Dr Dipo Fashina is undoubtedly a household name in Nigeria, in relation to the politics of Labour Unionism, especially that of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
There is however an undulating cascadence of that name in its linearity of progressive gradience from “JINGO” of Great Ife’s School of Philosophy to “JINGO” of the more radical nationalist struggle for ASUU and Nigerian Universities survival in the chequered years of military dictatorship in Nigeria, when Gen. Ibrahim Babangida and Gen Sani Abacha ruled Nigeria with iron rods of tyranny, and the Nigerian Universities were caving under their successive jackboots.
That was the time that our legendary “JINGO” was a National Secretary to the rather foxy academic union – ASUU, under the then Dr. Attahiru Jega, now a full Professor of Political Science, former Vice-Chancellor, former National Chairman of INEC, and University Chancellor. Attahiru Jega was an equally radical and vocal political scientist, at Bayero University, Kano. Dr. Jega as ASUU President was a “JINGO” in his consuming spirit and fervour of “Jingoism”. Jega, a practised orator and an unrepentant and courageous Marxist was a vociferous and much beleaguered President of ASUU in the 1990s who led us into a six month ‘war’ of total strike against the dictatorial Abacha-led Federal Government.
The myth of “Jingo-ism” was waxing very strong among our compeers who were students of “Great Ife” in the early 1980s. Even though I didn’t attend Ife Varsity, and, as such, I didn’t get taught by him, the name, Dr. Dipo Fashina, popularly known as “JINGO” was perhaps the most popular among the gallery of benchmark humanities scholars at the University of Ife in those decades of Great Ife’s epochal academic glory. Aspects of his stone attitudes in support of the weak, the lowly, the cheated, and his erudite stature as a Marxist Philosopher and scholar had simulation of influence on us.
As a matter of fact, the strong National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) which was led by Lanre Arogundade of Great Ife as National President in our time as Students’ Union Leaders (in the early 1980s) provided a positive contamination of ideas of Jingoism between Ife students’ leaders and our cohorts in the then OAU, Ado Ekiti students’ union leadership, under the broad umbrella of NANS.
I recall that at many summits of NANS, students’ leaders from Ife would always make footnote references to Jingo’s Philosophical ideologies in their attempt to validate the logic of their contributions to debates on students’ welfare as well as national cum international political and economic relations saga.
Indeed, the spirit of Jingoism was a pervading stroke of honour and candour which we all esteemed to be baptized in.
That spirit of Jingoism, apart from our natural talents of erudition, was an amplifier to the genius of activism that powered our hands and minds to revolt, and to stage a wild cat protest to President Shehu Shagari against America’s Invasion of Grenada in 1983. I recall those moments of our verbal girations when we would speak like Martin Luther King, Wole Soyinka, Jesse Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and other notable orators in world history!
Such was the youthful Intellectual exuberance, though seemingly wobbled, that eventually dilated our active minds to undergo a configuration of the ingenious talents that nurtured the seed of Jingoism in us.
Within my mind frame, as an undergraduate and a student union leader at the then Obafemi Awolowo University, Ado Ekiti, Jingoism was an ideal image and fame that formed a myth of intellectual awe and respect in my young and vibrant mind in the early 1980s. There was no opportune moment of encounter with any crop of “Great Ife” students, in which his name did not reverberate with esteemed adjectives of honour and radicalism.
Indeed those years coincided with the period of our new introductory lectures by a crop of hot intelligentsias from Ife, Ibadan and Lagos Universities. These scholars included Professors Ropo Sekoni, R.O. Atoye, Oyin Ogunba, Omosini, Albert Ashaolu, Olomola, Israel Ojo Adelola, Banji Akintoye, Lokangaka Losambe, theoretical linguist Ekundayo, and many other benchmark humanities scholars who pumped us drunk with the alcohol of radical intellectualism in those undergraduate years …
Thus, in my mental imagination, and myth making process, I had constructed these scholars of philosophy, linguistics, literature, history, sociology, anthropology and psychology as our own “JINGO” in those nostalgic years.
As such, the name “JINGO” became a locus classicus or a portrait of an ideal University wit and esteemed scholar who had the fame of being feared and loved altogether by the students. Even, at times, out of exuberance and exaggerative pomp, some students he didn’t teach would engage narrative plagiarism of his acts, gestures, ideas – just in a way to feign their closeness and identity with him.
However, in 1992 during the prolonged ASUU Strike against the Abacha-led Federal Government, being then a jingoistically bred lecturer Grade I, and a little deified “Jingo” of Ado Ekiti University at that time, I nurtured a vehement departure of ideological conviction against the untoward local politics of our branch ASUU executive. Absolutely, they were brazingly raping our collective intellect in support of their cleverly woven subversion of the then truly renowned scholar Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Peter Bodunrin (of blessed memory). That coincided with the time that our vintage Jingo himself was National Secretary to ASUU, and also the Zonal Coordinator for the Ife/Akure/Ado Ekiti zone of ASUU. Thus, when he came to monitor the planned Strike debates at Ado Ekiti, our vintage Jingo became the unfortunate victim of the fortunate genius of argumentation and radical jingoistic criticism which his image and transcending myth had indirectly helped to nurture in me. I confronted him with iron-block reasons why our local branch of ASUU deserved a wreath of shame for mounting a politics of Intellectual mediocrity, whereby our Chairman fell apart from the erudite V-C’s refusal to make a Senior Lecturer with a bare two published papers hewed from his Howard University’s PhD thesis. Even though, apart from his seeming laziness toward the “publish or perish” University academic act, that Lecturer, so very much like Jingo in aspect, was very cerebral and well respected by his students for his radical lecture notes and ideas in Political Theory.
In that conspiracy of resistance, activated by a dramatic show of my inborn extraordinary courage, I withstood Dr. Fashina’s strength of philosophical and intellectual interventions, on the tripod of our aggregate of reasons to declare our branch Chairman a hypocritical and selfish leader. That was the unfortunate rudeness of a fortunate disciple of Jingoism!
I disagreed to Uncle Jingo’s logic of settlement. Even though he was my idol in my mental and psychic configuration, I eclipsed that feeling with the dark shadows of our grief against the hypocrisy of our branch leadership. But, Oga Jingo felt I was too radical to be pacified. I pitied his dilemma, and my refusal of his diplomacy became an open show of disrespect. I didn’t know that based on my incorrigibility, I would have to grapple with a loss of his affection for a long time … In the unfolding years, I was literally a ‘bad boy’!
But, a couple of months after the Strike, true to our suspicion and grievance, our branch leader accepted a Federal Appointment from the same Abacha-led Government that we ASUU had condemned as “aberrantly dictatorial and corrupt”. With this act of hypocrisy, coupled with the demise of our esteemed scholar, and Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Peter Bodunrin, I began to seriously navigate how I might fulfil my contracted years of University Lectureship with the then Ondo State University, Ado Ekiti and seek a greener pasture for my intellectual fulfilment in a more cosmopolitan intellectual environment.
But, that affront of verbal argument with our mythical hero and Ideologue, Uncle Dipo Fashina, my paternal namesake, I guess, was the first time and a most trenchant beginning of Nelson Fashina’s formation of the ‘bad boy’ image in the psychic metaphors and mind of his hero – the metallic ideologue and the cerebral Jingo, Dr. Dipo Fashina, my paternal and oracular name sake. And that was the making of the hunting monster that mistakenly or erroneously defined me as anti-ASUU! And that hunt was a nightmare that had ironically led me to the mount of fulfilment in my quest to attain the highest point of intellectual development in the University system. Thus, when I applied to the position of Senior Lecturer at OAU, Ile Ife in 1996, that image haunted me, even though I was rated best by the Interview Panel … I had longed to stage a return of the prodigal without a meaningful success until in recent years when the subterfuge became over and flew past the memory of history in Jingo’s mind.
Even in the Jingo years as ASUU National President, the image of a radical Jingo whose surname is the same as mine hunted me at the President Obasanjo’s Aso Rock, in those years of Otunba Fasawe/President Obasanjo-Atiku ruling PDP. Just because I share the same surname with Dr Dipo Fashina, the then ASUU President who was perceived as a monster that was hunting the Obasanjo-Atiku led FG, I lost favour in many opportune places. Most often, some egg heads would ask to know my affiliation with Dr. Dipo Fashina, the troublesome and impeccable ASUU President.
Indeed, he was seen in those high circles as nothing more than a ‘Principality’. Many times, and on many occasions, I would respond with much perplexity, that he’s from Lagos while I’m from Ondo State. It was a complex irony that, even those years that his image was haunting my opportunities to attain political realization in Abuja, Dr. Fashina, the idol of ASUU and Dr. Fashina, the errand surrogate of the Fasawe/Atiku/Obasanjo power fame had been in light and darkness relationship since 1992 over local ASUU problems. Yet, the spirit of Jingoism was haunting me at Abuja. I remember when I sought audience to see the then Minister of Power (name withheld) on a planned business visit. But, when the name and card Dr. N.O. Fashina rebounded on his table, I met brick walls of favour. In fact, everywhere, people taught I was related to Dr. Dipo Fashina.
Thus, to prove that ASUU wasn’t out to subvert that Minister’s interest, I voluntarily came to U.I to speak with our ASUU Exco to support him to become Minister of Education during a Federal Cabinet reshuffle. But, in another twist of fate, the then ASUU U.I with Olu Oni Ola as Secretary turned the table against me. They accused me of lobbying them for a politician’s interest. Well, today, I Bless GOD, all that is history!
Today, I’m the most tranquilized and fulfilled not only because of my 22 years of unshakeable support for ASUU’s positive ideologies in the University of Ibadan, but essentially because Oga Jingo could now, say, “Nelson how are you?” with unfeigned smiles in response to my respectful greetings.
Thus, it is with a fervent mind of gladness, that I wish Uncle Jingo a happy birth anniversary at 73. Sir, I wish you the best of long life, good health and prosperity in greater service to humanity.
Nelson Fasina is a Professor of English at the University of Ibadan, (UI), Ibadan.
