Aláàfin Ṣàngó, the third monarch of the Oyo Empire, was about the most celebrated and one of the most controversial rulers of the Empire. He was fiery, ambitious, charismatic and was extremely powerful. Like the cap insignia with which the Lagos godfather is known by today and which his worshippers scramble to don, Ṣàngó’s motif was a staff called Ose Ṣàngó, an ornately carved symbol depicted by fire, lighting and thunder
By Festus Adedayo
On Wednesday, February 25, 2025, a very toxic but innocuous advertorial was published in the Punch newspaper. It was authored by a group which called itself De Renaissance Patriots Foundation. Entitled Systematic Marginalization of Lagos State Indigenes, and signed by Major General Tajudeen Olanrewaju (rtd.) and Yomi Tokosi, the advertorial explains the legislative gangsterism currently going on in Lagos State, ex-Speaker Mudashiru Obasa’s impudent audacity and President Bola Tinubu’s nauseating silence on the civilian coup ongoing in the State of Aquatic Splendour.
The only fitting narrative that can explain the Obasa phenomenon and the Lagos godfather’s paternalism for Obasa and his ilk is the Osu caste system in Igboland. Among other obnoxious systems like the killing of twin babies, killing of children who grew first upper incisors, human sacrifices, among others, Osu caste is evergreen in its evil, and rooted in Igbo tradition and religion. Rev. George Thomas Basden’s book Among the Ibos of Southern Nigeria, (1921), a detailed account of the clergy’s experiences while living in Igbo land as a Christian missionary in the early 20th century, examines the people’s customs, beliefs, social structure and religious practices.
On page 109 of the book, Basden defined Osu as “a slave, but one distinct from an ordinary slave (ohu/oru) who in fact is the property of the god and when devoted to a god, he has no prospect of regaining freedom and he restricts his movements to the procuts of the shrine to which he was attached”. Centuries after the end of slavery and in spite of modernity, Osu caste’s poignant smell is rank in Igboland as Osu are still discriminated against, cannot marry a freeborn, their aspirations curtailed. They are thus forced to form an inter-group bond and alliance to press for their rights. A former minister under Olusegun Obasanjo, who is an Osu, is the rallying point of this caste against discrimination by “freeborn” Igbo. As I will argue presently, the Lagos parliament crisis, among other indicators, is fueled by the ancient indigene/settler dichotomy in Lagos. In this case, the Lagos godfather symbolizes the Obasanjo minister, hell-bent on protecting his fellow Lagos migrant-settlers.
General Olanrenwaju’s group which published the advertorial made several allegations against the godfather. They are encapsulated in the phrase, “persistent discrimination against the indigenous people of Lagos State.” Perhaps, the most insulting to the group was the temerity of the godfather’s choice of two non-indigenes of the state, Bisi Akande and Segun Osoba, ex-governors of Osun and Ogun States, to mediate in the crisis of the Lagos House of Assembly. Apart from the group’s total denunciation of this alien intervention, it specifically took Akande to the cleaners. Akande, it said, who “is struggling for political breath” in his home state, being unable to resolve the ongoing conflagration therein, feels entitled to poke-nose into Lagos matter “because his children, Akande Funmilayo (Chairman Apapa/Iganmu LCDA) and Yinka Akande are seriously benefiting from (sic) as Local Council Chairman and Director of Lekki Free Trade Zone respectively.”
As groups or individuals, Lagos indigenes have always stood up against the ruling establishment. A 1908 proposed water rate for Lagosians is an example. On July 20 of that year, Governor Walter Egerton proposed to charge Lagosians for them to access portable water. This was after his government constructed a #130,000 pipe borne water scheme, the precursor of the Iju waterworks built in 1916. Two indigenes of Lagos, John Randle and Orisadipe Obasa, medical doctors, under the banner of the People’s Union, arranged a rally of Lagosians at Enu Owa on November 26, 1908 where they took Egerton on. Randle and Obasa were themselves not autochthonous Lagosians. Randle, born in 1855 in Regent, Sierra Leone, originally from Oyo town, was son of Thomas, who settled in Aroloya part of Lagos, while Obasa, whose father descended from the Elekole of Ikole-Ekiti, was brought to Lagos in 1878. It must be borne in mind that Orisadipe Obasa has no ancestral connect with Mudashiru who is currently recreating an MC Oluomo motor-park hijack prototype in the Lagos parliament.
...the downfall of Oba Ṣàngó is a detailed illustration that even in a modern world, no ruler or godfather is immune from the vulnerabilities of power. It also illustrates the destruction immanent in human nature. The Obasa episode, though seemingly miniature, has the potential to implode and flush the Lagos godfather down the drain, replicating the Ṣàngó downfall in recent history
Indigene/settlers conflict in Lagos dates back to the 15th century. The Awori headsmen earliest settlers on Lagos Island, descendants of legendary Ogunfunminire, who hailed from Ile-Ife, had faced a Bini attempt to uproot them which was successful. A fierce battle that took place at Iddo had Olofin, who administered the area, being routed. Since then, the development of Lagos has attracted the influx of migrant-settlers Yoruba and other ethnicities laying claim to Lagos. The influence of migrant-settlers was so overwhelming that when in 1950, Dr I. Olorun-Nimbe emerged Mayor of the Lagos Council, only him and four others were Lagos indigenes while the rest 19 were migrant-settlers. The 1951 Constitution which placed Lagos under Ibadan, in a Western Region administration, further worsened Lagos’ fate, until the 1954 Constitution restored its place. In 1967, Lagos got a state of its own and federal capital status. So, when in the 1950s, the heartland of Lagos indigenes’ residence, the Isale Eko, was demolished, groups were formed to continually fight the interest of indigenous Lagosians. They included the Isale Eko Association (1955) and Egbe Eko Parapo (Lagos Citizens’ Rights Protection Council – LCRPC) 1962. The latter emerged from a merger of the Lagos Aborigines Society and the Egbe Omo Ibile Eko (Association of the Sons of Lagos State) which was led by Chief T. A. Doherty. Today, the most prominent of those associations is the Association of Lagos State Indigenes (ALSI) hitherto led by Justice Ishola Oluwa, a retired High Court Judge.
The role of identity in Nigeria’s migrant-settlers crisis shows its importance in Nigerian social life. It also shows that identity has negative potentials that can be deployed as a tool for mobilizing violence. In the year 2000, Lagos deployed identity for violence when Hausa and Yoruba indigene-settlers engaged one other in a fratricidal war in Ketu. That fight, which claimed lives, indicates the adversarial use that autocththony can be put to. Scholars have said that several of Nigeria’s worst conflicts occurred because original inhabitants, or indigenes, are pitted against migrant-settlers. The Obasa Lagos budding conflict, though appears political, may unravel the powers behind it.
In Yorubaland, the migrant-settlers dynamics is rich in literature. It is indeed an ancient phenomenon. Signified by the native markers of àjèjì or àjòjì (migrants) and onílé, (autocththony) the common phrase that defines that transaction is, no migrant-settler should duel with an indigene over ownership of land (àjòjì kìí b’ónílé du’lé). This is the meat of General Olanrewaju and his De Renaissance Patriots Foundation’s beef with Tinubu and why many autochthonous Lagosians, regardless of Tinubu’s behemoth political power in Nigeria, his talismanic influence and boundless wealth, are against his continued domination of Lagos. It also explains why a Tinubu, who today is carrying a monstrous elephant of Nigerian power and wealth on his head could be this needlessly bothered by the tiny cricket of being sidelined in the sack of Obasa as Lagos House of Assembly Speaker. The moment Tinubu loses this makeshift, badly-constructed Lagos identity in the battle with autochthonous Lagosians, he has lost all.
The above was recalled with the aim of stating that, though the àjèjì and onílée stranger politics in Lagos has always been on the front burner, it has been more pronounced in recent time. This specifically drew more Lagosians’ ire with the godfather, an àjèjì, becoming the Lord of Lagos and defender of the rights of fellow migrant settlers. In the above referenced advertorial, the De Renaissance Patriots Foundation claimed that since 1999, only one Lagos Omo-Onílé (son of the land) has been governor, ostensibly Raji Fashola. What this means is that Tinubu, Akinwumi Ambode and Babajide Sanwo-Olu, in the words of the advertorial, are àjòjì. The group also listed names of many àjòjì who it said have, unfairly, hoisted the banner of Lagos at the detriment of Lagosians.
Some extreme ones among the Lagos indigenes’ rights advocates have literally equalized their battle to an ancient Yoruba wise saying that no stranger can back a child like its mother (kò s’éni t’ó le mòó pòn bí olómo). Some others, in pursuit of this narrative, have claimed that the àjòjì at the helm of political affairs in and of Lagos, don’t appreciate Lagos enough,just like the domestic goat undervalues the prowess of a hunter and his gun; or one who inherits a huge agbada gown does not appreciate its value (ewúrẹ́ ilé kó mọ iyì odẹ, aj’ogún ẹwù kó mọ iyì agbádá nlá). It is on these twin premises that they derive their two conclusions. One is that, Lagos could have developed more than it does if the migrant-settlers had been autochtonous Lagosians. Second, that Lagos could have been greater but for the fact that the wealth accruable to the Ajoji from their leadership of Lagos are being funneled to the migrants’ original place of migration.
Prior to 1999, there did not seem to be anyone who held the jugular of Lagos like Tinubu. Before the ascendancy of his volcanic phenomenon, the last power outpost of Lagos was a group pejoratively called the ‘Ijebu Mafia’, disciples of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, operating as Afenifere leaders, living in Lagos. They determined the political geography of the aquatic state. Indeed, this group conducted the primary for the 1999 governorship which allegedly had Late Funsho Williams coming tops but which an internal abracadabra among the group tilted in favour of Tinubu. Immediately he grabbed political power, Tinubu, applying Law 33 of Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power which encourages the power holder to discover each man’s thumbscrew – their weaknesses – found out the Ijebu Mafia leaders’ thumbscrew and used it to prepare their political graveyards. He then succeeded in tearing them apart, deploying the Niccolo Machiavelli divide and rule tactics in the service of his ambition.
By 2007 when the godfather left office as Lagos governor, he had totally decimated their ranks, cloning a counter-group called Afenifere Renewal Group and leaving the Awo disciples licking their fatally bruised wounds. Abetted by Lagosians themselves, only a few, like the late Chief Ganiyu Dawodu, fought Tinubu to the hilt before his transition. By the time Lagos aborigines woke up to do a reconnaissance, it was too late. The godfather had captured Lagos and kept the lagoon and the sea inside his limitless-space pocket. Twenty five years after, not only does the godfather determine the political and economic barometer of Lagos, he determines when it will rain in the state or its time of drought.
The godfather’s migrant-settler place in Lagos is discussed only in hushed tones. Those privy to his migration and the story of his settling in Lagos maintain sealed lips. While he was governor of Lagos State, some dissident groups made efforts to document his migrancy by writing a book to document the family tree of Lagos Tinubus. Some other analysts have said that if the Lagos autochthony is to be broken into brass-tacks, virtually all Lagosians will fail the litmus test. For instance, the ancestor of the Tinubus is himself a Kanuri. While some settlers chose the Lagos Island side of Lagos called Isale Eko, Sierra Leone returnees were known as Akus or Saros, and Brazilians and Cuban returnees known as Agudas. Many of them originally hailed from towns scattered round the southwest. Only the Aworis can be said to own the Lagos autochthony. Immediately Mudashiru Obasa began to recreate the MC Oluomo-style tactic in Lagos House of Assembly, some forces came out to assert the deposed Speaker’s àt’òhúnrìnwá (migrant) status in Lagos and that he was not linked in any way with Orisadipe Obasa.
The 2023 election witnessed a groundswell of push-backs by, especially non-Yoruba indigene-settlers in Lagos, against the godfather’s fiefdom hold on Lagos. The outcome of that election showed a gradual whittling of the corrosive hold of the godfather on Lagos politics. Apparently a rebellion, Lagos migrant-settlers encircled the Peter Obi Labour Party and succeeded in giving it 582,454 votes as against 572,606 for the godfather’s APC. The godfather must have been furious. Until then and since 1999 when he held court, no one dared peer naked fire to look at the fiery face of the leopard. In the process of scapegoating for this colossal rout, a source told me the godfather held his Ajélè (an appointed official who oversees an empire’s economic and political interests) responsible and has since not forgiven him. More importantly, he is cross with him for being his own man and having the guts to win re-election due to his personal effort. For any godfather, a la the precepts of the Forty-eight Laws of Power, the Ajélè had committed an unpardonable sin against the Leviathan. So, even though Obasa rode roughshod on the Ajélè as Speaker, especially during the 2025 budget speech presentation, keeping him waiting for hours, the godfather wasn’t fazed and probably wrote the script. The world has since seen that, as Obasa’s water bug (Ìròmi) dances on the stream surface with impunity and audacity, executed with sheer brigandage, as well as abetted by institutions of the Nigerian state, the danceable tune egging the poor little creature on comes from a godfather drummer living in Aso Rock whose ego was fatally bruised.
To buttress General Olanrewaju’s submission, today, Lagos political power echelon, from governor, deputy governor, commissioners to special advisers, ministers representing Lagos, to federal and state parliamentarians, is tilted in favour of àt’òhúnrìnwá (immigrants) as against autochthonous Lagosians. The most laughable was Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola who represented Lagos West from 2015 to 2023 and before then, from 2011 to 2015, was Lagos House of Representatives member. Today, the man, known as Yayi, has perfunctorily exchanged state of origin like a prostitute changes her liaisons. He now represents Ogun West.
The story of Lagos, its godfather and potential explosion is beginning to resemble the cataclysmic end of the Yoruba deity of thunder and lightning, Ṣàngó. Aláàfin Ṣàngó, the third monarch of the Oyo Empire, was about the most celebrated and one of the most controversial rulers of the Empire. He was fiery, ambitious, charismatic and was extremely powerful. Like the cap insignia with which the Lagos godfather is known by today and which his worshippers scramble to don, Ṣàngó’s motif was a staff called Ose Ṣàngó, an ornately carved symbol depicted by fire, lighting and thunder.
Ṣàngó, the third Aláàfin of Oyo, who reigned between the 15th and early 16th centuries, was a man of great ambition, fiery charisma, and immense power. His name is invoked today to reify awesome might and the mystery of power. He mirrors a complex interplay of leadership acumen, divinity, and eventually, a reference point of potential human vulnerability. Like the Lagos godfather, Aláàfin Ṣàngó had a talismanic and commanding presence and inspired widespread loyalty. He also had the magical and mystical ability to command fire from the sky in his fit of anger. Ultimately, though his strength , the endowment ultimately led to his downfall. One day, Ṣàngó, enraged, invoked fire which resulted in a conflagration that went out of control. It eventually led to the destruction of his palace as well as lives of its inhabitants. It was the beginning of his end. Stripped of all he had, Ṣàngó departed Oyo Kingdom and never returned. He eventually committed suicide at a place called Koso.
Apart from the power of Yoruba anecdotal retelling latent in that Sango narrative, the downfall of Oba Ṣàngó is a detailed illustration that even in a modern world, no ruler or godfather is immune from the vulnerabilities of power. It also illustrates the destruction immanent in human nature. The Obasa episode, though seemingly miniature, has the potential to implode and flush the Lagos godfather down the drain, replicating the Ṣàngó downfall in recent history.
Maybe we all should just watch while an end comes to this tyrannical hold, after all, in the words of Nawal El Saadawi in her A daughter of Isis, “Things that never end are only boring, and were it not for death, life would be an impossible burden.”
