Background
He was born on February 20, 1935, in Abeokuta.
He was born on February 20, 1935, in Abeokuta.
Educated at Olowogbo Methodist School and the elite King’s College, Lagos. After a month’s spell as a teacher he went to Ibadan University College in September 1957 and read history, geography and government for a BA (June 1960).
From May to August 1960, he served as an administrative officer in the Western Nigeria civil service, then joined the army training at the Nigerian Army Depot, Zaria until December 1960 when he was selected for Mons Officer Cadet School, getting his commission in May 1961.
Returning to Nigeria he was posted to the 5th Battalion in Kaduna where he commanded a platoon and ran cadre courses for junior NCOs. He served with the UN mission in the Congo (Zaire) and was promoted fast to second in command of his company.
He returned in June 1962 to the HQ of 2nd Brigade, Apapa, attended an infantry officers training course in the USA and was promoted Deputy Quartermaster General at army HQ in Lagos.
After the January 1966 coup he was briefly posted to Enugu as second in command of the 1st Battalion and later to Benin as commander of the garrison. But he missed front line service, for by the time the Biafran war started in June 1967, he was already Quartermaster General at army headquarters in Lagos, a post he held for almost three years, in the most crucial period of the war when 344 the supply and equipment of the army depended largely on him.
He was transferred to command the Ibadan Garrison in June 1969 and left to do a course at Latimer Joint Services Staff College in 1970, returning to be appointed Military Governor in Western State on April 1, 1971. For the first five months he governed without commissioners and then announced a team of relatively unknown technocrats who had not been involved in the political in-fighting that has dominated the country of the Yorubas in the past. Under his governorship the state has lost its ‘ Wild West” image. He has restored a peaceful atmosphere, tackled the disastrous financial position and has started reorganisation of local government and the status of the chiefs.
No typical soldier, he is the only university graduate among Nigeria’s military governors, yet he has the performance, bearing and austere political style of a military man. Though an arts graduate, he deliberately chose a military career and made his name during the war as an efficient organiser and financial administrator. As Military Governor he has set himself principles and targets which he strives to live by and the determination to cut out the clan infighting that has dominated the West in the past.