As much as possible,
influential politicians in Nigeria, like President Olusegun Obasanjo, would do
all they could to avoid the nation’s bad roads. Travelling on those roads
endanger their lives as well as those of their exotic automobiles.
To get round
the danger, Nigerian leaders prefer commuting by helicopters and make beelines
from the comfort of their abodes in the capitals to the villages.
During one of such trips
two years ago, Chief Obasanjo took Prince Bola Ajibola on his Presidential
chopper for what looked like a war reconnaissance along Iseyin Road in the Oke
Ogun area of Oyo State. He and Ajibola, a former Attorney-General and Minister
of Justice, have been friends from childhood. And in the recent past, he
appointed Ajibola to oversee the implementation of the World Court verdict on
Bakassi after which Nigeria ceded the oil-rich peninsula to Cameroun. They
therefore, could afford to swap jokes.
As the helicopter hovered
in the air, Obasanjo’s croaky voice sliced through the clattering of the
machine’s propellers and the crackles of its radio communication facility.
“Bola, look down to your left,” Obasanjo nudged his friend. “What can you see?”
Prince Ajibola’s eyebrows arched in an attempt to lock his eyes on the
direction and reacted that he could see nothing other than what looked like an
evergreen forest. “Look properly, are your eyes failing you?” Obasanjo asked
further.
Obasanjo then patiently
revealed that what Ajibola saw were not trees haphazardly scattered by nature,
but a carefully planned plantation of teak. The trees are like the cedars of
Lebanon, valued for their usage as electric poles, export-earning and
artificial regenerative potential. Ajibola interjected: “Segun! What are you
doing with teak?”
Shrugging, Obasanjo
replied: “For your information, there are over one million trees in that
plantation,” adding that they were part of what would sustain him in
retirement. He further revealed that his teak plantations are not only in
Iseyin, but in other parts of the country where he also owns farms producing
palm oil, rearing chickens, pigs and other things. “These are money-spinners,”
Obasanjo said with satisfaction.
Even as Obasanjo’s
helicopter will take off from Abuja on 29 May (after handing over power to Umar
Yar’Adua) and land at Navy Secondary School, Abeokuta, from where he would
proceed for a reception organised for him by his Egba kinsmen, what he, his
passengers and crew members will see will go beyond teak. They will have an
opportunity to appraise the extent of work at his multi-billion naira
Presidential Library, Hill Top mansion in Abeokuta, and his farm in Ota, Ogun
State.
Apart from all these,
however, President Obasanjo, in the view of critics, has other business
interests that will not only sustain him during retirement, but will make him
one of the world’s wealthiest statesmen. These span land ownership, farming,
oil exploration, banking, hospitality business, a university and an ethanol
factory among others.
Indeed, President Obasanjo
is looking forward to his retirement, the rites of which will begin this week.
Like in 1979 when the late General Mamman Vatsa, then Commander, Brigadier of
Guards, accompanied Obasanjo back to Abeokuta from Dodan Barracks, Lagos, after
handing over to the civilian government, headed by Alhaji Shehu Shagari,
Obasanjo will, on 29 May, also be given a rousing reception at Moshood Abiola
Stadium in the Ogun State capital. On Sunday, 3 June, a thanksgiving service
will be held for him at St. Peter’s Cathedral, Ake, Abeokuta. This will be
followed by another reception at the Valley View Auditorium of the Government
House in the city.
After these, he will relax
and enjoy the fruits of his labour, or scheming, as the case may be. “I am going
back to my farm,” President Obasanjo said on a Nigerian Television Authority
phone-in programme. “But I am getting old and so I will not be able to run the
farm hands-on,” he noted.
Established since 1978,
Obasanjo’s farm has been producing fresh agricultural products for almost 30
years. According to Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, a former Special Assistant to the
President on Public Communications and now the Minister supervising the
Aviation ministry, the President’s farm makes an average of N30 million a month
or N360 million per year.
Written By
By Ademola Adegbamigbe
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