The toast of Nigeria

I consider it a great honour and privilege to be given the task (and a most pleasurable one too) of proposing the toast of our beloved country Nigeria at the May Ball of the Oxford and Cambridge Club for which the organisers have chosen the Metropolitan Club, Victoria Island, Lagos as the venue.  For this I am most grateful to Mr. Akinfela Akoni, the President of the club.  According to his business card, his former address was Wolfson College, Cambridge.  Two of the past presidents of the club – Professor Theo Ogunbiyi (St Catherine’s College, Cambridge) and Ambassador Oladapo Fafowora, (Trinity College, Oxford) are also here as confirmation and demonstration of their life-long commitment to excellence, integrity, knowledge and the bountiful harvest to be derived from the best of western education regardless of the brutal declaration by “Boko Haram” that the core values we are celebrating are strictly “haram” (prohibited/forbidden).

Looking around this elegantly decorated dining room and the array of bow-ties perfectly hooked to proper dinner jackets by the men as well as the magnificent evening gowns by their adorable spouses, we are in a defiant mood.  We refuse to be cowed or subdued by kidnappers, rapists, arsonists and suicide bombers.  We are perfectly poised to do justice to the culinary delights and fine wine as well as champagne as we rise to drink a lusty toast to:

“100 YEARS OF NIGERIA’S UNITY”

I am ready to concede that the cynics may well quibble about the grammar and syntax and on my part (as a chartered accountant) I am inclined to overlook the arithmetical inexactitude.  It is a small price to pay for such excellent company in a most convivial ambience.

Besides, if you care to look at page 3 of the dinner programme, the Special Guest of Honour is Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke, the Honourable Minister of Petroleum Resources.  Her previous address was Hughes Hall, Cambridge University.

She is away on official duties outside the shores of Nigeria and has offered her profuse apologies for not being here tonight to propose the toast of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

As nature abhors a vacuum, I have her mandate to assure you all that her spirit is very much with us.  As further confirmation of her generosity of spirit, she has mandated me to act as the Minister of Petroleum Resources for tonight only!!  At the end of the evening I shall be handing out oil blocks and oil lifting contracts in consonance with the quota reserved for graduates of Oxford and Cambridge Universities as well as their friends and admirers.  There may be no free lunch (even in Freetown) but I can assure you that you made the right investment by buying tickets for tonight’s May Ball (even though we are already in June).  Permit me to misquote William Shakespeare:

“June cannot know the glory that went with May.”

While we are on the subject of lunch, some of you may be aware that I played a very minor role in the visit of V.S. Naipaul the world renowned novelist (previous address University College, Oxford) to Nigeria a few years ago.  He was invited to lunch at this same Metropolitan Club on a Tuesday afternoon.  He is the author of:

1.  “Bogart” a 3000 word story

2.  Education: Port of Spain and Oxford

3.  A House for Mr Biswas

4. The Loss of El Dorado In A Free State

5. Trinidad Killings, Argentina, Guerrillas

6. A Flag on the Island, Africa, In A Free State

He sat next to the then President of the Club Mr Akintola Williams, at the Elders’ Table (Table One) and he was duly introduced to an array of Oxford and Cambridge graduates.

He would later, almost in despair, confess that he had never met so many Oxford and Cambridge graduates in the same room outside the United Kingdom.  For a man who is not known for being excessively diplomatic or tactful, he could not resist lamenting how a country that has produced so many outstanding scholars could manage its affairs so poorly – from one crisis to another in precarious defiance of the laws of gravity.

Incidentally, just as I was leaving my home to come here, there was a programme on television about Oxford and Cambridge Universities.  The main thrust of the documentary was that for 800 years these two institutions of learning have been producing leaders not only for Britain but also other parts of world.  America is not an exception – former US President Bill Clinton was a Rhodes Scholar and his previous address was University College, Oxford.

Nigeria appears to be one of the few exceptions – Oxford and Cambridge are yet to produce the President of our beloved country.

Perhaps the time is now ripe for the Nigerian graduates of Oxford and Cambridge to launch a joint frontal attack at achieving what has eluded us all these years.  Apparently, Ghana had the good fortune to have Dr Kofi Busia whose previous address was University College, Oxford as its Prime Minister from 1969 To 1972.

On page 4 of the dinner programme, we are taunted with a quotation (a vignette) by the English author, William Makepeace Thackeray (1811 to 1863):

“Next to excellence is the appreciation of it”

Accordingly, we are provided with an appetizer:

“In recognition of the great achievements of its members over the years in diverse fields of human endeavour, the Club has decided to randomly select from its membership, those who have distinguished themselves in their chosen field, that their hard work and legacy should not be forgotten.”

The following epitaphs caught my eye:

NameCollege/UniversityFieldAccomplishments

(i)Chief RemilekunDowning College, Law Youngest Nigerian

Fani-Kayode QC SAN Cambridgeand politics QC, Deputy Premier, Western Region Moved the motion for Nigeria’s independence.

(ii)Mr. Victor AdedapoSelwyn College, LawLegal pacesetter, Kayode Cambridge graduating in 1920, taught Nnamidi Azikiwe at King’s College

Presumably, one is the son and other would be the father who are linked by the genetic code or DNA bristling with brilliance and scholarship.  I am not so sure that the “Nnamidi Azikiwe” referred to (first President of Nigeria) was ever a student at King’s College.

Also, the documentary to which I referred claimed that in the 1960’s for every one student from Singapore, Korea, Malaysia, Thailand or Indonesia at Oxford and Cambridge Universities, Nigeria had eleven.

They have since become the Asian tigers while our own dear country is still struggling to emerge from the dark tunnel of poverty, ignorance and violence.

Please accept my sincere apologies for not accepting responsibility for the authenticity of the documentary – especially the claim that Lee Kwan Yew and Chief Remilekun Fani-Kayode were in the same graduating year (1959/60) at Cambridge University.

Fani-Kayode was expected to bag a “Double First” or a “First” but missed out by the narrowest of margins.  Lee Kwan Yew pipped him by getting a First but in the Commonwealth Law Examination, Fani-Kayode was first and Lee Kwan Yew was second.  Regardless, Lee went back to Singapore and transformed his tiny poor country from “The Third World To First” going by the title of his best-selling book on nation building.  Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew’s abiding philosophy and ethos are that all it takes to build a great nation are a few good men and women.  Hence, we are entitled to ask after thoroughly enjoying ourselves at the May Ball:  “What are these Oxford and Cambridge men and women waiting for?”

Kindly, permit me to disclose that my firm, JK Randle Professional Services has embarked on wooing Oxford and Cambridge Universities to partner with us in refining the metrics of our “PPFT Index” as a veritable tool for Risk Assessment and Risk Control for corporate entities and countries.

PPTF stands for Perfectly Poised For Trouble”!!  I hate to admit it but Nigeria’s PPFT index is very much on the high side especially with 2015 elections looming on the horizon.

Before the evening is over, we shall know the next Governor of Ekiti State.  

J.K Randle