{"id":64570,"date":"2019-02-07T15:51:44","date_gmt":"2019-02-07T14:51:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=64570"},"modified":"2019-02-07T15:51:44","modified_gmt":"2019-02-07T14:51:44","slug":"remembering-bola-ige","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/articles-opinions\/remembering-bola-ige\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Bola Ige"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By\u00a0<\/strong><strong>abiodun KOMOLAFE<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Ethno-religious leanings or socio-political ideology notwithstanding, it is almost improbable for any society to underestimate the contributions of some people to the emancipation of its people and the realization of the dream of its founding fathers. For instance, America will forever remain grateful to the likes of Martin Waldseemuller, Stephen Moylan, George Washington and Martin Luther King <em>Jnr<\/em>. for their contributions, one way or the other, to the realization of the American dream as a land of equal opportunity for all. In like manner, China\u2019s economy wouldn\u2019t have become <em>\u201cthe fastest sustained expansion by a major economy in history\u201d<\/em> to the extent of having <em>\u201clifted more than 800 million people out of poverty\u201d<\/em> but for the political sagacity and economic ingenuity of leaders like Chairman Mao Zedong and Den Xiaoping. In a word, the world owes Winston Churchill, Pope John Paul II, Nelson Mandela, Ayatollah Khomeini and others a debt of gratitude for their efforts at leaving the world better than they met it. Here in Nigeria, Nnamdi Azikiwe, Obafemi Awolowo, and Ahmadu Bello, among others, have left their marks in the sand of time and one is not in doubt of their place in world history.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Among such great Nigerians who have also etched their names in gold is the late Bola Ige. Ige was a poet, novelist, writer, founding member of <em>Afenifere<\/em> socio-cultural group and devoted Christian. He was a multi-lingual, gifted orator who did so much to promote socio-cultural integration and the Yoruba Agenda. A deep thinker and an irrepressible crusader for the Common Good, he was once the Secretary of the youth wing of the defunct <em>Action Group<\/em> (AG) and he eventually rose to the peak of the Party hierarchy. Amid the uncertainties of life, the \u2018<em>Cicero of Esa-Oke\u2019 <\/em>walked in integrity and in the beauty of democracy.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>A prominent lawyer, once described as the luminary SAN (Senior Advocate of Nigeria), Ige was former Commissioner of Agriculture in the defunct Western Region of Nigeria. He was also the governor of the old Oyo State between 1979 and 1983. In 1999, he sought the nomination of the now-rested <em>Alliance for Democracy<\/em> (AD) as a presidential candidate but the rest, as they say, is history. Bloodied but unbowed, the <em>Afenifere<\/em> chieftain was later appointed, first, as Nigeria\u2019s Minister of Power and Steel; thereafter, Attorney General and Minister of Justice. In fact, Ige was the African Representative designate to the <em>United Nations International Law Commission<\/em> before death struck on December 23, 2001.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>For us in Nigeria, Ige proudly stands in the class of John Kennedy, George Bush and, perhaps, Bill Clinton, whose politics have in no small measure electrified America. Rather than accumulate instant wealth and sudden fortune, his legacy lies in the <em>\u2018Four Cardinal Programmes\u2019 <\/em>as espoused in the manifesto of the-then <em>Unity Party of Nigeria<\/em> (UPN). Among those things he introduced that would live forever in the hearts of the people was how he democratized the education space. It is a fact of life that, without his intervention, many people might not have gone to school. And, because they were educated, majority of them are now in the top echelon of the appurtenances of power, contributing their quota to nation-building. It is also interesting to note that, like John, Bola\u2019s assassination <em>\u201cprecipitated a national nervous breakdown\u201d<\/em> and fatalistic sense of futility.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Well, Nigerians must be alert to the fact that remembering Ige is not all about naming places or monuments after him. Of course, there are perhaps enough of that! In my view, it\u2019s time we started dealing with the socio-psychological underpinning values of monuments, which is the celebration of humanity, not mere \u2018monuments\u2019, the glory of which is likely going to fade away or perish with time. Instead, what we need now is the internalization of humanity institutional monuments, which deal with humans in the heart of hearts of people.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Till date, the world looks at America\u2019s premier political dynasty, whose politics <em>\u201cinspired the idealism of the Sixties\u201d; <\/em>\u00a0and the Bush-Davis-Walker family, which included two presidents, two first ladies, a state governor and a senator, with immense admiration. In the 1960s, Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham had a rare privilege of understudying Kennedy\u2019s case while on internship at the White House. It is perhaps the realization that a typical society has its own institutional pattern that motivated the future Clintons to remain in the Democratic Party. Even, Barrack Obama could not afford to sidetrack <em>\u201cthe last of the Kennedys\u201d<\/em> in his quest for America\u2019s 1<sup>st<\/sup> Citizen. Today, America\u2019s 42<sup>nd<\/sup> and 44<sup>th<\/sup> presidents are better for it! But I doubt if a 10-year-old Nigerian will not ask if a titan like Awolowo ever passed through this land. No thanks to the removal of History from the school curriculum.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>With regard to natural expectations, democracy finds full expression in being a political system of competition for power. But then, why can\u2019t the children of Nigeria\u2019s heroes past ride on the wave that has been created by their heroic parents? This brings me to the tricky question of \u2018political recruitment\u2019 and \u2018leadership mentoring\u2019 patterns in Nigeria. For example, Muyiwa (Ige\u2019s son) has no reason to be struggling for a place in Nigeria\u2019s power ladder with persons of lesser political pedigree; not even within <em>Uncle Bola<\/em>\u2019s locality. Unfortunately, ours\u00a0is\u00a0a\u00a0country\u00a0where warped systems prevail! \u00a0The tragedy of leadership in this part of the world is that, for the strangest of reasons, political neophytes and clumsy characters, whose penchant for transactional politics, political entrepreneurship and manipulation of passions knows no bounds, just emerge as \u2018leaders\u2019 and foist themselves on the people. But all that must change in order to encourage future generations! Needless to repeat that the younger Ige has the name, qualification, experience, reputation and the pedigree which eminently qualify him to, as it were, step into his father\u2019s shoes! The more reason he and others in his shoes must be encouraged wherever and whenever they show interest in politics because they have a name to protect.Top of Form<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>May the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, grant us peace in Nigeria!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>*KOMOLAFE writes in from Ijebu-Jesa, State of Osun, Nigeria (<a href=\"mailto:ijebujesa@yahoo.co.uk\">ijebujesa@yahoo.co.uk<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>abiodun KOMOLAFE,<\/p>\n<p>O20, Okenisa Street,<\/p>\n<p>PO Box 153,<\/p>\n<p>Ijebu-Jesa, State of Osun.<\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By\u00a0abiodun KOMOLAFE &nbsp; Ethno-religious leanings or socio-political ideology notwithstanding, it is almost improbable for any society to underestimate the contributions of some people to the emancipation of its people and&hellip;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":64571,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Remembering Bola Ige - Pointblank News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/articles-opinions\/remembering-bola-ige\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Remembering Bola Ige - Pointblank News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By\u00a0abiodun KOMOLAFE &nbsp; 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