For Ola Balogun @ 70

Now and then, introspection dawns as regards what life is all about. This is more so in these times when demystification looms large in the land. Human forms, which should embody our religious convictions, get disrobed by the day. And if one is not really steeped in what one believes in, the tendency is to abandon ship. But then, this will not happen. This is because, despite the demystification, clarity still dawns. Such clarity stems from the fact that, though some officers of the temple before, during and after the 2015 elections decided to desecrate the temple, such desecration has not in itself condemned the temple. Ironically, more clarity could well come from the fact that it is even possible to approach the temple without any human intermediary. Still, puzzles remain.

Recently, one of such puzzles was virtually solved by the renowned film-maker, Ola Balogun. In a rather longish piece, which was published in The Guardian of August 12, 2015, Ola Balogun delved into his continuing life and times. He did this to mark his seventh decade on earth. OB wrote glowingly about his life. How it all started on August 1, 1945 when he was born. He also wrote, in gushing, tones about his parents who brought him up in Aba Ngwa, in present-day Abia State.

He was virtually recounting an Eden experience. For instance, such was the high degree of tolerance and sophistication in those days that he was named Chukwuemeka by one of his father’s friends, Chief Uzoka, who also named his sister Ngozichukwu. OB reveals further that such was his cosmopolitan upbringing that the first languages which he spoke were Igbo and pidgin. Not for him the insularity which characterizes our current existence. Then, the ‘other’ was virtually non-existent. It was one seamless whole whose only hallmark was Humanity. This Humanity was expressed in the fact that, as a young boy, Ola Balogun actively participated in the local Igbo children masquerade, known as the Ulaga.

OB also recalls with nostalgia how, during festivals like Easter and Christmas, he and his mates would go around the streets of Aba entertaining passers-by and families who were visited at home.

Such an exposure could well have been responsible for his life-long love for music. This was revealed in the fact that he formed his own highlife band, ‘Iroko’. 

Even then, after a self-confessed life of tumultuous existence in which, according to him, he has loved and been loved by several women, OB is beginning to feel the inevitable: intimations of mortality. On this note, he writes with some pleasure and surrender by contending that when he finally leaves this earthly plane, he will do so with no regrets. Rather, according to him, he is anxious and impatient to be reunited with his dear parents who have remained at the centre of his life, in thought and deed, for all the years and decades spent on earth. He waxes further about human existence when he contends that, courtesy of direct observation and deep meditation, he believes that human existence is akin to a stream that begins in a modest and unsung trickle in some obscure corner at the moment of our birth. Such a life, he avers, gathers momentum as we grow older, passing through a variety of landscapes which we hardly have time to glimpse and enjoy. Meanwhile, according to him, we are swept forward in the course of our onward motion, before finally pouring in a rush or flowing at a leisurely pace into a large body of water that may happen to be a sea, or a lake!

In view of the immediate foregoing, OB advises the younger ones by contending that life is a beautiful adventure that deserves to be lived and enjoyed on its own terms. He further admonishes us that the siren calls of overweening ambition and greed for material wealth are nothing but misleading signposts on the road to eternal perdition. On this note, it is possible to say that OB could well have been a priest. Mercifully, and particularly in contemporary Nigeria where many members of that tribe have been discredited and disrobed, OB does not own a cassock.

Rather, he is a multi-talented human being who has seen through the venality and grandiloquence which are the hallmarks of the Nigerian political elite. Needless to say, the irresponsibility of this class has ensured that Sodom and Gomorrah pale into insignificance when comparisons are made with the hellhole called Nigeria. And true to his essence, it is gratifying to know that Ola Balogun, a film-maker, author, and musician, has been described as “an individual who is scornful to the last of the abundant variety of political dwarfs, rogues and ne’er-do-wells who have desecrated the sacred soil of the African fatherland by presuming to hold political office in post-colonial African countries, wreaking untold damage on the future of countless generations of Africans yet unborn”.

Consequently, it is on this significant and thoughtful note that this column is saying Happy Birthday (though belated) to Dr. Olatunbosun Chukwuemeka Balogun, an authentic member of the Floreat tradition. Certainly, they do not make them like that anymore.

Dear reader, in case the meaning of Floreat eludes you, please ask the gentleman on the next page. His name is JK Randle!

Kayode Soremekun