IF Chief MKO Abiola had not died, or if he were not incarcerated, his farm enterprises in Nigeria would probably have had no rival today, a senior manager in Abiola’s business household said yesterday.
Shortly after the incarceration of the multi-billionaire businessman-turned politician in 1994, his business empire began to suffer serious setback.
His farm enterprises, dealing in biological products, which are sensitive because of their nature, spread across the North and South of the country, began to fall apart.
Rev. Olumide Oyediji, a top official of Abiola Farms, told The Guardian that the difficulty in gaining access to the chief executive officer of the farm enterprises, while Abiola was in detention, brought untold hardship to the farm businesses.
According to Oyediji, all of Abiola’s enterprises came under suspicion and close watch by the then military government of Gen. Sani Abacha. Major businesses such as Concord Airlines and Concord Press were closely monitored.
Like these and any other of his businesses, “it was not profitable to continue,” he said, adding that they could not raise loan facilities because Abiola could not be reached, even when he was needed to sign cheques.
Visits to some of Abiola’s businesses, including Concord Press, Concord Airlines, Abiola Farms and Wonder Loaf Bakery, among others, showed nothing but faded memories of the once-internationally acclaimed entrepreneur and philanthropist.
The same fate has befallen hisformerly bubbling and golden MKO Abiola Crescent, Ikeja, Lagos, home that was a Mecca of sorts.
However, while many respondents regret the state of Abiola’s once thriving businesses spread across the country, particularly the famed Abiola Farms; others take consolation in the realisation that Abiola’s good works, especially in philanthropy and the supreme sacrifice he gave for Nigeria’s democracy live forever.
Thus, they would want Abiola to be immortalized as a national hero by letting him adorn the national currency.
Oyedeji said that, “one of the mistakes Chief Abiola made was in the sole ownership of his businesses.”
He argued that if other stakeholders, from Nigeria and abroad, particularly foreign organisations, had been involved, the decision of the government to clamp down on Abiola would have touched other co-investors and stakeholders and would probably not have led to the death of those businesses in which they invested.
“Political adversaries terminated Abiola’s ambition, said Oyediji, who observed that, “if Abiola became president, we would not be saying what we are saying now; and if he had not gone into politics or he had been allowed to claim his mandate, he would have been the best farmer in Nigeria or in Africa.”
He listed Abiola farms in some states, including a small farm in Obada Oko in Ogun State, as the Southwest coordinating centre, and for pineapple project.
Elsewhere, the farm sizes were bigger, varying from a few hundreds to thousands of hectares of land.
On the Mambilla plateau in the present-day Taraba State, Oyediji hinted that Abiola Farms got a 5,000- hectare farm dedicated to sunflower, cowpea, maize and upland rice production.
The 2,000 hectares of farm in Lafiagi, Kwara State, was intended for maize, upland rice and cowpea while another 100-hectare expanse of land in pockets of arable places in Etinan, Akwa Ibom, was for oil palm plantation.
In Eggua, Egbado North area of Ogun State, the 1,000-hectare land, originally intended for maize and cowpea, was converted to a farmland where “the first largest African fish farm was to start, but was stalled by Abiola’s imprisonment.
The crop project intended for Eggua was also affected by clay soil and waterlogging of the soil, which made mechanization difficult, particularly the use of soil preparation equipment.
Oyediji disclosed that the 25,000-ton capacity silo built at Lafiagi farm, and bought for about $400,000 in 1988, was meant to store maize for all season for the farm and other farms nearby “so that all growers can send their maize for off-season storage, for human and livestock use.”
For now, he said, nothing is being done at the Lafiagi farm, as the silo is “lying fallow.”
He, however, noted that Kola, Abiola’s first son, is “still interested in revamping the farms and is struggling to get facilities and foreign partners.”
An earlier attempt to get some South African investors did not work, he said, adding, “all pieces of equipment in the farms are still in serviceable conditions, and we are looking forward to partnerships” to revive the farm businesses.
Mrs. Hafsat Abiola-Costello, one of Abiola’s daughters, reflected on the demise of her father and his spirit of giving he left behind.
She said: “It is difficult to isolate one aspect in the life of a man of so many parts. Especially when for his kids, knowledge of his philanthropy — the work for which he was known in his lifetime and remembered beyond it — was acquired almost by osmosis.”
She recalled that her father taught them that by investing in others they were investing in themselves; and in giving, they receive.
Lagos businessman, Mr. Amaechi Kingsley, said: “It is a shame that 13 years after the death of MKO Abiola, there is no national monument in his honour.
“Besides the Polytechnic and Stadium named after him in Ogun State, what else has been paid as tribute to the man who laid down his life for the democracy we are enjoying?”
For Imeh Uka, the greatest beneficiary of Abiola’s struggle is former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
He noted that the campaign to write Abiola’s name in gold had been on the front burner since 1999, when Obasanjo began his first term as president, “yet the beneficiaries of the annulment (of June 12) had remained adamant, reaping where they did not sow.”
Olumide Joshua said Abiola’s spirit would continue to hunt national leaders, who failed to do the right thing.
On the contrary, Yinka Idowu, a Lagos resident, said Abiola deserved the ill treatment being meted to his memory by politicians and associates, “having failed to honour Pa Obafemi Awololo during his lifetime.”
“You see the difference between Awolowo and Abiola years after their death. When Abiola was alive, everybody was praising him; he was the man of the people. But after his death, many things began to unfold.
“For instance, we heard the reason we did not have mobile telecommunications before Obasanjo’s tenure in 1999 was because of Abiola’s misappropriation,” Idowu said.
Shortly after the incarceration of the multi-billionaire businessman-turned politician in 1994, his business empire began to suffer serious setback.
His farm enterprises, dealing in biological products, which are sensitive because of their nature, spread across the North and South of the country, began to fall apart.
Rev. Olumide Oyediji, a top official of Abiola Farms, told The Guardian that the difficulty in gaining access to the chief executive officer of the farm enterprises, while Abiola was in detention, brought untold hardship to the farm businesses.
According to Oyediji, all of Abiola’s enterprises came under suspicion and close watch by the then military government of Gen. Sani Abacha. Major businesses such as Concord Airlines and Concord Press were closely monitored.
Like these and any other of his businesses, “it was not profitable to continue,” he said, adding that they could not raise loan facilities because Abiola could not be reached, even when he was needed to sign cheques.
Visits to some of Abiola’s businesses, including Concord Press, Concord Airlines, Abiola Farms and Wonder Loaf Bakery, among others, showed nothing but faded memories of the once-internationally acclaimed entrepreneur and philanthropist.
The same fate has befallen hisformerly bubbling and golden MKO Abiola Crescent, Ikeja, Lagos, home that was a Mecca of sorts.
However, while many respondents regret the state of Abiola’s once thriving businesses spread across the country, particularly the famed Abiola Farms; others take consolation in the realisation that Abiola’s good works, especially in philanthropy and the supreme sacrifice he gave for Nigeria’s democracy live forever.
Thus, they would want Abiola to be immortalized as a national hero by letting him adorn the national currency.
Oyedeji said that, “one of the mistakes Chief Abiola made was in the sole ownership of his businesses.”
He argued that if other stakeholders, from Nigeria and abroad, particularly foreign organisations, had been involved, the decision of the government to clamp down on Abiola would have touched other co-investors and stakeholders and would probably not have led to the death of those businesses in which they invested.
“Political adversaries terminated Abiola’s ambition, said Oyediji, who observed that, “if Abiola became president, we would not be saying what we are saying now; and if he had not gone into politics or he had been allowed to claim his mandate, he would have been the best farmer in Nigeria or in Africa.”
He listed Abiola farms in some states, including a small farm in Obada Oko in Ogun State, as the Southwest coordinating centre, and for pineapple project.
Elsewhere, the farm sizes were bigger, varying from a few hundreds to thousands of hectares of land.
On the Mambilla plateau in the present-day Taraba State, Oyediji hinted that Abiola Farms got a 5,000- hectare farm dedicated to sunflower, cowpea, maize and upland rice production.
The 2,000 hectares of farm in Lafiagi, Kwara State, was intended for maize, upland rice and cowpea while another 100-hectare expanse of land in pockets of arable places in Etinan, Akwa Ibom, was for oil palm plantation.
In Eggua, Egbado North area of Ogun State, the 1,000-hectare land, originally intended for maize and cowpea, was converted to a farmland where “the first largest African fish farm was to start, but was stalled by Abiola’s imprisonment.
The crop project intended for Eggua was also affected by clay soil and waterlogging of the soil, which made mechanization difficult, particularly the use of soil preparation equipment.
Oyediji disclosed that the 25,000-ton capacity silo built at Lafiagi farm, and bought for about $400,000 in 1988, was meant to store maize for all season for the farm and other farms nearby “so that all growers can send their maize for off-season storage, for human and livestock use.”
For now, he said, nothing is being done at the Lafiagi farm, as the silo is “lying fallow.”
He, however, noted that Kola, Abiola’s first son, is “still interested in revamping the farms and is struggling to get facilities and foreign partners.”
An earlier attempt to get some South African investors did not work, he said, adding, “all pieces of equipment in the farms are still in serviceable conditions, and we are looking forward to partnerships” to revive the farm businesses.
Mrs. Hafsat Abiola-Costello, one of Abiola’s daughters, reflected on the demise of her father and his spirit of giving he left behind.
She said: “It is difficult to isolate one aspect in the life of a man of so many parts. Especially when for his kids, knowledge of his philanthropy — the work for which he was known in his lifetime and remembered beyond it — was acquired almost by osmosis.”
She recalled that her father taught them that by investing in others they were investing in themselves; and in giving, they receive.
Lagos businessman, Mr. Amaechi Kingsley, said: “It is a shame that 13 years after the death of MKO Abiola, there is no national monument in his honour.
“Besides the Polytechnic and Stadium named after him in Ogun State, what else has been paid as tribute to the man who laid down his life for the democracy we are enjoying?”
For Imeh Uka, the greatest beneficiary of Abiola’s struggle is former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
He noted that the campaign to write Abiola’s name in gold had been on the front burner since 1999, when Obasanjo began his first term as president, “yet the beneficiaries of the annulment (of June 12) had remained adamant, reaping where they did not sow.”
Olumide Joshua said Abiola’s spirit would continue to hunt national leaders, who failed to do the right thing.
On the contrary, Yinka Idowu, a Lagos resident, said Abiola deserved the ill treatment being meted to his memory by politicians and associates, “having failed to honour Pa Obafemi Awololo during his lifetime.”
“You see the difference between Awolowo and Abiola years after their death. When Abiola was alive, everybody was praising him; he was the man of the people. But after his death, many things began to unfold.
“For instance, we heard the reason we did not have mobile telecommunications before Obasanjo’s tenure in 1999 was because of Abiola’s misappropriation,” Idowu said.
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