“When the history of the present generation comes to be written, the new Premier (Ladoke Akintola) will be remembered for the part he played in Nigeria’s Independence.”
(Hon. Dennis Osadebe, the Opposition Leader in the Western Region Assembly, 1960 while seconding Hon. Odebiyi’s Introductory speech).
History itself is innocent, but historians are biased. The fact that only the survivors write history places the dead at the receiving end.
“Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth”, this is one of the laws of propaganda often attributed to the Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda to Adolf Hitlers during the heydays of WWII, he buttressed the theory of Nazi himself that said the only thing he needs to control the State is to control the text book.
The bundles of lies that have been repeated over years since the demise of Ladoke Akintola have portrayed Akintola as someone that contributed nothing but gory to the Western Region, not to talk of the entire Nigeria, but this is an insinuation that works contrarily to the facts and figures. The lies might have covered distances at the process, but the truth would catch up in a minute.
While in Schools, even on the street, the most popular thing that we were taught and told about Ladoke Akintola SLA was that, he became Premier, he betrayed his party and he brought about Wild Wild West and blah blah blah, nobody cares to educate us about the nitty-gritty of the historical trajectory and the contributions of this said personality to the development of Yoruba Nation and Nigeria at large.
But as a natural member of an inquisitive class, I did not take everything the way they were said, instead of settling for less, I picked up my armour of researches, positioned my thinking cap and decided to take an adventurous leap, I took it upon myself to exhume the past for the sake of revealing it.
Dearth of relevant materials about the subject matter has made Akintola to be one of the most understudied nationalists in the anal of Nigeria history. For some obvious reasons, his political adversaries deliberately manipulated the media against him and suppressed his works and achievements after his demise and often credited them to others or to themselves in their vicious attempt to obliterate his blessed memory and short-change history.
But in a bid to set the records straight, I don’t want to bother us with his 1940s academic adventure, political voyage and journalistic escapade, I would rather start with some of his contributions from 1950 after he returned from Britain.
With the formation of Action Group in 1950, Ladoke Akintola as one of the founding fathers and best legal luminaries of his era was made the Legal Adviser to the new Party, in 1953, Bode Thomas who was the Deputy National Leader of the party met his ugly fate and Chief Akintola succeeded him after election was conducted.
Ladoke Akintola as a Lagos based Politician was one of the four persons that represented the Western Region in the Federal House of Representatives. Akintola was the first Opposition Leader at the National Level of Government in Nigeria. It was said about him that he controls the government from opposition seat as a Master of Ambiguity.
He would go down in the anal of history for been the first Minster of Labour in Nigeria. During his time in office, he was remarkable for being the first Nigerian to negotiate an international agreement with the representatives of Spanish Government in Fernado Po in 1953. Enugu Mining crisis and other labour related issues were diplomatically settled under his watch.
In 1953, still at the House of Representatives in Lagos, Akintola was made the Minister of Health, history recorded it that he was principally responsible for the establishment of University College Teaching Hospital Ibadan, (UCTH) that started in 1953 and completed in 1957 when Akintola served as Minister of Health.
In 1953 when Anthony Enahoro moved the first motion for independence at the National Assembly, it led to a pandemonium that almost set the North against the South, Ladoke Akintola was responsible for leading the delegates of Yoruba and Igbo to Kano that resulted to the popular Kano Riot of 1953, but at the end, normalcy was brought back into the country. His role as fence mender cannot be substituted.
Blessed with oratory prowess and courage, the same Ladoke Akintola moved the second and last independence motion in 1957 that finally gave Nigeria her independence in 1960.
His contributions to the development of Western Region and Nigeria cannot be placed under obscurity for eternity, in 1957, Ladoke Akintola became Minister of Aviation and Communication, by 1958, he birthed and implemented an idea that led to the creation of Nigeria Airways to compete with the West African Airline Company (WAAC), British Overseas Airways Company (BOAC), the precursor of British Caledonian Airways and later British Airways, that had hitherto dominated the aviation sector in Nigeria and in 1958, SLA travelled to Holland to source for the set of airplanes for Nigeria Airways.
In 1959, Old Western Region was remarkable for having the First indigenous Television Station in Africa, SLA as Minister of Communication as at that time was prominent in making it a reality. In fact, the story of communication in Nigeria cannot he told outside him.
During his days in House of Representatives, SLA as he was fondly called by his admirers sponsored more epoch-making bills and moved motions than any other representatives of his era, he was also made responsible for legal matters in the House of Representatives and he introduced the Bill that enabled Nigerians to be appointed Queen’s Counsel (Q.C) now Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and later set up the Unsworth Committee which was responsible for the establishment of the Nigerian Law School in Lagos.
In 1960, fate beaconed on him to leave Lagos for Ibadan as the preferred person for Premiership Position. As Premier of Western Region, Akintola was principally responsible for the establishment of University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, he was the first Chancellor of that same school in 1962.
The building and completion of the first skyscraper in Africa located in Ibadan, the Cocoa House in 1965 was credited to Ladoke Akintola who was at then the Premier of the Region. He supervised the whole processes and completed it.
At his first appearance in the House of Assembly in Ibadan in 1960, the Leader of the House, Hon. J.O. Odebiyi, described him as “a man of varied career who has been a teacher, journalist and a lawyer, before his exalted position as Head of Government and that the new Premier is known for sincerity, loyalty to a cause and assiduity and furthermore, that he was an interesting debater, whose humor and diction in English and Yoruba (Hausa, Nupe) command great respect”.
Today, the POLITICS OF COOPERATION AND MUTUAL BENEFITS as postulated by Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola is now the pillar of South West Politics. 50 years after the demise of SLA, his legacies and ideas are very sacrosanct and relevant in Nigeria politics.
Ogunwoye Samson Gbemiga writes from Iresapupa, Ogbomoso, Oyo State. He can be reached via ogunwoyesamson@gmail.com
