40 — Vanguard, WEDNESDAY,DECEMBER 31, 2014
OONI SIJUWADE:
The King clocks 85 By Adelegan Adegbola But be no afraid of greatness: Some men are born great, Some achieve greatness Some have greatness trusted upon them - William Shakespeare (1564 1616) in Twelfth Night or What You Will.
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HIS aptly describes Arole Oodua, The Royal Eagle of the Yoruba, the keeper of the seal of Yoruba, the successor to the legendary throne of Oduduwa, whose paramountcy is historically incontrovertible, the Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade, Olubuse II, Arole Oodua, D.Litt, DCL, CFR. Ooni Sijuwade was born great, he achieved greatness and he has greatness thrust upon him. Men of genius are admired, men of wealth are envied, men of power are feared, but only men of character are trusted. But believe it or not, greatness is not the gift of the majorities. Greatness is nurtured on vision and integrity. The quintessential icon of African royalty and splendour of the Yoruba; the earthily head of his people, the preserver and occupier of the Yoruba sanctity; it is true that we all live under the same sky but we don't all have the same horizon. Old age is honourable.
Princely family His Imperial Majesty, Ooni Okunade Sijuwade, was born in Ile-Ife into the prestigious and princely family of Prince Adereti Sijuwade on Wednesday, January 1, 1930. Every time a baby is born, existence takes on a new meaning. Men of wisdom, of good conscience, articulate thinkers, people of character and faith like Okunade Sijuwade, the change agent are rare. He attended Rev. Kuti's Primary School, Abeokuta, Abeokuta Grammar School and Oduduwa College, Ile-Ife. And for his tertiary education, Kabiyesi attended the Advanced Business Management at Northampton, England as well as courses in Management in Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Scotland, West Germany and Israel. There is no stopping the young Prince Okunade Sijuwade who seemed to pattern himself after his father. "The journey to manhood is neither for the mediocrity nor for the lay-about,
but strictly for those who are focused, thoughtful, resourceful, persistent and hard working." As a Prince, Okunade Sijuwade's business career was marked by more than an average fortune. Truly, it could be rightly said that fortune and baby luck smiled on him as a man. Highly motivated, inspired and figuratively possessed by iron will, courage and prodigious industry, the Prince was destined to be a success in whatever he laid his hands on. The Prince, a prodigy, a whiz-kid, a precocious child, usually emphasized hard work as a cardinal principle. As a "Merchant Prince" on the go, he was focused on the way forward at all times. Life levels all men, but hard work, perseverance, dedication, education, and determination reveal the eminent ones.
Selfless service to humanity Lurren I. Lee once said, your life is your message to the world, make it inspiring. Kabiyesi Okunade Sijuwade's life story and the message it presents to the world are distinct and unique. He is a great man with a commitment to excellence, distinction, vision and selfless service to humanity. In Yorubaland, 'Ade-Ori la fi m'oba, Ileke ni ti awon Ijoye' meanin"t the King is recognized by the crown on his head and the chief by the beads on their neck. Hard work is the surest road to success and one who wants to be successful in life and achieve greatness should develop an attitude for hard work. Besides, for over forty-two years, Kabiyesi had cultivated the habit of sleeping for only four hours a day. However, his experience in the Nigerian business world where everybody seems to be actively looking for money at all costs, has taught him to make even the additional sacrifice of sleeping with one eye open! This habit, alas! has been characteristically difficult to shake off! Oba Okunade Sijuwade's work experience from the time he left college would read like the pages of an imaginary best-seller written by a graduate of Harvard School of Business. Furthermore, the route to the top for Kabiyesi began with a three-year stint in his father's own business followed by the two years adventure in the media, working for the Nigerian Tribune before proceeding to the
Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade at 85 United Kingdom for Business Management Studies. He joined the Leventis Group of Companies in Manchester in 1957 and he became the first African Management Trainee for two years. And upon his return to Nigeria, he was first appointed the Sales Manager, Leventis Motors in the Old Western Nigeria. He later became the Adviser to the Chairman of Leventis Group of Companies. In addition, by 1963, the magic that the Prince was using for the A. G. Leventis conglomerate seemed to have attracted the attention of the government of the Old Western Region of Nigeria, which soon took the young Prince on loan to manage the National Motors (Nigeria) Ltd., with one hundred and sixteen expatriate staff members under him.
Distributor of vehicles And shortly after, Prince Sijuwade rose by leaps and bounds. He soon established his own Engineering Company, The WAATECO along with a few of his close friends. With 12 branches in Nigeria, almost 200 Russians on its staff had its headquarters in Lagos WAATECO became the distributor of vehicles, tractors and engineering products from the former USSR, thus pioneering commercial links with that communist bloc. Knowledge, like power, is not evenly distributed throughout the society and from man to man. And for a long time, the Prince remained one of the only handfuls of Nigerians doing business with both the capitalist West and the socialist East without getting embroiled in their Cold War politics or ideological differences. However, the Prince was quite familiar with many of the leaders in the two camps - East and
West. Further, the years rolled by and the Prince also grew and rose to be an astounding success in the international business world. And by 1973, he had moved the headquarters of his growing business empire to London where he could conveniently communicate with the entire commercial and business world thus making the entire world his domains. He convinced everyone that he had indeed arrived on the business scene. Thinkers ruled the world. No one has ever been a good leader without a leading mind. The mind is the cradle of dreams. The enigmatic Prince of the Source became the Ooni of Ife on Saturday, December 6, 1980 and this made him automatically the Head, the Supreme Head of the Yoruba race, which has a population of about 80 million people both in Nigeria and in the Diaspora. He became the inheritor of the exalted and prestigious stool, Olofin Oduduwa, the legendary progenitor and founder of Yoruba race. The Ooni, is not only a first class ruler but the paramount ruler of the Source and a great race. He has a keen sense of duty; a sincere patriot, who has built bridges across na-
Olubuse II is a man of knowledge, who values academic eminence, he is a voracious reader. He is always ready with an apt quotation
tions, a statesman, a man of courage, a philanthropist extraordinary, a practical man of the world with an enviable touch of class, a wise man with a penetrating insight and vision. Ooni Okunade Sijuwade is an epitome of African monarch.
African monarch He is a man of boundless energy and an example of kingship par excellence, an initiator, an articulator, energizer and actualizer of development plans and movement towards the unity, peace and progress of Nigeria. As the spiritual leader of the Yoruba and Africa at large, Ooni Sijuwade, Arole Oodua, has visited many countries of the world where the citizens are of Yoruba descent. On one of his historic visits to the Caribbean Islands, no sooner than the Ooni and his entourage arrived in Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, where there was no rainfall for over three years, that the heavens opened up and there was a down pour for hours and days in those countries. Ooni Okunade Sijuwade in his giant strides in his mission to unify the nation, became a shower of blessing. Value shapes human progress and they are fundamentally the roles that leaders take but there seems to be a dearth of good example from most leaders of today. But Ooni Sijuwade offered himself to fill the gap. On one occasion, Kabiyesi Olubuse II said "my stand, since I became the Ooni along with a large number of good traditional rulers of this country is for the people of the North, the East and the entire Yoruba people not only to see one another as brothers and sisters but to live and work together as one family," adding
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