On April 2nd, 2022, the paramount ruler of Ijebuland, Awujale Sikiru Kayode Adetona, Ogbagba 11, clocked 62 years on the throne of his forefathers. Preceding Oba Adetona’s ascension to the ancient stool of Ijebu, there had been 57 Awujales starting from Awujale Olu-Iwa to the incumbent’s immediate predecessor, Awujale Daniel Adesanya, Gbelegbuwa 11, who was the traditional ruler of the kingdom from 1933 to 1959. Oba Adetona’s prestige, acceptability, as well as the love and affection he enjoys among his people, have grown rather than diminished with time. This is also the case with most traditional rulers in various communities across the country who enjoy greater respect and legitimacy among their people than elected leaders who govern the modern sphere of the state do. Yet, the conventional wisdom received uncritically throughout Africa largely as a result of the unfortunate violent encounter with colonialism is that electoral democracy predicated on the emergence of governments through the ballot box offers the best mode of organizing a society’s political affairs. But is it possible to credibly deny that liberal democracy for the most part has been a colossal failure in Africa?
Not only are the supposedly democratic processes through which governments are supposed to be produced in accordance with the will of the people more often than not perverted, corrupted and compromised, the quality of leadership that routinely emerges is generally low, and the governance outcomes in terms of enhancing the wellbeing of the people largely disastrous and deplorable. With the ballot often being a weapon of mass self-destruction in the hands of frequently illiterate and poor voters, susceptible to ethnic, religious and other primordial forms of manipulation as well as vulnerable to the allurements of money bag vote buyers, liberal democracy has severed to deepen underdevelopment rather than being an agency of progress and positive transformation in Nigeria and other parts of Africa.
Of course, this is not to romanticize traditional, largely monarchical, pre-colonial political systems in Africa but to lament the fact that, no thanks to the colonial encounter, the political evolution of post-colonial Africa has been decoupled and delinked from the rich governance experience and lessons of the continent’s pristine past. In this regard, the late Basil Davidson noted in his classic, ‘The Black Man’s Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation State’ that the post-colonial nation-states of Africa were, in practice, “not a restoration of Africa to her own history, but the onset of a new period of indirect subjection to the history of Europe. The fifty or so states of the colonial partition, each formed and governed as though their people possessed no history of their own, became fifty or so nation-states formed and governed on European models, chiefly the models of Britain and France”.
This, Davidson argues that Africa’s case is unlike that of Japan, for instance, which “was able to accept “westernization” on its own terms, at its own speed, and with its own reservations, ensuring as far as possible that new technology and organization were assimi lated by Japanese thinkers and teachers without dishonor to ancestral shrines and gods. Japanese self-confidence could be salvaged. Such an outcome was impossible in dispossessed Africa”. Is a return to the pre-colonial African traditional governance systems and structures then feasible or even desirable? Certainly not. But there are ways in which aspects of the traditional past can inform and influence the modern present positively.
As Professor Richard Sklar notes, for instance in his conception and articulation of what he describes as ‘dual authority structures’ in Africa, “The African national governments are fragile, and there is great need for authority based on consent of the governed. In this circumstance, a separate source of authority, embedded in tradition, could powerfully reinforce social discipline without abandonment of democratic form of government. The rejuvenation of traditional authority would not, then, imply a resurgence of either “feudalism” or political oligarchy”.
The Awujale comes from the Anikinaiya Ruling House in Ijebu-Ode. The other three Ruling Houses are Gbelegbuwa, Fusengbuwa and Fidipote from which the paramount ruler emerges on rotation at the demise of the incumbent. Oba Adetona was a prince studying Accountancy in England when he was recalled home at the age of twenty-five to occupy the throne. Speaking on his nomination in an interview, the monarch said “The news meant little to me, even though I knew it was the turn of my ruling house to present the next candidate. My father, as far as I knew then, was an obvious candidate and could therefore assume succession. Even if, for some reasons, he was not chosen, there was still his brother, Pa Adenaiya”. His father, surprisingly, put forward Kabiyesi’s name for the throne and, on October 26, 1959, the kingmakers (Afobaje) unanimously picked him from among six candidates nominated by the Anikinaiya Ruling House to become the Awujale.
In contrast, for the 2023 election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is to spend N239 billion in organizing the polls including expenditure on poll materials, vehicles and a possible presidential run-off. The major political parties have fixed stupendous amounts as expression of interest and nomination fees for various positions; financial requirements that put these offices out of the reach of people below a certain economic category in a largely poverty stricken economy like ours. Should the process of choosing society’s leaders consume so much of scarce public resources that could otherwise have been channeled into positive developmental purposes?
An online news medium, Ijebu News Extra lists the character traits for which the monarch is revered among his people as including fierce and sturdy independence, candor, objectivity, sincerity, entrepreneurial spirit, reliability and resoluteness. Some of the attainments for which the Awujale is acclaimed include the revival of the Ijebu Age Grade system (the regberegbe), building of the gigantic palace and the Ojude Oba pavilion, the establishment of the Ijebu Development Board on Poverty Reduction and the granting of coronets to many communities.
During the harrowing period of the General Sani Abacha military dictatorship, Oba Adetona was known as one of those monarchs who stood by principle, truth and integrity and refused to bow to the pressures of the government. In his words, “My duty is the welfare of my people; and in doing that there will be risks and I have to face the risks on behalf of my people. That is why I am on the throne. If I can’t do that, then I should quit. I saw the need to defend my people and I did just that…If in the course of doing that I am removed, I will have no regret whatsoever. The people are always with me because they can trust me. So, I have to do my duty to them too”.
But by far the most enduring defining legacy of the Awujale was his endowment in 2016 of a N250 million Professorial Chair in Governance at the Department of Political Science, Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago-Iwoye, Ogun State. The project to which over N1 billion has been committed is designed to initiate and execute researches that have the capacity to proffer solutions to contemporary challenges and issues of governance at the local and global levels; promote scholarship, rigorous research activities and opportunities for collaboration with scholars and institutions committed to good governance as well as serve as a springboard for attracting quality staff and
students to the university through research output. The Professorial Chair has further evolved into a full-fledged Oba (Dr) Adetona Institute of Governance Studies also located at Ago-Iwoye campus of OOU. The Institute’s structural edifices have helped to elevate the aesthetics of the university’s landscape. This year, the Institute has commenced postgraduate programmes in Governance Studies offering M.Sc, Governance Studies, Professional Master in Governance Studies (MGS), and Ph.D, in Governance Studies.
Speaking on his motivation for this initiative, the Awujale said, “My intention is to endow a chair that would remain in perpetuity so that even when I am gone, and my children’s children are there, the fund would still be there to sustain the chair. I have been on the throne for 56 years and have seen that rather than make progress, we are retrogressing in terms of our governance. We are not getting good results. My idea is that we interfere and see how we can bring about change that would affect the governance of this country that Nigeria may be a much better place for the younger generation and all of us to live in”. There is no doubt that if more altruistic, well placed Nigerians emulate the Awujale’s noble example and endow more prestigious professorial chairs in our universities, it would go a long way to help attract funding and quality staff to these beleaguered institutions. It is not surprising that the Chair and Institute have attracted some of the country’s best and brightest scholars to OOU. The first occupant of the Chair was renowned political scientist, Professor Ayo Olukotun while the current occupant is another accomplished political scientist with immense global reach and influence, Professor Adigun Agbaje.
Some of the illustrious scholars who have delivered lectures under the institute’s auspices include the eminent geographer, Professor Akin Mabogunje, the historian and polyvalent scholar, Professor Toyin Falola, a former Regional Adviser for Africa, United Nations-Habitat, Professor Oyebanji Oyeyinka, and foremost historian and Emeritus Professor, Anthony Asiwaju. Noting that the Chair is the first of its kind in Nigeria and Africa, Professor Asiwaju described Oba Adetona as “the oracle of Ijebuland, the voice of the voiceless, the epitome of moral authority, defender of people’s rights and exemplar of responsible governance”. It is difficult to disagree with him.
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