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By Ifeanyi Igwebike Mbanefo

In my former world of newspaper journalism, personality interviews and obituaries are standard fare. But tributes, profiles and biographies are anything but standard. And quite frankly, they shouldn’t because no life is standard. Not to the person who lived it. Or to those who were touched by it.
I know this that for a fact, having written profiles, tributes and biographies for 37 years.
I have been circling back and forth to these musings since Pa Ayo Adebanjo’s passing because my thoughts are like fractals. I haven’t narrowed them to a singular center yet. Or been able to find a pattern as ergodic theorists claim. Maybe because his life was elegant and purposeful. Maybe because it was long and impactful. Or maybe because its dimensions are too many and complex to grasp in the moment.
Whatever it is, writing a tribute or profile, in my view, remains the best way to learn about, to reflect on someone’s life and to take a quick gauge of his likely impact. And if done well, it becomes the first take of history, abstracted from the awful din of life and human experience.
To be done well, as in the case of Pa Ayo Adebanjo, requires going beyond the bullet-list of civic accomplishments to examine his character, the footprints he left, the other lives he impacted and how he shaped the course of history in 96 years.

Let’s start with politics. Adebanjo was first and foremost a Zikist. It was allure of zikism, with its message of spiritual balance and social regeneration that awakened his political consciousness in 1943. Zik’s five principles for African liberation which, amongst other things, urged African youths “to show empathy for other people’s views and recognise their right to hold such views” and “to expel from one’s self national, racial, tribal, political-economic, and ethical prejudice” became, not only abiding principles, but article of faith for Adebanjo.
He was also a pragmatist, who like Obafemi Awolowo, his mentor, knew that the journey to regional and national relevance starts from tribal pathways. Something that Zik’s rivals – Awo and Ahmadu Bello – knew intuitively. That was the reason for the formation of Egbe Omo Oduduwa. I return to the East whence I came from Zik allegedly said when he was ousted from the Premiership of Western Region. Zik of Africa was forced by circumstances to add Owelle of Onitsha to his unbelievable stretch of honorific titles.

Adebanjo never grew past his Zikist upbringing despite becoming the galvanizing secretary of EOO, and eventually the de facto leader of the Yoruba ethnic nationality. He was an uncompromising, unblemished, but complicated figure who became a respected voice in Nigerian politics.
Needless to say, there were many who held unflattering images of him. Tafawa Balewa’s government drove him into exile with charges of treasonable felony; Aguiyi Ironsi locked him up in Kirikiri Maximum Prison; Sani Abach again drove him into exile. Presidents Obasanjo and Tinubu barely tolerated him … the way you treat a badly behaved uncle.

One might propose a reconciliation of these visions of Adebanjo but for the fact is that the stories are not as inconsistent as they seem. He was Zikist and Nigerian whilst defending, leading, and speaking for Yoruba ethnic nationality. And for every other just cause.
That he suffered, as did hundreds of others in the service of the Yoruba race and provided credible leadership during their days in political wilderness was what made him both a Christ and a Moses of Yoruba race.
But he was also not a saint. He was chauvinistic; Christiana Ayo-Adebanjo, his wife who stood by him in all his many tribulations, got only a cameo role or (waka pass as Nolloywood would say) role in his male/dad biography. Christiana and family members, were they given more attention, would have provided a more rounded portrait.
Assembling these different aspects into a single picture is by no means easy… a difficulty that is inherent to the genre of tributes and biography. Everybody wants to relate a life that makes sense. And the way to make sense of Adebanjo’s life is by turning it into a tale that works.
Desiring a solid plot, I flailed about unhappily until I realized that his was a lifetime of politics. And it began with aspirations for continental and nationalist leadership and ended with what he dreaded most an ethnic, provincial leader. In other words, he left unfulfilled, which of course, was not his own making; he fought very hard to prevent it. He failed in his dream for a just, equitable, harmonious Nigeria. A Nigeria in which all ethnic nationalities coexist in harmony. And Ndi Igbo and Yoruba work together, abandoning their oftentimes, needless rivalry.
Has it ever happened? Well, yes, depending on whom you ask. It happened in 1857 when Bishop Ajayi Crowther, a Yoruba man, wrote Isoama-Ibo, the very first book written in Igbo alphabets, phrases and sentence patterns. His inability to pronounce “GB”, which he wrote as “B” led to the interchangeable use of Ibo and Igbo. Used car parts traders will describe Ibo as follow come.
It happened with joint economic planning in the late 1950s between Western and Eastern Regional governments. Wole Soyinka was jailed for trying too hard to stop the civil war. His book, The Man Died, turned out a paradoxical narrative of personal triumph and national decline. The Country Died would have been a more apt title, because the man achieved greatness, and the country became mediocre. Unremarkable. Uninspiring!
Of course, there are those who will disagree. For the antebellum Nigeria was not very cooperative. There were enough instances to support their position. The infamous cross-carpeting controversy in the Western Region’s parliament, and the rejection of offers to form the central government, first by Action Group/NCNC and UPN/NPP.

Compared with all the other crises facing Western/Eastern regional relations, nothing produced an irresolvable maelstrom of contradiction more than the 2023 Presidential Elections. What crystalized its threat from the beginning was the clash between “fairness” and “entitlement,” between morality and law regarding who takes the first shot when the presidency comes to Southern Nigeria.
Both the South East and South West had legitimate claims to the presidency. But Adebanjo was convinced that Ndi Igbo had, in addition, a moral claim to the presidency. Having, like the Yoruba, been locked out of the presidency since 1960; Ndi Igbo, like Yoruba deserved a national concession to heal the wounds. Because 1999 presidential election was, strictly speaking, a search for a president of Yoruba extraction.
Adebanjo and many others felt Igbos deserved a similar treatment. Obasanjo too. Adebanjo, who had compromise in his DNA, campaigned and spoke forcefully for it with a genuine sense of bewilderment, a foreboding of tragedy and no small dose of indignation, about some Yoruba politicians’ sense of entitlement.
In the months that followed, he came under immense pressure to recant or apologize, but he did not budge. If he was, surprised finding himself, an Omoluwabi, and Yoruba leader with unblemished record, cast in an unexpected role as the voice of Yoruba archrivals, Ndi Igbo, he did not show it.
If he thought he was merely going to provoke some conversation and maybe piss a few people off, he grossly underestimated the desperation of some politicians. And because of that, he may not have expected that his stance was going to get the kind of vituperative and sustained blowback that it received. In many ways, people imposed the politics they wanted on his statements. And people from Ahmed Bola Tinubu’s camp moved to dethrone him and whittle down his enormous influence by trying to foster a rogue leadership on Afenifere.
In the interval between the controversy and the election, it became obvious that many people, agreed with him, even if they hesitated to say so publicly. Peter Obi, his preferred candidate, could have won the presidency, but for the infamous technical glitch. Obi’s opponents lost in Abuja and Lagos, the most cosmopolitan cities in Nigeria, which was indicative that Nigerians desired an end to provincial politics.

Not a few persons rued the outcome of the 2023 presidential elections. The parlous state of the country has opened a box of tantalizing what-ifs. What if Peter Obi won? What if Atiku Abubakar won? What if the courts stopped Bola Tinubu? Counterfactuals are never simple. Many historians have argued that whatever path history took was the best possible one, and most times meets the exigencies or needs of the moment. Immediate gratification. Or real politick, as politicians say.

Adebanjo is unfortunately not one to accept that ideology of history. He subscribes to the liberal understanding of history as an exalted, providential force that compels the great to rise above the ordinary. It’s a corollary to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s thesis about the arc of moral universe being long and always bending towards justice.
This hope for historical vindication is loud now but not new. Indeed, it is an ethical outlook that has shaped the actions of countless people. But it is a double-edged sword. The idea that history will judge can be used rhetorically by any side in a contest for good or evil.
Ifeajuna/Nzeogwu used it for their reckless coup. Murtala Mohammed/Theophilus Danjuma used it for their murderous revenge coup. And PBAT’s asphyxiating economic policies is predicated on eventually obtaining a favorable judgement from history. Petrol price, foreign exchange and inflation rates not withstanding!
Indeed, a sense of history oriented towards future redemption has inspired not only moral courage in the face of oppression, but also the moral recklessness of oppression itself. By deferring moral judgment to the future, amoral and reckless leaders sometimes act in a manner that may seem morally dubious.
Adebanjo in raising his voice, was calling on compatriots to act in a manner that would let our country laid down the heavy burden of hate. Vice President Biden made a similar call in his speech at DNC in August 2020: “May history be able to say that the end of this chapter of American darkness began here tonight.”
That was the essence of Adebanjo and the import of his life and accomplishments as a national hero. He was an only child but became Nwaorah, Onwa n’etili Orah, and Nwanne di n’mba, as Igbos call public-minded people. The Bible describes them as salt of the earth.
In departing, Adebanjo left us with an unresolvable puzzle. Should we because of the devastating effects of this future-oriented ethical vision of history, abandon that ideology and simply call for restoration of ordinary ethics, doing what is right simply because it is right, without regard for some future payoff.
Anyone who has two shirts should give the one who has none and anyone who has food should do the same. Luke 3: 11. Wouldn’t it be more pragmatic to treat civilization and progress simply as an ethical way of being, available to all of us right now, not as the endpoint of some historical process.
Is the purpose of human agency to act for some future, unknowable gains, or to strive to improve self, the world and transcend our humanity. Or is it the opposite?
Tough questions and no easy answers. Life is messy, only people like Pa Ayo Adebanjo give it purpose and meaning.