chief Clarke gave a series of interviews in which he touched on a key point of restructuring: the word our leaders hate to hear! Nevertheless, Chief Clarke harked on the need for devolution of powers. His words; “The powers of executive governors and Mr. President should be curbed”.
(On governors) “Nothing curbs their powers at present except impeachment and the first thing a governor does when he comes into power is to buy the legislature.
When you give one man in a state power and call him executive governor; give him all the accounting powers, administrative powers and security powers he becomes drunk because power corrupts”.
Chief Clarke also tells of the sorry fate that befalls any man for whom a governor does not like his face.
“That man cannot make any progress. If he is in the Civil Service, he will never be promoted. If he is a politician, he will disappear”.
Eight short months and one general election later, Clarke’s words are ringing as if prophetic.
Just last week and with meteoric speed, one of the governors made and passed a law effectively balkanizing an ancient kingdom in one of the states, in order to reduce the domain of the person occupying the traditional stool.
The same governor immediately appointed and installed four new emirs into four “newly created” emirates. He issued them certificates of “appointment” on the spot, and even encouraged them to take a shot at the stool; after crowning them as 1st Class Chiefs.
Not done, this state chief executive also slammed a revived corruption case on the Emir. All this was because the traditional ruler at the center of the storm who is a very outspoken person, had warned about corruption in high quarters and had asked the people of that state to “vote wisely” in the last elections!
It is these kinds of vicious cycles that Chief Clarke seeks to see the end of.
At eighty years, ten months and eight days today, I believe Chief Clarke has many more years of positive engagement and advocacy in him to see Nigeria moving in the path of development again. And so may it be for him; for Nigeria.
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