' As one born in Lagos, I see a richness in text about Ibadan and I wonder why there are no Ibadan studies around the world. This is a place of history and historians, it is a place of culture and cultural administrators, and it is a place of colorful politics and politicians. Which University in the world will take on the systematic study of Ibadan the land of love and lovers, the city of warriors and subdued wars.'-Kola Odutola
Along with the texts referenced in this essay, the works of Toyin Falola on Ibadan would be crucial for such a study. Pointing the way along such lines is also the 2004 seminar Ibadan 1960 at the University of Leeds, where such luminaries of the University of Ibadan as Molara Ogundipe, Martin Banham, John Picton and Dele Lawiyola spoke and where Banham presented "Ibadan 1960", in contrast to which one may also read James Gibbs' 'Martin Banham and the Scandalous Leeds-Ibadan Connection".
I attended the event in honour of the scholar Abiola Irele at the University of Ibadan relatively recently and was privileged to learn about Irele in the context of the earlier history of the university from those who were either Irele's fellow undergraduates or colleagues there. A most memorable experience.
I attended the Toyin Falola conference there relatively recently. A most memorable experience in a striking campus.
Going down textual lane: Ibadan in text and thoughts
January 29, 2020
As a child born and battered (not buttered) in Lagos, my thoughts about Ibadan people are three fold. I think of a different accent when they speak English. When you read Niyi Osundare's article you will moderate that notion. The other stereotype that comes to the mind of this Lagos boy is that Ibadan houses do not have street addresses but you can describe where you are going or looking for by Agboole Oloolu or Agboole Alabẹni (as in Bimbo Adelakun's Novel). The third stereotype is that people of Ibadan eat a lot of ẹkọ and ọ̀lẹ̀ (as in moinmoin). I cannot really trace where I got that last one. It will be great to read what people of Ibadan think about Lagos city, ilu ina n jo ogiri o sa. The place we sing its praises as "aromi sa legbe legbe." Let me tell you my story of Ibadan through the eyes of writers and thinkers.
My maternal grandmother was a Mid-Wife at Adeọyọ Hospital. My first train ride was to Ibadan and each time I hear the name Ibadan the smell of puff puff by Mama Room Two (aka Mrs. Lufadeju to adults) takes me over. Then much later in life, the poem by J.P Clark in the West African verse competed with the puff puff of Mama Room Two. To mention Ibadan and not recite the poem was like an academic crime.
"running splash of rust
and gold-flung and scattered
among seven hills like broken
china in the sun."
The China in Papa Clark's poem is not the same China (the country) now scattered beyond several hills on the continent of Africa. Are they not gradually taking over our roads, our rails but not yet our rivers? Ibadan the city, insists that it must have a tiny piece of my history. Therefore, in 1980 when all my classmates from Baptist Academy, Lagos got admission into different universities across the country especially the great University of Ibadan, I too was lucky to be admitted to the place to study Chemistry. I knew the admission letter was a mistake but I went through all the needed admission rituals/ processes, I obtained my matriculation number just as a symbol. It was at the admissions office that reality set my records straight. I was told what I already knew; admission denied. I left and my journey took me to Oke Gunya in Abeokuta. I was that stone rolling around in search of a place to repeat my Advanced level exams. I will spare you the punishment of the details of what happened that year and the very interesting teachers I met at the Ogun State Polytechnic. But, who will forget the Chemistry teacher we named "Bone Shaker" because his car had seen better days. If you offended the gods, they will make Bone Shaker offer you a lift to Onikolobo or Ojere. Making it alive to tell this story means that angels were on guard those days.
In any case, after my rejection at Ibadan in 1980, the gods of the city insisted I had to come live in the place for a while. So in 1990, I got a job as a programs officer (well that is what I called myself) with Nigerian Environmental/Action Team (NEST). The Non-Governmental group was based at New Bodija, first in the property of Chief Mrs. Osibogun before relocating to the ground floor of Dr. Jide Owoeye's property on the same street. I lived in Ibadan for less than three years but those years wil always be my golden years. It was the period I met Dr. Sehinde Arigbede, the medical Doctor who left his cushion job as a Neurology-Surgeon at the then University of Ife to go live and work with farmers. He operated as the National face of Coalition for Popular Development Initiative in Nigeria (COPDIN). His is a story that must be told some other day. I sat at his feet for nights listening to the high politics of the development world. I would leave my duty post near Oja Bodija to Ode Omu to go stay with Baba Irawọ. His wife (Mrs. Adunni Arigbede) fed me the most delicious meals and the husband took over the after dinner thought for food. I heard about various innovative efforts to change the world especially the African continent. Please do not ask me what happened to the ideas or the actors who formed ASDAG and the 1993 document they produced on "code of practice for the NGO sector in Africa.:
After about three years, I left Ibadan without packing up my flat. I left everything I owned in the place. Lagos gave me new responsibilities and my paths at Cinekraft crossed those of Mr. Tunde Kelani and his partner Mr. Wale Fanu. It was there I saw the birth of Nigerian films and met the Ghanaians like John Atiase (Papa Jay), Igho Gotta, Mohammed and others who contributed in no small way to the nascent film industry.
I was done with Ibadan but Ibadan was not done with me. It did not take time before Ibadan scholars and writers started to come my way. I heard about Dr. Adunni Amimbola Adelakun's book; Under the Brown Rusted Roofs but never got hold of a copy. The much I read about the book came from Pa Ikhide, the Reader who writes. Luck however smiled on me again when prolific professor Toyin Falola sent me his book In praise of Greatness. All I have done is read (ok call that study) the pages devoted to this daughter of Ibadan. If you know Professor Falola to any degree, you will know that he combines rigorous reviews with in-depth digging of any text. He termed the chapter on Dr. Adelakun 'more than a story'. So, in lieu of reading the Novel myself, I am hanging on every word by the erudite professor to make up for my inability to grab a copy of this book. Just like Professor Falola and Femi Osofisan observed, I do not think Ibadan is a sexy city but it is a city that speaks about sex at certain seasons of the year (Read Abokede by Steve Ayorinde to learn more). In Falola's review, he teases his readers by setting the tone about Ibadan's importance to the Yoruba race and the nation space of Nigeria. The citizens of Ibadan will even tell the deaf that the first Television station was in Ibadan, the first University was the University College Ibadan. If you wait around long enough, you will be told about the first Weti ẹ too. To those of us not too versed in the political history of Nigeria we at least know that Ibadan had the first civilian Garrison commander, the Baalẹ of Amala. We also know of the man fondly called Olowo ti o n fi owo saanu. Ibadan has colorful political personalities that cannot be ignored by any serious researcher. The flowery language and their provincial intonation are always a delight to the ears of a Lagos middle class boy.
So back to Abimbola's novel, Falola says from the "third-person narration of the novel, it can be deduced that the story spans two decades, starting toward the end of the military rule of General Olusegun Obasanjo." Remember I am hanging on the words of the professor to navigate my way through this fictional account of Ibadan of the rich and the very poor. If you want to know about the class structure of the largest city in West Africa then consult Niyi Osundare's "Images in Rust and Gold" (the title of his chapter in Dapo Adelugba's edited volume). In Adelakun's creative world, readers get to meet Arigbabuwo (one who see calabash to scoop money) and his father, and then we meet Kazeem the second generation Arigbabuwo. According to Falola, Adelakun took us into the world of those who live under the Brown roofs. The names of the characters alone will wake the imagination of Ibadan in any reader. Female names like Afusa, Fasila, Sikira, Mulika, Motara, Alake and so on are not strange to the ears of Lagos inhabitants. The male names like Jimoh, Rafiu, Rashidi, and Chief Akeweje make familiar sounds too. Those that the author did not give names had aliases that took one's mind to places like Berẹ and Oje. There are references to 'Baba n salẹ', Akọwe, Alaafin Kudeti and such names that throw light on the multi-religiosity of Ibadan.
If the fictional account of what happens under the Brown roofs is not for you, then you should search "over the hills and everywhere" for the edited collection of reminiscences by Bunmi Salako titled Our UI published in 1990 by Lyntana Books. You will get to read an account of how a student brought in his girl friend from town and without his knowledge; his escapade became a semi-public show for fellow students in the dormitory. As the story went he got a round of applause from all those who surrounded his bed to enjoy the peep show. I must confess that the collection of memory recollection is not only about sex and the over indulgence of students of the then premier University. Bunmi like Bimbo Adelakun allowed us see the city and the many socio-economic layers that make the place what it is in the imagination of people of Lagos like me.
It will almost be criminal to write about my impression of Ibadan and leave out the works of the erudite lawyer Adewale Ajadi, the Country Director, Synergos. Internet has it that "he is sought-after leader, speaker, writer, creative spirit and facilitator." The Internet has its limitations because Mr. Ajadi is much more. He was the one who brought international development thinkers to work on the Sustainable Ibadan Project (SIP). Since the Internet does not forget Patrick Cobbinah and Michael Addaney edited a book in which records of SIP cannot easily slip away. Apart from this laudable project, Mr. Ajadi also wrote a full-length book, Omoluwabi 2.0: A code of Transformation in the 21st Century Nigeria. In this book of over 200 pages, Mr. Ajadi deployed indigenous knowledge to interface with Western management concepts. The book fills the knowledge gap created by an apparent lack of codification of the kind of native knowledge that pervades the air in Ibadan.
You cannot spend time in Ibadan and not wax poetic, there is something in the air that insists you must reflect and reflect I did. What do you expect from a Lagos man? In my collection of poetry, I took on Ibadan as well…
Ibadan, their Ibadan
I have been to Ibadan and back
I have seen the back of Oluyole
Nowhere in the land did I see horses,
horsemen, or horse shit
I have been to streets in Ibadan and back
but behind my mind is the epithet (oriki)
of an Ibadan where thieves raided
on horsebacks and in one distant land
a King's horseman refused death to court esin
The sin and the scene of yore
still reign supreme in folklore
told to children by moonlight
when rooms with modern bulbs
boast of mournful darkness
and dark men molest the children of light
and children of light line the Express way
singing praises to waylay heavenly prizes
from the GO with direct line to HIM
and to Kings…
I have been to Ibadan and back
My Labu of wisdom never will shake
just as the new Akala-magbo rakes the
destitute and city dregs into imaginary lakes
of fire and gbegiri soup
I have been to the loop of Ibadan-Meseogo
Seen the school of thugs and lords of thugs
talked to urchins with bowls and rods
heard the chords from the guts of mums
begging for early morning share
from the Chair with no news to cheer
As I return with this turn of history
and a ton of misery,
my brain marks this twist as one long dark night
that must pass and pass quickly without fail!
Did Yoruba people not say that it is the big masquerade that concludes the festival? Yes, Professor Toyin Falola's Mouth Sweeter than salt has both fictional and reality in one book. Ibadan's story and excesses come to the fore. There is nothing done in Ibadan that has no reason. Even the saying that Ibadan a fi ẹsin kole, has its own defense. Falola quoted copiously from Under the Brown Roofs where the author brought in how Bashorun Ogunmola justified stealing another famer's game. I noticed a similar kind of defense in Abokede written by Steve Ayorinde, in this case it was a robust defense of what appears to outsiders as vulgarity.
Conclusion
However, Ibadan city may appear unplanned but the thinkers have thought through most of what happens in the place. As one born in Lagos, I see a richness in text about Ibadan and I wonder why there are no Ibadan studies around the world. This is a place of history and historians, it is a place of culture and cultural administrators, and it is a place of colorful politics and politicians. Which University in the world will take on the systematic study of Ibadan the land of love and lovers, the city of warriors and subdued wars.
Toyin Falola
Department of History
The University of Texas at Austin
104 Inner Campus Drive
Austin, TX 78712-0220, USA
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