OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY OR UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS: ‘THERE IS ONLY ONE UNIVERSITY’

‘THERE IS ONLY ONE UNIVERSITY’

In the early 1980s whilst my nascent Christian faith was not a barrier to the increasing bond of friendship that was developing amongst Ayowale Ogunye, Oladele Olawoye and I, slowly but surely our paths diverged.  The divergence occurred on account of the progress with their studies and the stalemate with mine. I was marking time at King’s College, Lagos while they progressed to University of Ife and Repton College, Derby in the United Kingdom respectively.  This was a huge but inevitable wrench but we maintained regular contact.  It is interesting to note that through ’Dele, his younger sister Mopelola, a dark petite, pretty and very astute girl became ‘my school daughter’ and the bond with the family remains strong.  I would spend many Fridays visiting her at their campus home and offering any encouragement I could give.  Naturally, it evinced some suspicion on the part of her mother thinking I might be nursing some romantic inclinations towards her daughter but that was always further from the truth. 

The University of Lagos, Akoka campus staff quarters where they lived was nicely laid out with each of the Professor’s houses crowed around with low hedges of the bougainvillea variety and gardens surrounding it and of course a garage and two roomed boys’ quarters to complement it.  Other staff quarters came in flats but were all decently apportioned with lots of space and boys quarters allocated to each flat.  Inside the houses, the sitting areas were nicely set out with spacious rooms, a dinning and a study on the ground floor.  The master bedroom on the upper floor was usually en-suite and the other two rooms were of reasonable sizes.  The roads were smooth, consisting of two lanes and made of concrete in contrast to those of Abule-Oja where we lived.  Those who lived in the quarters were cushioned from the harsh realities of life outside.

’Dele, Ayo and I had formed a close bond from our attendance at the summer school held during the long vacation at the University of Lagos Faculty of Education.  Here we reunited with many old Staff School mates and made new acquaintances from other schools.  I was known to preach to a couple of the students and was listened to but many just found the whole thing bizarre and hilarious.  Once while visiting ’Dele’s home in the staff quarters with others, which included ’Damola Adeyeye and I led a number of us in a lunch prayer session in the sitting room.  However, in the middle of the session, Dele’s father, the law Professor, Mr. C.O. Olawoye arrived, interrupted us in dramatic fashion, and proceeded to lecture us on the dangers of religious extremism!

I remember that every holiday, back from Ile-Ife, Ayo who also lived at the University of Lagos staff quarters with his father a Professor of Chemical Engineering, his mother, his siblings, ’Yinka, ’Tayo, 'Bukola and ’Deji, would, on my visits, entertain me with tales about life in Ife, of its glory, its beauty and the new vista of opportunities it opened up.  He would entertain me with ‘gist’ about the Elite Club and its intrigues.  At home, I also received some interesting accounts from my twin sister, Folashade, through letters or when she ventured home on holidays.  I always suspected that there might be some slight exaggerations but I was proved wrong.  I was full of envy but was torn between going to Ife or settling into University of Lagos near where we lived.   It would have been very advantageous to be in close proximity to Panaf Olajide Olakanmi who now worked at the University so that I could effortlessly resume my career in student politics.

However, there were two hurdles to cross, that of the Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB) and the School Certificate Examinations.  There was a mix up which caused some confusion with my JAMB registration, which was only resolved thanks to the efforts of Dr. E. A. Akinluyi, the Director of Planning at University of Lagos.  I had consistently scored highly in my Fifth Form examinations except in the subject of Mathematics. This was a disappointment to my mother because despite all the investments she made in providing me various Mathematics tutors I simply could not hack it.  I acquired a reputation with a few classmates of scampering out through the classroom windows on the arrival of the Math’s teacher, I simply dreaded the subject and I was no longer interested in giving it the benefit of doubt.  

Eventually I received my School Certificate results and I was sorely disappointed, not because I was unsuccessful.  However, I was unable to obtain the highest distinctions in all my seven subjects only managing distinctions in five of them.  Of course, I knew there was no hope for me with Mathematics where I managed a pass but Biology?  I thought I deserved more that a credit and Oral English, a pass?  I thought after my debating experience I could speak English with effortless diction only to be proved wrong.  In any case, my results were excellent enough for me to be admitted into university. 

Now I had to await the JAMB results to see if I would be admitted into the Ife Law Faculty.  The cut off mark for Law was very high, you needed to score over 300 out of 400 to be in with a chance.  In my case, I fell short, I only scored 278, it seemed my mother’s dream of me studying law would not be realised for the moment.  The study of History, my second choice, beckoned me like my father before or I could take up the option of a return to King’s College for ‘A’ Levels so I could retake JAMB, this was the dilemma I faced.

Taking cue from the path my father took I settled for History at Ife but obfuscated when telling my friends what I was studying.  I felt rather inferior to those studying a professional course.  In the past I had long arguments with Ayo Ogunye when I suggested to him I wanted to study Political Science, he always looked at me puzzled, wondering what for?  When I pointed him to the example of my father, he simply responded by suggesting times had changed.   I had the opportunity during the long vacation of spending some time in Ile-Ife with Professor ’Kayode Adetugbo.  On my first visit I was blown off my feet by its majestic beauty, the immaculately kept lawns, the variety of flowers and the vitality it embodied.  

The entrance into the university concealed the full extent of its beauty but as you left the gates behind you and approached, venturing deeper into its grounds much more awaited you.  You were slowly but deliberately seduced into the bosom of its environs as it emerged like a tantalising painting from an arts gallery, the beauty of the campus was revealed before you, its magnificence enticed you and its architecture enraptured you, rendering you speechless!   There was indeed only one university in the world and any hankering for the University of Lagos simply faded into oblivion.  Professor ’Kayode Adetugbo with whom I stayed with was a union activist in the University and he regularly played host to many political activists on the campus and it is from him I received my first introduction in the political life at Ife.

On the university’s resumption day, the 2^nd of December 1984 my twin sister and I with my mother driving travelled to Ile-Ife in our crammed blue Nissan estate car, which appeared to be anchored down with so much of my sister’s luggage.  After driving ponderously for four hours, we arrived at ‘Great Ife’.  I entered Ife armed with lots of cash, some acquired from my mother but most of it through the generosity of my uncle Dr. Benjamin Abimbola Adigun who was always kind to me.  Dr. Adigun, my father’s second cousin was a director of AGIP OIL, tall, very regal in bearing, and very wise, a man of great means who spoke Italian effortlessly.

I embarked on a spending spree, eating lavishly, sampling a variety of soft drinks and visiting the Oduduwa Hall to watch the movies.  Less than three weeks later in 1985 my spending spree came to an abrupt end when my wallet containing all my cash of over a thousand Naira was stolen during a film show at Oduduwa Hall.

While my twin was guaranteed some accommodation in Mozambique Hall, there was no chance I would get one on account of late receipt of my admission letter.  However, my uncle, Professor ’Kayode Adetugbo agreed to harbour me temporarily in his staff quarters whilst I settled down.  However, that was very far from my mind, I was already plotting on how I would seize the political scene in Ife by storm.  Academics was also very remote from my mind; I reasoned that if I could succeed in my acquisition of power at King’s College, Lagos there was no reason why at University of Ife it could not be my oyster but here I was to receive a rude awakening.

In Tribute to Professor Adebowale Adefuye - 'The Good Guy'

At that moment, eking out a living in London as a British Civil Servant, toiling away within the offices of the Inland Revenue in the leafy suburbs of Surrey the name Ade Adefuye leaped out.  Ten years had rolled by since the passing away of my father Dr. Olasupo Ojedokun.  In commemoration, a memorial lecture was organised and Professor Ade Adefuye, then the Nigerian Deputy High Commissioner to the UK had graciously agreed to be the guest speaker at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs. The lecture was titled ‘The Commonwealth and Nigeria in a New World Order’ and held on 24^th April 1992.  Regrettably due to work commitments I was constrained to remain in the UK and unable to travel to Nigeria to attend the event.

The thread linking my father to the Professor went beyond the role of a memorial guest speaker.  He was connected to him in other ways, as a junior colleague at the University of Lagos in the Department of History before he was seconded to the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs and through his wife Aunty Shola who is my mother’s cousin.

The Professor was one of the many lecturers who paid me attention when as a young schoolboy I took to the habit of roaming the grounds of the campus of University of Lagos in search of close affinity to my father’s memory.  The Professor was the one who paid me attention and cleared his schedule to meet with me in his London office when I required consular assistance in the 1990s.

It was through my good friend Dr. Ayowale Ogunye, in the midst of the crises that engulfed the University of Lagos, claiming his father and 6 other professors' positions, I came to realise even in the 1980s that Professor Adefuye was one of the good guys.  In the past few hours, in far away America, we have lost an intellectual colossus, an indefatigable diplomat, a beautiful soul, a man of dignity and above all a father and husband.  Our thoughts and prayers are with Aunty Shola and the family at this time.

Critics Of Bible Silenced Once Again: Archaeological Discoveries Prove Old Testament To Be Accurate

BRAVE TEAMAUGUST 9, 2015

This article originally appeared here.

For many years, the critics of the Old Testament continued to argue that Moses invented the stories found in Genesis. The critics contended that the ancient people of the Old Testament times were too primitive to record documents with precise details.

In doing so, these critics basically claimed that there was no verification that the people and cities mentioned in the oldest of Biblical accounts ever really existed.

The discovery of the Ebla archive in northern Syria in the 1970′s confirmed that the Biblical records concerning the Patriarchs are spot on. It was during the excavations in northern Syria that the excavating found a large library inside a royal archive room. This library had tablets dating from 2400 -2300 BC.

The excavating team discovered almost 15,000 ancient tablets and fragments which when joined together accounted for about 2,500 tablets. Amazingly, these tablets confirmed that personal and location titles in the Biblical Patriarchal accounts are authentic. These tablets are known as the Ebla Tablets.

For a long period of time, the critics of the Old Testament used to argue that the name ‘Canaan’ was used wrongly in the early chapters of the Bible. They claimed the name Canaan was never used at that specific time in history. They further accused that the name was inserted in the Old Testament afterwards, while the earliest books of The Holy Bible were not written in the times that are described.

However, with the discovery of the tablets from the northern Syria, the word the word “Canaan” does appear, contrary to the claims of the critics. The tablets proved that the term was actually used in ancient Syria during the time in which the Old Testament was written.

Additionally, the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were also thought to be pure fiction by Bible critics. These cities are also identified in the Ebla tablets, in addition to the city of Haran. Haran is described in Genesis as the city of Abram’s father, Terah. Previous to this discovery, ‘scholars’ suspected the actual presence of the ancient city.

In addition to this, countless other archaeological findings confirm the Biblical records to be real and accurate. Some of these findings are listed below:

• The campaign into Israel by Pharaoh Shishak (1 Kings 14:25-26) is recorded on the walls of the Temple of Amun in Thebes, Egypt.
• The revolt of Moab against Israel (2 Kings 1:1; 3:4-27) is recorded on the Mesha Inscription.
• The fall of Samaria (2 Kings 17:3-6, 24; 18:9-11) to Sargon II, king of Assyria, is recorded on his palace walls.
• The defeat of Ashdod by Sargon II (Isaiah 20:1) is recorded on his palace walls.
• The campaign of the Assyrian king Sennacherib against Judah (2 Kings 18:13-16) is recorded on the Taylor Prism.
• The siege of Lachish by Sennacherib (2 Kings 18:14, 17) is recorded on the Lachish reliefs.
• The assassination of Sennacherib by his own sons (2 Kings 19:37) is recorded in the annals of his son Esarhaddon.
• The fall of Nineveh as predicted by the prophets Nahum and Zephaniah (2 Kings 2:13-15) is recorded on the Tablet of Nabopolasar.
• The fall of Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon (2 Kings 24:10-14) is recorded in the Babylonian Chronicles.
• The captivity of Jehoiachin, king of Judah, in Babylon (2 Kings 24:15-16) is recorded on the Babylonian Ration Records.
• The fall of Babylon to the Medes and Persians (Daniel 5:30-31) is recorded on the Cyrus Cylinder.
• The freeing of captives in Babylon by Cyrus the Great (Ezra 1:1-4; 6:3-4) is recorded on the Cyrus Cylinder.

PRINCIPAL KING'S COLLEGE LAGOS

EXCERPTS FROM 'I FOUND MY VOICE' - NOMINATED FOR BEST WRITER

The Principal, King’s College was by custom abbreviated to PKC.  Mr. Augustine. A. Ibegbulam, aka ‘Bingo’ had been a diplomat at UNESCO in Paris, he was very sophisticated and suave. He was an Old Boy and had been a teacher at the school.  In maintaining control over the school, he deployed psychology rather than the brute force of the cane, to drive fear and obedience into the student populace.  With the VPKC, Mr. ’Tayo Sofoluwe aka ‘Ishano’, the strokes and lashings of the cane came as routine expectation when you caused offence, but with the PKC you were never really certain of what awaited you. ‘Bingo’ bestrode the school grounds like a colossus with the weight of traditions thrust upon his diminutive frame.   You crossed him at your own peril; many scampered at the rumours of his approach.  Some thought I was playing a dangerous and improbable game when I took on ‘Bingo’.   But I was re-assured by Jacks aka ‘Jakaba’, a previous Vice School Captain and at the time a student in the University of Lagos, that I was on the right path.

My earlier run-ins with the PKC were instructive; he once stopped me whilst I was out in the city of Lagos on an exeat from the boarding house.   He beckoned to me as I strode along Tafawa Balewa Square summoning me to his parked chauffeur driven car, a cream coloured Mercedes-Benz 200 with leather seats, to interrogate me.  He asked me where I had been and then questioned the legitimacy of my green coloured exeat card.  I assured him the exeat was legitimate, pointing to the signature of the Master, but rather than let the matter rest he referred me to Mr. Ibaru aka ‘James Bond 007’, the Senior Boarding House Master for further investigation.  I was racked with nerves because the exeat’s legitimacy was masked by a sinister fact; I had obtained it under some false pretenses to attend the dentist but instead had gone for my GCSE Examinations.  These were unofficial examinations, which a few adventurous Fifth Former, entered for discretely and took ahead of the official examinations as some sort of practice run for the real thing, the West African School Certificate Examinations.  I had visions of Mr. Ibaru, the quintessential ‘spymaster’ inspecting my dentition to establish whether I had received any dental treatment.  I made strenuous efforts to re-open a previous gap between my teeth to create the right appearance but failed.   In any case, I was cleared of any breach of school rules but I wondered if he was out to get me.  Apart from that incident, I was scrupulous in my obedience to the school regulations because I reasoned that once I decided to take on the PKC I had to dwell above board.  I resolved never to break any school rules or provide the authorities an excuse to ‘hang’ me. 

Another run in with the PKC occurred when I had the privilege of compering the lecture delivered by Justice Victor Ovie-Whiskey (the father of Anthony my old classmate), then Chairman of the Federal Electoral Commission, during the King’s College Fifth Form Week.  I had visited the Justice at his Onikan office and he had received me with great courtesy and bent over backwards to accommodate my requests.  He had served as the Chief Judge of Bendel State before his current appointment.  He was as robust in his stature as he was in his courtesy and he wore a thick-rimmed pair of glasses and bore a thick moustache.

One of the privileges of attaining the Fifth Form was the opportunity to organise a week of celebrations, which included religious services, games, lectures which climaxed with a dinner open to invited secondary school girls.  I had arranged the lecture, contacted and invited the speakers, and in my view compered it rather well.   I was very pleased with myself and was euphoric after the event.  It was after school hours, I had my shirt untucked, ‘flying’ as we called it, as I glided around the school celebrating my ‘mastery’ and ‘triumph’.  Suddenly the PKC’s voice bellowed out in my direction:

‘Speaker of truth, speaker of liberty …. breaking School Rules.’ 

Apparently, though it was outside school hours I was still incorrectly dressed.  I suspected that his reaction and rebuke was in response to my extra-curricular activities, which included reporting him to various King’s College Old Boys.  All of a sudden, the euphoria was sucked out of me and I fell down to earth from my moment of gliding around the school grounds with a big and painful bump. 

My mind wanders through to my only experience of the Fifth Form Dance, which occurred during the 1982 academic session. I had declined to take part in the Fifth Form Dance of 1984 simply because in my arrogance I reckoned I was past it, I simply felt mixing it up at that stage was not a priority.  I was originally of the 1982 set but was now two years behind having succumbed to the loss of two academic years in 1979 and 1981.  In fact, I could have been entitled to attend three Fifth Form Dances if I so chose but I was not susceptible to greed of that kind.   In 1982, I was in Form Three but that did not debar me from participating since they were all my former classmates.  I attended the Dance not because I had desires to fraternise with the girls or gyrate to the rhythms of the music, but because I was determined to act as a spoiler preventing my mates from indulgence and exuberance of the sinful variety.  I was bedecked in my 1979 check suit, made in America, purchased for me by my Uncle Ojedele, the only suit I owned.  It had passed its fashion date, the bottom of the trousers flared, sweeping all the dust and dirt in its path but I cared less at that stage.  Others were more suitably attired with the fashion of the age and this appealed more to the girls.   I remember incurring the wrath of ’Niran Fatunla aka ‘Lakubu’.  He had secreted a girl away from the Assembly Hall, the venue of the Dance into one of the deserted classrooms near the basketball court availing him of the darkness of the night to engage in a particular manner of fraternity.  I had had my eyes on him all night and I trailed him to the rendezvous point then at the top of my voice like a latter day John the Baptist, I announced my presence by screaming:

“It is a sin, leave her alone, it is a sin!”

My intervention put paid to Lakubu’s intentions and desires but he was sure to repay me with a merciless beating after the weekend was over.  I am not sure ‘Lakia’ with whom I later re-united with at the Faculty of Law, Obafemi Awolowo University ever forgave me for the incident.

I was due to preach at the Fifth Former service organised for the Sunday preceding the Dance and had received a lot of advanced billing.  I had prepared my message and looked forward to preaching a message sprinkled with some brimstone and fire.  However, it seems the planning committee had developed cold feet and decided that the PKC might consider it inappropriate for a ‘serial repeater’ to take to the rostrum.  The only problem was no one remembered to advise me about the change.  The change of plan hit me like a thunderbolt when I saw S.K. Anguwa raise himself from his seat and stroll down from the Assembly Hall stage where we were seated towards the rostrum to deliver his prepared message.  I sat there with my classmates, stony faced, seething throughout the service feeling very betrayed!

In the morning after the dissolution of the Cabinet, the PKC invited me into his office to provide an account of the events from the previous day.  It was apparent that he had been well briefed and I was expecting the worst.  Armed with what had become my constant companion, the constitution of the Students’ Council and the minutes recording details of the momentous event, I explained to him that my role had been that of an impartial Chairman who gave the casting vote on a motion put before the house after it was deadlocked.   The concealment of my true motives continued, assuring him that I had neither instigated nor mobilised anyone and could not be blamed for the negligence of the Cabinet in failing to fulfill its constitutional duties.  He listened intently and was very reflective, he advised me that he would arrive at a decision after making further enquiries.  Later in the day, he confirmed that the constitution had been followed and that the Cabinet remained dissolved.  

On this occasion, the PKC had impressed me as a fair-minded man and it seemed that his perception of me was slowly being transformed and vice versa.  I sensed he began to see me as a ‘radical reformer’ rather than a ‘rabid radical’ and he appreciated the clear mandate I had to deliver lasting changes to the Council.  The dissolution was confirmed and the scene was now set for the election of a new Cabinet and my ‘dominance’ of the Students’ Council.   I now thought that at last I could ‘form’ a Cabinet in my ‘own image’.  Immediately a Council meeting was conveyed and Cllrs. Akufo, Akinla, Britus and Oyewunmi were elected and constituted into the new Cabinet.  At the first meeting of the newly constituted Cabinet, I advised them that my time was limited; I meant business and was determined to deliver.  Cllr. Dawuda Britus my fellow Panes House member and previous Ikoyi Run winner was elected the new Head of Cabinet.

It seemed I was at the height of my powers and it felt intoxicating to be adored by many and sundry.  The unrelenting chants of ‘Panafism’ and the usual chorus of ‘You are Carried!’ were never distant from me trailing me all around the school.  In all the adulation, I sensed I could do no wrong and that ‘my people loved me’.  The complete and utter ‘domination’ of the Council by the ‘Panafism Orientation Committee’ was now complete; at least that is what I reckoned.  But this reckoning was to be brought down to reality with a serious incident.  The incident led to my arrest and detention at the Lion Building, Lagos, the zonal Police Headquarters.