The Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Samuel Odulana Odugade, is dead. Palace
sources said the monarch died at about 7.30pm on Tuesday in his palace
in the Monatan area of Ibadan. Oba Odugade, who was born on April 14,
1914, became the Olubadan in July 2007. It was gathered that palace
guards immediately summoned a son of the deceased, Prof. Femi Lana, who
also informed some Ibadan high chiefs about his father’s demise. Though
efforts to get the reaction of Lana were futile on Tuesday, a source
close to him said the monarch’s corpse had been deposited at the morgue
of an unnamed hospital in Ibadan.
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“I can tell
you that Prof. Femi Lana and some high chiefs have taken the corpse to
the mortuary but I will not tell you the name of the hospital because
his death has not been formally announced,” the source said.
Another
top source close to the palace, however, said the Olubadan-in-Council,
comprising all the high chiefs would have to first pay a condolence
visit to the family before the formal announcement of the monarch’s
death would be made.
This, the palace source explained, might be
done on Wednesday (today), adding that the Olubadan-in-Council or the
family could formally announce the death after the condolence visit.
The
source said, “The Olubadan is dead. He died peacefully in his sleep in
his palace at Monatan and not in the hospital around 7.30pm today
(Tuesday) due to old age. You know he celebrated his 100th birthday in
April 2014; he would have clocked 102 this year. The palace chiefs
invited his son, Prof. Femi Lana, who in turn, informed some high
chiefs, including the Ashipa of Ibadanland, Chief Eddy Oyewole.”
Another
high chief, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not
allowed to comment officially on the matter due to tradition, said the
monarch’s burial might not be immediate.
“His burial may not be
immediate. He was not a Muslim but a strong member of the St. Peter
Anglican Church, Aremo, and I’m sure that the church, the Central
Council of Ibadan Indigenes and the Olubadan-in-Council will participate
in his burial,” the chief said.
With his demise, the Balogun of
Ibadanland, Chief Saliu Adetunji, is expected to be named as the new
Olubadan by the Olubadan-in-Council.
Adetunji is one of the nine Ibadan high chiefs promoted about three weeks ago by the late monarch.
A
soldier who fought in the World War II, Oba Odulana was a seasoned
civil servant and a thoroughbred politician who later became a minister
in the First Republic.
The late monarch began his elementary
education at Saint Andrew’s School, Bamigbola, in the present Lagelu
Local Government Area in January 1922 and obtained a transfer to St.
Peter’s School, Aremo in 1929.
He completed his middle school education at Mapo Central School in December 1936.
He equally strengthened his education via correspondence college.
He
had a brief stint with the United Africa Company as a produce clerk
before taking up teaching at the Church Missionary Society Elementary
School, Jago, in the present Ona-ara Local Government Area, in 1938.
He also taught in several schools from 1939 to 1942.
He, however, quit teaching to pick the more challenging duty of a soldier during the 1939 World War II.
According
to his biographers, the lessons learnt at his duty post was well
utilised, such that upon the end of the war in 1945, he was put in
charge of the demobilisation of returning soldiers in Lagos, which
earned him an exemplary character award of the Army Fourth Brigade and
this climaxed into an immediate appointment with the Colonial Office
Education Department in 1946.
While in the civil service, where
he was until 1959, Oba Odulana actively assisted in the establishment of
both primary and secondary schools in various parts of the old Western
Region of Nigeria.
He voluntarily retired and embraced politics to represent his people in the 1959 pre-independence House of Representatives.
This
led to a string of political achievements, such that he was appointed
as the Parliamentary Secretary to the late Prime Minister, Alhaji
Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, in the country’s first independent cabinet.
In
1963, he attended the epoch-making Commonwealth Conference in London.
He also became the country’s Minister of State for Labour.
In
1964, he led the Nigerian Parliamentary delegation to the London
Constitutional Conference to restructure the then British colonies of
Rhodesia and Nyasaland now known as Malawi, Zimbabwe and Zambia.
Odulana’s
journey to the throne started with his appointment as the Mogaji (Head)
of his Ladunni family compound, at Oja-Igbo in 1972.
In 1976, he became the Jagun-Olubadanland.
http://whatsupibadan.com/2016/01/20/olubadan-dies-in-his-sleep-at-101/
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