Princess Adenrele Adeniran-Ogunsanya, grew up under the tutelage of her late father, Otunba Adeniran Ogunsanya who was prominent in the politics of First and Second Republics.
Princess Adenrele Adeniran-Ogunsanya
Okay, lets get a bit personal. You and your father were known to be very close in his life time. Would you say you have realised his dreams for you politically and he would be so proud of you?
I always say to anybody that cares to listen that my father was very good to me. We were too close and he was both father and mother to me as well as my best friend.
When my mother refused to come and live in Nigeria and handed me to him, it was two of us together until he died. He was the one bathing me as a little girl and dressing me up and taking me to everywhere he went, even attending political meetings in the NCNC/Action Group days and I was called his ‘hand-bag’ amongst his friends.
I was little and would usually sing political party slogans in open campaign vehicles with my hair flying in the wind. Indeed, my father was very good to me and his name deserved to be heard.. I can only take it as far as I could. I pray that some of my nephews and nieces, even my children would take if further. I have tried my best. Nobody is perfect. Only God is perfect.
They used to call you your father’s ‘hand-bag’. Would you say this ‘hand-bag’ contains as much as your father would have loved it to contain?
I think I learnt a lot from him and I’m grateful to him because he charted a path for me that brought me this far. So, by and large, I just thank God.. I would like to be more content but I am content.
You had a privileged childhood?
Yes. It was my father and I initially but he got married again but we retained our closeness because he personally took care of me.
I grew up at a wonderful time to have grown up, at the time that there were lots of men who were full of charisma, who were patriotic about their country, who meant well. It was a time when there were ideologies in politics, a time when there were values.
Our house was always a bee-hive of political activities and as a child I had t
he privilege of knowing and even associating with my father’s political cronies of the first republic. In terms of social amenities, there was never a problem. Really, I can count by the fingers the number of times we didn’t have water in our family house in Surulere.
Whenever I go to our house in Surulere even till date, when I turn the tap, water still comes out. And it’s not borehole because we don’t have a borehole. We’ve never had a bore-hole. I tell my kids stories, about how Lagos was, about how much fun it was and they think I’m talking about a different country.
A driver used to pick me up from school, from my primary school and I used to avoid wanting to go with the driver because I wanted to go with my mates in scholars’ bus. And it was clean. There were so many things that are around today that were alien to us in those days. So, I just pray that we get some semblance back. It is true that there is a lot of sophistication around but there is no depth in that sophistication.
Politics has changed. I sang political slogans in the old days as a little girl but nobody would do it now. Little kids would not be allowed into political terrain now because things have changed. No parent would permit that. Then it was safe even though it had its own hazards, but nobody can do it now. It was because it was only my father and I and he took me around.
But this is the first time you are getting involved with any government?
Yes. But I have served in a federal position or a board position and I have been an executive of a party at a national level but I have not served a government before now. I had an opportunity during the 1979-1983 period to serve in government but my father declined, saying I’d not done my apprenticeship.
My father said I had to pay my own dues. He told the gentleman that brought him the news that he should go and bring his own child. He told me that particular person has served him but I haven’t served yet.
Wasn’t that an obstruction?
Well, that was how he felt. He wanted me to achieve things for myself. It’s the same way he felt about going to speak specially for me to be able to get into Queen’s College. He refused. I sat for Common Entrance then and was posted to Methodist Girls High School.
My first choice was Queen’s College. My father clearly refused to go and ‘leg’ for me at Queen’s College. He said he could do it for other children but not for his own child. It’s a principle thing.
But you were too close to him, always sitting next to him and resting your head on his heart…
I’m happy he did it that way. I realised that the way he handled things pertaining to me helped in building my character, it’s part of making me strong and I have no regrets or hang-ups about what he did.
I knew that what he did was right. He said he could do it for others but not for me, that I should make do with what I had. If he was alive, he wouldn’t have lobbied for me politically. He would just have watched me develop and do my own things. He would want me to get anything on merit.
I remember the time your father died, you told me how you used to go and visit him at the mortuary and talk to him until the attendants begged you to stop, that you were making him restless. Why were you doing it then?
He was my best friend. He was the one I always confided in and I thought I could still confide in him. He was my mother and he was my father. We had our differences but it never lasted long. He understood me more than any person. There was a day I was driving and I saw a woman by the road side having a baby. I think the labour caught her on the road and so, I parked and came down to assist the woman in the delivery.
It was a long time and I was very young and somebody ran to my father and told him they saw somebody like me with a woman having a baby by the roadside. My father knew immediately that I was the one because he told them that is the kind of thing I would do. So, my father knew me so well.
When I was going to talk to him at the mortuary, I was just saying my mind. I can’t remember the exact things I was telling him but I can also remember that the gentleman at the mortuary, an old man refused to close my dad’s casket until I came because he said there was no way he would close it without me being there, that I must wash my father’s head. So, he said unless I came and do it, he would not close it.
He used to see me come to the mortuary to talk to my father at the general hospital but on that last day, due to the hold-up I encountered on the way, I was late. Every family member was there to see him for the last time but I was held up and the man stood his ground.
So, did you wash his head?
I did.
But it’s strange, so unimaginable.
(Laughter). Well, I did.
You have other siblings. Are you in good terms with them?
Yes, there’s Adeniran Ogunsanya, Jnr, and others and we have never fought over properties since our father died. None of us has ever fought the other. We might have differences on issues from time to time but we never fought.
You have children and grandchildren?
Yes, I have four kids but I lost one of them, a girl. I have three grandchildren from my eldest son.
By Chioma Gabriel
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