Today’s diary is loaded again.

Things are moving at a breathtaking pace.

When this whole thing started a few weeks ago, I was at ground level zero in my chances of achieving success.

Odegbami

Now, even the walls know that my chances have moved up a notch or two, and steadily getting better and brighter.

I have never been more convinced that this entire political conundrum in Ogun State has a divine pilot. Otherwise why would it be so perplexing, so inexplicably confusing and excitingly intriguing?

Last Tuesday, Bamidele Ademola-Olateju, my friend, erudite scholar and powerful social commentator with a massive global social media followership, sent me a ‘frightening’ message – my Facebook posting last Monday had almost hit the half a million mark by Thursday!

It took some explaining by a more IT-savvy Ayodeji for the import of that information to sink – my innocent political diary has taken wings!

Within minutes of that last posting, I was receiving prayer messages from all over the world for my daughter in Detroit, Michigan, who was receiving doses of painful radiation treatment for cancer, and for my friend, Abiodun, who lay in pain at the FMC hospital in Abeokuta awaiting surgery for a blocked bile duct.

The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Dr. Lanre Tejuoso, read it and swung into action by contacting the Chief Medical Director, CMD, of the FMC in Abeokuta.

Several doctors were calling me to find out more.

Dr. Dada, a CMD of one of the FMCs in Lagos, called and arranged a telephone conference for  me and the CMD of the FMC in Abeokuta. The meeting turned out to be a very difficult conversation because the truth is always a bitter pill to swallow.

It is clear that the challenges in Nigeria’s health sector are enormous. That most public hospitals are in a winless chase to meet the challenges of a ceaseless flood of patients; that facilities and funds are limited; that medical and auxiliary personnel are capable, overworked and underpaid; that health is not demonstrably a national priority; that the health sector is crippled by the politics of unreleased national budget allocations.

The result is that a country that has no business being in the bracket of poor countries with its enormous natural and human resources, has probably the worst public health sector in the world.

The product of that situation is a ceaseless stream of emigrating Nigerian medical personnel to Australia, Saudi Arabia, Canada, United States, United Kingdom, South Africa and several other countries that recognize their capability, use them and reward them handsomely.

By Wednesday, the second day of Eid el Kabir, the FMC was undergoing some serious transformation. Workers cleaned everywhere day and night. Even bed sheets were changed.

It has been 4 days since my last posting.

Abiodun is recuperating in a much cleaner ward at the FMC Abeokuta, following a successful surgery on Thursday, supervised by the CMD, a surgeon himself.

I seize this opportunity to thank all those through whose intervention Abiodun now has hope of leaving the hospital alive.

Omobonike Odegbami is also handling the greatest challenge of her life courageously. I do not know where she gets the courage from, but today is the 4thday of her radiation therapy. She still writes a diary of her physically and psychologically awfully painful daily experience.

On behalf of the family, I thank everyone for their prayers.

Back to some politics.

I have filled my nomination forms, paid the required fees, compiled the requested documents and now seeking the required number of Labour Party members to endorse my candidacy. I also await confirmation of the date for the Primaries in Abeokuta.

So, we are marching on.

Remember the Bush Barempowerment program for market women and Alajapasin Itori Ido area of Abeokuta that I was invited to some two weeks, or so, ago?

It has received a shot in the arm.

Dimeji (he does not want his identity revealed at all) contacted me this past week to find out the value of the loan facility I did not mention that I presented to one lucky market woman.

I gave him the embarrassing figure.

Within a day he was back, offering to contribute some funds to accommodate an additional 5 to 6 women every month.

On Friday, he redeemed his pledge.

Between Willie and my team, the details will be worked out and the revolving no-interest, loan facility for market women and Alajapasin that area of Abeokuta will be expanded.

I thank Dimeji.

Finally, on the second day of Ileya, when Ijebu Odewas bristling with thousands of people from all over the country, at one of the most colourful and grandest cultural festivals in Yorubaland, Ojude Oba, I went quietly to honour a friend’s invitation to spend the day with his family and some town folks in Ijebu Ala, a quiet little town a breath away from Ijebu Ode.

I was aware of some ‘fear’ that I would not be welcome anywhere in Ijebu land because I had chosen to ‘challenge’ the legitimate determination of the people to ensure that only their ‘son’ becomes the next governor of Ogun State.

Unfortunately for those expressing such sentiments, I am well fed on the ‘diet’ of the Afenifere Renewal Group (I co-ordinate the Ogun State chapter) whose mission has been the actualization of a Yoruba socio-cultural, economic and political Agenda, a restoration of Omoluwabivalues, and a complete reintegration of the Yoruba people into united community.

I cannot be a part of such a group and, at the same time, be a part of a further fragmentation of the Yoruba into superficial parts that mortgage the greater good of the community for narrow personal or sectional interests, particularly at this critical time in history when all hands should be on the deck for a global Black cultural reconnaissance, with Ogun State as the launch pad.

The vision is to re-position Nigeria in its rightful place and role as the long-anticipated leader of the Black race and of African nations, and the epicentre of a new Black civilisation on earth, a grand mission that ordinary minds may not be able to conceive or envision. But this was the lingering vision of many African leaders during the flood of Independence from colonial rule around 1960 – Nnamdi Azikiwe, Kwame Nkrumah, Ahmadu Bello, Julius Nyerere, Patrice Lumumba, Obafemi Awolowo, Jomo Kenyatta, and so on, reawakened now by divinely constructed circumstances.

When I shared the fear with a respected elder friend and leader of another political party in Ijebu Ode, and teased him that I may be considered a persona non-grata by my Ijebu brothers and sisters, he screamed: ‘Noooo. Iro ni o.The ordinary Ijebu person on the street loves you more than you can ever imagine. The politicians may have their own reservations, but that is their own problem’.

I was pleasantly surprised when he added that I should add a stopover at his home to my itinerary.

So, confident about my place with my brothers and sisters from Ijebu and Remo, I went to Ijebu Ala, spent my Ileya day there, with a feast of grilled ram meat, the sweetest Ikokore, the chilliest drinks and an audience that had gathered under a canopy to meet with me.

A pin drop could be heard as they lapped up every word I spoke when it was time to talk about my life in football extracted from the archives of my fading memory.

They eventually turned this private gathering into my second unofficial town hall meeting in Ogun State.

Oh, what a great time and experience it turned out to be. It was like having a ring side ticket to ‘An Evening with Mathematical’.

I told them everything.

Well, almost everything: my early days in Jos, going to school, my football/academic days in Ibadan, playing for Shooting Stars, joining the Eagles, going to my first Olympics all as a student, my best goals, my best matches, and so on and so forth, great stories that brought back floods of nostalgic moments of my life.

It was very refreshing, even for me.

I will love to do it again, but somewhere else, soon.

Until the invitation Femi was just a brother.  I did not even know where in Yorubaland he came from. He was just like all my other brothers, friends and colleagues that I had always known throughout most of my life, as of the same genetic stock:  Tunji Bolu, Femi Oye, Deji Osibogun, Kunle Soname, Idowu Otubusen, and many others. For the first time in our timeless relationship I am being forced to be conscious of our ‘differences’.

What a shame. What a tragedy.

As I left Ijebu Ala my last words to Femi and his people were a solemn promise…a crazy promise for that matter.

One day soon, along with other parts of Ijebu land, Ijebu ala has a big socio/cultural ‘surprise’ in wait for it.

Having heard my personal story, knowing that I am a sportsman and a team player to the core, they should trust me.

By Segun Odegbami