My Comrades of June 12, by Late Otunba Leye Akintola | Southwest First Alert Magazine
One of the unsung heroes of this our democracy is Comrade (Prof. Emiratus) Ola Oni. A confidant of the late Cicero - Chief Bola Ige, Ola Oni of blessed memory was among men to give credit to when thinking of the route threaded to earn this democracy.
In Oyo State, his residence was the decision making laboratory for policies and strategies that won the victory we celebrate today as democracy. It was in his siting room that the decision for candidate for the 1999 candidacy for the governor of Oyo State was taken. We were all active participants at that time and graciously, MOST of us are still alive today seeing what the democracy we fought for has been turned to.
Comrade Ola Oni was the convener and sustaining force of NADECO, who was one of the think tank that came up with the idea of having a unified, and formidable front for advancing the struggle for the actualization of June 12 1993 mandate. He has a team of faithful comrades among which are Comrade Sanda, Comrade Oyebola, Com. Moshood Erubami, Dcn Segun Olalere, Com Wole Abisoye, my humble self and few others at the local level here in Oyo State.
At the nucleus level of the struggle in CD, I remember one of our numerous visits to Imaria, - Dr. Beko's Office in Lagos. We were already taking our leave when the unmarked vehicle guys came as was always the case then, they came to whisk Dr. Beko away again. He was then seeing us off to our car when he saw them. He was so friendly with them as he said, "gentlemen, please give me a little time to pick my bag". He was referring to his always ready packed bag for his need in detention.
That was the case for most activists then. They are always ready to be picked up at shortest or no notice at all.
Comrade Ola Oni, Gani Faweyinmi, Femi Aborisade, Moshood Erubami and host of others were frequent and regular lodgers at detention camps around the country.
We got so used to been tear gassed that we stopped reacting to it.
Among the heroes we must not forget when we talk about the struggle for political liberation of the will of the people is one man in an unusual place and region. He is comrade Shehu Sanni, now a senator from Kaduna. He was the CD link man in the north then.
He saw it all. He gets hounded into detention at the slightest wink of the juntas then. He was a torn in their flesh in their on backdoor.
There are so many other comrades that I cannot catalog here. Sometime very soon I will be publishing my involvement in the struggle for Nigeria’s attainment of democratic polity.
When some of us make comment so passionate about the way thing are run today, we obviously are speaking from experience. We saw death face to face during the confrontational struggle with the military to earn the nascent democracy that we had then. Seeing attempts pointing at taken us back to the dark goggled days is frightening and we cannot but resist such with every inhibiting force left in us.
It was not sweet seeing comrades felled by your side from the bullets of heartless juntas, and still continue so resolutely with the struggle daring every consequence. We lost quite a number of comrades with some permanently disabled on the way to regain political freedom. If you were part of the gory scenes of lifeless bodies on the streets then, you will not want to toil with the fruit of that struggle.
We must do all we can and give all it will take to ensure this democratic experiment succeed and self-refine.
Happy Celebration.
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