BAMIDELE ATURU, LIFE IS A JOURNEY NOT A DESTINATION?

Icheoku says fortunately for him he was pulled off the line when he was on top of his game, the ovation loudest and was a well known happened on the Nigerian stage. From birth when we all enter the world to begin this journey called life, until we make our exit through death, everything in between is but rest stops and detours en-route our final valediction. Icheoku maintains that the entire human race, like a hamster on a wheel, is on a race to no where. They are all on a journey with no apparent destination and are intermittently, serially, pulled out from the line as the maker chooses. The number of Bamidele Aturu Esquire has come up in the home-coming roster and his journey has now petered to a stop. Icheoku says RIP Bam.

Like few other Nigerians with conscience who came before him, Bamidele came, Bamidele saw, but regrettably Bamidele did not conquer the many societal ills and decadence pervading Nigeria before he took his final bow; admitted he kept fighting till the very end. Gani Fawehinmi preceded him; likewise Tai Solarin; then there was Beko Ransome Kuti's effort which also failed; Chima Ubani gave it his all but also did not succeed; ditto Ebami Eda Fela Anikulapo Kuti just to mention the prominent VERY FEW. Now Bamidele Aturu has also joined the list of this select few Nigerians who desperately wanted and tirelessly worked to affect change in a polity that considered their breed very threatening and thus frustrated them. Icheoku says all these people shared a common passion - they frowned at the decay that is the Nigerian society and set out to do something about it. 

But unfortunately, it is usually very difficult to lit a candle in a dark, dank and daft society where more than 99.9% of the populace prefer to maintain the status-quo and obstinately refused to be mobilized to help change the society for the better. Icheoku says these humanists did not fail for lack of trying or for not pushing hard enough. No, they failed because a septic society in which they unfortunately found themselves was not ready or willing to change. Instead, they turned against them, branded them radicals and socialists and communists who must be stopped at all cost and thus became very hostile and full-throttled in their resistant to their noble effort. Icheoku says this apathy on the part of greater Nigerians is the primary reason why these few well intention-ed Nigerians, who shouted themselves hoarse for a new order but were ignored, often died unfulfilled, downcast and broken-hearted. This is now the lot of Bamidele Aturu as he joins his fellow past travelers, who traversed through the Nigeria unforgiving terrain, a terrain populated by impervious to change human-beings.

Bamidele Aturu allegedly died from 'fatigue and stress' related health complications? Icheoku have always wondered how so many Nigerians survive the pressure-cooker of an environment that is the Nigerian society? Admitted that some locals might attribute his death to "remote controlled" African magic, but Icheoku is certain that acute 'fatigue and stress' could trigger such convulsive pressure on the human physiology that the heart or even the brain is forced to shut down due to some catastrophic trauma resulting in instant death. A brain aneurysm or arterial blood clot which cuts off blood supply to vital organs, resulting in massive stroke, could also be the culprit in his death? Ebola virus disease also sometimes manifests in similar instant shut down of vital organs resulting in instant death and possibly could also have been implicated in his death? However, Icheoku must move on from all these unhelpful speculations and defer to pathologists' autopsy to uncover the actual and conclusive cause of Bam's death. 

Icheoku says what is done is done and instead of hopelessly moaning Bam's loss, let those still walking the grounds of Nigerian find a way of prolonging their own lives through concerted regular medical check-ups and improved lifestyle; and then in memory of the dead, try to continue the good work he did while he lived. Icheoku says the best way to immortalize Bamidele Aturu is to carry on with the fight and struggle for a just and better society which he lived for and courageously fought for in his quest to enthrone a better, improved and "re-branded" Nigerian society, where the rule of law reigns supreme. By doing this, Bam would not have died in vain and this will go a long way in showing that he died fighting a worthy cause worthy of emulation.

However Icheoku disagrees and rejects Femi Falana's assertion that 'Bamidele Aturu's death is unbelievable' because every mortal was born to die and Bam is a mortal and therefore this needless doubt was mere pandering. Life is but an indeterminate journey, wherein individuals are accordingly plucked out as the maker deems fit and whenever He chooses. Although death at a relatively young age may be 'shocking' to those who do not believe in Rapture's teaching of suddenness of end of life, but for all those others who truly understand that there is no stipulation as to longevity, whenever it happens, it is always acceptable without question as a Divine's will. In other words, waxing philosophically, Icheoku says that there is nothing like "untimely death" or "sudden death" or "death come too early" as with any journey, it ends when it ends, period. This affirms the teachings of Master Jesus when he admonished mourners not to mourn like unbelievers and that they should leave the dead to bury themselves. Translation, let the dead move on and now allowed to rest while the living continues with their own journey, carrying their cross of staying alive until they reach their own end too. 

Icheoku says at least Bam lived and in the process left some imprints on the estate called Nigeria which he called home. Like many real activists, he was born an activist, he was a natural, a streak which manifested very early in his life. Bamidele's first noticeable thunder of activism was way back during his NYSC passing out parade when he refused to shake the hand of a military governor because he represented a military institution that is undemocratic and anti-people. Also Bam's ideas were revolutionary and he had the courage to push them regardless of the pains he suffered or the inconvenience they caused him. Unlike some later day mushroom activists, Bam was not a publicity seeking pretender to human rights activism in Nigeria. No, he was the real deal activist; he was as genuine as it gets and the real-estate of Nigeria attests to that. Whenever there was a noticeable flagrant abuse, he shouted, he litigated, he mobilized and he even marched on the streets in protest, refusing to be intimidated by the tear gases and cudgels of the oppressors of the Nigerian state. He did not do it because it was easy or convenient, he did it because it was the right thing to do and he did it without wavering; neither did he scurry away with tail tucked in between his legs when the heat became unbearably too hot and he did it until the end. His struggle against June 12th annulment and mobilization for restoration of democracy in Nigeria was of general knowledge. 

Like William Shakespeare in Julius Caesar said through Mark Anthony of Brutus, here was was a man, Icheoku says Bamidele Aturu was a human right activist extraordinaire. He was fashioned in the mold of Gani Fawehimni, admitted he was no Gani Fawehimni whose true likeness there is no fellow in the firmament of Nigeria. Bam also added value to law practice and the legal profession in Nigeria with some very insightful legal thoughts which were published in various Law reports as well as Newspapers; wherein he espoused and expressed valid opinions on how certain things could be done and made better, except that he preached to a deaf society which refused to listen. Icheoku says his foremost effort to affect a change in lawyers' garb in Nigeria, stopping lawyers from adorning wig and gown in a very hot climate, was frustrated by the same lawyers he was trying to help, many of who steadfastly believe that without the hood there is no monk; and that the wig and gown makes them different or enable them stand out from the commoners and ordinary Nigerian general populace. 

Icheoku laments that the dress-code which is still fashionable among lawyers in Nigeria has since been discarded in many civilized societies that has freed themselves of this British colonial vestige. A bequeath which makes lawyers' appearance rather 'too solemn and overtly drably encumbered' than advocates of the law, freely prying their trade unfettered by weighty dark gowns and scratching breached horse-hair wigs? The only good news is that such revolutionary idea often takes several eons after their thinker is gone to come to a general acceptance - the reason why some people are said to have been born ahead of their time. Icheoku is hopeful that like many other great ideas in life whose conception were initially resisted, the now departed Bamidele Aturu's questioned desirability of lawyers wearing wig and gown in such a hot climate as Nigeria, will one day come to a head with Nigerian lawyers asking themselves what have they been smoking all these years, garbed like melancholic undertakers? A purveyor of beautiful idea often die without experiencing the beauty of what he propagated come to fruition and Bamidele Aturu will not be an exception. So with Bam now gone, can the rest of us all who are still walking the walk learn to live our lives as if we will someday also die and pray it will be peaceful and less painful. Rest in Peace BAM and may your ideas live long and thrive, Adieu! 7/27/14