THE year was 1965. I was an innocent starry-eyed 13 year-old and Nigeria was in turmoil. It was the era of the “wetie,” when the houses of politicians and key public-figures were burnt down in the brouhaha that was then Western Nigeria.
We lived in Oke-Ado in Ibadan and our next-door neighbour was Chief Ogundiran, a minister in the government of Chief S.L. Akintola, the Premier of the Western Region. (Ogundiran was famous for only wearing white.) In the spirit of the times, a mob came early one morning and burnt down his house. He jumped out of the window and managed to escape.
Fani-Power: I was having private lessons in Mathematics at the home of a colleague, Enitan Abiodun, when we heard the noise of a crowd outside. We rushed to the veranda to see Chief Remi Fani-Kayode (alias Fani-Power), then Deputy Governor of the Western Region, standing on the seat of a moving convertible. He was surrounded by a mob, which was shouting and hailing him. On hearing the noise, Enitan’s mother rushed to the veranda shouting “Awo!” only to discover that the people outside were not supporters of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, but those of his arch-enemies.
The shout of “Awo!” by Mrs. Abiodun brought the procession to a screeching halt. “Who said that? Who said that?” demanded the mob, enraged. “Fani-Power” turned and looked up at us. His eyes were the usual blood-shot red. At the time, many claimed it was because he regularly smoked Indian-hemp. Fani-Kayode pointed to our building and identified to his thugs that the offending shout came from our direction. We did not know that the floor of the convertible he was standing in was loaded with empty bottles. His thugs reached for the bottles and rained them down on us as we all scrambled back inside the house for dear life.
Like father, like son: That was 48 years ago. Today, Femi Fani-Kayode, the 53-year-old son of “Fani-Power,” continues in the mischievous tradition of his father: throwing dangerous missiles at the innocent. He recently wrote an incendiary article entitled: “The Bitter Truth About the Igbo,” in which he maligned the Igbos and virtually told them to get out of Lagos and leave Lagos for the Yorubas.
What is peculiar about the article is that Femi Fani-Kayode himself is no more Lagosian than the Ibos he berates. The Fani-Kayodes are not from Lagos. They are from Ile-Ife in OsunState. Femi Fani-Kayode’s only legitimate claim to Lagos is that he was born there.
But then so were many Igbos who are, therefore, Lagosians. Moreover, Igbo-Lagosians have one up on Femi Fani-Kayode. They live in Lagos. Femi Fani-Kayode does not. Igbo-Lagosians work in Lagos and pay taxes to the LagosState government. Femi Fani-Kayode does not. Therefore, what right does he have to write his diatribe against them? What right does he have to maintain Lagos does not belong to Igbo-Lagosians?
Train-wreck: Having thrown these bottles maliciously, Femi Fani-Kayode decided to throw a few more. He wrote another invective entitled: “A Word For Those Who Say I Am A Tribalist.” In order to demonstrate that he was not anti-Igbo, he presented the cliché that some of his best friends are Igbos. As proof, he detailed three Ibo women (some now happily-married) he claims to have had affairs with in the past. Only God knows how this shows he is not biased against the Igbos. Slave-traders slept with their slaves. Is that proof they were not racist?
The jury is out already. Femi Fani-Kayode is a bigoted tribalist. Only a tribalist can say he is not anti-Ibo and then say this about the Igbos: “(They are) collectively unlettered, uncouth, uncultured, unrestrained and crude in all their ways.” “They have no restraining factors because money and the acquisition of wealth is their sole objective and purpose in life.” Clearly, Femi Fani-Kayode is out of control. He has become something of a train-wreck. He was President Obasanjo’s agent-provocateur for so long, where he maligned elder-statesmen like Yakubu Gowon; he no longer knows how to speak with decorum.
The American model: I am Yoruba. Nevertheless, I repeat; the Igbos of Lagos are Lagosians. They are Lagosians whether ethnic jingoists like Femi Fani-Kayode like it or not. The Lagos branch of the old Action Congress of Nigeria acknowledged that no less than 45% of the population of Lagos is Igbo.
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