‘When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle’ -Irish philosopher Edmund Burke.
Ex-SenatoR, ex-Governor, ex-Ibadan High Chief, Rashidi Adewolu Ladoja has ascended the Ibadan throne as the 44th Olubadan. I am not sure the ancient city of Ibadan has seen any Olubadan of our modern times that has been as decorated as Oba Ladoja. His is a testimony of the saying that man proposes but God disposes. Where are the arrowheads of the opposition that cut short Ladoja’s tenure as the governor of Oyo state (May 29, 2003 – January 12, 2006; December 12, 2006 – May 29, 2007)? Like Orlando Owoh crooned, ‘Awon da? A wa won, a o ri won mo!’ Where are they? I am sure you know the answer! We search for them but they cannot be found. Even those of them still alive must bury themselves in shame!
Talking of Ibadan, where I served my mandatory one-year NYSC; thereafter enrolling for a post-graduate course in Political Science at the nation’s premier university, the University of Ibadan, before going on to kick-start my journalism career at the now defunct Sketch newspapers, my mind always raced back in time to one of those poems that we read for our West African School Certificate examination – John Pepper Clark’s laconic poem – Ibadan/Running splash of rust and gold/Flung and scattered among seven hills/Like broken china in the sun.
Life is a huge irony! If one Olubadan does not join his ancestors, another Olubadan cannot mount the saddle. The sadness of one, therefore, is the joy of another. Fortunately in Ibadan, they usually depart in ripe old age; the type of transition that we say in Yoruba land is not one of mourning but of the celebration of a life well spent. Long may the king reign!
Ask any Olubadan: My suspicion is that the most joyous day of his life – and his greatest achievement – regardless of whatever other achievements he might have chalked up in life – is the day he ascends the highly exalted throne of his fore-fathers. Every other achievement pales in its significance. And it is not likely that anything he achieves while on that throne will be as momentous and as celebrated as the day he ascends the throne. Incidentally – and that is the irony of life – the next momentous event of his life will be the day he, too, vacates the throne for another person to occupy! Someone vacated the throne for him. The occasion, without doubt, was momentous in his life. He, too, will vacate the throne for another person. And that event will also be momentous in the other person’s life. The same rejoicing that was witnessed when the throne became vacant for the present Olubadan to occupy it will be witnessed long, long down the line, but in another direction. No one can prevent that from happening in the fullness of time, since no one has ever succeeded in preventing it from happening in the past!
The beauty of the Olubadan succession system is that it takes the lucky occupant a long, long wait before it becomes his turn. It is what is called turn-by-turn. So, they usually grow old before it gets to their turn. Another beauty of the system is that while it has embedded in it the ‘Emilokan’ principle, this is also not cast in iron. The next-in-line is known, but only God decides who gets there. Long may the king reign! But I am sure you understand that the other flip of the coin as far as this prayer is concerned is ‘Long may the next-in-line wait!’ But there is no cheating involved here because every incumbent had also passed through that long wait before it became his turn. Let God grant the incumbent good health and long life to enjoy his long wait, which has now become a reality! And let God grant those coming behind good health and long life to see out their own long wait! The patience to endure the long wait and the fortitude to accept God’s decision on the matter, may the good Lord grant everyone concerned!
As we close, let me make a reference to a podcast which featured Chief Bisi Akande, one-time civilian governor of Osun state, who was asked the yet-to-be-answered trillion-Naira question of ‘Who killed Bola Ige?’ Ige was a one-time governor of Oyo state, chieftain of the Left-leaning Alliance for Democracy which controlled the politics of the South-west region of Nigeria at the time, and Minister, first of Power, and then of Justice before he was gruesomely murdered on 23 December, 2001 in his home at Ibadan, despite the hordes of security operatives around him. Efforts to find the killers have eluded everyone. Only rumours and speculations fill the air. Mercifully, but sadly in the same breath, Chief Akande took us a step closer to unravelling the mystery by saying, without mincing words, that ‘Government killed Bola Ige’ He repeated that statement again and again. Which government? Many will understand him to mean the federal government? How? Why?
While Chief Akande revealed something, he chose to still put a lot more useful information under wraps. Some things you know, you may not reveal but take with you to the grave, he said! Why? Opportunities to redress wrongs are lost. Chances of doing justice are thrown to the dogs. The need to purify our society and cleanse our conscience is glossed over – all on the altar of wanting to sound and act politically correct! Chief Akande said Ige spoke with him before his assassination, but what Ige told him, he would not say. The Oyo state governor at the time of Ige’s murder, Comrade Lam Adesina, also reportedly spoke with Chief Akande, but the contents of their discussion, Akande would also not disclose. He said with both men dead, who would be his witness! Instead, he said we should ask Ladoja, who succeeded Lam Adesina as the governor of Oyo state, why he discontinued the court case filed by Lam over the murder of Ige. Would Lam have unraveled the issues surrounding the murder of Ige in open court? Akande said probably! But should a successor-governor’s hands (in this wise, Ladoja’s) be tied over a matter in court or should he be free to review the matter and take whatever he considers the best decision in the circumstance?
We need to know! Because that is how public interest can be served in this matter! Surely, public interest is not served when those who know something choose to keep silent. ‘All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing’, says Edmund Burke who is believed to have echoed John Stuart Mill’s earlier admonition that ‘Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing’ As they always say on the set of LTV, Ikeja, Lagos, ‘If you see something, say something!’ And I add: Not only say something, do something! Our own Wole Soyinka says ‘The man dies in all those that keep silent in the face of tyranny’ And what can be more tyrannical than the gruesome murder, in his own bedroom, of a serving Minister of the Federal Republic?
I wonder how many of our leaders have chosen the path of not standing up to be counted in the arduous task of sanitizing our society. Despite repeated prodding by his interviewer, Chief Akande insisted he would go to his grave with some secrets that he knew. The other day, another ex-governor of Oyo state, Chief Omololu Olunloyo, also doggedly rejected suggestions that he put pen to paper. He knew so much, he said, but would prefer to take everything to his grave; which he did some months ago! Oftentimes, we hear leaders say if they divulge all they know about this country, or even a cent of it, the entire country will go up in flames. Why not, if not? To spill the beans and clean up the Augean stable or keep piling stuff under the carpets – which is more profitable?
Yes, States keep secrets and leaders know the limit of what they can divulge at a particular point in time. That is why some information or documents are described as ‘classified’. But because enlightened societies also know that public interest is not served if such documents are permanently kept under wraps, they are declassified after a given period. For example, evidence relating to the assassination of the 35th president of the United States, John F. Kennedy, on 22 November, 1963, were recently declassified by the US Government.
One critical pillar of Western societies is their relentless pursuit of the public good. No effort is spared and no stone is left unturned in the pursuit of justice. Even if it takes decades and tons of money, they keep pursuing criminals until they are caught and are brought to book. That way, every criminal knows that the chances of getting caught are high, and that they ultimately will face the music. That, alone, is deterrence. And that is why we speak of the ‘long arms of the law’. That is also why they have the saying: Crime does not pay! Here, however, nothing pays better than crime. Here, the arms of the law are not long at all; they are crooked, miserably short, ineffective, and ineffectual.
Another advantage of a relentless pursuit of truth by the countries of the West is that we have seen cases of historic injustices upturned when new truths and evidence are unearthed. Can we ever have such happen here? Whereas we all complain, especially when we lose our vantage position and are now at the receiving end of the same system we have helped, we are mostly all complicit in the decadence that envelopes our society. If we know the truth but fail to speak, act, pursue or defend it, then, we qualify as part of the hordes of ‘good men’ that Burke and Mill say do nothing but look on while evil men perpetrate and perpetuate their evil act.
Therefore, I do not know whether, at this point in time when he has already attained to the very pinnacle of his life-time ambition, Kabiyesi will want to take up the challenge thrown his way by his fellow ex-governor, Chief Bisi Akande. Let us begin to straighten and elongate the arms of the law here – like they do abroad, where our leaders always run when they want to enjoy the better life they have bluntly refused to replicate here. It is by so doing that we can make our own society a safer and saner place for all of us – and for generations yet unborn.