Erelu Olusola Obada, the Deputy Governor of Osun State is 59 today. Last week, in Osogbo, the state capital, Obada went down memory lane with journalists and spoke about her growing up years, revealing memories of her life which she holds dear. She also spoke about being the deputy governor of her state in the past seven years. Ayo-Lawal Gbenoba was there.

How do you keep so fit at 59?
Well, with the kind of schedule I have, you cannot help but maintain your agility or drive, because you are not sitted at one place everyday. You are moving around. There are a lot of cerebral challenges and in your bid to make sure that the people of Osun are well served, there is no time for excesses.

Is there no special regime, maybe diet or something like that?
Of course, once you are growing old, you have to start looking after what you eat. For instance, I have cut out carbohydrate and red meat. I love fish and lots of vegetable. So, my diet has changed to reflect the fact that one is growing older. That is the fact.

While you were growing up, were there some experiences you had, which you still remember, either in your primary or secondary school days?
Let me start with the primary school. Up till I was about six years, my grandmother used to carry me on her back. So, on the first day at St. John’s, Iloro, Ilesa, she put me on her back as usual and we went to the school so that I could register.

When we got there, they said, ‘who is the person that is starting school?’ and grandmother pointed at me on her back and said, ‘that is the child on my back.’ They told her to put me down. Of course, I clung to her wrapper; I couldn’t allow her to go and leave me with the strangers.

She offered to stay with me, if they could give her a seat, but they rejected her offer and asked her to leave. I remember that I cried and cried until after a few days and she stopped backing me to school. From that experience, I think some elements of discipline was instilled in me.

You grew up with your grandmother?
Yes. Then, my parents were in Ibadan. Mind you, my father was the only child of his mother. I also had some elder ones, who were twins but they died. They were born prematurely and in those days, there was no incubator. One died after, maybe, two days and the other one died the third day.

So, I became the eldest child of my parents when they had me about two or three years after the twins died. So, you can imagine the joy of my grandmother Madam Mariam Ekunhunmi Agbeja. As far as she was concerned, I belonged to her.

Staying with her, how did it shape your life?
Oh! Number one, at that stage, I was extremely spoilt. I refused to eat, except she prepared special foods that I wanted to eat. I was spoilt and when my father realised that ‘Mama’ has spoilt me, he decided to take me to Ibadan to continue my education at UMC, Oke-Ado.

At  what age was that?
Around seven or eight. But let me tell you something about my grandmother and I, where this bond that was so strong emanated from. After we left the family house at Ijoka, my father built her a four bedroom bungalow at Okesa. On moving into the house, after about two or three days, she placed me on a couch in the sitting room and I slept off. It was early evening.

Then, I woke up with a shout of  ‘snake, snake’ all around me. I wondered what they were talking about and there was my grandmother with a huge stick in her hand and ‘Mama Olomi,’ who was staying with her, also had a big stick in her hand.

They were trying to kill a snake, which was about to strike me where I was lying on the couch; and my grandmother was cursing and cursing in Ijesa language, saying all sorts of things to the snake, that God would not allow the snake to prosper.

She cursed the snake with ‘sonponno,’ she cursed it with ‘lukuluku’ and the end of the day, ‘Mama Olomi’ killed the snake and granny dragged the snake out, poured kerosine on it and burnt it. That was very memorable, although,  I was too young to appreciate the experience. It was when I grew up that I realised that God used my grandmother and ‘Mama Olomi’ to save me.

Also, when I was young, my grandmother used to deal in kolanut and I remember that we used to bring them out of the pod to clean and get them ready for the market. She was trading heavily in Kolanut. I had my cousins then, when we were at the family house at Ijoka, who used to sell things at the nearby motorpark down the road.

I also wanted to join them to sell something because I was always alone when everybody left. So, I cried and told my grandmother that I wanted to follow my cousins to sell kolanut.

So, she would put a few pieces on a small tray and I would follow my cousins to the motorpark to hawk. The first day I went out, I was surprised that within 15 minutes, I had sold everything; somebody just came and bought off everything.

I ran back home and said: ‘Iya Aro, I have sold everything!’ I was so happy. She said, ‘ah! My darling daughter, ‘omo aje’ (child of prosperity); she started praying for me that I would do well in life and would become a very wealthy woman; that I sold all those kolanuts for her? She was very elated. But, to cut a long story short, I would insist to be given another set to go and sell and she would say, ‘you would go tomorrow.’ 

I think I went a few times and it now transpired that later, when my grandmother had died, two people from the family compound now told me that each time I was given kolanut to go and sell, my grandmother, ‘Iya Aro’ would give them money to go and buy everything off my tray, so that I would not stay outside but return home on time. She didn’t want to get into any trouble with my father. So, all the prayers she offered, she engineered everything.

That was really awesome because I had always wanted to be enterprising, right from my youth; I wanted to be enterprising, to make things happen, and I thank God for my grandmother’s life. She is now dead but, she is fondly remembered.

How did your early days experiences prepare you for what you are doing now?
That’s a very interesting question because it is the experiences you have had in life that prepared you. It is not just one thing, it is all of these experiences put together that prepare you. These experiences make your person, your personality, your habits, what you are; throughout life, all of us, we have good moments, we have bad moments and every bad moment had been to prepare us for something.

You learn from your mistakes and I believe that, yes, I have learnt from my mistakes and God had given me the opportunity to re-engineer my life in many ways. Today, I give glory to God, because I am quite happy with the person I am. Of course, it is left to whoever is reading this piece to form an opinion on whether one is doing well or not, whether one is good or bad, but I am very happy with my person.

If you are not happy with your person, you cannot give your best.I am happy with my person because I have had many experiences which have helped me to be a better person.

Do you care to give us one experience and how it has helped you to be the achiever you are today?
It is all about day-to-day living; you have so many experiences that you cannot just begin to place your finger on one or the other. You cannot begin to say this was what happened yesterday, this happened today, but every interaction I have with my fellow human beings has been an experience. For instance, I feel my life is better enriched by having this chat with you.

That in itself is an experience that will count. But, I must tell you one thing, that I always try to look for the good in people. When you tell me that someone is 100 per cent bad, I would say it is not possible because God has made everyone of us with two attributes - good and bad. Individuals now choose which way they want to go; either you want to be good to the society or you want to be bad.

If somebody is so bad, let’s say, 95 per cent bad, I relate with such a person on the five per cent goodness. So, I don’t write off any person. God has made me in such a way that I key into the five per cent. There is no person that is totally bad and there is no person that is totally good. Experiences have taught me that. The vagaries of life have taught me that you can extract goodness from every person.

When you returned to your parents in Ibadan, how did you cope with your father?
You can be sure that he dealt with me. The kinds of prank I used to play with my grandmother, that she would wake me up, bath me, dress me up and give me food to eat, yet I would carry my school bag and wait outside and say I would not go to school.

She would beg me and sing my ‘oriki’ (cognomen) thinking that would help. My father just felt that I was just too spoilt so, he took over. I tried it when I got to Ibadan and he put me in a school. I tried it only once and I was not given a chance to try it again. My father beat the living daylights out of me. He said I should just forget that ‘Iya Aro’ thing; that I was in Ibadan to be disciplined.

At a stage, I wanted to run away but ‘Iya Aro’ promised that if I read up to the university, we would run away together. That encouraged me to continue my education and it was later, after I had grown up, that I realised we were not going anywhere.

Were you at that time thinking of politics?
Like I told you earlier, things happen and progress without you knowing it. I never thought of politics then. But when I was growing up, I tried student unionism but left. As I grew up and politics started coming up, I thought that there is something I could contribute to help the society.

When I articulated it, I showed it to my husband and he said okay. I called my children and we discussed it.

Those who should know, I sought their consent to move forward. Here I am today, by the special grace of God. It is not by anybody’s making but by Him. I will remain grateful to Him and will worship Him for the rest of my life.

How were your secondary school days?
Oh! Queen School, Ede. We started in Ede and later moved over to the Ibadan campus. I loved Ede so much because we moved from Ibadan to Ede by train. I loved the experience so much. Of course, they would have reserved some coaches for the students.

I later became the sports captain of the school. I was involved in athletics. I also engaged in long distance races. All my friends, uptill today, were Queen’s School girls. So many of them.

We know you like playing netball or present day basket ball. We also know that you don’t like football...
I must apologise to you lovers of football. I cannot understand, for the life of me, why 22 grown up men would be running around, chasing one round object. That is what they do and those who love football that is what they enjoy.

But the problem I have in my home is that each time a goal is scored, my husband, in excitement, could carry me up and even throw me on the ground, or anywhere he could. So now, when he is watching football, anytime a goal is scored, I take to my heels.

I now tell him to let me take the children out for a swim or something, so that he can watch his match. By the time we come back home, it is either the team he is supporting has won or lost, and I would have escaped being thrown on the ground.

You have been the deputy governor now for seven years, going to eight. What has been the most difficult challenges?
It’s been an awesome experience. I thank God for all the things I have experienced. I thank God for this experience. I think we have worked hard to make sure that our administration moved the state to a higher level. Challenges? I would not call them so because one has challenges everyday and you work towards overcoming them.

What I would say is that prior to this time, women have been finding it very hard to come into politics. It has been tough. But I think it is a step in the right direction to encourage women now to come into politics. We have a governor here who is doing so much for the women. I believe that at the national level, we can do more for the women. We are now insisting on 30 per cent representation of women in all political positions. I think we can do better in all positions.

In Rwanda, they have done 50 per cent. That is now the benchmark, the Rwandan experience. Even today, we have not done 30 per cent. When you look at the National Assembly, we have about 10 female members of the House and about seven senators. We can do better than that.

How have you coped with being the deputy governor to a man in the last seven years?
Well, I am okay in the sense that I am working with a good man. You must realise that at any point in time, there is going to be one captain in a ship or one pilot in a plane. The Bible also said: “Give unto Ceasar what belongs to him and to God, what belongs to God.” If you cannot be a good follower, you cannot be a good leader.

You must learn how to follow so that you would have had all the experiences that would assist you when you become a leader. The kind of work we do, the governor and the deputy are seen as one office. If you start fighting the person you are working with, you are fighting yourself.

It does not augur well for good governance. We have promised the people of Osun that we will give them good governance. Once in a while, if I have issues, I go and talk to him and he also calls me and talks to me. I believe that God has been faithful and extremely kind to the two of us and the job we are doing.

What should we expect from you after this office?
I know that the good God I serve will do something good for me. I am what you call a workaholic. I have done my best and I believe that God, in his infinite mercies, will show me the direction to go.