It was in the days of the landline and I had one extension by the bedside. The call came at about 8:00 a.m., rousing me from a late morning sleep – I have always been a late sleeper. The voice on the line however cleared whatever was left of my sleep. It was that of late General Adeyinka Adebayo, the first Military Governor of the old Western Region. ‘Why are you in court with your Oba?’ he asked, cutting morning pleasantries short. Confused and needing clarifications, it was my turn to ask a question. ‘My Oba?’ I asked. Instead of an answer, other questions followed rather rapidly, and in them I found my answer. ‘Are you not an Ekiti man?’ ‘Are you not in court with Oba…. (names respectfully withheld).’ I responded that he was the one who took my publication to court. He cut me short again with ‘It’s un-Yoruba to be in court with your Oba’. He then gave his order like the Military Officer he was. I should go to him to apologize. I should also not go empty handed. I remember the ‘package’ I was to go with included Schnapps and kola. He had probably informed the Oba that I was coming because the ‘dispute’ was settled in minutes.

Whatever righteous indignation I must have had at having to travel all the way to Ekiti to apologize over the publication of a story we all knew to be correct, was tempered by my immense respect for General Adebayo and the realization that he meant well and had played the role of an elder who truly believed that it was sacrilegious for a Yoruba man to be in court with a Yoruba Oba irrespective of the circumstances. It has always been the role of elders in Yorubaland to straighten things before they become crooked.

Yorubaland is steeped in several traditions that are largely anchored on respect – respect for institutions and respect for age. There are many proverbs which indicate that the young will always play a second fiddle to the old when it comes to rights, privileges and even disputes. This was what happened in my case. But it is the respect for institutions that is primal in Yorubaland. At the zenith of these institutions is Obaship. An Oba in Yorubaland is not just the first among equals as we have in some other communities. He is the first without equals. Even his ‘Igbakeji’ (second-in-command) does not come close. Modernity and the diverse nature of cosmopolitan dwellers have considerably watered the mystique of the ancient institution down. The antics and abuses of some of the Obas have also not helped matters. All of these have combined to make people ‘get away’ with things that might otherwise have been considered taboo. I confess I have gotten away with a few myself. I had met and interviewed quite a few first class Obas during my active years and hiding under the toga of journalism, I confess I didn’t always pay due, traditionally expected respect. I felt being obsequious would put me at a disadvantage in the sometimes adversarial and the sometimes serious mental game that good interviews often require. I was wrong and it took another interview appointment to prove that. I was due to interview the late Oba Oyekan of Lagos. He noticed, as I was ushered into his presence, that I did not do the ‘needful’. He asked for my name probably to be sure I was Yoruba and promptly cancelled the proposed interview. It was a hard lesson that had stayed with me since and now that my acquaintances are ascending the throne, I accord them their due respects in public.

General Obasanjo, like General Adebayo, has always paid his respects to this ancient tradition – I have seen a picture of him prostrate before an Oba before. And to the best of my knowledge, these respects have always been reciprocated by the Obas. This is why the public humiliation that happened in the ancient town of Iseyin last week caught many observers by surprise. If it was unheard of to ask elders to stand up and sit down as if they were recalcitrant children, it was sacrilegious to demand that of Obas. It was a show of some power that he no longer has. In any case, certain actions take more from you than they add to you. This was one of those and I really don’t know who, between the Obas and the General, ended up diminished by that incident. A defense I heard was that some Obas had shown disrespect to Governor Seyi Makinde which the General wanted to redress. If that was true, the Makinde I read about is more than able to handle such a situation. I agree that a Governor as the head of a state, should be accorded his due respects in the public space and a President as head of a nation deserves to be respected by every citizen. Anybody, including Obas, who disrespects a constituted authority is courting trouble. In the same breath, anybody who goes to an Oba’s domain, especially his palace, must accord him his due respects. Respect begets respect. The respect General Obasanjo gets now can only be accorded him because of his age and past office. It is deserving but not mandatory. Heavens would not have fallen if those Obas had refused to get up because he no longer has the power to make heavens fall. He is no longer the President of the country and the earlier he realized this, the better for him and the rest of us. For someone who craves respect, one should ask how much respect he has accorded sitting Presidents and Governors in the past.

They say what you have is what you hold aloft. The institution of Obaship is one of the things that the Yoruba race has. We must continually hold it aloft, even as modernity diminishes its mystique, even as the antics of some Obas show that the gods now have feet of clay. It is un-Yoruba to humiliate an Oba in public to borrow some words from General Adebayo. Whatever their missteps, and there appears to be many among the current generation of Obas, they should be addressed in appropriate closets. Otherwise, we would have lost any sense of indignation if anybody from another race humiliated, not just one Yoruba Oba, but a collection of them in public. They say if you treat your garment as a rag, people will wipe the floor with it. It is a proverb of the elders. Our revered General Olusegun Obasanjo is an elder who must understand the import of the proverb. Like I said, his past offices and achievements make him deserving of certain respects. But respect, I repeat, must beget respect.

•Muyiwa Adetiba is a veteran journalist and publisher. He can be reached via titbits2012@yahoo.com

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