Biodun Jeyifo (BJ): Fond Memories of a Committed Intellectual
Jibrin Ibrahim, Deepening Democracy Column, Daily Times, 20th February 2026
We lost Prof Biodun Jeyifo, or BJ as we fondly called him last week,
not long after we organised an 80th anniversary symposium in his
honour. At the event, his bosom friend. Dr Yemi Ogunbiyi explained he
was not supposed to have reached the ripe old age of 80 as much
earlier in life, he had been diagnosed with a disease that was
supposed to guarantee a much shorter life-span. It was for this reason
that he relocated to the United States to have access to better
medical facilities. We thank God for giving him a long and fulfilled
life.
I had known BJ as a young Marxist student in Ahmadu Bello University,
Zaria, who travelled frequently to Ife, to engage with the relatively
large number of student and lecturer comrades who flourished within
the university community. I always found him to be an inspirational
figure with total commitment to revolutionary struggle. He loved
polemics and was never one to shy away from an argument as he was
endowed with the gift of the gab. BJ also never hesitated to criticise
the older generation of Marxists, who he felt had failed in their task
of leading the country into the desired socialist future we deserved.
I remember a meeting of Nigerian revolutionaries, a word we used to
describe ourselves in those days, a big debate over who had the
correct understanding of the social forces in the country and how to
combat them and open a path for genuine revolutionary struggle. The
meeting which took place in Jos was strongly marked by an age divide
which crept up between BJ and Eddie Madunagu on the one hand and the
older comrades on the important question of revolutionary capacity and
strategy. As often happens in such situations, labels emerge to
counter stronger arguments and BJ and Eddie were labelled with the
"insult" word of Trotskyites to delegitimize their arguments. Maybe
one day, I will write about my recollections about labelling in
Nigeria's left history- the Trotskyites, the labour aristocrats, the
opportunists, the Stalinists, the Maoists, the suspected state agents
and other false pretenders. It has been a significant baggage for left
movements throughout history.
This is the reason why after over a century of organisation, at no
time did the left ever develop a unified movement. The numerous
conferences and movements starting with the Zikist Movement which was
denounced by Zik himself in the 1950s, Tunji Otegbeye's Socialist
Workers and Farmers Party in the 1960s: The Movement for People's
Democracy (1975), All Nigeria Socialist Conference, Zaria (1977 and
!978) all failed to achieve the unity goal. The left has been in a
situation in which its objectives were always clear – building a
better life for the masses of our people after displacing the ruling
class that has neither the intention nor capacity to do so has always
floundered.
As a young lecturer in Ahmadu Bello University in 1980, I was already
in the progressive caucus when Biodun Jeyifo, (BJ), and Uzodinma
Nwala, newly elected pioneer President and Secretary of ASUU, stormed
our Samaru campus to bring the good news. The transformation has
occurred, they proclaimed, by the law of 1978, the Nigerian
Association of University Teachers, then existing in the five pioneer
universities, was dead and from its grave emerged the Academic Staff
Union of Universities (ASUU), a trade union. We were in exquisite
excitement as BJ explained to us that intellectuals can now join the
working-class struggle as trade unionists and bring our intellectual
support to the larger struggle to improve the educational system, but
even more important, make our contribution to creating a progressive
Nigeria. We celebrated the irony of a repressive military regime
accidentally creating favourable conditions for the revolution.
I was in the team that dashed off to the Department of Electrical
Engineering to inform Prof Buba Bajoga, the last head of the
association, that a new regime had arrived and his association had
been annulled by law. Always a gentleman, he accepted the new state of
affairs and moved on. We organised elections and George Kwanashie and
Raufu Mustapha emerged as the first leadership of ASUU in ABU, the
bedrock of campus radicalism in Nigeria. We immediately engaged in
organising the first ASUU strike and in 1982, I spent months in the
Ibadan headquarters providing support for the ASUU negotiating team.
In 1983, I became the secretary of ASUU in ABU with Yahaya Abdullahi
as Chairman and the struggle continued.
BJ's core argument was that with a joint umbrella coordination of the
organizational work of workers and intellections, an opportunity could
be created for a revolutionary vanguard to emerge and create the
necessary impetus for the Nigerian revolution, which could completely
transform the entire African continent. It would be recalled that
before "fabricating" ASUU from a law that the universities were not
even aware of, BJ and some of his comrades had established the Ogi
commune in rural Osun State where they worked with the peasantry
hoping to emulate the Maoist revolution in Nigeria. The commune failed
and ASUU became the next revolutionary stepping stone.
The revolution did not happen then. BJ moved to the United States,
became one of the world's finest literary critics and constructed the
poetics and aesthetics that justified why Wole Soyinka deserved the
Nobel Prize for literature. Thanks to BJ's work, Soyinka got it and
placed Nigeria on the literary map. As BJ joins the ancestors, his
footprints and polemics continue to inspire revolutionaries and others
with the gift of the gab.
Professor Jibrin Ibrahim
Senior Fellow
Centre for Democracy and Development, Abuja
Follow me on twitter @jibrinibrahim17
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