It is not difficult to place the man, Samuel Ayodele Adebanjo. He lived his life in the open. If we want to put his life in a straitjacket, we will be right if we describe him as a crusader for justice. He was forthright in his insistence that Nigeria, and any society for that matter, will continue to flounder in the absence of justice. Indeed, there can be no disputing the fact that Pa Adebanjo, while he lived, wrote his name in brilliant colours. He was a quintessential statesman -skilled, experienced and a respected political figure.
Unlike many political leaders in his class who, more often than not, lapse into moroseness and quietude in old age, Pa Adebanjo remained a firebrand to his last day. In a way, he almost gave a lie to what we know about what the passage of time does to most humans. Everyone’s life story, as we know, is defined by experience. That is why it is trite to say that life is experiential. Nobody can package his environment and its dramatis personae outside his experience. Any story told outside the force of experience is nothing but a fairy tale. A mere flight into fantasy. Experience is actually the bedrock of life and living. One major lesson which we usually take away from the school of experience is the sobering influence of time. As people age, they become less adventurous and more reflective. Many people tend to go into their shells when they age. Some become even less expressive.
But anybody who paid even the scantiest of attention to Pa Adebanjo’s exploits in his old age will readily agree that he defied the sobering influence of age. He remained acerbic and outspoken, telling truth to power when he must. He never pretended; and he never fought shy.
In the build-up to the 2023 presidential election, for instance, Nigerians of goodwill pushed out a well considered position to the effect that the presidency should go to the south east geopolitical zone for reasons of equity, fairness and justice. The zone, everybody agreed, has been shut out, deliberately and systematically, from the commanding heights of Nigeria’s governance structure. For Nigeria to enjoy a strong union where every segment of it will feel a sense of belonging, it was canvassed that the same conscious scheme that saw to the exclusion of the south east must be reversed to ensure the zone’s inclusion in the scheme of things.
Even though most Nigerians know this as a sine qua non in the effort to build a strong and united Nigeria, quite a good number of them did not speak up. They merely muttered their convictions in the cold discomfort of their homes or in the foamy confines of beer parlorurs. This deliberate reticence was most pronounced among the aged, including some of those who we, quite wrongly, address as statesmen. Only a minuscule fragment could speak up. Even in the clan of those that were courageous enough to speak up, Adebanjo was inimitable. He was not just vocal, he was unequivocal in his deliveries. His point was that the Igbo of the south east should be allowed to occupy the office of president of Nigeria in order to heal the sore that has festered in the country’s body-politic for decades on end. And so, while Bola Tinubu was busy scheming with some nation-wreckers of northern extraction on how to grab power in 2023, Pa Adebanjo told them in very clear terms to drop the evil plot and support a south easterner instead for the office of president. He warned that thwarting the south east presidential project would not augur well for Nigeria.
Regardless of Pa Adebanjo’s warning, the nation-wreckers from the north goaded Tinubu on. They were not interested in national unity or cohesion. Instead, they fought like bulls-in-china-shop in their frenzy to deepen the country’s fault lines. But their destructive scheme did not enjoy a smooth sail. Tinubu, the candidate of those who wanted Nigeria to be sent to the gallows, could not win the election. Instead, Peter Obi, the South easterner that Pa Adebanjo and an overwhelming majority of well meaning Nigerians supported for the presidential project won the election. But the nation-wreckers would have none of that. They dug in. And because Nigeria is a land of morally bankrupt men and women, the nation-wreckers got hold of the situation. They penetrated the electoral commission and the courts. With these degraded institutions in their kitty, Tinubu was eventually foisted on Nigerians as president.
But it is important to note that while the ugly scheme to enthrone Tinubu was going on, Pa Adebanjo shouted his voice hoarse. He spoke from the rooftops. He told the world that Obi won the election. He told the nation-wreckers to give peace a chance in Nigeria. He asked them to retrace their steps so that Nigeria could make a forward leap that would bail it out of its unending state of potency. Regrettably, all the entreaties fell on deaf ears. Those who do not wish for a united and peaceful Nigeria had their way. They went ahead to install Tinubu as president.
What has been the the outcome of the refusal to listen to the wise counsel of Adebanjo? The answer is as clear as crystal. Nigeria is in doldrums. Its inhabitants appear doomed to perdition. The imposition the people got in the name of government is snuffing life out of them.
The people are hungry. They are weighed down by grinding hardship. But the pity of it all is that the government that threw them into this dungeon is as confused as the people. It does not know how to get the people out of the hell fire it condemned them to.
So, Pa Adebanjo was right after all. He saw through the evil scheme and warned Nigerians against it. His fears about the injustice that ripped through the 2023 presidential elections have been confirmed.
At this point, we can say that Pa Adebanjo has played his part in life. His interventions on Nigeria were done for the best interest of the country. He wanted Nigeria to be restructured in a way that will make for equity and justice. But those who are bent on keeping Nigeria down have continued to resist the rebirth of the country. They want things to remain the way they are because they are benefiting from the anomalous situation.
Now that he is gone, where are the other Pa Adebanjos? Where can we find them? Who will say it as it is without minding whose ox is gored? I pose these questions with a sense apprehension, knowing that evil triumphs when those who know say or do nothing.