In memory of the Philosopher-in-King, Maitama Sule

"There is no true orator who is not a hero" so says Ralph Waldo Emerson- American poet, essayist, and philosopher (and I would add, and indeed, I should, that there is hardly a hero who is not an orator. And there lies the conundrum- only the Almighty knows the secret which connects the wonders of […]

"There is no true orator who is not a hero" so says Ralph Waldo Emerson- American poet, essayist, and philosopher (and I would add, and indeed, I should, that there is hardly a hero who is not an orator. And there lies the conundrum- only the Almighty knows the secret which connects the wonders of the tongue with the wonders of the brain. Those who would excel by the tongue would most likely excel by the brain. At his birth, the Nigerian history was birthed. At his death, the Nigerian nation lost a star whose legacy would be hard to replace.

For those who never knew him, what this country has lost by his passage would be insignificant. But for those who knew him for what he was, his death could be likened to the death of Shakespeare in Greek’s history or the death of Martin Luther King Jr (d.1968), or that of Sir Winston Churchill (d.1965) of Great Britain or even Pericles, the first man of Athens. Except for the fact that Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule did not become a ‘King’, he was, I would argue, the philosopher-in-king. Today I refer to a statesman, an administrator, a scholar, a man of letters and perhaps most important of all, a complete Nigerian. I memorialize a Muslim whose ethnic identity was inferior, even in his own estimation, to his national identity. I mourn a man of stellar qualities and one whose presence used to illuminate the dark recess of our national life.

That was Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule. It was probably his like that Sir Winston Churchill had in mind when he said “Of all the talents bestowed upon men, none is so precious as the gift of oratory.” On his tongue, phrases and textual symmetries converge; in his speeches, metaphors and melodies find union.

Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule was like a warrior whose sole weapon was his words, words which ‘gushed’ like a fountain from his tongue, his tongue, you would remember had hitherto been sharpened by long years, long nights and long days of learning and refining. The first day I listened to him, it felt as if I had always listened to him. The last time I heard him speak, in Kano, I never knew it was indeed going to be the last time. As it was the first day, so it was that last day. By then his speech had taken an unusual tenor and texture; it had become etched, as it was, on the carousel of time. Listening to him therefore had become familiar. Like the alternation of night and day, listening to him had become a willful submission to stations of stupor where the listener desires an entrancement and entrapment, as if by the wizard, into a luminescent space where nothing exists other than reason and beauty. Such was the power he was imbued with that he was capable, with his speeches, of lifting hearts from the abyss of darkness, of giving hope in the season of despair, of refining human vision when men thought life was without mission. That was Dr Maitama Sule who strove, throughout his short life on terrestrial earth- and what a short life that lasted for eighty-eight years that was-to show Nigerians how to be the true Nigerians. While he was alive, life in Kano was, for him and to him, incomplete in the absence of life in Lagos.

That was him, Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule – the bearer of oratorial powers; there goes Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule, the purveyor and conveyor of elocutory prowess. That is where he now lies, in his grave, all alone, Dr Yusuf Maitama Sule, the internuncio of scholarly erudition. He was an "oppressor", with his speech, in truth; he was a liquidator of evil in words, in action. They listened to him, his audience, and became convinced of the reason in his speech; he controlled their judgment, his audience, simply because his words were like balms on the frayed nerves of unreason. Listen to him one more time as he spoke to the present: "In short, there is meaninglessness in philosophy, insecurity in polity, chaos in politics, immorality in society, corruption in economy, frustration in art and lack of creativity in literature…Today as I have said, we are no longer ourselves, our cultural values has been thrown overboard…"

In the manner of the incurable optimist, Dr Sule never lost hope in the Nigerian experience. "Listen" to him – "However, in spite of the ugly picture I have painted, I believe we can still get out of the woods, I am not a pessimist I am an optimist, I believe that if we can revive the glory of the past, by reminding us of the good achievements – the success Sardauna and his likes, of our founding fathers, if we recall what Sardauna did and emulate his example, we can certainly revive the glory of the past".