Nevertheless, he must have stirred the hornet’s nest sufficiently to provoke the following front page report in ‘’Saturday Sun’’ newspaper of March 11, 2017.
‘’Headline: ‘’Polygamy law: Sanusi under fire” Emir of Kano, MuhammaduSanusi II threatens to introduce a new law that will restrict polygamy in Kano State:
‘’Those of us in the [mainly Muslims] North have all seen the economic consequences of men who are not capable of maintaining one wife, marrying four. They end up producing 20 children, not educating them, having (leaving) them on the streets, and they end up as thugs and terrorists.’’
Please let us add the memo from Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, the Governor of Kaduna State to President Muhammadu Buhari:
‘’The danger of this current state of affairs is that we are inadvertently creating successive generations of poorer, barely educated, unskilled, hopeless and angry children of the poor, side by side with increasingly richer, privately educated, skilled and optimistic children of the privileged. It is a demographic and social time bomb waiting to explode as the poor and hopeless youths are easy recruits of insurgents, violent politicians and criminals.’’
Perhaps it would not be out of place for me to disclose that every Friday night at the Lagos Motor Boat Club, a corner of the club overlooking the calm waters of the Lagoon, is the arena (or battlefield!) for a marathon debate between old boys of King’s College Lagos and old boys of St. Gregory’s College over the unresolved issue of which school is (or was) better. It is an extension of their everlasting and intense rivalry in academics, sports, literary debates and integrity/character. I must confess that as we speak the old boys of St. Gregory’s College are entitled to bragging rights based on their successful transformation of their school which was in danger of collapsing on account of overcrowding, poor teachers ( and poorer teaching equipment), lack of funds, indiscipline e.t.c. It was the old boys of the college who came to its rescue by investing massively in the principal, Monsignor Babasaiye Akpalla. Today, the school is back to its old glory, looking pristine and majestic. It could even be mistaken for a university campus!!
The least we can do is to recommend Monsignor Babasaiye Okpalla of St. Gregory’s College, Obalende and Mr. J.A Gbadamosi (Officer of the Order of the Niger) the former Principal of Ahmadiyya College, Agege who celebrated his 90th birthday last week for special commendation by President Muhammadu Buhari.
I must also record my eternal gratitude to Justice Charles Archibong (Rtd), an old boy of St.Gregory’s College who in the dispute between Statoil Nigeria Ltd and Inducon Nigeria Ltd delivered a judgement which specifically ordered that my firm, J.K. Randle Professional Services should be appointed to audit the relevant accounts and submit a forensic report to the Court for a fee of U.S. $1 million. Even though I am yet to receive even a dime, that must not be allowed to stand in the way of recognition of his generosity of spirit and remarkable professionalism.
However, nothing must disturb our weekly Friday duel at the Boat Club where the vigorous debate usually lasts until well after midnight accompanied by generous lubrication provided by wine, champagne and exotic dishes as compensation for the lousy food we endured at our respective boarding schools.
I refrain from making any comments about the deplorable state of affairs at Kings College or even more appalling disasters at Queens College, Yaba where two students are alleged to have died from drinking contaminated water and living in terrible unhygienic conditions. For all we know, those two institutions are living on borrowed time unless there is massive intervention by invoking the spirit of late Chief Stephen Awokoya. As a chartered accountant I can truthfully confirm that when you borrow time, there’s no way you can pay it back! Indeed, by placing so much emphasis on science education, Chief Awokoya predated what more developed countries such as China, Japan, South Korea, the United States of America have formally adopted as the fulcrum of their curricula-‘’STEM’’ stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.
Indeed, it was Chief Obafemi Awolowo who posed the question:
‘’ What is education and in what way can it contribute to the attainment of national freedom?’’
Being an astute lawyer, he was quick to provide an answer to his leading question:
‘’Education is that process of physical and mental culture whereby a man’s (and woman’s) personality is developed to the fullest.’’
Let me remind you that we started off with a huge conflict. In our hearts we have a deep urge and obligation to congratulate the Awokoya family but our head (and thinking cap) tells us that we should rather sympathise with them because their patriarch has set them an impossible task.
We in the J.K. Randle family have found ourselves in the same situation.
It is an ambush from which we are trying to extricate ourselves by salvaging whatever is left of our legacy and heritage. The land on which the hall where we are gathered was built by my grandfather Dr. J.K. Randle and in his lifetime he shared it with ‘’….the people of Lagos for their peaceful enjoyment and recreation.’’ It was known as the ‘’Love Garden’’. It was as blissful as it was serene. Next to it was the Dr. J.K. Randle Swimming Pool which he also built. Both the garden and swimming pool were funded for several decades by his estate after his death on 28th February 1928.
As you are all well aware both the Chief J.K.Randle Memorial Hall (named after my father) and the swimming pool were demolished without any prior warning by the government on 24th September, 2016.
We are now in the same boat as the Awokoya family! In our own case, we plan to build a first class Medical Centre/ Teaching Hospital to replace the ruins for which we did not bargain. It is the least we can do in memory of our illustrious ancestors who committed their resources and devoted their lives to education, sports and philantrophy.
We are yet to come to terms with the proposed agenda of the government.
Chief Obafemi Awolowo was both a formidable lawyer, one of the best in land matters (check with the Oniru family) as well as a legendary politician; and he was also a friend of my father (both of them were born in the same year-1909). I have no doubt that were he alive today he would have readily offered his professional skills and commitment to justice in our favour. Furthermore, in order to ensure the support of Chief Awokoya we would feel obliged to add a Medical School/School of Science. Also, in recognition of the unassailable evidence provided by those who are vigorously advocating the formidable healing powers of classical music, the MUSON Centre will serve as the special wing of the hospital in order to cater for those who truly deserve to augment their conventional medical treatment with generous lashings of melody, rhythm and elevating sonatas.
As for the Chief J.K. Randle Memorial Hall, the proposed ten-story edifice will bear testimony and keep faith with the original and sacred commitment to arts, culture, music, drama e.t.c as well as serving as the epicentre of social and communal interaction.
We are in the cusp of history. It is our resilience that is being tested. If nothing else, it is very much to the credit of our ancestors that they did not hide their money in soak-away pits, grain silos, overhead water tanks, underground/basement garages or the most egregious and audacious of all- U.S. $9.8 million in the slums of Kaduna.
After all these years of giving and more giving, we cannot continue to give way (or give away). Like the Awokoya family, I humbly submit that the J.K. Randle family deserves a change of fortune.
In a sense, Chief Awokoya and Chief Awolowo were like Siamese twins who were joined at the hips in their crusade for education. While one provided the vision, the other supplied the drive and energy. Consequently, they earned themselves the rare recognition of being Savant Leaders.
Professor Adebayo Williams is here with us and I have his permission to share with you his incisive and brilliant exposition:
‘’A savant leader is a person of great wisdom and prodigious learning approaching the benchmark of genius but who prefers to use his formidable intellectual endowments in the service of statecraft. He is the modern equivalent of the Platonic philosopher-king. All the great leaders of the earlier epoch, even where they were soldiers, were men of prodigious intellect who preferred to use their mental gifts in the service of the people: Lenin, Trotsky, Churchill, De Gaulle, Mao, Nehru, Amilcar Cabral, Senghor, Nyerere, Nkrumah, Zik, Awolowo and lately Nelson Mandela.’’
They are the champions of value driven and purposeful lives for whom the recurring decimal is: ‘’How can I add value to the lives of the poor and wretched?’’
Chief Awokoya was an unrepentant advocate of science education. I am not sure whether or not it extended to political science. Science is all inclusive anyway. Regardless, he would have taken to heart what Franklin D. Roosevelt [1882-1945] a great American President declared:
‘’In our personal ambitions, we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up or else we all go down as one people.’’
The crunch of course comes with the question posed by W.B. Yeats:
“How can we know the dancer from the dance?”
That is precisely why Chief Awokoya’s emotional investment in science education has rightly been acknowledged as phenomenal. Both Chief Awokoya and Chief Awolowo were austere, frugal and disciplined. So how can we equate their monumental exertions and reconcile their intimidating educational attainments/bequests with the present Nigerian experience of a nation in the intensive care unit as it reels from one crisis to another?
Our forefathers consistently demonstrated dedication and guts. Hence, they must be puzzled by the timidity and frivolities of their successors who prefer cavalier compromise to principled commitment in the belief that the first option available is fine and easy-why not settle for it? That is why we are entitled to challenge the Stephen Oluwole Awokoya Foundation for Science Education to proceed, in haste, to raise the bar.
The departed Chief Awokoya whose spirit we can invoke only with trepidation provided both the road map and compass to greatness. The navigation has been handed over to his successors who should grasp the nettle by launching the Stephen Oluwole Awokoya University For Science.
[Address delivered at the 22nd Stephen OluwoleAwokoya Foundation Annual Lecture, Award of Honours & Postgraduate Scholarships held on 21st March, 2017 at the MUSON Centre, Onikan, Lagos].
J.K. Randle
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