Book: The Many Colours of a Rainbow

Biography of Senator Ahmadu Ali Reviewer: Mahmud Jega    When I was invited to review this biography of Senator Ahmadu Ali, I expected the invitation to be cancelled when the organisers eventually discover that I participated in Ali Must Go riots in 1978. Senator Ali said in the Preface that this book was in the […]

Biography of Senator Ahmadu Ali

Reviewer: Mahmud Jega 

 

When I was invited to review this biography of Senator Ahmadu Ali, I expected the invitation to be cancelled when the organisers eventually discover that I participated in Ali Must Go riots in 1978. Senator Ali said in the Preface that this book was in the making for 30 years. We thank the Almighty Allah for sparing our lives to witness its completion because it has revised many opinions that we held since our days as students. 

I have read dozens of Nigerian, African, European, American, Asian and even Australian biographies over the years and I can confidently say this is one of the most interesting, most amusing, most revealing and most game changing I have ever read. Any Nigerian especially of my generation who reads it will change his misconceptions about Senator Ahmadu Ali from Ali Must Go to Ali Must Stay!  

A statement in the Prologue caught my attention. It stated, “Senator Dr. Ahmadu Ali is an extraordinary man, a man who successfully crammed several life times into one; a man who has passionately pursued, simultaneously, varied interests or even careers and somehow managed to excel and rise to the pinnacle of achievement in each one of them.” This paragraph reminded me of a 1978 edition of TIME magazine with the Prince of Wales on the cover titled “A most uncommon block.” The opening sentence of that story read, “If Prince Charles Phillip Arthur George Mountbatten Windsor did not exist, who could have invented him?” It then went on to reel out the Prince’s many virtues.

Reading this book I also thought, if Senator Colonel Dr. Chairman Ahmadu Ali did not exist, who could have invented him? He is a self taught authority on his combined Igala/Bassa Nge family history; he was a local school teacher during his holidays; he was the daring night escort to a professional local hunter in Idah; he was the young confidante of both Attah of Igala Ameh Oboni and his powerful friend Ogu Gabriel Ogu, before they quarrelled; he was a pioneering student of the best schools in Nigeria including Barewa College, NCAST and University of Ibadan; he was the Barewa College House Captain known as Ivan the Terrible; he was best graduating student in Barewa Class 1954 with five distinctions and three credits in Division One; he was the Secretary General of NUNS who organised an international student conference in Ibadan in 1957; he was Captain Barracuda of the Pyrates Confraternity meeting on the roof of University Bookshop in the 1950s; he is a medical doctor, chief consultant physician, a psychiatrist, was medical officer of several Army Battalions and famous head of Kaduna’s 44 Military Hospital during the Civil War; he was an officer of the Nigerian Army for 16 years; he was the secret visitor to the war front in 1968, which almost earned him AWOL status; he was the hurriedly arranged postgraduate  student to the UK; he was a brilliant student at all levels at home and abroad; he was the discoverer of many strange illnesses among men brought from the war front; he was the first director of NYSC; he was Federal Commissioner for Education; he was the only Nigerian who served as a minister under three Heads of State; he was the man who oversaw the most rapid expansion of educational facilities in the history of Nigeria including the establishment of NUC, JAMB, NBTE, new universities, polytechnics and COEs; he saw to the launching of UPE in 1976.

Senator Ali was the man who sneaked into the ranks of students who were demonstrating against him in 1978 and they did not even recognise him; he was the former Secretary General of NUNS in the 1950s who issued a statement  announcing the banning of NUNS in 1978; he was the founder and leader of the Movement for the Creation of Kogi State until it succeeded in 1991; he was elected Senator of the Federal Republic on three different occasions; he was the man over whom fate conspired together with men on four different occasions to prevent him from contesting for the governorship of the state he helped to create; he was national chairman of PDP at the peak of its power, sprawl and growl [some will say also at the peak of its arrogance];  he was the man who climbed to the peak of Mount Cameroon and nearly fell into the crater; he is Nigeria’s number one stamp collector, Nigeria’s number one collector of coins and currencies and one of Nigeria’s most bookish personalities who reads every book that he ever sets his eyes on; he was the man who cheated death in 1957 failed to travel on a train which derailed that night at Lalupon and killed all the boys that he was to travel with; he was the man who together with his delegation missed a plane in New York because his travel planner got drunk and fell asleep in a cafe, only for the plane to crash in Los Angeles. All of these stories and many more are contained in this biography; all very beautifully narrated, with total recall and in very good prose. Anyone who has an interest in Nigerian history whether colonial or contemporary should read this book.

Many important historical revelations are contained in this book. For example, Senator Ali provides evidence that Major General Aguiyi-Ironsi had a hand in preparations for the January 1966 coup in the way he bundled Ali out of Enugu to the UK in September 1965 for a course that was still a year away. The book also provides an insight into General Gowon’s inspirations and motivations in his decision to establish NYSC in 1973. For the first time also, we learn that the decision to charge students 50 kobo per meal in 1978, which sparked off Ali Must Go, was taken by the Supreme Military Council on the advice of National Universities Commission, NUC without Ali’s knowledge! 

Senator Ali should however provide more information on President Obasanjo’s ill-fated Third Term project. His explanation in this book is not satisfactory.