Every country has its good and bad eggs. That is the point I am making. But there are a few individuals that would forever make a lasting impression. My hypothesis is that Obafemi Awolowo is one such leader in Nigeria.
In a country of 160 million people, you are bound to find all kinds of characters including heroes and heroines, villains and charlatans, wise men and geniuses as well as criminals, lunatics and mediocre, brave men and cowards.
In the same country, you are bound to find historical figures like Uthman Dan Fodio, Emotan of Benin, Moremi of Ife, Ogedengbe Agbogungboro of Ilesha, War hero Fabunmi of Ekiti and a few political leaders of consequence like Nnamdi Azikiwe, Sardauna Bello and Obafemi Awolowo, and elder statesmen like Sir Kashim Ibrahim, the former Governor of the Northern Region, Sir Francis Ibiam, the former Governor of Eastern region, Ooni Risa Kabiyesi Atobatele Adesoji Aderemi, the former Governor of Western Region and J. S Marriere, the former Governor of the Midwestern Region.
These are just a few of the men and women of timber and caliber many of us grew up to know or read about in Nigeria. All of them are all great leaders who can be counted on to offer their successors in power some words of wisdom in times of national crisis.
Nigeria is definitely not in short supply of such leaders as I will show in this write-up. But we also have a few criminals and gangsters, armed robbers like Aneneh from Bendel State or Oyenusi from Ondo State who held the whole nation to ransom, so to speak, at one point in our history as I recall.
The only execution I ever witnessed in my life was that of Oyenusi along with 6 of his partners in crime who were all tied to the stake and executed at the Bar Beach in Lagos. I went to that execution out of curiosity.
I have been told that Oyenusi has cheated death so many times and would probably do it again as he faced the firing squad because he had boasted that he could never die from a gunshot. There was a part of me that believed all the thrash being peddled around about Oyenusi in particular.
All of his fellow armed robbers died within a split second of the first shot hitting them. But Oyenusi did not die until the second shot hit him. I saw him move his head at the first shot with a dry smile on his face. He dropped his head at the second shot with blood oozing out of his chest.
The whole spectacle lasted less than a minute. Never again would I ever witness such a dehumanizing spectacle. Every country has its good and bad eggs. That is the point I am making. But there are a few individuals that would forever make a lasting impression. My hypothesis is that Obafemi Awolowo is one such leader in Nigeria.
I am sure some of my Igbo country men are already fuming at the mention of Awolowo’s name because they just don’t like the man despite all the good things said about him by one of their heroes, Ikemba Odumegwu Ojukwu, the Oxford-trained historian who was gracious and truthful enough to describe Awo as “the best President Nigeria never had” and who in a detailed interview with Rudolf Okonkwo of Sahara Reporters of New York has revealed his own version of what transpired in the war and why he did not write his own memoir.
Rudolf Okonkwo, a brilliant engineer and a proud alumnus of the Federal University of Technology, Akure asked the Eze Igbo the kinds of questions Walter Cronkite, Larry King, Dan Rather, Tim Russert, Charlie Rose, Chris Matthew, Chris Cuomo, Rachel Maddow or Al Sharpton would have asked if they were conducting the interview.
Those who were disappointed that the Ikemba never got around to writing a book on the war should just go and read a copy of that interview at the Sahara Reporters website. If they do, they would appreciate like I do that the Ikemba had the greatest respect for Awolowo and would be the last person to condemn or castigate the great leader. It was clear from many of his answers to Okonkwo that he did not subscribe to some of the nonsense being peddled around by some Igbo revisionists, not all of them I must say, who just hate Awolowo and the Yorubas.
Awolowo was not just the “Lion of Ikenne” but the Lion of Nigeria from all his accomplishments as first Premier of the Western region and later on as the Leader of Opposition at the federal level and as Federal Commissioner for Finance who managed the finances and the economy of Nigeria during the war without borrowing a penny.
The man, more or less, single-handedly won the war for Nigeria using his brain power and the stroke of his pen. He was helped in the effort by the boots on the ground led by Nigerian war heroes like the black scorpion Benjamin Adekunle, Olusegun Obasanjo and a few of their colleagues like Murtala Mohammed, Theophillus Danjuma to mention a few.
Awolowo crafted most of the strategic policies that ended the 3 years of a war that would probably have lasted many more years as many Generals on both sides were benefitting from it. Awolowo knew that and he decided to end the bloody profiteering and racketeering.
I take off my hat for other Nigerians who have made a difference quite apart from the few I have listed in this write-up. Some of them are still alive but a good number have died. Among the dead were Alhaji Aminu Kano, Odumegwu Ojukwu, Tai Solarin, Gani Fawehinmi, Jaspar Adaka Boro, Kenule Tsaro Wiwa, Professor Kenneth Dike, Professor H.A Oluwasanmi, Professor Samuel Adepoju Aluko, Dr. Chike Obi, Major Chukwuma Nzeogwu, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna and Colonel Banjo and Col Adekunle Fajuyi. Among the living that I know very well are Wole Soyinka, Femi Falana, Professor Awojobi, Dr. Ohonbamu, Alex Adedipe, Chuba Okadigbo, Olaiya Fagbamigbe, Wumi Adegbonmire and a few others I may have omitted due to memory lapse or just because our paths never cross in their life time.
I cannot help but wonder how Nigeria is going to cope when few of the living among them like Wole Soyinka finally make their exit. We would just wake up one day to hear Wole Soyinka is no more. My big question is what Nigeria going to do when that happens because debt is one sure debt we all owe and must pay sooner or later.
I look at the Jonathan Government today and I remember the good old days of Yakubu Gowon as head of State and individuals like Okoi Arikpo as Foreign Affairs commissioner, Shehu Shagari as Commissioner for Internal Affairs, Wenike Briggs as Education commissioner, Shetima Ali Monguno as trade commissioner and Obafemi Awolowo as Commissioner for finance and Deputy Chairman of the Federal Executive Council.
Those were the good old days in Nigeria with Ejueyichie as Secretary to Government and the 4 musketeers of Allison Ayida, Philip Asiodu, Ahmed joda and Eme Ebong as federal permanent secretaries and Abdul Azeez Atta as permanent secretary in the federal ministry of Finance.
You don’t have today in the Jonathan’s Government the same caliber of top officers and elder statesmen who can walk straight to the President’s office at Aso Rock to tell him not just what they thought he wanted to hear but what the President needed to hear loud and clear as any of those individuals would have done without pulling punches but doing so in a way that forces the President to have a very sober reflection on some of the nation’s problems.
I recall Obafemi Awolowo as Federal Commissioner for Finance and Deputy Chairman of the then Executive Council questioning the wisdom of Yakubu Gowon Government creating more diplomatic missions abroad at a time the Federal Government was fighting a very costly civil war. Awolowo has argued that Nigeria needed all the money it could find from internal and external revenues to prosecute the Biafra War.
Awolowo told General Gowon it made no sense for Nigeria to continue to waste money on creating diplomatic missions when the stability of the nation was in total jeopardy. He personally went ahead to advise his colleague, Okoi Arikpo to put the plan on hold and to even consider reducing Nigerian missions abroad while the Biafra war was still on.
Gowon who had great respect for Awo quickly obliged.
I was among the last batch of Foreign Affairs officers to be posted to the new missions. Awolowo literarily scuttled my ambition to become a diplomat. That was how I ended up starting my career at the Federal Ministry of Defense while another colleague of mine, Isaac Ayewah ended up going to Education while Paul Ayewoh ended up going to the then Federal Ministry of Communications. The three of us were initially recruited to serve in the Foreign Service. The two gentlemen later had cause to go back to the Foreign Affairs Ministry and they both became Ambassadors at some point in their career.
That was how my ambition of becoming an ambassador like them was truncated by Awolowo. I initially blamed Awolowo for stopping me from being addressed as “Your Excellency” which was the title I was gunning for when I applied to be a Foreign Affairs officer starting from January 3 1968 when I joined the Federal Public Service as a direct recruit from Igbobi College, Lagos where I last served as a lecturer in History and English.
I am sure Dr. Obiajulu Aduba of Boston would again say I am blowing my trumpet for saying this. I am saying it because it is the truth. Ambassador Isaac Ayewah and Ambassador Paul Ayewoh are both alive and can testify to what I am saying. I am just damn too old to start parading whatever positions I have held in the Federal Public Service. I am saying it because it is the truth.
I thank God for giving me the opportunity to serve in some of those high visibility positions in the public service at my prime. If Dr. Aduba does not like it, there is nothing I can do about that. I respect the man too much for me to want to fully respond to some of the insinuations he has made about me. We both write for Chatafrik and I consider him a colleague. If he knows me well enough, he would not say those things about me.
I repeat that unbiased Nigerians would forever treasure Obafemi Awolowo who would have led Nigeria to the promise land just like he did in the old Western Region which became the pace setter in Nigeria under his premiership. Those are the facts that Dr. Aduba cannot sweep under the carpet or completely obliterate.
Part of the reasons I am documenting some of the things I write is not to give a chance for some revisionists to start presenting fiction as facts while expecting the rest of us to start shouting “Ogbuefi Eyin Ba Eyin” “or Ranka Dede” I speak the truth as I know it and I could care less about how people interpret it.
Nigerians would for a long time treasure the memory of Obafemi Awolowo for having the courage of his conviction to tell Yakubu Gowon, it was time to change the Nigerian Currency because if that was not done, Ojukwu and his Biafran Generals who had broken into the Enugu Branch of the Nigerian Central Bank by force, would have continued to use Nigerian money to buy weapons to prolong the Biafra war indefinitely.
By that single stroke, Awolowo forced Biafra to go print her own currency which had no gold reserve to back it up and no other nation was ready to accept it as legal tender to purchase more arms and weapons.
It was a strategic move on the part of Awolowo who wanted the war to end quickly so Nigeria could end the carnage and the heavy loss of lives on both sides of the great divide. It was the right thing to do at the time and Awolowo crafted the policy and he executed it with clocklike precision never before seen in Nigeria much to the dislike of Biafrans.
Obafemi Awolowo scored another home run in the Biafra war when he advised Yakubu Gowon to stop supplying food to Biafra soldiers, if Odumegwu would not change his policy to let the International Red Cross be the one distributing the food to where they need to go in Biafra.
Ojukwu had bluntly refused to let the Red Cross or the Federal Side be the one distributing the food to starving Biafrans and children many of whom were already suffering from Kwashiorkor because the food supplies were being commandeered by Biafran soldiers and Generals and top military officers in Biafra who refuse to let the food supplies reach the poor Biafra civilians.
Ojukwu was relying on clemency of the Federal Government and he still wanted to dictate the terms of the help he was getting. Awolowo merely told Yakubu Gowon Ojukwu could not do that with him (Awolowo) as part of the Gowon Government. Awolowo actually told Gowon when he agreed to serve under him that he did not like the idea of working for an unelected Government and that hewould resign as soon as the war ended. That was precisely what Awolowo did...
Another big sin of Awolowo that the Igbos wanted him crucified for was Awolowo’s plan to stop Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe from becoming the first Premier of Western Region in 1954.I give kudos to Awolowo and the few members of the Mabolaje Grand Alliance of Ibadan, an affiliate of the NCNC which crossed carpet to give Awolowo and his Action Group the chance to push the NCNC into the opposition in the Western House of Assembly at Ibadan.
If Azikiwe had been allowed to rule the Western Region in 1954, I know many of my Igbo friends would have claimed today that the West was once a colony of the Igbos and they would have been right to say that.
The Yorubas are forever indebted to Awolowo and the Akinloyes of this world for their clear vision by not allowing the Igbos to treat the Yorubas as their slaves forever.
The late Chief Eyo Ita becoming first Premier of the Eastern Region would have been child play compared to what would have happened if Azikiwe had been named the first Premier of Western Region. That would have created an Earthquake in the power configuration of Nigeria to the big advantage of the Igbos who would have been controlling two out of the three regional Governments of Nigeria.
That would have been a colossal tragedy for the Yorubas. The Yorubas can say today that we were never the colony of the Igbos at any point in our history. The Igbos would have been gloating about the time they once ruled the Yorubas. I am glad they never got a chance to make such a claim.
That would have been heresy for the Yorubas. The real credit for that belongs to Obafemi Awolowo who is next in our esteem to our progenitor the great Oodua, the first Ooni Risa of Ile Ife, the cradle of Yoruba civilization.
I don’t care what names the igbos call Awolowo today, the bitter truth they don’t want to hear is that Awolowo did the right thing in every position he took on Nigeria. If the Igbos call him a tribalist for that reason, they are free to do that, but so was Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe who quickly ran back to the Eastern Region to stop Chief Eyo Ita from becoming the first Premier of Eastern Region.
Two wrongs don’t make a right. If Dr. Azikiwe was the nationalist he claimed, he should have allowed Eyo Ita to be the first Premier of Eastern Region to teach Awolowo a lesson on how to be a nationalist. If he had done that, he and the Igbos would be justified in calling Awolowo a tribalist and the Yorubas would have lost their right to defend Awo.
To all of Oodua children, Awolowo was a leader in a million and the “best President Nigeria never had” We sure concurred with Ikemba Ojukwu because he spoke the truth and nothing but the truth and God bless him for saying so for the whole world to hear.
I know this is going to be one of the most controversial articles I have ever written on Obafemi Awolowo. Some of my Igbo brothers and sisters are going to be throwing everything at me for speaking the truth. It is unfortunate that they are going to do that, but I think it is better to speak the truth than to glorify falsehood.
I feel compelled to do it for the sake of history and for the benefit of generations yet unborn. I am not going to let some revisionists get away with turning history on its head just because it satisfies their narrow interest and ego.
If Obafemi Awolowo were still alive today, his take on the security situation of Nigeria would have been totally different from those of many of our elder statesmen of today like Olusegun Obasanjo, Edwin Kiagbodo Clark, Yakubu Gowon and former Heads of State including our first class traditional rulers all over Nigeria.
Awolowo would have called a spade a spade by asking Jonathan to tell Nigerians who are the faceless sponsors of Boko Haram in his Government.
Awolowo would have figured a way out of the quagmire and the retrogression Nigeria currently faces with Jonathan as President. Awolowo accurately predicted during the Shagari era that the Nigerian economy was in serious trouble and that the Nigerian ship of state was adrift and ultimately headed for troubled waters. His enemies called him the prophet of doom, but every prediction the man has made has come to pass.
That is why unbiased Nigerians would forever eulogize and treasure Awolowo like I do. Let those who have ears hear, and let those who have eyes clearly read the hand writing on the wall. Awolowo has been proved right by history and his soul will forever rest in peace.
Need I say more?
I rest my case.