My earliest memories of late Baba Lamidi Adedibu were not formed from newspapers, political science books, or documentary archives. They were formed from whispers, the kind of whispers adults lower their voices to make. I was still a teenager then, growing up in Ibadan, listening more than I spoke, observing more than I understood. And in those years, one name travelled through streets, motor parks, beer parlours, and living rooms with equal weight, Adedibu.

However, it was never just “Adedibu.” It was always said with an adjective attached. “Fearful warlord”. “Strongman!” The one who dictates Oyo politics from Ibadan. The way people spoke about him carried both awe and caution, like they were describing a storm you respect but pray never meets you on the road.

Even among politically aware adults, kindness was not the dominant tone when his name came up. Some spoke with admiration for his power; others with quiet resentment. But nobody spoke with indifference. As a teenager, I didn’t yet grasp the full mechanics of godfatherism, patronage, or electoral machinery, but I understood influence. I understood fear. And from the way his name moved conversations, I knew this was a man whose shadow was longer than his physical presence. Then came the moment that sealed my early perception.

I remember watching a television interview of him, one of those rare sit-down conversations where he spoke candidly about himself. In that interview, Adedibu described himself, half-jokingly yet firmly, as a “troublesome man,” adding that being troublesome was an attribute of Ibadan people, a reflection of their boldness, their refusal to be subdued. As a teenager, that statement did something to me. It hardened the image I already had,a self-aware political warlord, proud of his disruptive strength, unbothered by elite approval. In my young mind, the picture was complete. Adedibu was power without apology. Influence without refinement. Fear without disguise.

However, growing up has a way of complicating childhood conclusions. As I got older, studying politics, covering public affairs, listening to deeper historical accounts,  I began to encounter layers of Lamidi Adedibu that teenage whispers never captured. I started hearing stories not just of the strongman, but of the strategist. Not just of the warlord, but of the grassroots organiser. Not just of the feared, but of the fed, the man who provided food, money, and shelter to countless loyalists and ordinary residents.

Gradually, my understanding shifted from myth to structure. I learnt that late Baba Lamidi Adedibu, born in 1927 in Ibadan, was not an accidental political force. His journey cut across Nigeria’s evolving political eras, from pre-independence movements to post-military democracy. He built influence not through elective office but through networks, ward leaders, party agents, community loyalists. His Molete residence became a political pilgrimage site where ambitions were either blessed or buried.

He was instrumental in shaping party dominance in Oyo State, particularly during the early Fourth Republic. Presidents, governors, senators, many of the current political actors owed their political pathways to his singular endorsement. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo himself acknowledged Adedibu’s role in consolidating PDP’s electoral victories in the South-West, especially in 2003. Love him or hate him, his fingerprints were on the ballot outcomes that shaped Oyo’s governance.

This is why, when the Oyo @ 50 honours list was released and his name was missing, the backlash did not surprise me. Because if anniversaries are about telling the story of a people, then omission becomes interpretation. And interpretation invites contest. Supporters of Adedibu argue strongly that you cannot chronicle Oyo’s democratic journey without dedicating a chapter to him. They point to his grassroots mobilisation machinery, his ability to translate street sentiment into electoral numbers, his role in producing political office holders, and his philanthropic reputation among the urban poor. To them, honouring him is not glorifying controversy; it is acknowledging influence.

However, even as I recognise these arguments, I cannot ignore the weight of the opposing view because Adedibu’s legacy is not one that sits comfortably in unanimous celebration. For many critics, Lamidi Adedibu represents the institutionalisation of godfatherism, a system where political loyalty flowed upward to individuals rather than outward to democratic institutions. His patronage structure, though socially supportive to followers, is seen by reformists as politically corrosive, encouraging dependency over ideological politics.

There were also long-standing allegations of strong-arm tactics within his political operations, the use of enforcers, intimidation, and electoral pressure. Whether every accusation was proven is almost secondary to the public image they created. To a generation pushing for cleaner democratic processes, honouring Adedibu risks appearing like a celebration of the very political culture they seek to dismantle. And so, I try to imagine the deliberations of an awards committee sitting over that honours list.

They were likely not debating whether Adedibu was influential that would be indisputable. They were probably debating symbolism. What does Oyo @ 50 want to project? Institutional progress or raw political power? Consensus figures or polarising giants? Developmental technocrats or grassroots political enforcers?

Anniversary honours are not just historical, they are aspirational. They reflect the future a state wants to signal, not just the past it inherited. In that sense, the committee may have viewed Adedibu as too controversial a symbol for a unifying commemorative platform. However, the more I reflect, the more I return to my teenage memories, to those fearful whispers, to that TV interview where he owned his “troublesome” identity. Because history is rarely built by gentle men alone.

We should know this that Baba Adedibu was not universally loved. He was not institutionally polished. He was not controversy-free. But he was consequential. He shaped political outcomes, leadership trajectories, and grassroots engagement in ways that still echo in Oyo today.

So when I ask myself, does he deserve to be on the Oyo @ 50 honours list? my answer is layered. If the award is about moral spotless legacies, the hesitation is understandable. But if it is about historical weight about those who bent the political climate of their time then leaving Adedibu out feels like telling Oyo’s story with a missing chapter. Now, as I have grown from that teenager who saw him only as a fearful warlord, I now see him as something more complicated, a political architect forged in a rough democratic era admired by many, rejected by others, but impossible to erase.

Baba Adedibu’s legacy will always divide opinion, that much is certain. Honour him or not, he remains one of the men who shaped Ibadan, and by extension Oyo, into the political landscape we know today. Yet, in judging his omission, we must also attempt to understand the mindset of the Oyo @ 50 awards committee. Commemorations are as much about the future a society wants to project as they are about the past it remembers. Their decision, whether one agrees with it or not, reflects a particular vision of history, one that prioritises certain values over others. And perhaps, in that tension between impact and symbolism, lies the real story of why Lamidi Adedibu’s name continues to command conversation, even in absence.

 Ogungbile Emmanuel Oludotun writes for Oyo Affairs

My earliest memories of late Baba Lamidi Adedibu were not formed from newspapers, political science books, or documentary archives. They were formed from whispers, the kind of whispers adults lower their voices to make. I was still a teenager then, growing up in Ibadan, listening more than I spoke, observing more than I understood. And in those years, one name travelled through streets, motor parks, beer parlours, and living rooms with equal weight, Adedibu.

However, it was never just “Adedibu.” It was always said with an adjective attached. “Fearful warlord”. “Strongman!” The one who dictates Oyo politics from Ibadan. The way people spoke about him carried both awe and caution, like they were describing a storm you respect but pray never meets you on the road.

Even among politically aware adults, kindness was not the dominant tone when his name came up. Some spoke with admiration for his power; others with quiet resentment. But nobody spoke with indifference. As a teenager, I didn’t yet grasp the full mechanics of godfatherism, patronage, or electoral machinery, but I understood influence. I understood fear. And from the way his name moved conversations, I knew this was a man whose shadow was longer than his physical presence. Then came the moment that sealed my early perception.

I remember watching a television interview of him, one of those rare sit-down conversations where he spoke candidly about himself. In that interview, Adedibu described himself, half-jokingly yet firmly, as a “troublesome man,” adding that being troublesome was an attribute of Ibadan people, a reflection of their boldness, their refusal to be subdued. As a teenager, that statement did something to me. It hardened the image I already had,a self-aware political warlord, proud of his disruptive strength, unbothered by elite approval. In my young mind, the picture was complete. Adedibu was power without apology. Influence without refinement. Fear without disguise.

However, growing up has a way of complicating childhood conclusions. As I got older, studying politics, covering public affairs, listening to deeper historical accounts,  I began to encounter layers of Lamidi Adedibu that teenage whispers never captured. I started hearing stories not just of the strongman, but of the strategist. Not just of the warlord, but of the grassroots organiser. Not just of the feared, but of the fed, the man who provided food, money, and shelter to countless loyalists and ordinary residents.

Gradually, my understanding shifted from myth to structure. I learnt that late Baba Lamidi Adedibu, born in 1927 in Ibadan, was not an accidental political force. His journey cut across Nigeria’s evolving political eras, from pre-independence movements to post-military democracy. He built influence not through elective office but through networks, ward leaders, party agents, community loyalists. His Molete residence became a political pilgrimage site where ambitions were either blessed or buried.

He was instrumental in shaping party dominance in Oyo State, particularly during the early Fourth Republic. Presidents, governors, senators, many of the current political actors owed their political pathways to his singular endorsement. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo himself acknowledged Adedibu’s role in consolidating PDP’s electoral victories in the South-West, especially in 2003. Love him or hate him, his fingerprints were on the ballot outcomes that shaped Oyo’s governance.

This is why, when the Oyo @ 50 honours list was released and his name was missing, the backlash did not surprise me. Because if anniversaries are about telling the story of a people, then omission becomes interpretation. And interpretation invites contest. Supporters of Adedibu argue strongly that you cannot chronicle Oyo’s democratic journey without dedicating a chapter to him. They point to his grassroots mobilisation machinery, his ability to translate street sentiment into electoral numbers, his role in producing political office holders, and his philanthropic reputation among the urban poor. To them, honouring him is not glorifying controversy; it is acknowledging influence.

However, even as I recognise these arguments, I cannot ignore the weight of the opposing view because Adedibu’s legacy is not one that sits comfortably in unanimous celebration. For many critics, Lamidi Adedibu represents the institutionalisation of godfatherism, a system where political loyalty flowed upward to individuals rather than outward to democratic institutions. His patronage structure, though socially supportive to followers, is seen by reformists as politically corrosive, encouraging dependency over ideological politics.

There were also long-standing allegations of strong-arm tactics within his political operations, the use of enforcers, intimidation, and electoral pressure. Whether every accusation was proven is almost secondary to the public image they created. To a generation pushing for cleaner democratic processes, honouring Adedibu risks appearing like a celebration of the very political culture they seek to dismantle. And so, I try to imagine the deliberations of an awards committee sitting over that honours list.

They were likely not debating whether Adedibu was influential that would be indisputable. They were probably debating symbolism. What does Oyo @ 50 want to project? Institutional progress or raw political power? Consensus figures or polarising giants? Developmental technocrats or grassroots political enforcers?

Anniversary honours are not just historical, they are aspirational. They reflect the future a state wants to signal, not just the past it inherited. In that sense, the committee may have viewed Adedibu as too controversial a symbol for a unifying commemorative platform. However, the more I reflect, the more I return to my teenage memories, to those fearful whispers, to that TV interview where he owned his “troublesome” identity. Because history is rarely built by gentle men alone.

We should know this that Baba Adedibu was not universally loved. He was not institutionally polished. He was not controversy-free. But he was consequential. He shaped political outcomes, leadership trajectories, and grassroots engagement in ways that still echo in Oyo today.

So when I ask myself, does he deserve to be on the Oyo @ 50 honours list? my answer is layered. If the award is about moral spotless legacies, the hesitation is understandable. But if it is about historical weight about those who bent the political climate of their time then leaving Adedibu out feels like telling Oyo’s story with a missing chapter. Now, as I have grown from that teenager who saw him only as a fearful warlord, I now see him as something more complicated, a political architect forged in a rough democratic era admired by many, rejected by others, but impossible to erase.

Baba Adedibu’s legacy will always divide opinion, that much is certain. Honour him or not, he remains one of the men who shaped Ibadan, and by extension Oyo, into the political landscape we know today. Yet, in judging his omission, we must also attempt to understand the mindset of the Oyo @ 50 awards committee. Commemorations are as much about the future a society wants to project as they are about the past it remembers. Their decision, whether one agrees with it or not, reflects a particular vision of history, one that prioritises certain values over others. And perhaps, in that tension between impact and symbolism, lies the real story of why Lamidi Adedibu’s name continues to command conversation, even in absence.

 Ogungbile Emmanuel Oludotun writes for Oyo Affairs