The whole of the place where the Oyo State Government House is located in Ibadan used to be known in ancient times before the founding of this third Ibadan in its present location as Idi Ogungun. (do-do-mi)

The Ogungun tree after which the area was named is still standing there, and the area within the immediate vicinity of the three is still called Idi Ogungun, the name it has been bearing since more than 200 years ago.

This same Idi Ogungun has been the theatre of many events in the history of Ibadan.

For an example, the confederate army of Ife, Oyo and Ijebu which destroyed the city of Owu were using Idi Ogungun as their camping ground. From there they used to sally forth to lay siege to the city of Owu. Owu was finally captured when the people of Owu opened their city gates to the confederate army when they had no more food to eat.

The city of Owu which then comprised of the areas now known as Bashorun, Iwo Road, Monatan up to her boundary with the sister Owu town of Erunmu was then very close to Idi Ogungun.

Owu people can be identified today by their tribal mark as they are only tribe of the Yoruba race that have the tribal marks of three broad vertical lines above three broad horizontal lines.

Since their dispersion from their original homestead, they have been mostly domiciled among the Egbas in Abeokuta where they are up till now, though they are still found forming part of the indigenous population in other towns in Yorubaland.
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Some of the well known Owu personalities are General Olusegun Obasanjo, a two-time head of state of Nigeria and Prince Bola Ajibola, a former justice of the World Court.

But I digress....

As Oba Isaac Akinyele recorded in his book Iwe Itan Ibadan (the history of Ibadan) there used to be a saying in ancient times which went as follows “Oninure Idi Ogungun ti i seru domo” meaning “the kind hearted man of Idi Ogungun who will make slaves to become like free-borns”. This statement had been extant in Ibadan years before the coming of Captain Bower to Ibadan or ever before the coming of the British Government.

This same Captain R. L. Bower was one of the officers of the 7th Battalion King’s Royal Rifles and part of the force of the British Punitive Expedition that pacified the Ijebus in 1892 when they subjugated Ijebu-Ode and opened up the way to the Yoruba hinterlands which hitherto had been close because the Ijebus did not allow non-indigenes to enter not to talk of passing through their country, thus ending the age-old saying “Ijebu-Ode, ajeji o wo” meaning Ijebu-Ode, a place that is that strangers must not enter.

After successfully participating in the pacification of the Ijebus, Captain Bower was appointed as the first Ajele (Resident) of Ibadan.

He arrived Ibadan in 1893 with a force of about 100 soldiers. The Ibadan authorities wanted to assign him a place within the city-walls for residence, but he marched through and took up his quarters outside the city walls in the area known as Idi Ogungun, where he set up his camp.

The place where he set up camp on that day became the Residency and since then it has been the seat of Government for the South-West and it is now the seat of the seat of the Oyo State Government

Thus one can see that the seat of the Oyo State Government is located in the place where it is today because Captain Bower chose to settle at Idi Ogungun, and since then subsequent District Officers, Residents and Governors continue to have Idi Ogungun as their seats of government.

Though it is now known as Agodi, the whole of the area used to be known anciently as Idi Ogungun.

Now this is the part I find interesting:

After setting up his camp at Idi Ogungun the first act of governmental administration which Captain Bower did was to issue a proclamation to the effect that henceforth all slaves have become free and they could leave their master’s establishment to go to their respective homes and that nobody should ever be referred to as slave anymore upon pain of condign punishment.

Thus Captain Bower, the man of destiny, thus unwittingly fulfilled the ancient prophecy that had been extant ever before he was born: “Oninure Idi Ogungun ti i seru domo” (“the kind hearted man of Idi Ogungun who will make slaves to become like free-borns”)

He is currently immortalized by a tower erected in his memory at Oke-Are, which is called Bower’s Tower.
It is the spiral stair-case of the Tower that is referred to in local parlance as “Layipo”, giving rise to the saying “Ibadan lo mo, o o mo Layipo which simply means You have only been to Ibadan, but you have not been to Bower’s Tower which originally is used to refer to people who had been to Ibadan but had not been to see the spiral staircase (Layipo) of Bower’s Tower and does not imply as it is been now understood to mean that Ibadan people are very deceptive
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Ayodele Adeniran