They call him Leading Gentleman.
The meeting had to be squeezed into his very hectic schedule as he prepared for his 80th birthday. He was born on December 31, 1930.
For Dr. Victor Abimbola Olaiya, OON, whose wife also goes by the very coincidental name of Victoria (Victor/Victoria), God Almighty has been kind to him, life has been good to him and he has been good to life.
This would not be an interview that you would be found wanting conducting but the question kept resonating: How do you interview an 80-year-old man who is neither a politician nor a political scientist nor a public office holder on whom venomous vituperations could be heaped regarding the state of the nation.
Victor Olaiya, just a jolly good fellow, a highlife musician of seemingly unsurpassed quality – at least in this clime – would still need to talk.
And, as usual, questions beget answers and answers beget further questions, we set to do the job.
Olaiya came across as a very humble, very lively, yet complex individual.
The complexity of this persona is ingrained in the way he sees life, what life has done for and to him, as well as the simple, nay simplistic approach he adopts to life.
He became a musician by default after his uncle with whom he was living with in Owerri, decided to become despotic with Olaiya’s father’s properties. This led to litigation.
Olaiya, then just 12 years of age was asked:
“So, sorry sir, why would a 12-year- old boy be interested in his father’s estate or property or will? What actually happened?”
The response was a long one.
Then, there was this aspect of a very rich man in Nigeria of those days whose name was Da Rocha and who was in the company of other rich men who wanted to buy a property at Tinubu. Victor Olaiya’s father, Alfred Omolona Olaiya, beat them all to it and this created anxiety: Who the hell is Alfred Omolona Olaiya? They asked.
The building remains a monument and still stands.
According to Olaiya, when asked how much the building cost at that time and what year it was “I cannot recollect. The house is a hundred and something years old now, so, I can’t recollect how much it was sold for.”
But, the anxiety was not just because Olaiya’s father bought a building and beat other Lagos big boys to it, it was the fact that he was not present but gave a blank cheque to his lawyer, the late Taylor, who bided in his absence but only filled in the agreed fee for the house in the cheque.
The interview would be a two-part series.
During the interview, the way he clutched the trumpet demonstrated that here was a man who loved his trade. There were laughter aplenty all through the interview. He also spoke about the ‘Cherikokos,’ to whom he dedicated some tracks.
The second part is as interesting if not more interesting than the first part.
Take, for instance, the following tips coming your way next week:
How many musicians have passed through Dr. Olaiya and who are they?
He almost abandoned music because of one incident: What was it?
He almost lost his life at a point but one kind-hearted Lagosian saved his life: Who was that?
You would be shocked to read about the Greatest thing “I would have loved to do but which I do not see myself achieving.” What would that thing be? It would shock you.
But, enjoy this, yet.
And, to Dr. Victor Abimbola Olaiya, OON, we say, Happy Birthday @ 80, Sir.
Excerpts:
At exactly what age did you start handling the trumpet; not music, but the trumpet?
I started at the age of 16, in 1946.
Just after the Second World War! 16? And, I’m sure that from then on, there would have been no day when you did not engage this trumpet…
Very rarely! I don’t think so!
What led you into trumpeting? How did that contact emerge? Some other people would have loved the drums or some other musical instruments?
I will start by saying that my father, Alfred Omolona Olaiya, was a church organist – African Church Hallelujah in Calabar. He was handling prison contracts there after retiring from the Nigerian Army after the Second World War. My mother – Bathsheba Owolabi Mota’jo, happened to be trading with my grandmother in Calabar.
My mother happened to be the leader of the Yoruba native cultural group, a coincidence of a life time, the two of them met and this accounts for the fact that music naturally runs in the blood of the family and must have inherited it.
I was at African School, Onitsha, on Iweka Road, opposite lawyer Mbanefo’s house. I happened to join the school’s brass band. I had that inclination but the vacancy then was for somebody to play on the B-flat baritone horn; I graduated to the E-flat French horn, but with a B-flat mouth-piece, so, it was easier to graduate to the next level of the B-flat cornet and to the B-flat trumpet.
This was before I came over to Lagos where I played in so many street bands, one of which was the Cocoma which appears to have been replaced now with the Boys Brigade. Then, I was earning a salary of One Shilling and six pence a month.
For some of those who would be reading, what would that translate to in today’s naira?
(Long laughter) I don’t know.
But ,what could that buy for you and how long did it last?
I was using it as pocket money and it lasted a whole month and sometimes more, with a nephew of mine who lived with me, as well as the late Bala Miller, who also lived with me in my father’s house in Tinubu. After Miller’s school certificate days, he would just pick up a job and drop it because of his love for music.
When did you move back to Lagos?
I moved into Lagos in 1946.
Looking back from your days in Calabar to Onitsha through Owerri and then in Lagos, something must have shaped your life in such a way that would have led you straight into music. What would you ascribe it to, apart from your joining the brass band in Onitsha, there must have been one life-changing experience?
I think I fell out with my late uncle,
S. O. Rotibi (Ogunmoroti) who was the administrator of my father’s will – he was my father’s junior brother. By accident, I fell out with him and I had to leave Owerri. I was in a Roman Catholic school in Owerri then but had to leave and move over to Onitsha. But for that disagreement and but for that movement to Onitsha, I wouldn’t have been opportuned to join the school band. My mother gave me free hand and she wouldn’t ask me not to do whatever I wanted to do because she believed that playing music would not lead me astray.
I would say that the sudden and sharp disagreement threw me out of the family compound to Onitsha. I moved to Onitsha in 1942, I was in Standard Two and by 1946, I had moved to Standard Six when I joined the school band.
Sorry, sir, in 1942, you would have been 12 years old, if I’m correct?
Yes, just a small boy then.
So, sorry, sir, why would a 12-year- old boy be interested in his father’s estate or property or Will? What actually happened?
It’s a long story.
Some of my elder brothers who had passed out of King’s College were doing fine and, in fact, one of them, Omolehin Olaiya, who was then working in the Passport Office, was the one who issued the late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe his Nigerian passport with which he travelled abroad in those days.
What year was Dr. Azikiwe given that passport?
Ah! I cannot remember because it wasn’t I who gave him that passport.
Back to the story of how a 12-year- old boy got involved in property matter…
(Laughter) I had big brothers who had sons who were older than me, but they had no option but to call me ‘uncle.’
They were enlightened and had to wrestle the estate from that my uncle through the court. The father of the late JIC Taylor, a former Chief Judge of Lagos State, who was also a lawyer happened to be the lawyer to my father.
We have a building overlooking Tinubu Fountain and it remains a monument.
The building was bought much earlier in the 19th century by my father who was doing well in his bar business where he was selling liquor to soldiers both retired and serving – in Calabar.
That building you are talking about is opposite Bamgbose Street. How much was it sold for to your father at that time?
I cannot recollect.
The house is a hundred and something years old now so I can’t recollect how much it was sold for,
But, let me even tell you what happened when my father wanted Lawyer Taylor to buy the house for him. It was through a bidding process. There were many rich men present at the bidding place and each had come with his money and high hopes that he would buy the house.
What my father did was to sign a blank cheque and sent it to Lawyer Taylor – a blank cheque – with the instruction that he should buy the house for him. He sent the blank cheque through his driver, Baba Laisi, from Calabar to come down and give to Taylor.
There were many rich men there that day and among them was this popular rich man, Da Rocha and a few others.
During the bidding, they were all surprised when the bid kept going up and up and at a point they simply sat back because nobody knew who my father was.
Then, there was a silent conspiracy, as if to say, ‘let’s leave him to keep bidding and we’ll see how he would be able to pay for the house.’ And, you know, thinking that my father or that the man with the name Olaiya would end up coming back to beg them or even resell the property to them, they refused to continue bidding.
And, so, that was how the bell rang and they said Alfred Omolona Olaiya has won the bid and people still continued asking, ‘who is this Alfred Olaiya’?
People like Da Rocha and a host of others who were there were just watching and according to Lawyer Taylor, all that was on their minds was that ‘where would he get the money to pay’?
Suddenly, Lawyer Taylor entered the agreed figure into the checque and handed it over to the auctioneer and again, another round of agitation: ‘where is Olaiya? Who is he’?
And, Taylor told them that he was in Calabar and that was the end of the story and that was how we bought the house.
Who is administering the House or the Estate now?
I am the one, as young as I am now at 80; I am the one administering it.
Going back to the story of the family problem!
My family had money but that my uncle was mismanaging proceeds from that estate because my father had many houses in Calabar, Aba, Owerri, Oron, Oturkpo and Onitsha and, of course, Lagos.
Your father alone or his father or the family?
My father alone! He was a very rich man, very, very rich man.
In terms of my age and involvement in the property, we were all brought to Lagos to come and attend the court proceedings.
I was very young and I wouldn’t know what was happening, my brothers won.
How many children did your father have?
(Laughter) 24 children and I am lucky to be the 21st.
Can’t you see I tried?
After that my uncle lost the case, he just thought it proper to do away with most of us who were living with him in Owerri and that was how my mother sent for me in Onitsha and it was there that I met this fortune called music.
It was in Onitsha that I joined the school band.
But, in late 1946, my mother had to send me back to my brothers in Lagos.
Okay, there were 24 of you from your father; how many have you made, without prejudice to the Yoruba proverb that ‘you do not count children for the owner’?
Well, it is true. But I would have thought that I have 13.
The 13 children are they from Mama alone?
No. They are from my various Cheri Kokos.
Source:vanguard
No comments:
Post a Comment