Victor Olaiya: Trajectory of Nigeria’s birth and decline

By Owei Lakemfa

 A widely held African belief is that there are three
stages in life; when you are born, adulthood and old age which
  presages eternal departure. These are also symbolized by dawn,
afternoon and sunset. Likewise, the life of Victor  Abimbola Olaiya, the
music genius can be broken into three equal segments, neatly characterized into
three thirty-year periods. He was born into colonial Nigeria in  1930 and
witnessed the agitations for independence and aprosperous future.
Thirty years later,  the new country, Nigeria was midwifed.

Olaiya was commissioned to perform at the official
State Banquet to mark that October 1, 1960 Independence Day.  In the next
thirty years, he saw a troubled country seized by soldiers, fight  a
needless and degenerative Civil War in which some two million perished, and the
country firmly under military jackboots. In another three decades, as his sun
set, he also witnessed the sun of his beloved country setting thanks to  a
sick and parasitic political class which plays politics with everything.

Olaiya handled the trumpet the way only  a genius
could, and played Highlife music which rocked the 1950s into the early 1970s
and laid the foundation for subsequent music genres like Juju. The founder and
creator of Afro Beat, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti cut his teeth under him.

Olaiya was a music machine producing one hit after
another. One of them is  ‘Ilu Le’ a narrative of the economic difficulties
  to which the citizens of the new country were being subjected. The
simple, emotive  and highly danceable song was rendered  in two
stanzas in Shakespearian couplet form. The first was about the general 
hardship which all suffered. The second stanza focused on what he analyzed as
the coping strategies of women. He sang in Yoruba that  a gaily dressed
woman would visit  a man and tell him she’d looked everywhere for
him  wondering if nobody ever told him. For Olaiya, this was  a mere
smokescreen for the lady to seek financial bailout.

This highly melodious song with simple and
unforgettable  lyrics, speaks to the heart of the populace. It  was
an early indication   of Olaiya being  a social conscience of
the people. Also embedded in the song is his   lifelong preoccupation
with  women themes.

Another hit “Omo pupa” is a dedication to fair
skinned  ladies. In wooing the lady he tells her: “When I get to London, I
will send you money for ticket.” Obviously a fake promise.

In “Mofe muyan” he sang: “Please tell the lady not to
leave. I have said we came to catch fun. Lady, please don’t leave. I am
child-like…”

The  “Mr. Judge”  song is  rendered as
a  court drama in which he is helpless about the beautiful women
especially those that frequent the Itafaji and Tejuosho markets. He sings in
English: “I say Mr. Judge  show me the way. Before  you talk, I plead
not guilty…All the girls  from Campus Square…E.T. Mensah blow your horn.
Dr. Victor Olaiya blow your horn”

“Tina Mate” is a song wrapped like a  conflict in
a question and answer form. He asks, in any given situation who do you choose;
mother or wife, wife or girlfriend? In “Iyawo Maronu”  the husband tries
to comfort the wife and counsels her not to become belligerent or adversarial
just because they are undergoing  financial challenges. He cautions her
not to become unfaithful as nobody can predict the future” In “Gbemisola” he
uses a female vocalist who praises the husband and pledges her love, 
singing: “If I have riches today, you gave them to me”

Olaiya  loved and respected women but in general,
he tended  to see them in his music more as lubricants of society rather
than engines that move society.

“Iye Jemila” is an hilarious song in Ijebu languge in
which he called  out an imaginary couple, the parents of his heart throb,
Jemila who after collecting some money from him refused to give him her hand in
marriage. He makes an allusion to the Ijebus alleged tendency to counterfeit
money. He and cautioned them: “Human beings are water. They flow cross the
world. If we don’t meet at the source, we’ll meet upstream.”

In “Afrika” which he rendered in English, he lamented
that the continent  is burning and  dying

Singing: “Afrika, so so fight, fight, fight. Afrika so
so war, war ,war. Afrika so so fire, fire fire. Afrika

 so so die, die, die.” He gave examples of the
then war theatres like Congo,  Sudan and  Chad. But in giving
examples of the wars in Angola, Mozambique, Soweto (South Africa) Namibia
and  Zimbabwe, he failed to indicate that they were liberation wars;
necessary wars against colonialism, racism and Apartheid.

Olaiya sang many philosophical songs  employing
the trumpet and many languages  especially Nigerian and Ghanaian.  He
was a well organised person who believed deeply in collectivity.

I was shocked in the late 1980s when I got a
 message from him  seeking an appointment to visit me in the VANGUARD
Newspapers  where I was Labour Editor. I replied that he is a father of my
generation and that he should rather, grant me the honour of visiting him.
During our  meeting  at his hotel,  I discovered he had been
reading my  debate against the Performing Musicians Employers’ Association
Of Nigeria (PMEAN)  being run by non-employers who had tried to drop the
word “Employers” from the organisation’s name  and changed the acronym to
PMAN.

He wanted me to help build another musicians body,
the Nigeria Union of  Musicians (NUM) which is “a forum for bands (and) 
musicians who play an instrument or sing”  He was the President of the NUM
and wanted me in addition,  to assist in getting the Radio, Television and
Theatre Workers Union (RATTAWU) to affiliate the NUM. Olaiya believed in labour
and solidarity and marched at the May Day. During  my visits, he gave me
copies of his records which he autographed.

Nigeria underwent long spells of military misrule with
brutal dictators holding the country in a vile   stranglehold. The
most brutal and kleptocratic  was General Sani Abacha who wanted  to
transform into an ‘elected’ President. For this, he deployed  huge sums
from the looted national treasury. In that season of infamy, Abacha  gave
PMEAN   a billion Naira contract to get all the notable musicians to
perform at  a march to  endorse his be-goggled makeover. The leading
musicians fell over themselves to get to Abuja and perform for evil. Tried as
the organisers could dangling huge sums of money, two musicians  pointedly
rejected the money and refused to join in the chorus of infamy; young Femi
Kuti, and  Olaiya.

Monuments are unlikely to be named after him, but Dr.
Victor Abimbola Olaiya who departed on February 12, 2020 will never be
forgotten.