Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, also known as MKO Abiola, was a Nigerian publisher, businessman, and politician. He lived from August 24, 1937, to July 7 1998. In 1988, he was made the ‘Aare Ona Kakanfo’ of the Yoruba land, a title used to describe a top military commander of the Oyo Empire in 1988. He hailed from the Egba clan in Ogun state.
When MKO Abiola ran for president in 1993, Ibrahim Babangida, the military president at the time, annulled the results over claims of fraud and unfairness.
President Muhammadu Buhari presented Abiola with the national honour of Grand Commander of the Order of the Federal Republic (GCFR), which is only given to Nigerian heads of state, posthumously on June 6, 2018, and Nigeria’s Democracy Day was moved to June 12.
Early Life
MKO Abiola was born to Salawu and Suliat Wuraola Abiola in Abeokuta, Ogun State. His mother traded kola nuts, and his father was a produce trader who specialised in cocoa.
As the first of his father’s twenty-third children to survive infancy, Moshood Abiola was given the nickname “Kashimawo,” which means “Let us wait and see.” It was not until he was fifteen that his parents gave him the proper name Moshood.
Abiola received his primary education at African Central School in Abeokuta. As a young boy, he assisted his father in the cocoa trade, but by the end of 1946, his father’s business venture was failing, precipitated by the destruction of a cocoa consignment declared by a produce inspector to be of poor quality and unworthy for export and to be destroyed immediately.
At the age of nine, he started his first business selling firewood gathered in the forest at dawn before school, to support his father and siblings.
At the age of fifteen, Abiola established a band and began playing for food at various ceremonies. Once he was able to demand payment for his performances, Abiola used the cash to pay for his family’s support as well as his secondary education at the Baptist Boys High School in Abeokuta.
Abiola was the editor of the school magazine, The Trumpeter, and Olusegun Obasanjo was deputy editor.
He joined the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons at the age of 19, ostensibly because it had a more robust pan-Nigerian origin than the Action Group led by Obafemi Awolowo.
He was awarded a government scholarship to study at the University of Glasgow in 1960, where he later earned a degree in accountancy and became a chartered accountant. He later joined the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN).
Abiola, As A Family Man
Moshood Abiola married many wives; notable among them are Simbiat Atinuke Shoaga in 1960, Kudirat Olayinka Adeyemi in 1973, Adebisi Olawunmi Oshin in 1974, Doyinsola (Doyin) Abiola Aboaba in 1981, Modupe Onitiri-Abiola and Remi Abiola. He had many children.
Kudirat Abiola (born Kudirat Olayinka Adeyemi), (1951–4 June 1996), was a Nigerian pro-democracy activist. She was assassinated in 1996, while her husband, Moshood Abiola, was detained by the Nigerian government after declaring public support for her husband.
Simbiat Atinuke Abiola was Bashorun Moshood Kashimawo Abiola’s first wife and the mother of five children, including Kola Abiola. She was an industrialist, an entrepreneur, and a devout Muslim.
She was an avid sportswoman who was one of the first women to compete in novelty football matches at Abeokuta Grammar School in 1954. She was the life matron of the now-defunct Moshood Abiola Football Club in Abeokuta, as well as the proprietor of Kakanfo Queens FC in Abeokuta, until her death.
Political Career
Moshood Abiola began his professional career as a bank clerk with Barclays Bank in Ibadan, South-West Nigeria, in 1956.
After two years, he was hired as an executive accounts officer by the Western Region Finance Corporation before moving to Glasgow, Scotland, to further his education. He earned a first-class degree in accounting from Glasgow University, as well as a distinction from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland.
After returning to Nigeria, Abiola worked as a senior accountant at the University of Lagos Teaching Hospital, then at Pfizer, before joining ITT Corporation, where he eventually rose to the position of Vice president, of Africa and the Middle East. Abiola spent much of his time and made the majority of his money in the United States while remaining chairman of the corporation’s Nigerian subsidiary.
Abiola’s political career began when he joined the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC) at the age of 19.
In 1979, the military government kept its word and handed over power to civilians. Abiola, who was already involved in politics, joined the ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in 1980 and was elected the party’s state chairman.
Re-election was held in 1983, and everything appeared to be going well because the re-elected president was from Abiola’s party, and based on the true transition to power in 1979, Abiola was eligible to run for the position of presidential candidate after the re-elected president’s tenure. However, his hopes of becoming president were dashed for the first time in 1983, when a military coup deposed the re-elected president of his party and ended civilian rule in the country.
Abiola’s June 12 Story
After a decade of military rule, General Ibrahim Babangida faced mounting pressure to return Nigeria to democratic rule. Following an aborted initial primary, Abiola ran for the Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential nomination, defeating Ambassador Baba Gana Kingibe and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to secure the SDP presidential nomination ahead of the 12 June 1993 presidential elections.
The election was declared Nigeria’s freest and fairest presidential election by national and international observers, with Abiola even winning in his northern opponent’s home state of Kano. Abiola won in the national capital, Abuja, the military polling stations, and over two-thirds of Nigerian states.
However, the election was annulled by the then Head of state, General Ibrahim Babaginda.
Subsequently, Abiola, declared himself the lawful president of Nigeria in the Epetedo area of Lagos Island in 1994, an area primarily populated by (Yoruba) Lagos Indigenes. He had just returned from a trip to garner international support for his mandate.
Following his declaration as president, he was declared wanted, accused of treason, and arrested on the orders of the military Head of State, General Sani Abacha, who dispatched 200 police vehicles to arrest him.
Moshood Abiola was imprisoned for four years, spending the majority of that time alone with a Bible, a Qur’an, and fourteen guards. Pope John Paul II, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and other prominent human rights advocates lobbied the Nigerian government to free him at that time.
Abiola’s Death
Moshood Abiola died unexpectedly on the day he was to be released from prison, shortly after the death of General Sani Abacha. Abiola passed away while meeting a group of American diplomats in Abuja, including Susan Rice and Thomas Pickering, at a government guesthouse.
Significant evidence of chronic heart disease was discovered during independent autopsies performed and observed by doctors and pathologists from the Nigerian government, the Nigerian Medical Association, Canada, the UK, and the US.
Abiola’s Legacy
The memory of Chief MKO Abiola is honoured both in Nigeria and abroad. The Lagos State Government proclaimed June 12 a public holiday as a result of his passing.
Other states, such as Ogun, Oyo, and Osun, declared June 12 a public holiday in 2018 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the presidential election that was later declared invalid in 1993.
Nigeria continues to observe June 12 as a holiday. In 2019, June 12 was commemorated as Democracy Day, replacing May 29, and it has been like that till today. Remembrance events are arranged across Nigeria.
There have been calls for a presidential posthumous recognition of Moshood Abiola. At the moment, MKO Abiola Stadium and Moshood Abiola Polytechnic in Ogun state are institutions named in his honour. Also in Ojota, Lagos, a 46 feet tall statue was erected in his honour. The statue depicted a smiling Abiola wearing a flowing agbada with his right hand raised showing the sign of peace.