Ayo Adebanjo says he will die a very contented old man
Interviewing a soon-to-be 94-year-old man, who has been a lawyer for more than six decades, is never going to be an easy task.
When that interviewee is Chief Ayo Adebanjo, who has not only seen it all but is ideologically rigid, it makes the task even more daunting.
Born on April 10, 1928, barely six years after the Clifford Constitution and the first legislative elections in Nigeria, Adebanjo has lived through the finest and ugliest moments of Nigeria’s history: the constitutional processes, the struggle for independence, party politics leading to independence and after, the civil war, military rule, return to democracy, the struggle for the protection of democracy and civilian rule, and the bigger struggle of ensuring the survival and development of Nigeria.
He joined the struggle early in 1943 as a Zikist, but in 1951, he became a member of the youth wing of the Action Group, and a mentee and political disciple of late Chief Obafemi Awolowo.
This became the defining moment of his life and 67 years later, he has remained faithful to the ideals of that political party and the ideology/political philosophy of his mentor.
On Wednesday, February 9, TheNiche sat down with Chief Adebanjo in his Lagos home for an interview that lasted almost two hours.
He spoke on death, the state of the nation, President Muhammadu Buhari, his political mentor, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe and many other issues.
But it was his take on Ndigbo that is most revealing and explains why it is challenging to build a bridge of understanding in the South.
READ ALSO: Nigerians not visitors in South Africa, it’s their home, says Julius Malema
For him, Awolowo was infallible and had no faults. For daring to interrogate some of his claims, he became rather tetchy.
Excerpts:
On President Buhari: “In normal climes, there would have been a revolution for President Muhammadu Buhari to vacate office immediately. Buhari has proved to be incompetent for the main reason for which he was elected, which is to save lives and property. He has shown enough cluelessness that he shouldn’t have been tolerated for any minute longer.”
On death: “As far as Ayo Adebanjo is concerned now, I am finished. It is the funeral dirge that I am expecting. It is your generation that I am pitying, not me. At 94, what I am expecting now is my funeral dirge. Baba rele …. You know what Baba rele means in Yorubaland? That is the song they sing for the old man they are going to bury. What am I going to say that God has not done for me at 94? What have I not got? I am a very contented old man.”
On 2023 elections: “I say it without any fear of contradiction that election without restructuring is an exercise in futility. Tell me that Ayo Adebanjo is talking nonsense, that does not concern me. When it will happen, I may have gone but you will be around and you will remember that I said it. You are contesting an election under the rules made by your opponents and all the ambushes are there. INEC is under Buhari, the courts are under him, the tribunals are under him and you say you want to contest election. You are joking with Fulani. Fulani people know where to ambush you.”
On Chief Awolowo: “I am a fanatical supporter. That was the man who preached and acted what he said consistently – in private, in public. I had the privilege of working with him as his secretary in his constituency. What he said in private, in public, anywhere, he practiced. If I am to come back to this life again, I will be an Awoist.”
On Ndigbo: “Chief Awolowo told us that Igbos, down from Azikiwe, are misguided but we must work with them to defeat the Fulani.”
It is an interview like no other. Starting from tomorrow, February 22, TheNiche will run the Ayo Adebanjo interview.”
It will be an eye-opener. And it is explosive. Only in TheNiche.
Visit www.thenicheng.com. You will be glad you did.
