Showing posts with label Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 8, 2017

For Onukaba (Adinoyi-Ojo)

By Taiwo Obe
The book, Atiku – The Story of Atiku Abubakar, has the author’s name as Ojo Adinoyi. Unless, of course, you were familiar with the author or, and, knew that he was a special aide to the former Nigerian vice-president, you would have thought that it is not the same person as Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo. But then, when he joined The Guardian as a reporter in June 1983 immediately after his National Youth Service Corps primary assignment at Radio Nigeria, Ikoyi, his name was simply Shaibu Ojo. Till date, one of our colleagues at The Guardian still calls him, perhaps jokingly, Shaibu. He had written an article celebrating Nigeria’s rich culture including taking pride in our traditional lines, signing it with “Shaibu Adinoyi-Ojo.” A reader responded wondering why he was bearing an Arabic name, Shuaib (that’s the correct spelling and it means “stream”), advising him to live by example. Trust Shaibu, a principled person, he quickly dropped that name. His father’s name was Shaibu Onukaba. His own middle name was Adinoyi.
*Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo
So, he became Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo. He likes now to be identified as Adinoyi Onukaba Ojo. As that is mouthful, we shall agree here to call him simply Onukaba, which is what I call him. He calls me Taye, which most people who knew me from childhood still call me. Taye, of course, is the abridgement of To aye wo – (I came to) “taste” the world for my twin, Kehinde, who the Yoruba lore says, sent me – which, for convenience, has also been clipped to Taiwo. By the way, Onukaba means hard work and Adinoyi is “father of the multitude.”
Seest thou a man who is diligent in his work, that’s Onukaba. Anyone who is familiar with this wonderful guy – and this is not patronising him – knows that he gives his all to any project he commits to, and, yes, he’s truly someone who bears the burden of many, particularly his kin, some of whom won’t think twice before abusing the privilege.
Onukaba and I bonded almost immediately when we met. He had studied theatre arts at the University of Ibadan and had been taught playwriting by Prof. Femi Osofisan, who was the one who influenced his admission to The Guardian. He was a quintessential reporter. He shunned unethical practices like a plague.
A little digression, please: the other day a visitor in my office overheard a telephone conversation where I was vouching for Onukaba’s incorruptibility. The visitor wondered if he was a Nigerian. Yes, he is and a proud one at that.