Every December regurgitates the memory of his hideous murder at the Bodija Estate in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital. The scars have not healed. The pains linger in the minds of relations, associates, and empathisers. The puzzle remains unsolved. Who killed Chief James Ajibola Ige, the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice in the Fourth Republic government of Olusegun Obasanjo?
On December 23, 2001, the news ricocheted throughout the country that unknown assailants had killed Ige. Twenty-three years later, the killers remain at large. The inability of the government to unravel his killing – most people believe he was assassinated – aptly underscores the illusion of justice.
Ige, a lawyer, prolific writer, eloquent social critic, and astute politician, was a committed Awoist. He was a dependable ally of the late sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo. He was the National Publicity Secretary of the defunct Action Group (AG) in the First Republic.
In the late sixties, he was a commissioner in the military government of Col. Adeyinka Adebayo in the Western State. In the Second Republic, he was governor of the old Oyo State on the platform of the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN). In the post-Third Republic period, he became the Deputy Leader of Afenifere. He died as an elder statesman.
Full of magnetism, charm, charisma, and carriage, Ige was also a controversial politician. He was an orator with a caustic tongue. It was not for nothing Ige was popularly called the Cicero of Esa-Oke, his hometown in Osun State. He was simply electrifying on the podium. On some occasions, he also ran into crises. When the vicissitudes of life assailed him, he bore his ordeals with philosophical calmness.
In the camp of Awoists, Ige and his colleagues -Lateef Jakande (Baba Kekere) and Bisi Onabanjo (Ayekooto) – were subjects of envy. On some occasions, Ige’s political career was threatened by malevolent colleagues. He survived the bitterness in Awo’s days. But it was a different ball game afterwards.
In 1999, he was rejected at the Alliance for Democracy (AD) presidential primary by the Awoists. They said Ige, tagged a Yoruba irredentist, lacked a national outlook, unlike Chief Olu Falae, the former Secretary to the Federal Military Government and Minister of Finance. Supporters of Ige complained that the time-tested criteria of age, ideological learning, hierarchy and service to the fold were ignored by the wise men who converged on D’Rovans Hotel in Ibadan to pick the party’s flag bearer. That singular event marked the gradual of parting of ways between Ige and his old friends in the Awo camp.
Before his murder, he had been assaulted at the palace of the Ooni of Ife where hoodlums seized his cap and hung it on a nearby tree.
Ige’s murder provoked rage, curses, and regrets. He was a bridge builder. He had friends across the six geo-political zones. He believed in mentoring young Nigerians from all walks of life. Fork-tongued and skilled in the war of words, Ige’s mouth was sharper than the razor. He was also humorous.
In Law, his profession, and politics, which he described as a vocation, Ige distinguished himself, to the delight of the indomitable Awo.
But he was an ardent critic of Awo and the AG before he joined the fold. He had criticized the AG for lack of an articulated foreign policy. Awo opened a file where he kept the thought-provoking articles written by Ige, especially his documented attacks against his party. When Awo’s lawyer-friend, Chief Morohundiya, under whom Ige later took off as a pupil lawyer, took the rebellious young lawyer to the AG leader, Ige told Awo that he stood by the position he had taken. Indeed, Awo admired that candour and courage, for only a few could call a spade a spade. Recognising his potential, he resolved to groom him, encourage him and moderate his views.
Consequently, Awo made Ige a member of the AG Committee for the Review of Foreign Policy, along with the late Prof. Hezekiah Oluwasanmi, Akin Mabogunje, Tunde Oloko, Olumbe Bashir, and Prof. Samuel Aluko. He was also an active member of the AG Youth Association, led by the late Chief Remi Fani-Kayode, and later, Ayo Fasanmi, the socialist chemist with a long beard. At 32, Ige became the AG National Publicity Secretary at the party’s rancorous Jos Convention.
Having discovered his virtues – bravery and outspokenness – Ige was assigned to defend the oppressed United Middle Belt Congress (UMBC) chieftains who were in an alliance with the AG when the leaders of the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) hounded them into detention.
When the House of Representatives primary in the old Lagos Mainland Constituency between Sikiru Shitta-Bey, the Secretary of the AG Youth Association, and Adewale Thompson, son of the licensed surveyor at Odaliki Street in Ebute-Meta, was deadlocked, Ige was the young AG leader sent to organise a fresh shadow poll. He reported to Awo that although both Shitta-Bey and Thompson were popular, it appeared to him that the pendulum of victory tilted more towards the direction of the son of Shitta-Bey, the “Seriki Musulumi” of Lagos. Awo ratified Ige’s report. Both Ige and Thompson hailed from Ijesa land in Osun State. Fourteen years later, Governor Ige appointed Thompson as Oyo State’s Attorney-General and Justice Commissioner.
Ige stirred many controversies in the First Republic. He was a critic of the Balewa government. His platforms were public lectures, radio and television programmes.
On the eve of the Commonwealth of Nations’ Heads of Government meeting in Lagos in the sixties, Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa had to stop a live television programme in which Ige was a discussant. After dissecting the agenda of the meeting, Ige described the Commonwealth as ‘an organisation where the wealth was not common’. The programme was stopped immediately.
He had dazed Western Regional Premier Ladoke Akintola, himself a wordsmith, with verbal missiles, after regaining political control at the end of the six-month emergency rule. When Akintola boasted that the ring of power had been fixed on his finger and nobody could remove it, Ige went on air, saying if the ring could not be removed, the finger could be cut off.
Ige shared in the tribulation of Awo and other AG leaders. He was detained in Kwale, in the old Midwest Region, during the six-month emergency period.
He was fluent in Hausa, having lived in Kaduna during his childhood. An effective campaigner, he had a heart of steel. Relying on his fluency in Hausa, he took the risk of leading a campaign train in Kano. Like Aminu Kano, he descended on Northern Premier Ahmadu Bello, a prince and Sardauna of Sokoto, who he described as an epitome of aristocratic and feudalist oppression, urging the ‘talakawas’ to free themselves from captivity. He narrowly escaped death when the goons of the Northern People’s Congress (NPC) attacked his campaign train.
When Awolowo was released from prison and appointed the Federal Commissioner of Finance and Vice Chairman of the Federal Executive Council in the Yakubu Gowon administration, he had recommended Ige for a ministerial position. But still, Ige could not make the list due to the quota system adopted for the appointments.
However, the military governor of Western State, Adeyinka Adebayo, appointed him the Commissioner for Agriculture and Natural Resources.
Ige was dropped as a commissioner for rebelliously criticising other agencies of government. Out of government, he returned to his legal practice. In 1975, he became a member of the Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) set up by the Murtala/Obasanjo Administration to package a new constitution, preparatory to the return of power to civilians in 1979. The late Chief Fredrick Rotimi Alade (FRA) Williams (SAN) chaired the committee; Awo declined to serve in it.
As a member of the “Committee of Friends”, Ige became a founding member of the UPN, led by Awo. In 1979, he vied for governor of Oyo State, defeating his rival and former Vice Principal, Venerable Emmanuel Alayande, to the discomfort of Awo who had favoured the old teacher and cleric for the slot. When Awo persuaded Ige to step down for the old man, with a promise to make him a minister after winning the presidential election, Ige was said to have retorted: “I cannot leave certainty for uncertainty.” Awo then asked: “Does it mean that my ambition is not certain?” Ige promptly apologised.
After his victory at the poll, he mounted pressure on Alayande to serve as his Special Adviser on Education.
The 1979 governorship election was a tough contest between Ige and Chief Richard Akinjide, First Republic Minister of Education and candidate of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN). It was in the post-Adegoke Adelabu era and the UPN, an offshoot of the defunct AG, wanted to assert dominance in Oyo State.
During a live television debate in Ibadan, the state capital, there was a hot argument between the two lawyers. The old “NCNCer” was said to have, in Ige’s view, politically disparaged Awo’s Free Education Policy. Akinjide had alleged that the programme bred miscreants. Ige’s reply was harsh. He asked: “How many of your relatives who benefitted from the programme are armed robbers, charlatans and social miscreants?” Tempers rose. Some scolded Ige for extreme polemics. Others merely laughed it off.
Curiously, the relationship between Ige and his deputy, the late Chief Sunday Afolabi, was later strained. Ahead of the 1983 polls, Afolabi indicated interest in the governorship slot. During the friction, the deputy governor claimed that the governor had stopped his allowances. Their mutual friend and former Military Head of State, Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo, offered to mediate in the crisis. It became Ige’s undoing. His rivals in the UPN came up with charges of disloyalty against him at the Yola Conference of the UPN. In that delicate moment, he narrowly escaped expulsion from Awo’s political family.
In his book, Household of War, a veteran journalist, Dare Babaribsa, said historians aptly captured the anxious moment as the “night of long knives”. Ige’s saving grace was Awo, who applied wisdom in handling the sensitive matter.
Afolabi later defected to the NPN to team up with Chiefs Adisa Akinloye, Akinjide, Busari Adelakun, Lamidi Adedibu and Dr. Victor Olunloyo to sack Ige from power. After the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO) announced the results, riots broke out. The houses of notable politicians in the state were razed.
Following the 1983 coup, Ige was detained, tried and sentenced to imprisonment by a military tribunal. There was drama as Ige and Olunloyo met in detention. Both men were to take a ride in a Black Maria. Olunloyo teased Ige, saying: “You must enter first, senior brother. After all, you spent four years in power. I only spent three months.” Ige hissed, ignoring the tantrums from the renowned mathematician. Ige was released by former Military President Ibrahim Babangida, who ousted Major-General Muhammadu Buhari as Head of State in a palace coup in August 1985.
But in his private life, Ige also courted controversy. At a public lecture, he had referred to the Olubadan of Ibadan and the Soun of Ogbomoso as Baales upgraded to first-class kingship by a former Military Governor David Jemibewon. Ibadan indigenes frowned at the remarks. His Ibadan title, the “Aare Alasa” was withdrawn by the Olubadan-in-Council and conferred on the Ewi exponent, Olarewaju Adepoju.
Ige refused to participate in the Babangida transition programme in obedience to Awo’s advice to the progressives that they should dine with the devil with a long spoon. In 1986, Awo had shunned the Political Bureau set up by IBB and chaired by Dr. Samuel Cookery. He doubted the sincerity of the military President, warning that the nation had embarked on a fruitless search and “when we imagine that the new political order has arrived, we will be disappointed”. The prophecy came to pass. The victory of MKO Abiola, winner of the 1993 presidential poll, was criminally annulled by the IBB-led regime.
Ige continued with the “siddon look” political observance philosophy during the Sani Abacha era when he dismissed the five political parties of the time as the five fingers of a leprous hand. When the Abdulsalami Abubakar military regime came up with its transition programme, Ige traversed the two parties, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which had the majority of his colleagues in the “G-34” as members, and the All Nigeria Peoples Party (APP). Although he wrote the constitutions of the two parties, he could not cohabitate with those described as the hawks of the Abacha era. Although the closing date for party registration had elapsed, the Federal Government registered AD to forestall the exclusion of credible Southwest leaders from the transition programme.
But Ige’s party, the AD, could not fly beyond the regional level. A crisis seized the party from the onset. At D’Rovans Hotel in Ibadan, Awoists rejected Ige in preference for Falae as presidential flag bearer.
Ige never forgave his colleagues. He fought back. Against Afenifere’s wish, he joined the Obasanjo government. He was mocked by Afolabi, the then Minister of Internal Affairs, who described his former boss as a guest to a meal seizing the hands of his host. Ige replied that he was not focused on the food but on service to his fatherland.
In the Power and Steel ministry assigned to him, Ige was like a stranger. But it was a different ball game at the Ministry of Justice, where he motivated the celebrated suit on resource control and laid the template for the anti-graft war. He was a staunch believer in federalism.
What would have been Ige’s position on today’s contentious national issues: restructuring zoning or rotational presidency, state creation, regionalism, state police, local government autonomy, taxation in federalism, among others?
The firebrand lawyer would not have stayed tongue-tied, or, as he would say, maintained the aloofness of siddon look. He would have provided the legal perspectives to most of the issues. Truly, the nation, especially the Southwest, has lost a Cicero.
