I must say I am surprised that you still have dark hair despite your age. Ha no, we find a way round it by using hair dye to make it dark.
Did your father or mother live up to this age?
My father died at the age of 105, while my mother died under 70. By the time she died, I was exiled in Ghana. That was the time of the treasonable felony trial of Chief Awolowo. I was one of the accused persons that were alleged to have attempted to upturn the government of the day at that time.
Some people actually argued that it was true that Awolowo planned to do that.
Well, those who were opposed to us said so. All we knew was that it was a make-up to get Awolowo out of the way. And those of us who were his adamant followers; they set us up and caged (us). That is just the truth. At that time, what we had were tough boys who were trained in martial arts. At that time, the government of the day used the police to harass the opposition and we were in the opposition. What we did was that we selected and trained some tough boys to protect our party. Those were the people that were called thugs. They were not thugs; they were people who believed in us and who could not be compromised by the police and many of us were sent to Ghana to be toughened for that kind of operation.
Was carrying arms part of the training?
No. It was all these martial arts such as karate, kung fu and the stuff.
Why did you have to attend three primary schools?
In those days, primary schools were not up to standard six. The preliminary was the St. Saviour School but for primary two, it was in Ebute-Ero in 1937, where I went up to standard four. At that time, four schools were in Ebute-Ero: St. Peters; Faji; Breadfuit, St. John, Aroloya; and Cathedral School. Those of us who went to school that time had classmates, it is only your own ex-governors who don’t have classmates.
What gave you the boldness to confront the white man who entered your office and asked you for direction without saying good morning first?
Oh, that was when I was at the medical health office. I started my own activism when I was in primary school. By the time I became a civil servant at the Medical Office headquarters, nationalism was burning in us. I was in fact then what you can call a real Zikist because Zik then was the firebrand, who was awakening everybody; he was the one telling us that colonialism was bad. It was from the primary school that I started reading the West African Pilot. I used my pocket money to buy the paper and you dare not touch the old copies of the paper to wrap anything. Then, I lived with my mother who was selling provisions. So, when she was looking for papers to wrap things, I never allowed her to touch my papers. We committed Inside Stuff by Zik to memory. That was the regular column of the time. So, it was from that time that we learnt that the white men were contemptuous of Africans. Then I was the registrar of birth and death at the Medical HQs. So, when this man was coming in, he just said ‘where is Death Department?’ I just looked at him and thought why couldn’t he say good morning. I said ‘is that how you say good morning in your country?’ Of course, he was angry and he reported me to my boss and he queried me. I answered the query and I stated exactly what happened and my appointment was terminated. They expected me to beg or something, but I couldn’t do that such stuff. From there, I went to join a trading company and later, I went to the Daily Service as a reporter.
So, you really wanted to be a journalist?
Oh yes, I was going to be. In fact, originally I wanted to go to the polytechnic with (Olabisi) Onabanjo to train as one. I rose to the post of a commercial editor in the Daily Service. It was from there that Chief Awolowo said I should come and be his organising secretary. These days, young men are always after what the party would do for them. Then, we as young men were the people mobilising for the Action Group. The party bought us a van on which was written ‘Mosquitoes’ and we were wearing black shirts.
Why mosquitoes?
The AG called us the mosquitoes they would use to drive away the colonialists. You know the white men didn’t like mosquitoes, which gave them malaria.
How did you become so close to Chief Awolowo?
When I was the central secretary of the party, the youth wing then was very powerful and aggressive and he was watching my activities because each time he wanted to come out, we would organise the rallies. That was 1951/52. Our party was recognised as the best organised throughout the country because of the fact that the party employed full time organising secretaries. Not organising secretaries like Ebenezer Babatope that was just issuing statements; we really went to the people at the grass roots and convinced them on why they must be in our party. When they wanted to employ the secretaries, the party organised the interviews to take place in Ibadan. I am not a Remo man, but it was Awolowo who said he wanted me to be organising secretary in Remo division. When they were talking of inviting me for interview, that was when (Ladoke) Akintola said they must find a way of telling me to come. So, when it was time for me to go, after all the interviews had been conducted, Awolowo and some party leaders called me and told me that they wanted someone they could trust to do the job and that was how I got the job. When he was the premier, I was the one mobilising support for the entire Remo division. Awolesi, who was the Akarigbo then, was always commending me in the presence of Awolowo; that I even settled quarrels among his subjects because there were some areas in Remo then that were antagonistic to the Akarigbo. I used to persuade them to go and meet the oba and settle whatever differences they had with him; at times, I would lead them to go and pay obeisance. Then, we were dedicated and ready to serve the people. Our programmes were well organised such as free education, health services and others. Till today in this country, when you talk of free education and social development, all others copied us. We were the only one who sat down and talked about development.
Why didn’t you vie for political office? Was it that you didn’t have what it takes to win an election or what?
In our days, we believed in giving service. In fact, what you have just said, instead of regarding it as a compliment, one of the former governors, Bisi Akande, used it to denigrate me, that that man has never contested and won an election. All those who were contesting at that time were not better qualified than me. If even I didn’t in 1951/52, what about 1979? I became a lawyer in 1961. So, it was not a question of qualification or something but we didn’t dispute elections like this. I remember in 1979 when we were talking about the governorship position of Ogun, Chief Awolowo told me and Chief Onabanjo to go and decide who would be governor and I opted out; I said I didn’t want to be a state governor. I told Awolowo that I only wanted to be a minister under him when he was president. As an organising secretary to Chief Awolowo, I worked with him in his constituency. I knew him inside out. I told him that as someone that I knew so well, I wanted to see how he managed the central government, while I would be a minister under him.
Many believe there was more to the bond between you and Chief Awolowo that people probably do not know.
It is loyalty and devotion. You will be surprised, when I was going to England, I was only an officer of the party, Chief Awolowo as the premier organised a send off party for me in his Oke-Ado residence and he invited ministers. He described me as a dedicated young man and they contributed money for me because I was not rich enough. All the time I was the organising secretary, I could combine it with my private studies, I didn’t do that. It was when I was in England that I did my A-levels. All the time I was the organising secretary for about three years, I did not use the party’s time to study and I believe that was why God helped me because I finished both my A-levels and the bar within two-and-a-half years. I got to England in December 1958 and I was qualified as a lawyer in June 1961.
You mentioned Chief Babatope a while ago; this is someone who prides himself as the best organising secretary for Chief Awolowo; did he understudy you or something?
We were party leaders by the time he came. Not only that, the party had made a name. The difference between the organising secretary of our time and Babatope’s time is that, in our time, people didn’t want to hear about the Action Group; in Lagos, Ibadan or Ilesa, no. Then, the organising secretaries and the field secretaries were those responsible for wooing the grass roots into the party and it was not a joke.
Talking about planning ahead, you said all the programmes of the AG were planned carefully even before they were introduced. Do you see such happening these days?
One of the reasons the present day politicians would not accede to our own method is that before the AG was inaugurated, Chief Awolowo gathered his supporters and they were meeting for over a year discussing the policy papers of the party. If we come to government, what are we going to do about education, health, social development, etc? There were papers before we won the election and by the time we won an election, it was not a question of sitting down and thinking of what to do. Unlike these days when after they win elections, they now set up committees instead of going straight into action. During Awolowo’s time, you had to give a proper report of what had been done in education, health, development and all that. In fact, at the parliamentary council, we would have tabled everything and argued it instead of what we hear nowadays that the legislatures are refusing to pass the budget.
People criticise you for being too rigid, for expecting everybody to still follow what Awolowo did in the ‘50s.
If it worked in the ‘50s, because it really worked, why can’t it work today? You don’t abandon a winning team. A strategy that was used and it succeeded, why do you abandon it, particularly when we know that what you are now doing does not make it because you have not followed the path? Today, if my own party should win an election at the federal level or state level, we don’t need any economic summit for what we are going to do. The papers are already there, those who don’t know, they should go to Sipeolu Library in Ikenne. All the policy papers you find them there. Or if you read any of the Trilogy of Chief Awolowo, all these things are there. For the seven years that Awolowo remained the premier of the old Western Region and the performance everybody is talking about, we never went to Balewa to borrow a kobo. Why? The battle for derivation had been fought and won and every region knew how much was coming to it. Look at the VAT, the South pays so much and you take it elsewhere to develop. During his time, Awolowo fought against it. He said my people drink, they smoke, you people don’t smoke or drink, so I need money to deal with the bad effects on them, and you cannot move get money from the system where you don’t participate. That was how we fought derivation and at that time, the old Western Region had 50 per cent on cocoa; the North had 50 per cent of groundnut and the East had 50 per cent on palm produce. It was the military that came and de-structured Nigeria.
Don’t you see yourself as a loner because you have one or two things about virtually all your supposed associates like the Akandes, the Bola Iges, the Babatopes, the Tinubus...
No. Those are latter day Awoists. The only person I can say is my contemporary was Bola Ige. Akande and others are our own creation. It is because they didn’t want to follow the way we did it and felt that since they were governors, they must have it their own way. When did Akande come? It was Bola Ige that brought him when he had problem with (Sunday) Afolabi.
Even the Bola Ige you mentioned, you disagreed with him and accused him of giving legitimacy to Obasanjo’s government when he served as a minister?
Of course. People who don’t know like Akande, they say I didn’t like Bola Ige, that is not the issue. I disagreed with Bola Ige on principles and I maintained it that he shouldn’t have gone to Obasanjo’s cabinet. It was Obasanjo who needed us that time, we didn’t need him.
But you too were accused of the same thing when you were said to have agreed to become an Obasanjo appointee during the constituent assembly he organised.
That is a misconception. Obasanjo didn’t appoint me. He set up a technical committee inviting all political parties to be there. It was my party that appointed me as one of the five to go there. I was there; Ayo Opadokun was there; Mamman Yusuf, who was the chairman of the party then, was there and another two persons. Even as the Attorney-General at that time, Bola Ige wanted to be a member of that committee. Mamman Yusuf is still alive; it was him who said how can somebody be the attorney-general and still want to be a member of the committee? So, I was never an appointee of Obasanjo, it was a misconception and you can go and find out. Obasanjo is still alive; that committee, Obasanjo did not have any appointee there.
As a friend of Bola Ige, why didn’t
you use your friendship to talk
to him one-on-one instead of
what happened between you?
No, it was a long story and when you refer to it now, they will say oh, Chief Adebanjo has come, raking up old wounds. When Bola Ige lost the nomination to Olu Falae in our primaries, he didn’t like it. I was the acting chairman; he felt I should support him. He asked me to, but I told him that as the chairman, the moment I took side with one, it ceased to be a fair contest. That was my offence against Ige and I said if that was an offence, I pleaded guilty. I told him it would be improper for me to support him because I was the man that they would give the report to. That was what happened. Even the committee that did the primaries, I was not a member; neither was Pa Adesanya nor Olanihun Ajayi. Those of us he regarded as against him were not members of the committee and it is on record. And in fact, being an interested party, all arguments to persuade him not to be present during the selection of the committee failed; he insisted that he would be present. This same Bola Tinubu argued in the same line as his own contribution. I remember that when someone nominated Lawrence Omole, Bola Ige objected, he was now choosing who were going to examine him. That was how Prof. (Bolaji) Akinyemi from Ilesa came into that body. He told so many people he would win the primaries because in that committee, he had about five of his former commissioners as members. Akande was one of them, Senator (Mojisoluwa) Akinfenwa was one, and the late Pa (Emmanuel) Alayande was one and two others. Out of the 23, he said he was sure of 13 voting for him. So, when 13 became nine, I told him to go and ask what happened. Even some of his supposed commissioners didn’t vote for him. There are certain things people didn’t like about Bola, which he didn’t know because the day they were settling quarrel between us, he said he didn’t know what he did for some people not to like him and I told him I knew what I did to him and I said I always told him, ‘You are wrong. What people refuse to tell you, I tell you.’
Did you have cause to disagree with your idol, Chief Awolowo?
The only time I disagreed with him was when he said the governors would return automatically and I said he should not toy with such an idea. One thing with Chief Awolowo is that once you are able to give a superior argument, he would agree with you. In fact, he would come to you later to say he saw reason with you. That was how we were brought up.
What did you do to be able to get your wife to agree to marry you because I learnt she didn’t like politicians?
She didn’t know I was a politician; she liked my face. She liked a handsome young man and there was nothing to disqualify me. When her guardian, Patriarch Idowu, who was the head of the Methodist Church, called me for an interview and when the issue of being a divorcee came up, he said “you want to marry my girl, she is a very quiet person and I learnt you were divorced. So who was the guilty party; yourself or the woman?” I said if I told him I was not the one, I would be defending myself. I said all I knew was that having been divorced once, I would have to be very careful I didn’t have the same experience. The man was stunned by my argument.
Would you encourage your children to go into political activism?
I certainly would but they must have a job on their own and not dependent on politics because many of us who have fallen on the way side succumbed to crumbs. If I was that type of person, I would have been subservient to Bola Tinubu because he was in a position to give me everything I want. But I refused to be compromised and he dare not compromise me indirectly. There are many of us who criticise the government in the day but go to beg them under the cover of the night.
People will believe that you are one of the wealthiest to live in this kind of environment.
But they knew that I had a thriving law practice. I can tell you the source of this place and this is all what I have in Lagos. I had to sell other places and still had to raise a loan to build this place. I believe in my own labour. If I wanted to use political position as others do, I could have three or five of this place in Lekki here or on the Island even before Bola Tinubu came. I take an objection to the over-generalisation that all politicians are corrupt and that politics is a dirty game. I’m not part of the corrupt and the type of politics Awolowo taught us was not a dirty game. Politics is not dirty but those who play it are.
You join others to commend Tinubu for reclaiming the South-West from the ravages of the Peoples Democratic Party but you add a caveat that his motive was questionable. Why?
Oh yes, he is putting up a good fight but he has ulterior motive for what he is doing. It is not the way Chief Awolowo did it because he has personalised the party. I can’t be part of a party when someone has to determine who is going to be what.
How do you feel about the crisis in your state, Ogun, between the governor and the legislature?
What is happening in Ogun State is an unusual thing. It shows the kind of people that are in that party. It has even confirmed what I warned (Gbenga) Daniel against; you know he was a member of AD and when he joined PDP, I told him he would regret it. I told him that his types were not there; that the vision he had was different from those he was going to meet there. The problem in Ogun State was caused by Olusegun Aremu Okikiola Obasanjo.
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