The Aare Alaasa of Ibadanland, Oloye Lekan Alabi and Chairman, Adegoke Adelabu Post-Humous Centenary Birthday Celebration Planning Committee, extols the virtues of the foremost nationalist and politician, the late Chief Adelabu, and his progressive ideals, which made his life colourful and evergreen. His centenary will be celebrated on September 3.
Nigeria’s first Federal Minister of Social Services and Natural Resources (at age 39 in 1954), the first African Manager of the United Africa Company (UAC) (at age 21 in 1936), first Chairman the old of Ibadan District Council (now comprising II LGAS) in 1954, former first National Vice – President of the now defunct NCNC political party, former Leader of Opposition in the old Western Region House of Assembly and Leader of the NCNC Western Delegation to the 1957 Constitutional Conference in London, UK, the late Alhaji (Honourable) Adegoke Adelabu (alias Penkelemesi) would have been 100 years old, come Thursday, 3rd September 2015, had he not died in a road accident at Ode Remo (present Ogun State) on 25th March, 1958, at the age of 43 years.
Adelabu was a meteor, prodigy, wordsmith, orator, ebullient politician and nationalist of no mean order. He was a detrabilised Nigerian who strove for Nigeria and Africa’s emancipation, unity and prosperity.
Early this year, the Adegoke Adelabu Family of Oke Oluokun, Kudeti Area of Ibadan, Oyo State met and resolved to celebrate their patriarch. The family thereafter appointed me the chairman of the Post Human Centenary Birthday Planning Committee, with a grandson of the late age, Mr. Yinka Adelabu, a mass communication graduate of the University of Lagos and older brother of a Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Chief Adebayo Adelabu, the Agbaakin Parakoyi of Ibadanland, as the Secretary.
With the kind consent of the Adelabu Family, I proposed former President of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, GCFR, as the Grand Patron of the Adegoke Adelabu Foundation. On the day we took our proposal to Chief Obasanjo in his Abeokuta, Ogun State home, he not only graciously accepted to be the Grand Patron, but announced to the whole world that the late “Lion of the West”, Adegoke Adelabu was his political role model. Among the virtues of Adelabu that Chief Obasanjo praised that day was Adelabu’s wholehearted commitment to Nigeria and Africa’s freedom, unity and prosperity.
For the 3rd September, 2015 centenary programme, Oyo State Governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi is the Chief Host, Kabiyesi the Olubadan of Ibadanland, the Royal Father of the Day, Yeye ODUA H.I.D. Awolowo is Mother of the Day, Professor Mark Nwagwu of Paul University, Awka, Anambra State, Guest Speaker, the Senate President, Speaker, House of Representatives, some State Governors, Nigeria’s former permanent Representative at the United Nations, Alhaji Maitama Sule, other VIPS across Nigeria, as guests.
Among our objectives is to bring Adelabu’s patriotism, commitment to merit and egalitarianism to the fore for today’s politicians to imbibe.
Adegoke Adelabu was born to Ibadan parents at the family house at Oke Oluokun, Kudeti Area of Ibadan, Oyo State on 3rd September, 1915. He attended St David’s CMS, Kudeti, Ibadan (1925 – 1929); CMS Central School, Mapo, Ibadan (1930) Government College, Ibadan (1931 – 1935) Higher College, Yaba, Lagos (1936) Adelabu earned accelerated (double) promotions on three occasions at Elementary, Primary and Secondary School levels, yet he never came second in any examination, but first at all times.
In his book, “Africa in Ebullition”, published in 1952, with the foreword by his political leader, the late Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Adelabu espouses some of his thoughts and vision. Here are some.
National Unity
The crux of the problem of unity is that sacrifices, great sacrifices, must be made by individuals, by groups, by tribes, by bodies, by classes and by regions in order to usher in that unity which will secure for us freedom and independence. It is not that we too, do not love our tribe, religion, class and region. But we love Nigeria more. We hereby implore all partisans and regionists to join us in the Great Adventure. The stake is well worth in the sacrifice.
Sacred Duty
Any sentimental appeal to my Oduduwan ancestry or subtle attempt to exploit my religious susceptibilities is doomed to failure. Christians, heathens and atheists will always have my political confidence, respect and support. No sectional loyalty or group interest will ever deter me, for a moment, from my sacred duty to my Motherland. I will live, work, strive, think, write, fight and die for Nigeria, the whole of Nigeria, and not any confounded portion of it. If genuine nationalists of other tribes and regions will adopt my philosophy of self-sacrifice, our difficulties will melt into thin air.
Career Opportunities
I want a career open to talent. I want opportunities based on merit. I want the son of the Jukun farmer in Benue Province, the son of the Fulani herdsman in Sokoto, the son of a cocoa plantation labourer in Ibadan, the son of a railway porter at Enugu as well as the second sons of their Highnesses the ‘Emir of Katsina, the Ooni of Ife and the Obi of Onitsha to stand equal chance of succeeding Dr. Mellanby as the next Principal of Ibadan University College. Such as a career is open to talent in America. Such as career is open to talent in England. Such as career is open to talent in Germany. We shall labour without respite until such a career is open to talent in our own Nigeria.
Agriculture
Nigeria is, and will for ever remain, a predominantly agricultural country. If education is the foundation of freedom, then, agriculture is the lifeblood of Nigerian livelihood. Whatever other side-shows and subsidiary industries we may develop, they will remain just useful adjuncts to our mainly Agrarian Economy. The present methods of Nigerian agricultural production are medieval, wasteful, unprogressive and intolerably laborious. It is a desecration of the sacred human personality for men to be called upon to endure manual drudgery and physical exertion that would be considered cruel to beasts of burden in our vaunted technological age.
Our plan of reform in agricultural technique must have nothing of half-heartedness, piece-meal installments, superficial palliatives or unimaginative tinkering about the fringes about it. It must be a complete and fundamental over-haul; a daring and far-reaching orientation. A Niger/Benue Valley Authority, on the lines of the Tennessee Valley Authority in the United States of America, should be set up. It should be an independent, self-contained, semi-commercial public utility undertaking with wide statutory powers and adequate financial resources.
A People’s Constitution
Our first, our foremost and our immediate task on the attainment of National Independence will be to call a Constituent Assembly, charged with the supreme task of drafting, debating and finally approving a Constitutional Organic Instrument for the governance of our free country. Within its framework shall be laid down in broad general outlines, powers and rights. Meanwhile, an Interim Caretaker Government will take office in order to carry on the essential services during the transitional period of constitution making. It will be a coalition set-up for obvious conveniences.
Fundamental Principles
These are four in number; Unabridged Sovereignty, Political Democracy, Financial Autonomy and Federal Supremacy. They are the bedrock of Constitutional Government, the minimum data of Representative Institutions, the attribute of responsible Self Government and the popular manifestations of self-determination. In their absence you get tyrannical oppressions, irresponsible dictatorship, despotic rule, Imperial bondage, absolute monarchy, feudal chieftaincies and oligarchical ruling-castes of vested interest.
Political Democracy
This means the guarantee of basic human rights like the rights of free speech, freedom of association and or worship, free choice of livelihood, freedom of expression, freedom of movement and security of person and of estate. It means the written guarantee of constitutional privileges. It connotes at least Universal Adult Suffrage and direct election to popular assemblies. It rules out totalitarian regimentation and implies representative institutions. It guarantees social security to the people by making them the law.
Financial Autonomy
This denotes that the country shall be economical self-supporting, that taxation shall run parallel to representation, that funds for the public service shall be voted by popularly elected assemblies and that the government shall be free from economic domination by a foreign power from without or by monopolistic private interest or financial oligarchies from within.
Service to the silent millions
Who and where are the Silent Millions? They are all in all, and they are everywhere. But first, I will tell you who they are not. They are not the All-powerful One, the Big Ten, the Influential Hundreds, the Thundering Thousands, the Clamorous Hundreds of Thousands, the Vocal few. They are the teeming hordes, the dense crowd, the sweating masses. The mute multitude, the dump assemblage, the timid rank and file, humanity in aggregate.
Parties and Ideologies
There is so much loose talk these past few years in the press, the pulpit and public gallery of this or that Nigerian Political Party that I am constrained to ask, “Have we any genuine Political Parties in Nigeria today?” My answer is an unqualified No. A political party, as is popularly misconceived, is not an agglomeration of person. That is a crowd. And it is not a crowd acting together. That may be a club or a society. A club or a society does not earn the name of a political party on the strength of its following, the publication, adoption, and possession of a programme, the amount of publicity it receives in the press or by other vehicles of propaganda, its success at the polls, or even the successful implementation of its programme. All these it may do, and yet it would not merit the name of a political party.
To hear more and discover the genius called Adegoke Adelabu who came ahead of his time, Thursday, 3rd September, 2015 is the day in Ibadan, Oyo State.
