₦airaland Forum

Former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, tells his story in a marathon interview with TheNEWS editors in Lagos.

Q: How do you feel reaching the milestone age of 60, especially with the political turbulence you had to go through, starting from the NADECO years, exile, your return and the politics of the 4th Republic?

I feel very good and I pray to God to continue to grant me long life. I feel unfulfilled because what I set out to achieve by this age was to be in a great and fully democratized country that would be a pride of every citizen of Nigeria. There is still a lot of disappointment, and that’s why the country’s elders are still intervening in this democratic dispensation. We thought that the NADECO years would have built a new foundation that would usher in a stable foundation for democracy and after which there would be accelerated development and transformation of our country. Unfortunately, that has not been achieved. It is equally disappointing that the rule of law is only talked about rather than being genuinely practised.

It was even better during the NADECO years, because without the judiciary I wouldn’t have been a free man during the struggle. I am not confident that the same judiciary that ensured my freedom during the struggle is there today to guarantee justice for every Nigerian.
I am disappointed that we are still struggling to have free and fair elections. I am equally pained that the process has consistently been abused and that the current multi-party system has not worked well for the country. Rather, we are grappling with a lot of problems. One starts to wonder whether this country is being properly led.

The NADECO period was a very turbulent period for all of us, but I am happy about the role the media played. For example, I am glad that your magazine continues to maintain the objectives, character, professionalism and principles of its founding members in the promotion of democracy in the country.

I remember vividly that the top management staff of TheNEWS magazine were employees of the rested African Concord. Then, they did a story in African Concord, which embarrassed the military government, and they were asked to apologise. But they refused, stood by their story, with a firm conviction in their professionalism and integrity. They opted to resign instead, and without hope of another job. It gave some of us joy and pride that there were young and vibrant men who were committed to the rule of law, professionalism and who could exhibit a great deal of character. Sadly, you don’t find that anymore.

I have seen that the economic opportunity for Nigerians via good quality of life is not there. Instead, there is despondency and hopelessness. There is a great deal of uncertainty. Any reasonable and truly committed Nigerian, who is not exploitative and opportunistic, will not be happy with the present situation we are in the country.
I have seen that the objectives we profess to be pursuing as a country only exist on paper.
Let us acknowledge the courage of past leaders who built many of the infrastructure – the roads and bridges etc – we have today. If they were not bold, they would not have been able to achieve what they did. How many more of those infrastructure have we built today? It would be a thing of joy to, for instance, drive from Lagos to Ibadan, at night, to enjoy a good party and return. I remember I did that in those days. We don’t have that freedom anymore. We now have a nation full of lamentations.
As you get older, you wish that by now, you will enjoy a very peaceful and good life. That is, a life of prosperity in which many of our youths would be innovative and excelling. We were very committed to good values then. Good education used to be the pride of families. Then, you would find educated and ebullient youths delivering good speeches, with great vocabulary and in a competitive environment that promoted development for the country. You don’t find that anymore. The hallmark of every nation is the wellbeing of its citizens, but we are not well in Nigeria.

The NADECO years was a turbulent period. The struggle was meant to really rescue democracy. It was meant to guarantee freedom, protect Nigerians, ensure enduring adherence to constitutionalism. But these things are still missing.

At 60, I feel thankful to God, but in terms of personal and general fulfillment, I feel disappointed that the country has not seen democracy. This is not democracy; I don’t know what you may want to call it. But we have none. The late Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’s description of Nigeria’s democracy as a ‘demonstration of craze’ will be apt here.

We claim to have democracy, but what we have is imperialism. We have what looks clearly a unitary system, with greedy and selfish leaders, who claim to being patriotic, but don’t understand the meaning in terms of giving selfless service to the country. They don’t put their country first. It is very unfortunate.
We lack real prosperity and good leadership. We had a very good foundation. That is, the nation’s planners, the founding fathers. I don’t even know why we discarded our national anthem conceived at independence, which was the most apt and appropriate.

Q:. Given the way you have turned out to be a fearless politician, I hope it is not unreasonable to assume that you were not a compliant child while growing up. What were those pranks you played and how were you dealt with when caught?

I admit that I played some pranks and got spanked while growing up. Yes, I indulged in some pranks, like trespassing into other people’s gardens to pluck oranges, despite warnings not to do so. I would spend my allowance on bicycle renting. I told a couple of lies. For example, I would collect money from big uncles for the purchase of five books – Dic, Tion, Na, Ry –) instead of one dictionary! It was only one that I needed. I did that so as to have enough money to play around, rent bicycles and buy sneakers. I would play football, go and play at the lagoon, and turning out very dirty and rough in the evenings. There were so many of such pranks.
I would seize football from my mates and take it home. The boys would come to the house, asking for the football and my parents would spank me and order that I return the ball to its owners. There was a time I asked my uncle, the late Kafaru Tinubu’s dispatch rider to lend me his motorbike to ride. One day, he gave the motorbike to me to ride. As I got back home, my uncle, who had travelled and was not expected back at the time, had arrived. He caught us and ordered that we be locked up. It took a while before he released us, and I was severely flogged.
　
There were instances in which I and few of my friends would sneak into the truck of musicians, like the late Adeolu Akinsanya and Roy Chicago, without knowing where they were travelling to for musical performances. We would hide ourselves in their instrument trucks. There was a particular day when we did that and found ourselves in Ado-Ekiti, somewhere I had never been before. We did not know that he was going to perform at Christ’s School, Ado Ekiti. We had no money to return to Lagos and were stranded there. We couldn’t follow them back to Lagos because they were headed for another location, where they had a show. We managed to get to Lagos by jumping on a cocoa truck that was coming to Lagos.

Q:. Can you tell us those your friends with whom you played pranks?

Tunde Badejo, Bolaji Agaba, Rasheed Abina, Tunde Adeyemo, the late Sola Popoola… We really had a good time. There was a particular time 11 of us packed ourselves in a Volkswagen Beetle and headed to the University of Ibadan through Majidun/Ikorodu Road for the Havana Nite. As we were going through Majidun, one of the car’s tyres burst and we had a serious accident. I thank God that I am alive today.

Q:. In the midst of these, when did it strike you to travel out of the country?

I was lucky. Even though I was ambitous about travelling out of the country, particularly as my friends like Folabi Salami and Tokunbo Maxwell had just travelled to Germany, I would say that I was just lucky.
Others, like Nurudeen Olowopopo, of blessed memory, and Sola Popoola headed for the United States and it remained Tunde Badejo, Bolaji Agaba and myself.
So, the three of us were determined that we must get out of Nigeria, too. I went to Ikenne, with my late sister, for a big ceremony. We had gone to pick bottles of Coca-Cola from the cold room and wanted to quickly return to the St. Saviour’s Church, where my sister was. There was a sudden rain of bullets and had we not been rushing to the church to ensure that we didn’t miss what was going on there, I would have died.
The young man that was standing with me was hit. He slumped and died.
Based on the sad incident and how I had narrowly missed death, my family said to me: ‘This boy, you have always said that you wanted to travel out of the country, it is time to do so.’ So, my mother gathered some money, sold her trinkets to make up for the remaining part of my allowances and joined it with proceeds from the sale of the Volkswagen Beetle given to me by my uncle, the late Ganiyu Tinubu, who used to work at Simpson Street, Ebutte-Metta. He had a Beetle car he bought from a Canadian and had it converted into a convertible, which I used to drive. Nobody taught me how to drive. He asked that I sell it and add the proceeds to the money I needed for my trip. That was what I did.

Bolaji Agaba and I left the same day for the United States, while Badejo left some months later. We got our visas through my family connections. Bolaji’s own had almost expired before we left. On our arrival in the US, we thought we would stay in New York. But Nurudeen Olowopopo said we should not. So we put some money together for Bolaji’s ticket and headed for Washington D.C. I stayed with the late Sola Popoola at Washington before we started finding our way. We were running out of funds then.
He helped us secure a one-room apartment in Alexandria, Virgina. We got an unregistered used car (they left the licence open) commonly called Gypsy, which we ran as a taxi. We operated at the airport, where we picked passengers, and not anywhere else, like the hotel because it was forbidden for unlicensed cab drivers to do so. We did that for a while to raise some money. Bolaji went to Tennessee, while I headed for Chicago.

Q:. Was it through cab driving that you were able to survive?

It was aimed at getting additional money to what I had. I always liked to have a life of comfort. Tunde Badejo and Olowopopo told me that Chicago was very cold, so I told myself that I must have a car. I was supposed to have started schooling in April. I deferred it till September in order to have more money. Immediately I got to Chicago, I went straight to Richard Daley College. It was very interesting. I was able to pay for my apartment and tuition fees at the Chicago State University. I supplemented that by doing different menial jobs like door guard and security man.

Q:. Can you tell us some unpleasant moments that you had then?

One experience I will not forget was when I over-charged a naval officer, who was returning to the country. It was not intentional. Apparently, I didn’t know the direction; there was no GPRS in those days to locate directions. So, he gave me the direction to his house in a Virginia suburb. I gave him the price and the man responded with a slap to my face. He said I should know the correct fare to charge to the location he mentioned. He slapped me and gave me the money. �

Another experience was when I took a guy whom I didn’t know was drunk. When I drove to his house, he pointed a gun at me instead of paying the fare. He took my leather jacket and said: ‘Get into your car and get lost.’ He did not pay.

Another interesting one was when I was taking the third Accounting class and equally working as a security guard at a construction site. They were very serious with their kind of security. You just had to do that job. There were about six points with six clocks at the site, which the security man must wind every hour and with a dog in hand. So, there was never a chance of trying to catch a nap. As I was doing my accounting assignment, I fell asleep. I was dead asleep! The inspector came to the site and found me sleeping, with my head on my books. He simply pulled the register and wrote: ‘I have been here. You were sound asleep. So, see me tomorrow.’ When I woke up, I found that Skiddo (the dog’s name) was gone, and then the register. I just went to a corner, cleaned my face and concentrated on my assignment because I knew the job was already gone. You can’t lose two things. I ensured that I read well for my test and passed the next day. I opted to post their uniform and the cap to them, but suddenly ran into the man and he handed me my cheque and said the job was gone. I told him I knew and we said goodbye to each other! I had to start looking for another job.

Q:. Were you tempted to stay back in the US after your studies?

To be honest with you, yes. I was lucky when I got to Chicago State University. I entered the university with honours from the Richard Daley College, because I got credit in majority of the Accounting courses.
After the first term, I was one of the candidates on the Dean’s list and my professor, Joe Jesse, commended me for my hard work, class participation and brilliance. He said that I would be lucky if I could keep my activities and brilliant results up till the end of the term. He didn’t say more or in what form the luck would manifest.

At the end of the term, and still on the Dean’s list, Professor Jesse came around to inform me that he would employ me to manage the Accounting laboratory for the institution. He gave the letter of employment to the dean of the faculty. The following week, I was called upon to take up employment as a tutor because I was very good in Mathematics and Accounting. I met Tunde Badejo in the school; he was a year ahead of me. But I told him (we took a bet) that we would graduate the same year and he didn’t believe. Later, when I was given a scholarship to become a tutor, I took the letter to Tunde Badejo and said: ‘See, the school is paying my tuition.’ He was amazed. That was how I became a tutor, with my tuition being paid. Tunde Badejo majored in Mathematics, and having been challenged, his performance got better the following semester and he also became a Maths tutor in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. I was challenged and severely under pressure to keep up the grade as each semester rolled by, because if my grades should drop I would lose the scholarship. It was quite challenging and in the end, I graduated top of my class and I was recruited as an Accounting major. There were big accounting firms then. Touche was number nine. I was recruited. And I still got other job offers. Then there were eight big accounting firms in the United States, including Arthur Andersen , Arthur Young, Ernst and Whinney, Peat Marwick and Mitchell, Deloitte and others. Out of the big eight, five of them offered me jobs and that was school recruitment–right on the campus.
I was on the Dean’s list; I was in line for the award for the overall best Accounting student as well as that of the university scholar’s award. With that, the big firms would continue to woo you. Despite the five job offers, I was equally offered employment by IBM and others. Professor Jesse called me and advised that I should not be arrogant. He asked that I remove my name from the career placement centre because, according to him, the more they saw my grades, the more I would be sought after. He said that might hinder other accounting graduates from being recruited and that the faculty wanted as many accounting graduates as possible to be recruited by the big companies. So I went and removed it. Usually, there was a benchmark for recruitments by the big professional accounting firms and they didn’t go beneath that. I got an offer of $20,000, with travelling allowances and all that. It was big money for me at the time.
But when Arthur Young saw the money I was offered, they offered an additional $3,000. My adviser told me to consider an offer that would make me function effectively in my country, particularly given that the country is blessed with crude oil. I wondered what I would be coming back to do. The career placement officer called me again and asked me what I wanted to do. I said they just spoke to me from my department.

Unlike what happens in our country, universities in America prepare the students for the future; how to dress, how to face job interviews. The third day after that, Deloitte, Haskins and Sells, now Deloitte and Touche Consulting Group, gave me another offer. They said they were not just going to hire me, but develop me. They asked me to take the salary I was being offered or forget about the job. I went back to Professor Jesse and said: ‘Look at what these people are offering, I would rather go to Arthur Andersen because they were offering to pay more’. But he said that I should not. He said he had always advised me that my career and professional development were more important. He said Deloitte had clients like General Motors, Procter and Gamble, National Oil and worked with Aramco Exxon, etc. He said I should consider that my country has crude oil and I might want to return someday. He said I should consider a firm with clients in manufacturing and oil sectors rather than Arthur Andersen, which only dealt with financial institutions and banks.
I took to his advice. I resumed work at Deloitte training school in June 1979. By April 1979, when I was graduating, I had gotten my future charted. And that was the greatest thing I achieved in America.
My friend, Tunde Badejo was still looking for a job. As a honours student, I was there at the high table with the Dean, President of the college and so on, while the rest of the graduands were on the lower platform. So, when they called my friend, Tunde Badejo’s name, he refused to get up because they mis-pronounced his name and called him ‘Tunde Badeho’. He refused to get up. I was laughing at him from the high table and was saying: ‘You see, I told you we would graduate at the same time.’ I later stood from where I was seated and whispered to the event handler that his name is Badejo and not Badeho. It was not until they called the name correctly that he stood up.

Q:. Why did you opt to study Accounting?
Sincerely, it was accidental. It was the university placement. I was good in Mathematics and business courses. In fact, if I were to choose a career for myself, I would have chosen marketing. I know Tunde was placed in the Mathematics department also by the university. I came in with A grades and I had nothing less than A+ in Accounting and Statistics.

God bless Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

Is04970:
God bless Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

� Amen

Tinubu for president or nothing.

Nna mehnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Who has time to read all the lies from the sick one who is originally from Iragbiji but denied his ancestors

Tinubuadvocate:
Tinubu for president or nothing.

God will grant it as we wish... Amen

GuyWise101:
Nna mehnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Who has time to read all the lies from the sick one who is originally from Iragbiji but denied his ancestors

Even the Bible that you read and believe in says you should find and know the truth. For only the truth can set you free. If you can't creat time to read then stop creating time to spread the fake rumours about Bola Tinubu.
It is good to know the truth so you can live to tell your children what you leant and not what you carry as rumours.

Nigerians need Tinubu than Tinubu need Nigerians.

DeleTaller:
God will grant it as we wish... Amen