 |
| General Olusegun Obasanjo blessing late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole during the Opening of her new house @ Jajo Estate, Ikorodu on August 4, 2011 |
Society woman and philanthropist, Chief
(Mrs.) Adunni Bankole’s
unpublished memoirs granted to your Africa’s number one Celebrity encounter
blog Asabeafrika before her demise
on Saturday January 3rd hours to her second daughter, Zeenat Mopelola’s wedding to her husband Femi Sherifdeen Jato in Lagos, we bring you the tale of how Iyalode Adunni Bankole’s decision to
divorce her husband, Chief Alani Suara Bankole on several occasion and most
persistently in the last five years after her 50th birthday was
halted by elder statesman and former President and Commander-in-Chief the armed
forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Chief
Mathew Okikiolakan Aremu Olusegun Obasanjo.
 |
| The Late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole to Asabeafrika…’I even quote the Holy Bible to my Muslim Husband yet he refused to change from his old self’ |
Alani Bankole and Olusegun Obasanjo are widely seen to be
political foes yet Adunni despite being the last wife of Alani Bankole was able to relate with Chief Obasanjo and even tried to broker
peace between her husband and the elder statesman in her life time. Adunni Bankole’s mother, Princess Gbemisola Lateefat Adesida is
the Iyaolde of Owu kingdom while General Obasanjo is the Balolgun of Owu and the late Adunni is the Yeye Mokun of Owu kingdom. Her iconic heritage with Owu and her relationship with General Obasanjo through her mother saw
to the development of her relationship with the former President going beyond
the boundary of a big uncle to that of a father and a daughter, no wonder General Obasanjo was the father of the
day and the prayer bearer on August 4th 2011 when Adunni Bankole dedicated her new house
(Praise Court) at Jajo Estate, Ikorodu Lagos, South West Nigeria. Now take your
good time, find a good drink alongside your favorite snack as you read the Part
4 of Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole’s unpublished memoir
only on your Africa’s number 1 Celebrity encounter blog Asabeafrika
is a general fact that High Chief Alani
Suara Bankole, politician and business man and the husband of late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole was never
in good term with elder statesman and former President of the Federal Republic
of Nigeria, General Olusegun Obasanjo yet Adunni
was close to the Owu born General on account of their Owu birthright. Does Adunni think this could be one of the
reasons why Alani, her husband
abandoned her?
“For five years, I was in pains,
rigorous pains and I kept going to him and he said ‘stay there. If you leave, I
am going to deal with you’. I would go again ‘Baba, I am not happy, I am going
to die. He would say ‘you wont die, if you die, die in your husband’s house, he
will bury you’. I kept going there, he said ‘you must stay, you must stay’. I
would cry, cry and cry and this elder statesman kept his instruction saying,
‘stay there and die there”
 |
| The late Iyalode Adunni Bankole with Celebrity blogger Gbenga Dan Asabe inside her well furnished bedroom @ Jajo estate during the opening of the house in 2011 |
know I am not a politician” She began and continued with a straight face “General Obasanjo has nothing to do with
anything that happened between me and my husband. General Obasanjo is just a father figure to me; he is a fantastic
man, a very compassionate, elderly wise man, a man who knows everything from
the bottom to the beginning and who understand the undercurrents of the anatomy
of man. I don’t know those people who say bad things about him? I am yet to see
that bad thing in him. But for him (Obasanjo), maybe I would have died. He kept
me in my husband’s house for five years before I finally took the decision to
leave by myself. For five years, I was in pains, rigorous pains and I kept
going to him and he said ‘stay there. If you leave, I am going to deal with
you’. I would go again ‘Baba, I am not happy, I am going to die. He would say
‘you wont die, if you die, die in your husband’s house, he will bury you’. I
kept going there, he said ‘you must stay, you must stay’. I would cry, cry and
cry and this elder statesman kept his instruction saying, ‘stay there and die
there’. So, when I decided to leave, I just told him ‘I am moving o, I just
built a small house in Ikorodu, come and open it for me and he said ‘ok, you
are my daughter, I will open the house for you and he showed up. That is the man
for you. I am very apolitical; I am not someone who will fight you because
someone who is my friend hates you. This (Obasanjo) is somebody I have known
even before I married my husband, a father figure and an uncle so to speak. And
then because they are fighting in politics, I will now fight him? What if they
stop fighting and they go back together, where would I be? And ironically, for
people, the thing about me is that I want to be a tempering factor.
 |
| Late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole sandwiched between Mum, Iyolode Adesida and General Obasanjo during the opening of Adunni Bankole’s Jajo Estate, Ikorodu home on August 4, 2011 |
I don’t
want to fight him because my husband is fighting him, it is politics now, what
am I gaining from anybody fighting? It is not as if the politics has put fifty million naira in my bank account. The man gives me good advice, he lash at
me when I go wrong, he is very stern with me, he is very strict with me, he
doesn’t berates my husband in anyway. He doesn’t have time to talk about my husband;
he doesn’t encourage gossip in anyway. He is just someone who feels that when
you are emotionally disturbed, and you need a support, he gives you. And I am
close to all the members of his family; his wife is a good woman to me and I
feel like a daughter in that house that is all what my closeness to him is all
about. People are just reading unnecessary meanings into it. I don’t just fight
people for no cause. I don’t like fighting people; when I fight, I have a
temperament. I can lose my temper and then the next minute it is gone. I am not
someone who keeps malice; it is not in my nature. My nature does not allow it.
I want to be free with people. I want to love people. I want to contribute to
people’s lives. I want to be a free person. I don’t want to be gagged or
imprisoned”.
“My husband can be described as
someone who takes you to a river and doesn’t care whether you know how to swim
or not. He drops you in the river, if you like float, if you like drawn. I am
glad that I floated and I didn’t sink. But let me tell you, it is not easy. A
lot of time when I counsel people who have problems in their marriages and I
say things to them, they don’t know the compulsion that is driving me”.
 |
| Late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole to Asabeafrika…’It got to a point in the life of my relationship with my husband I had to ask him ‘Why are you running a concentration camp |
Loveless polygamy
very intelligent London School of Journalism trained media expert and businesswoman
told Asabeafrika how she was able to
survive 30 years under the roof of a man she claimed never appreciated the
volume of affection she gave to him in three decades. It is a whole exposure on
polygamy “My own polygamy is a different type of polygamy, even as far as
“Nigeria Polygamy” is involved; in the sense that, it was a loveless type of
polygamy. In our polygamy, the man had extra ordinary rules. And it was a
painful 30 years experience for me. My husband’s polygamy comes from a
different world. It was sacrilege for him to love a woman; he never heard any
soft word or soft touch for the woman. It is a situation where you have to earn
everything even the air you breathe.
and you had to accept to be a nobody to thrive or to meet his pass mark. If you
cross his path in any form, you have long years to pay for your “sins”. Very
long hard years, it was a situation where you had to suffer and smile
compulsorily. It got so bad at once that I had to ask him “why are you running
a concentration camp?” You see in my husband’s case as far as he is concerned,
once you marry him, you are under training. You are in a school that you will
never graduate from as long as he lives.
 |
| Late Chief Mrs. Adunni Bankole, Iyalode of Gbagura and Asoludero of Jajo Land |
friends; he plays his politics so much at home than even in the political
field. He is such a lucky man that he has such a set of kind women and children
that he has. He plays his politics among the women and children that at some
points, he set them against each other. Part of his “training” is that a woman
should live without money, what I am trying to tell you here is that I have
gone through more than a Para-military training. He doesn’t believe in clothing
his women, no birthday gift, and no birthday card. The woman must pay her worth
from nothing even if it means the woman works herself to death. If you are ill,
you are on your own and he has not a kind word to say to any woman. A lot of
his women leave in fear of him, you arouse his anger if you are low and you get
emotional and you probably weep, he never gives gift. So, my type of training
is different and I, exceptionally got in his bad book because of who I am. My
goodwill is infectious and so I had a lot of people around me to his dislike.
Also, I have a “person” in me which he finds very daunting. You can imagine
that all the goodwill I sold out while my dear step son (Dimeji Bankole) was in
office; my moving up and down to the amazement of people, my saying pleasant
things about him faithfully. My many goodwill publications about him all met
with very stiff opposition from him”.
“I have not even lived the kind of
life I deserve to live. I am still not living it. I just pray that God will
give me the grace to live long and live the type of life that I modestly
deserve to live. I have only lived thirty years of fear”.
 |
| The late Iyalode Adunni Bankole & Mum, Iyalode Adesida tend to chalenged kids at Heart of Gold Motherless Home, Surulere. |
Iporo
late Woman of timber and caliber spoke further on the character trait of her
husband “In a life with him, no much for you. By his rules, you should never
have enough. Part of his training for a woman is to give out so little and you
have no right to complain. No brother or sister of yours; or any family members
of yours can claim to have gained anything. They can’t even gain from you not
alone him and he is so vehement in this his belief that I wonder. It wasn’t a
part of me. I grew up in a family where people are cherished and where giving
is free. Where so many things go around and every one wants the other person to
be happy. My husband can be described as someone who takes you to a river and
doesn’t care whether you know how to swim or not. He drops you in the river, if
you like float, if you like drawn. I am glad that I floated and I didn’t sink.
But let me tell you, it is not easy.
 |
| Senator Kola Ogunwale, General Olusegun Obasanjo, late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole and Chief (Mrs.) Basirat Olayinka Ojugbele during the opening of Adunni’s House @ Ikorodu in 2011 |
A lot of time when I counsel people who
have problems in their marriages and I say things to them, they don’t know the
compulsion that is driving me. I tell them to endure but I keep forgetting that
I was even in it for 30 years and some people will say why did you leave? The
thing is, my own thirty years marriage is like a hundred years marriage where
you had so much to go through and you had to leave with it. Thank God for
cosmetic manufacturers; that I go out and make up my face, wear clothes and I
feel happy about it. I went through a lot of things. I was living with a lot of
pains, with a lot of heartbreak, with so many things. Shocks, Pains. I was
working so hard, too hard. I worked till a stage of standstill. I had to or
else you didn’t mean anything to your family. And my husband will forget that
before he married you, you come from a family where some measure is expected of
you. Like in my own peculiar case, my father was not a rich man at all. And I
am his first child; I had a mark to leave as his first child. My husband will
never help you to get up. He just expect you to stay put in there; and
sometimes, with retrospect, I think about it and I say maybe he doesn’t know
that he affects people this way? And for me, at a time, things just broke down
between us because I had to compulsively tell him the truth even when he
abandoned the house and went to Abeokuta, I will send him text. Everything I
said to him was insult as far as he was concerned. I will quote Bible. I did
everything I could to bring him to see things from other people’s perspective”.
“So, part of him being an upright,
honest, hardworking man is that he doesn’t give his wife money to spend. No
pocket money, no luxury, nothing. No clothing. He doesn’t believe he should
cloth a woman. No, he can not go and come back and say ‘I saw this five yard of
lace, go and buy it’. No celebration; Christmas,
Ileya, nothing”
 |
| Late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole with General Olusegun Obasanjo when the later was opeing her new house ‘Praise Court’ @ Jajo Estate Ikorodu on August 4, 2011 |
husband….
asked if her husband had any Christian background that warranted her to quote
Bible verses for him during her crisis with him but she gave Asabeafrika the reason “He is a Muslim
but he claims to read the Bible too. And I was living with it and I knew a lot
of people (wives) that were living like that and were not happy. And I will say
it to him and he will say ‘Adunni, you are the only one that will complain’.
But I said to him, these people are not happy. You know when we (wives) discuss
all these terrible things that he does to us, when he is coming, everybody goes
mum. Me, I will go to him and say ‘Chief, this is how we feel about you,
change’. And I was his enemy because I couldn’t believe that I will go nights
without sleeping. I will pray and wish he changes. Even right now, I am still
praying for him. I pray for him a lot so that he can see clearly and know that
people are in pains because of him. Even you couldn’t relax to your maximum,
you couldn’t unwind, you can not be your real self because everybody is like
you get on stage and act with him. A man who doesn’t have feelings for you at
all, then you now says something, he totally abandons you. He doesn’t care
weather you fair or leave, no emotion, nothing. Before you know it, he is with
another woman. And I feel so happy; people may not know my history and just say
things. But I feel I have passed a huge test in 30 years, it is not a joke”
“I did my best to be faithful to him,
I loved him, and I will do everything for him. I will cook him his best meals,
I treated him like a lord. I did everything but in spites of all that, he
remained his old self. He gets tired of women as they advanced in age. He is
like a child that never gets satisfied when it comes to women issue. He looks
for a fault and pastes it on each one. Every of his old wives that has stayed
with him, if you find out, they have ‘wronged’ him”.
 |
| The late Iyaolde Adunni Bankole with her mother, Princess Gbemi Adesida and friends storms Hearts of Gold Hospices, Surulere for motherless babies. |
My husband gave me N100K for my 50th
birthday
Adunni Bankole clocked 50 years in year
2009, Alani showed up at the
celebration and even had a quote on the event brochure for his youngest wife, Adunni. Asabeafrika
asked if the relationship was already witnessing turbulence at the time but
Adunni’s response showed shone more light on the strength of the matter “He was
there for forty minutes and he still
went around boasting about it, and he gave me hundred thousand naira
after the event. He gave me the money after several weeks, when I kept
pestering him and it is still the same hundred
thousand naira he gave me last year when my father died. That is how much I
used in burying my father”
 |
| The Late Iyalode Adunni Bankole to Asabeafrika….’I gave my husband all the affections in the world but he never returned them to me’ |
did Adunni not anticipate all these
when she met Alanni in 1980? “It is
such an ironical situation because I work hard. Despite the fact that I work
hard due to my parentage people still thought ‘oh, she is getting the cream of
it’. She is enjoying all the man’s wealth. My cousin once came from Abuja and
told me that some one said ‘See o, Dimeji’s step mother is the one taking all
the money, she has all these houses. I don’t have anything in Abuja. I have
never taken a contract. Even during Dimeji’s reign, I can not tell you how much
exchanged hands to the figure. If I tell you it will be too embarrassing. We
were still in training, we had to live without. Some times, during Dimeji’s
reign, I starved”
 |
| The Late Iyalode Adunni Bankole in the midst of the moving tale of her life to Celebrity blogger Gbenga Dan Asabe inside her Lagos appartment |
Yes, Dimeji Bankole gave us a car
but…..
there was a time the rumor went round town that Adunni’s step son Dimeji while
holding forth as the number 4th citizen of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria and Speaker of the Federal House of Representative gave Adunni and other of his father’s wives
a car gift each with a laudable sum of money, so how much did Adunni get and how did she spent it? “Yes,
he gave us a car. That is very true but after the car, nothing. He was so careful;
he didn’t want to offend his father. The man instructed him not to give
anything to us. I was living on a monthly allowance of exactly the same amount
I pay my driver. So, each time I get the allowance, I just gave it to my driver
and I still had my house girls. Feeding
the home, maintaining the home day in day out and I tried and lived with it.
Each time the money comes and I paid my driver, there was nothing more. Exact
figure I was paying my driver” Asabeafrika
asked her to kindly mention the sum but she declined “No, no. it will be
too embarrassing. Let’s leave it that way, it will be too embarrassing”
 |
| The late Chief Mrs. Adunni Bankole some media executives during the opening of her Jajo Estate, Ikorodu home |
I have not lived the kind of life I desire……
at her peculiar situation with her husband it appears to this blog that Adunni was the only rebel among Alani’s wives on account of her
education. She rebelled to get her financial freedom, rebelled to live the kind
of life she desire, but can she proudly say she is now on the verge of living
that life she ever desired? This is her response “I have not even lived the
kind of life I deserve to live. I am still not living it. I just pray that God
will give me the grace to live long and live the type of life that I modestly
deserve to live. I have only lived thirty years of fear”.
 |
| The late Chief Mrs. Adunni Bankole showing care to the motherless babies in company of friends @ the Surulere based Heart of Gold Children Hospices |
it comes to women….
a definition of her fearful life under her husband, Alani’s matrimonial ambience and why the man keeps changing women
like someone changing a foot wear “If anything goes wrong, he will take it out
on you as well as on your children. So, everybody lived according to how he
wants you to live. I did my best to be faithful to him, I loved him, and I will
do everything for him. I will cook him his best meals, I treated him like a
lord. I did everything but in spites of all that, he remained his old self. He
gets tired of women as they advanced in age. He is like a child that never gets
satisfied when it comes to women issue. He looks for a fault and pastes it on
each one. Every of his old wives that has stayed with him, if you find out,
they have “wronged” him. Everybody has wrong him one way or the other, he keeps
wanting another woman; I give myself a pass mark because before me, he marries
wives every two or three years after. He keeps marrying a new wife but in my
own case, I spent thirty years before he decided to go after those grand children
of his that he just married”
 |
| The late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole to Asabeafrika…’In as much as other wives choosed to remain quite in the face of silent pain i choosed to make my husband know the truth that we were not happy’ |
any of his wives….
Adunni’s husband, Alani was a very wealthy man, so what
prompted his stinginess to Adunni? “I
don’t know if my husband has money. All of us only get to read things about him
in the papers; he never shares anything with anyone. So, if he has money, I
don’t know. People often come to us and say, ‘how are you suffering like this
when your husband has all the money?”. Me, I don’t know if he has money.
Because when I married him he didn’t have much money, he was broke. But I still
married him. So, when people started saying ‘ah, he is now rich, he is now
rich, I expected things to change. But it only changed for the worse; he is
training us so that people will know that he didn’t steal any money. You know
he is a very upright man. And he does his business to the letters and keeps his
books. So, part of him being an upright, honest, hardworking man is that he
doesn’t give his wife money to spend. No pocket money, no luxury, nothing. No
clothing. He doesn’t believe he should cloth a woman. No, he can not go and
come back and say ‘I saw this five yard of lace, go and buy it’.
 |
| A father and his Daughter, General Obasanjo pulls up Iyalode Adunni Bankole up while blessing her new home @ Ikorodu in 2011 |
No
celebration; Christmas, Ileya, nothing. It is still like any
other day. No, picnic fees for children, no holiday, nothing. You have to live
a stringent life and you must also be happy. And if you dare complain, you are
in trouble with him and I was in trouble too many times over with him and I
felt that is not the way to live. Not me, maybe it could be okay for some other
people. But me, I try to accept every day I come across with lots of
enthusiasm, so I deserve to be happy. And incidentally, a lot of time, I tied
my happiness to him, if things didn’t come from him, I was always so sad.
 |
| General Olusegun Obasanjo offering elderly prayers for his daughter, Late Chief (Mrs.) Adunni Bankole inside her well furnished bedroom during the opening of her Jajo Estate, Ikorodu home in 2011 |
So, I
started going out and mixing with people. Ironically, people thought I was very
happy. Now, when people see the way I attend to him, they will say ‘ah, in
fact, we admire you. The way you used to look after your husband. Every day at
5pm, anywhere you are, you always say ‘I am going home to make chief’s dinner,
you carried him on your head’. And I was doing all those things; I was too
religious in my love affair to him. We would have bitter quarrels. Because he
will just do things to you and you go to bed and you can not sleep. Then when
we thought things were getting better, the harder side of him came out. So, it
was hard, harder and hardest and I saw no end. I saw no end. I saw no end to
it, we had a turbulent life. I was heavily laden in my heart but I will go out
and be boisterous and keep a cool face. But it was getting too much to
bear.”
 |
| The Late Iyalode Adunni Bankole to Asabeafrika….’I gave my husband all the affections in the world but he never returned them to me’ |
memoir as Alani and Adunni Bankole share their love story “How we met and fell in Love” only on
this blog tomorrow)
