Wednesday, December 10, 2008

'Femi's Agoniste' By Adesina Ogunlana


When the list came out, I knew his name would not be there. Boy was I right! And come December 16 2008, when the new titled men take office, he will not be there. So many people have been lamenting that his name was not on the list. As if it is anything new. In 2007, he was not found eligible in the first instance and so was not even called for the “Qualification Interview.”

I really wonder why people are attacking the conferrers of these titles on legal practitioners. Such critics are making it out as if it is our man’s right to be awarded the title. Of course the title in question is not the birth-right of anybody, er well, everybody.

For some people it is their birth-right or nearly so. If you doubt me, look in the direction of one well known Chambers in Ibadan which claims that God is with them. Of course that Chambers is the leading bakery of the title in question in Nigeria. With God and man helping them, the God-with-me Chambers has incubated many title owners in the last fifteen years.


Frankly, I wonder at those criticising the side-lining of our man-femora. First of all our man has not purged himself, sufficiently of his Ife-grown ideology. He is always in court for the wrong set of people. People like Ken Saro Wiwa and lately Okah, the super-militant. Even though he is now a rich man, he is yet a rebel, which even makes him worse. Now why should any sensible group of judges elevate a rebel onto the throne? We all know what happened when Moses a slave by birth was made a prince by adoption.

Secondly, how would the infallible scriptures which says that a “prophet has no honour in his town” be proved right if our man should also land himself another award, this time a local one. About a month ago, in Diegoland, our man was given an international award. The ceremony of the conferment did not take place in Okija Shrine, rather it happened in the “very before” of the whole world. But back home, the story was different, rightly so, for the scriptures, as his pastor-wife will confirm, cannot be broken.

Aside the issue of the scriptures, the granters of the title in their wisdom knew that too much of a good thing for an individual often proves injurious.
They must have feared that if our man should take a coveted local title, so soon after an international one, he may become unbearably swollen headed on account of his on-shore and off-shore achievements.

As things stand now, the sting of rejection at the local level will moderate the exhilaration of the conferment of the more universal accolade.
Something came to my mind, just now as, I was thinking of ending this piece. There were about forty either people apart from our man, who did not receive the Privilege Committee’s nod to gain elevation but nobody is talking about the rejection of these other people, almost as if it was only our man who was denied the title. Now that in itself is a distinction and recognition. A recognition you don’t apply for, even push for. A true distinction.