THE DEMISE OF A GOOD MAN….TRIBUTE TO DR. OLUYOMBO AWOJOBI. Femi Ojo

Pictures courtesy of Operation Hernia and Innovation Africa and Google

This week on my blog, I am not going to talk about governance or any contemporary political related issues in our polity. I am not going to write or rant about any of the latest sack of some hitherto political associates of Mr. Jonathan that he recently shown the way out and expectedly many of such people will still be booted out before President Jonathan finally goes home to Otuoke from Aso Rock. But I am going to pay tribute to the termination of mortality of one of the Nigeria’s best rural surgeons in person of late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi.

It was on Friday 17^th of April, 2015 that I received a very shocking news first from my wife, Omotoyosi on the demise of one of Nigeria’s best rural surgeons, a global brand, a community man, philanthropist, a great dreamer, a silent achiever, humble human being, a model to many, a great mind and a man that was feared and loved at the same time. “ Femi, Ayo Awojobi’s dad is dead seriously, Jesus!” that was the message I received from my wife who was shocked and wanted me to confirm the sad news. At first, I was confused and I said there could have been a mistake of identity of the personality of the dead, I said Dr. Awojobi could not be dead darling! I was not myself, I asked, where did u hear such a sad news?  My wife replied,”Mr. Bimbo Ojenike wrote that on his BBM”. I left my laptop immediately I heard that, knowing that my very good friend, Bimbo Ojenike does not just write anything on social media for the sake of drawing traffic or unnecessary attention. I was sad and only wished it was not true. Right away, I put a call to my cousin, Kayode Ojo, a very good friend of my brother from another mother, Dr. Ayodele Awojobi ,(one of late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi’s sons) before I could say a word, Kayode said, “bro Femi, Doctor is dead!” I was sad and suddenly, I was drenched with sweats coming out from my body in an office as cold as snow, filled with functioning air-conditions. The news of the demise of Dr. Awojobi, a very good man, a man that many sometime misconcepted was a rude shock to me! Still, I wished someone could just say, the news I just heard was not true, I put a call to my uncle, Mr. Leye Ojo, a man who worked with Dr. Awojobi for more than two decades until he resigned recently from Awojobi Clinic Eruwa. The news was the same and indeed it was a sad day for everyone! 

I am not going into plethora of rhetorics that abound on the person of late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi, a man who was really committed to his calling as a rural surgeon and a great man who gave his numerous patients best and affordable health care in the rural town of Eruwa, 60km away from the city of Ibadan. I have known the late Dr. Awojobi and Indeed the entire Awojobis’ family since my childhood years in Ogbomoso, in Oyo State but I had the rare privilege of working closely with him in July 2000 to sometime in May 2001. In 2000, I was in Eruwa on the invitation of my uncle and his family to come and live with them while I try to work my admission to The Polytechnic Ibadan, Eruwa campus. Unfortunately, all efforts to be admitted to study Mass Communication course failed. I was devastated and was confused, I did not know what to do, my uncle who was working with Dr. Awojobi at the time was also worried and felt concerned and he could read my mind perfectly. One day, my uncle sat me down and advised that while I was waiting for the next admission year, he would advise that, I should find something doing and in the process, I could save some little money in preparation for my study in the tertiary institution. He continued, “Femi if you agree, I will discuss with Dr. Awojobi about you, if he could offer you an employment as a ward-aid assistant in his clinic?” At first, I was not totally convinced, I would want to take such an offer. But somehow reason prevailed and I agreed with the idea. After all, my cousin, Olumayowa Ojo worked in Awojobi’s clinic before he gained admission to study in LAUTECH!

It was on a Sunday evening, that a man rode his motorcycle to my uncle’s house in Eruwa. I was sitting in the living room watching OGTV station, the man knocked at the door, entered and called out “Leye Ojo sorry to disturb you, I remember we need to get so, so, so and so… before we travel to Ibadan tomorrow” to which my uncle said yes sir! They also talked briefly on something else that I cannot remember and Dr. Awojobi left the living room shortly after to mount his bike. As he sat on his bike, he said “Leye that reminds me, let this guy start tomorrow” he was referring to me. That was how I got offer of employment to work in his clinic without writing any application letter. He was a good man! In appreciation my uncle bowed down for him to thank him and I did the same thing.

Working with late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi was a very rare opportunity. He was such a great man, with ideas and lofty dreams. He was very economical in the way he used resources, he hated people wasting resources. Working in Awojobi Clinic Eruwa was inspiring especially to those of us that worked directly with him one way or the other. Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi would always ask one about one’s educational plan and ambition in life. Where necessary, he would offer advice and would not hesitate to connect such fellow to people who could mentor the upcoming but naïve ones. Awojobi Clinic Eruwa itself is a learning place, though the hospital is located in the sleeping rural town of Eruwa but the proprietor of the clinic in person of the late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi through his commitment and great ideas made the place a mecca of sorts because of his many original medical inventions. He was a man of many firsts. He used local materials to make medical equipment and his originality in subjecting foreign medical concepts to the logic of rural medicine in Nigeria made him to be variously honoured and decorated at home and abroad. Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi in many ways represented local originality that has global competitiveness in the medical parlance. The late doctor besides being a medical guru, was politically conscious and many a time he stood to fight for his right. Occasionally he would talk about governance and offered his genuine opinions on government policies. He never hesitated to also demand for his right as a bonafide citizen of Nigeria. He was not a political contractor like many of his mates but he used his genuine enterprise and honest accumulation of resources to develop his community where government at various levels failed to perform to the greatest happiness of the greatest number of the people. The late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi was indifferent to the kind of crass materialism that often converts otherwise respectable men and women into idol worships. For him through his actions, money was important for happiness and good health that it could buy for the rural poor. He used his strategic position, influence and wealth for the majority of rural people by availing them free access to quality health care in Eruwa. I remember vividly that for many years he committed financial resources to maintain the then dilapidated road from Awojobi Junction opposite Eruwa Stadium to his clinic and around the surrounding neighborhood before the local government finally tarred this road. It was to his credit on the account of his influence and importance of his clinic that made the road to finally receive attention from the local government authority. 

Everyone dies but not everyone lived for good history, Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi is not dead for his many innovations, inventions, humanitarian gestures, moral standard and unrepentant believe in genuine rural health care services and many others of his actions and inactions will keep him alive here. His intellectual restiveness and creativity are what neither the passage of time nor the termination of mortality can take away. Indeed, doctor as we all called him, lived a fulfilled man! For my brothers, Mr. Oluyombo Awojobi and Dr. Ayodele Awojobi, rejoice; never be sad, you could not have asked for a better dad! His life is what future medical historians will research on and from his cheap medical solutions to complex problems will contemporary and future medical doctors draw wisdom. His many medical inventions without doubt will not only continue to be medically germane but nascent medical engineers will someday globally celebrate. For mummy Tinu Awojobi, a woman of substance, a co-traveller and confidant of late Dr. Yombo Awojobi, the strength to carry on his ideas and aspirations the good Lord will grant you.  And for the Eruwa community, it is indeed a great loss and when a great tree snaps, the inhabitants of the forest need no town crier to tell them story. As we pay our last respects to late Dr. Oluyombo Awojobi on 15^th May, 2015, here is a hope that posterity will forever say well of him and his good legacies will be carried on by those who will be in charge.