Opinion

Five years remembrance of Olooye

 

It is exactly five years today that the Late Dr. Abubakar Olusola Saraki of blessed memory departed to the world beyond. His death marked the inherent end of an era distinct by political activities and philanthropic act. To many sensible people, Late Dr. Olusola Saraki was an astonishing political expert, classical prototype.
The need to bestow a posthumous piece to the late political juggernaut is borne out of a matter-of-fact study I made about his political ideology. That Late Dr. Abubakar Olusola Saraki was a brilliant Nigerian was not in misgivings; this has zero to do with whether you have the same opinion with his political style or not. Dr. Olusola Saraki was an epithet of human relation who lived his entire life for the masses, using all his resources for the growth and development of the people, especially in Kwara State. In view of these and many other reasons he, Dr. Olusola Saraki needs to be remembered at all times. I am not writing this column as an ode, neither is it and eulogy. Rather, to the unending truth of history.
As a Kwaran, I owe an exclusive epistle precise to dedicate 14th of November each year in posthumous write down to the Late Dr. Olusola Saraki, whom I met in 1983 as a toddler.
Dr. Olusola Saraki was an extraordinary political mentor, exemplary role- model. He lived a fulfilled life, conquered poverty and liberated many from its claws. Indeed, he was a political uncommon talent, an enigma that never quivered. . Little wonder, the people celebrate him, except, perhaps the few emerging liberators without antecedents.
Disparate to false intuition of a slave master presiding over a fiefdom,  Olusola Saraki emerged as an advocate of rights of all people to well being and good life, as far back as the 1960s as a young fraught medical surgeon. It was a mixture of desire to serve patients at Lagos General Hospital casualty ward (at a time it was not popular to do so) and the genuine appreciation by the recipient –patients of his disinterested service (not money) that set Dr. Olusola Saraki on the path of public service.Late Dr. Olusola Saraki was not on government Scholarship, yet he gave back more to the community than those who from cradle to grave live like leeches on the community. He did impressed on some of us as accessible community Man whose house in Ilorin is just another house in the hinterland. He was not a godfather, demanding roads or empty water tank be named after him. He was not breathing down on all through idolized billboards either. On the contrary, he was a servant-leader of his people.
Olusola Saraki was not an ideologue. From the beginning, he made no pretence about his political forthrightness. Providence has destined him to become the future political Leader of Kwara. Kwara State is a society where consent, and allegiance have a near – vast source, people were acknowledged to the realism of the Saraki’s personalities and the mythology of his political good decision and legendary kindness blended to create an awesome feelings of admiration.
Posterity will continue to vindicate and value his ability to forge a consensus during the second Republic, precisely from 1979 – 1983, as Senate Leader, where NPN did not have the majority to pass legislation. In 1978 he was elected into the constituent Assembly and belongs to the Committee on the Draft Constitution (CDC), during Muritala/Obasanjo administration. In the Assembly,  he was strongly active and not a bench warmer. He was a founding member of club 19, which led the foundation for the National Party of Nigeria (NPN). As the senate Leader in the Second Republic, Dr. Olusola Saraki, along with his colleagues, worked assiduously to ingrain parliamentary democracy by putting national interest above personal and other parochial interests.
The National Assembly under his leadership was well managed such that it was crisis-free, and this is due largely to his ease of access. Shortly after they won the elections, the founding fathers of the NPN met in a house in Ikoyi, Lagos and decided to zone the positions among themselves. It was agreed that Joseph Wayas should be the president of the senate; Dr. Olusola Saraki should be the Leader of the senate, while Joseph Takar was made the chairman of the Finance Committee. When they got to the senate, the UPN caucus argued that even though NPN had 36 Senators, (or had the highest number of seats won by any single party), Dr. Olusola Saraki could not be called the Majority Leader as the NPN was not in the majority (UPN had 28 senators, NPP had 17, PRP had 7 and CNPP had 7). They then argued that although each party could have its own leader in the Senate, orderliness and national interest would require a consensus, popular senate Leader.
By the structure of NPN, Dr. Olusola Saraki was the leader of the party in the senate. He was nominated by a member of the NPN and his nomination was seconded by Senator Jonathan Odebiyi, the UPN Leader in the senate. They all voted him without any further nomination, unopposed. That was why when there was problem in NPN; the party could not remove Dr. Olusola Saraki as the Leader of the senate because he was entrenched in the politics of the senate such that he was often time referred to as small Awolowo.
No one in the Nigerian political Landscaped since 1978 was able to do what Late  Olusola Saraki did by carrying the burden of Kwara State with him from one political party to another, some of them wholly opposed.
The late Saraki opened his gates when many barricade theirs. His legacies speak volume of him. He constructed schools, provided water and health – care projects in most communities. Here was a humanist who invested and opened his gate for indigent people. Where others cared just for their families, the late Dr. Olusola Saraki catered for all.
For close to four decades, Dr. Olusola Saraki was not only the deciding factor in Kwara politics; he was more or less the only active politician which determined the political direction of the state. He was no doubt one of the most successful politicians in Nigeria having installed virtually all the civilian governors the state had produced since its creation in 1967.
Late Dr. Olusola Saraki was an embodiment of human relations who lived his life for the masses, using his resources for the growth and development of the people, especially in Kwara State and therefore needs to be remembering always. He is a nationalist and detribalised Nigerian, was a nationalist per excellence, and it would be unjust to limit his political advocate to Kwara State only. His admirers are always instructively trusted his judgments about whenever he made them go politically with the credence that he was not likely to betray their core political trust.
Dr. Saraki was instrumental to the historic enactment of the first minimum wage Act of 1981 as a senate Leader following the struggle of NLC led by Comrade Hassan Sunmonu. Dr. Olusola Saraki was also instrumental to the establishment of Michael Imodu Labour Institute in Ilorin, a vast upward centre of labor studies in Africa, an institute that perpetually immortalises Labour’s No1, Michael Imodu.
When asked about what he would be remembered for, Dr. Olusola Saraki was as explicit as he was in the ’60’s, “I will like to be remembered as the man who helped the sick get treated, the man who helped put a child in school, the man who helped, that poor woman pick her life after losing so much in business or whatever”. What a clever and speechifying answer back!
May Almighty Allah grant him eternal peaceful rest (Amen).
Adeyemi can be reached on [email protected]

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