It’s very bad that Ekiti has no factory —Ewi of Ado-Ekiti

Oba Rufus Adeyemo Adejugbe, is the Ewi of Ado-Ekiti in Ekiti State. The foremost traditional ruler in this interview by SAM NWAOKO, KEHINDE OYETIMI AND ABIODUN AWOLAJA speaks on issues of both local and national importance.

One of your own, Chief Afe Babalola won the prestigious Obafemi Awolowo Leadership Prize. What does this represent to you?

Chief Aare Afe Babalola is a genius. He is a man of many parts. People refer to him as Jack-of-all-trades and master of all. There are many other people that are referred to as Jack-of-all-trades and master of none. You may want to go to the field of law where you view his legal practice. His chamber is like an incubator where senior advocates of Nigeria are produced. Look at his accomplishments in the area of education. For two terms, he was the chairman of pro-chancellors and governing councils of all universities in this country. The experiences he garnered there led to the establishment of Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD) that you see today. By what the university has achieved in so short a time, some would quickly want to argue that many universities far older than ABUAD have not been able to match such achievements. ABUAD is just under 10 years.

When Babalola came and told me about his intention to build a university, he said he wanted to rebrand education. The first question that came to my mind which I asked him was what the name of the university would be. He said it would be called Afe Babalola University. It was then I knew that the university would be the best around. I thank God that today, the university is sited in Ado-Ekiti. It is adding value. There is no day that goes by that the name ABUAD is not tied to Ado-Ekiti.

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He also told me about the teaching hospital. I told him that building a teaching hospital is capital intensive just like the establishment of the normal university that he was facing. A teaching hospital is a university on its own. At his age, I told him he was not growing younger. I asked him how he intended to cope. These days when you give birth to a child, it won’t take long before you will know whether the child is a genius or not.

But the era in which Chief Afe Babalola was born (close to 90 years ago if not more), it was difficult to conduct such finding in those days. Otherwise we would have known ahead of time that this would be a special human being, perhaps one in a million. God just decided to create people like that.

Go to his farms. I really do not know if you have visited his farms. And one would only imagine when and how he would have created time for farming. He is a special human being. At many functions, people refer to him as a special being, others refer to him as a magician; some refer to him as a gift to this generation. Many refer to him with all kinds of adjectives. We are lucky to have him. Above all these, he is a giver. He gives out freely without minding the cost. While he is busy trying to solve a problem, some people will come to him with their requests. At the end of the day, you can’t leave his office without smiling home. In those days when he was fully in Ibadan, many of our children would go to him. No matter your status in life, he would give to you because the more he gave, the more God blesses him. He is very happy when people do well. And when you don’t do well, he encourages you by giving you all the support that you need. In the area of education, he wants you to get to the peak of your career in life. That is why whatever he does, he is at the top of it. We are very happy for him. What we pray for is that God grants him long life, because he cannot be there forever. We are praying for him because of all that he is doing. He is giving hope to the hopeless.

I remember a case at his teaching hospital. There was a mad person along the road. She was a terror to many people. He arranged and she was taken care and the person is fine. He has said that he is ready to treat as many as they are. He is a gift to his generation. Look at him. He has succeeded everywhere. He is an all rounder. Look at the field of medicine; look at the field of agriculture. Look at his major field of law. There is nowhere he has been that he has not succeeded very well. That is why I still maintain that he should have been the first person to receive this award. I am convinced by this. I am happy for him and for Ado-Ekiti too because we are proud to have someone like him from here. And what is more, he is an inspiration for the younger ones especially those who are aspiring to be an Afe Babalola. They should try to emulate him.

In what other areas would you want government intervention considering the important place that Ado-Ekiti represents in the South-West?

If you are travelling down from Abuja via Kabba, by the time you start approaching us, the standard of the road would have suggested to you that perhaps you are entering into a village. If you are coming from Akure through Ado-Ekiti bypass, Akure-Ilesa, you would think you are approaching a farm settlement. If you are coming through Erinmo-Iwaraja, you would feel sad. What we are saying is that this dualisation they started from Ikere should end at Akure. It is not too much for us to ask that they link us to Kabba so that when we are going to Abuja (since we have no airport), the railway would be finished and our roads motorable. We also want the airport too. It is when you have all these in place that we can appeal to our sons and daughters to come and invest. It is difficult for us to compete with people in Ibadan or Lagos. We have fruits here which make this place a factory for the beverage industry. If you want to produce, you need water for human consumption, otherwise you would end up killing the whole community if you have no access to good water. It is not easy to come by. Many of the towns here sink boreholes. You would think power supply is general. Our case is peculiar. I use diesel to run my generators all the time. BEDC is standby. Generators are my source of power here. There is no way you can produce here with that source of power and compete favourably.  For us to be part of this country, these three things must be in place so that when we eventually appeal to our sons and daughters that are well-to-do, then they will come. Ask Afe Babalola, he would almost tell you his regrets coming to Ekiti. Look at the cost of the roads. There is no airport. We have a lot of farm produce here. If we had a functional railway, it would have been very easy to transport these things to Lagos. It is very bad that in Ekiti there is no factory.

When I came in 1990, there was a textile factory here. That time, that factory employed more than 1,000 people. They ran three shifts in those days. But today it is a ghost of itself. Look at the number of people the members of staff of that factory would have been feeding. The ripple effects were great. Imagine what we would have enjoyed if we had two or three of those factories in Ekiti today where thousands would have been employed. Things would not have been like this. Go to the city, you will find many jobless youths where they are smoking. Some of them have postgraduate degrees. Many of them ride commercial motorcycles. As parents we are not happy about this. It was not like this during our days.

It is all over the news that given the clashes between herdsmen and farmers, food production has been affected. As a foremost traditional ruler in the South-West, what is being done to address this?

We are trying our best. At the state level, the government formed a committee. These people are Nigerians and we do not want to encourage our people to fight them. But we tell them that they cannot go to another man’s farm and destroy the crops particularly at this time of the year which is a dry season. Because when they are looking for what to feed their cattle, they pick up anything.

The representatives of the Sultan of Sokoto came here including the Miyetti Allah. We met with them. Because of this, we arranged with the Fulani leadership in Ekiti. We gave one of their representatives a traditional title so that he will be able to control them. It is a national problem. They know all the routes. While you are sleeping at night, they are there on the roads. By the time you wake up, the havoc is done. It is a big problem. We are telling them to find a ranch so that when you come, you bring your cattle and register so that when you want to leave, we will know your movement.

I remember there was a time we were meeting here and while we were considering this matter, a woman ran and was crying. She said she got a loan and acquired many acres of land. She said these cows got into her farms and consumed everything. We were lucky that the commissioner of police was here and so we instructed that the commissioner should follow them to the area. It was then they found out that the cows could be directed.

So when the Sultan visited for the turbaning of the chief imam, I told him that what his people were doing was not good. He appealed to me. It is a big problem. We are doing everything humanly possible.

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