A Patriot At 84: Bisi Akande And Educational Development Of Ila-Orangun – By Oyeniyi Akande

INTRODUCTION

As part of the ceremonies to mark his 84th birthday on 16th January, 2023, perhaps it is not out of place to trace a short account of the documented contributions of Chief Bisi Akande to the emergence of public secondary and post-secondary schools in Ila-Orangun and its environs so far.

2. By March 31, 2021, there were about forty (40) public and private secondary schools in Ila-Orangun alone [1]. How many people know or still remember that it wasn’t like that some 50 years ago, say, in 1973–even up to 1979? Do we recall that there was no single private school–primary or secondary– at all and that Ila and its environs had only one public secondary school back then?

3. In 1977, Ila Grammar School and the newly established Igbonnibi High School were the only secondary schools in the entire geographical area then known as Ila District Council–now consisting of Ila (including Ila Central Local Council Development Area), Ifedayo and some parts of Boluwaduro Local Government Councils.

TABLE I: ENROLLMENTS IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS IN ILA-ORANGUN, AS AT JUNE 30, 1977

4. Table I was critically interrogated in my speech at the Prize-giving Day ceremony in Ila Grammar School in 1978. Among other things, my speech observed

i) that even if both Ila Grammar School and Igbonnibi High School admitted their full carrying capacities for the 1977/78 school year, at least 30% of the pupils in Ila-Orangun’s then eighteen (18) primary schools alone–not including those in Oke Ila, Ora and Ila Less City wards–would not have spaces in the available secondary schools;

ii) that, “in a sadly diminishing trend, only 10% of those [expected to be] leaving primary schools in the 1982/83 academic year” could enter secondary schools around Ila; and

iii) that “This prediction means that 90% or an annual average of about 2,000 primary school leavers would have to be neglected to become layabouts and vagabonds” [2].

II. HOW ILA ESCAPED THE FATE MEANT FOR HER

TABLE II: POST-PRIMARY SCHOOLS IN ILA-ORANGUN UP TO 30TH JUNE 1977

TABLE III: POST-PRIMARY SCHOOLS ESTABLISHED IN ILA-ORANGUN 1980-83

Note: “Ila-Orangun” here includes Ila Metropolis and Ila Less City Wards

TABLE IV: PUBLIC POST-PRIMARY SCHOOLS ESTABLISHED IN ILA-ORANGUN AFTER 1983

5. The schools in Tables II–IV above may be grouped into three categories as follows

a) SCHOOLS EXISTING BEFORE CHIEF BISI AKANDE SERVED IN THE GOVERNMENT OF OLD OYO STATE

i) Local Authority Modern School (established January 1955, moribund by 1980s)

ii) Ila Grammar School (established January 1960),

iii) Igbonnibi High School (established September 1977)

b) SCHOOLS ESTABLISHED BY THE OLD OYO STATE GOVERNMENT (1980-83) in which Chief Bisi Akande served, first, as Secretary to the State Government and, later, as Deputy Governor:

 iv) The former L.A Secondary Modern School, Otan Road (established in 1955) was upgraded in 1980 to Agboluaje Grammar School and relocated to Ajaba Road to serve part of Oke Ede and the adjoining new settlements just springing up.

v) Eyindi Grammar School was established on Agbamu Road (1980). Unfortunately, the building contractor (incidentally an Ila indigene) did a shoddy job and later abandoned the site, thus the school failed, and students originally earmarked for it had to be transferred to the College High School, Ora Road

vi) College High School (1980) was established on Ora Road, opposite the Osun State College of Education (OSSCEILA), to serve both the OSSCEILA community as well as the adjoining Iperin neighbourhoods.

vii) Agboluaje Grammar School, Arandun Road (1980) to serve parts of Iperin and Eyindi communities.

viii) Isedo High School, Oyi Aiyegunle Road (1980) to serve Isedo and part of Oke Ede communities (1980)

ix) Kajola High School, Ajaba (1980)

x) Oyi Araromi Community High School, Obasinkin (1980)

xi) Ayegun Community High School, Ayegun (1980)

xii) Abalagemo High School (1980)

xiii) Community High School, Isinmi Olootu (1980)

c) PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS ESTABLISHED BETWEEN 1984 AND 2022

xiv) Ila Technical School (2002/2020):

First started in 2002 by the Bisi Akande administration as governor in Osun State (1999–2003) on the premises of the former temporary campus of OSSCEILA, Ajaba Road. It died when that government left office but was resuscitated in 2020 on the ruins of the defunct Secondary Modern School, Osogbo Road.

xv) St. Julius Grammar School, Isedo (2014) — the former Catholic primary school was upgraded to a secondary school by an ACN/APC Government in Osun State (2011–18) itself generally regarded as an offshoot of Bisi Akande’s earlier Alliance for Democracy administration in the State (1999–83).

6. The above analysis shows that during Bisi Akande’s 4-year sojourn in the Government of Old Oyo State (1979- 83), ten (10) additional public secondary schools were established within Ila-Orangun and its surrounding rural area, not counting those established in other towns within the then Ila Local Government Council, which included today’s Ifedayo and a large part of Boluwaduro Local Government areas.

7. Those new schools provided the much-needed student-carrying capacities to absorb virtually all the pupils who had to transit from the local primary schools. That was what allayed the fears expressed in my 1978 address at Ila Grammar School’s Prize-giving Day concerning non-availability of spaces in the then only two (2) public secondary schools and, thus, Ila-Orangun and its environs were saved from the grim fate meant for them! Together, perhaps thousands of students could have passed through those secondary schools, thus exponentially increasing the human capital capacity development of Ila-Orangun and its environs in the last forty-five (45) years.

III. SCHOOL LOCATIONS AS A TOWN PLANNING TOOL 

8. One very striking phenomenon about the “educational institutions map” of Ila-Orangun is how the early primary schools were located fairly evenly among the various original “Ogbun” (quarters) of the town:

a) St Matthew’s School straddles Isedo and Iperin,

b) St Julius School at Isedo,

c) Seventh Day Adventist School at Oke-Ede,

d) Native Authority School at Eyindi 

e) Baptist School in Oke Ejigbo and 

f) Ansarudeen School at Oke Ola.

Was that arrangement by design or merely accidental?

9. Obviously, the subsequent siting of secondary schools along the various roads leading out of Ila-Orangun seemed deliberate, i.e., to facilitate the spreading of physical socioeconomic development evenly as the town expands into its suburbs.

TABLE V: POST-SECONDARY EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS IN ILA-ORANGUN, 1979-2022

10. Even siting of the public tertiary training institutions in the town has followed the same pattern of deliberately using them to fast-track orderly growth of Ila-Orangun’s suburbs:

i) Osun State College of Education, Ila-Orangun, Ora Road (1979).

ii) Police Mobile Training College Forest Camp, Ila-Orangun, Ora Road (2007)

iii) Federal University of Health Sciences, Ila-Orangun, Oke Ila Road (2021)

IV. CHIEF BISI AKANDE’S RECORDED INVOLVEMENTS IN THE EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF ILA-ORANGUN

11. It is on record that Chief Bisi Akande, as a student in a Grade Three Teachers Training College in 1957/58, was a part of the movement by Ila youths which led to the establishment of Ila Grammar School in January 1960 [3]. As the Secretary of the Ila Electricity Committee, Bisi Akande, in 1976/7, persuaded the Committee to divert the fund already generated by communal self-help to the setting up of Igbonnibi High School after the State Government had taken over the responsibility for providing electricity to Ila-Orangun. Thus, he played noble roles in the establishment of those two early secondary schools in Ila-Orangun.

12. His roles in getting ten (10) other secondary schools established in Ila-Orangun within one single year (1980) has been alluded to earlier in this paper. Ditto for the establishment of a technical school in Ila-Orangun in 2002 when he was the governor of Osun State. It was speculated that Osun Government upgraded St Julius Catholic Primary School, Isedo, to a secondary school in 2014 to honour Bisi Akande because of the school’s nearness to his residence at Ile Obalumo, Isedo.

13. In 1979, the outgoing military government announced the establishment of a campus of the Osun State College of Education, Ilesa at Ila-Orangun. But its eventual take off and upgrading to a full college within two years could be attributed largely to the efforts of Chief Bisi Akande as Secretary to the Oyo State Government (1979–82) [4]. It is an open secret that the Federal University of Health Sciences, Ila-Orangun was established in 2021 by the Federal Government to personally honour Chief Bisi Akande by President Mohammadu Buhari who deeply appreciated the roles Akande, as the founding chairman of All Progressives Congress (APC), had played in bringing his government into office.

V. CONCLUSION

14. While we all rejoice at and proudly celebrate Chief Bisi Akande’s numerous well-deserved honours conferred on him nationally, it should not be forgotten that his charity actually began from home, that he himself sees “every politics as being local” and has, thus, devoted a lot of his time, talent and other resources to the emancipation of Ila-Orangun from ignorance, economic backwardness, etc., especially by promoting necessary human resources development through education. For instance, in its wake, the presence of OSSCEILA led to the establishment of private schools, the numbers of which stood at sixty-six (66) primary and thirty (30)secondary schools as at March 31, 2022 [1].

15. As a schoolboy, he was a member of the Boys Scout Movement and he seems to have internalised its motto, “Always be prepared”, so much so that he has often indulged in FORWARD PLANNING as exemplified by Table 1 in this paper–researching into the primary school enrolments at Ila-Orangun in 1976/77 and trying to forecast and prepare for how those pupils could transit to higher levels of education. So, when he had the opportunity as a cabinet member of the Bola Ige Administration in Old Oyo State (1979–83), he was not caught unawares but really optimised that position to tackle the hitherto bleak future of our community due to the gross lack of secondary school placements for children in Ila-Orangun and its environs.

16. To celebrate his 84th birthday ceremony, this short piece has specifically attempted to highlight his contributions to the rather revolutionary educational development of Ila-Orangun and its environs. And, as can be logically concluded, Chief Bisi Akande’s lasting impact on the educational advancement of Ila-Orangun and its environs is inestimable.

Oyeniyi AKANDE

REFERENCES

1. Akande, O. (2022), The Chronicle of Activities Towards Upgrading Osun State College of Education, Ila-Orangun to a University: 2013 to 2022, page ix

2. Akande, O. (1978) ed., “Towards equal access to Education: speech delivered at the 1978 Prize-giving Day of Ila Grammar School, Ila-Orangun” in Akande, O. (1978) ed., Essentials for Rural Development–Proceedings of the symposium on Problems, Prospects and Strategies of Rural Development in Nigeria: an example of Ila-Orangun, Oyo State held on 25 February 1978 organised by Ila Grammar School Old Students’ Association, pp. 128- 134.

3. Akande, A. B. (2010), “Congratulations, Ila Grammar School at 50: a Goodwill Message” in Akande, O (2010) ed., We Started Great: Reminiscences on Ila Grammar School, Ila-Orangun, Nigeria (1960- 2010) published by Ila Grammar School Old Students’ Association, pp.10- 12

4. Akande, A. B. (2014), “Foreword” to Osun State College of Education, Ila-Orangun (1979–2014): a celebration of thirty-five years of exploits and landmark achievements–published by the College, pp. vii-viii