MOSHOOD KASHIMAWO OLAWALE ABIOLA: The reason for the season

Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola (August 24, 1937 –
July 7, 1998), often referred to as M. K. O. Abiola, was a
popular Nigerian Yoruba businessman, publisher, politician
and aristocrat of the Egba clan born in Abeokuta, Ogun
State, Moshood was his father’s twenty-third child but the
first of his father’s children to survive infancy.
MKO showed entrepreneurial talents at a very young age,
at the tender age of nine he started his first business selling
firewood. He would wake up at dawn to go to the forest
and gather firewood, which he would then cart back to town
and sell before going to school, in order to support his old
father and his siblings
He later established a band at age fifteen where he
performed at different functions in return of food. He in the
end came to be acclaimed enough to begin requesting
money for his exhibitions and utilized the cash to uphold
his family and his optional instruction at the Baptist Boys
High School Abeokuta, where he outperformed. He was the
editor of the school magazine The Trumpeter, Olusegun
Obasanjo was deputy editor. At the age of 19 he joined the
National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons apparently
as a result of its container Africanist office, inclining toward
it to the Obafemi Awolowo-led Action Group’s keep focus
on investment and educational advancement for the
Western Region of Nigeria, where the Yoruba were in the
majority.
In 1956 Moshood Abiola started his professional life as
bank clerk with Barclays Bank plc in Ibadan, South-West
Nigeria. After two years he joined the Western Region
Finance Corporation as an executive accounts officer
before leaving for Glasgow, Scotland to pursue his higher
education. In Glasgow he received 1st class in political
economy, commercial law and management accountancy.
He also received a distinction from the Institute of
Chartered Accountants of Scotland. On his return to
Nigeria, he worked as a senior accountant at the University
of Lagos Teaching Hospital, then went onto Pfizer, before
joining the ITT Corporation, where he later rose to the
position of Vice President, Africa and Middle-East of the
whole partnership, which was head-quartered in the United
States. Therefore Moshood Abiola invested a considerable
measure of his time and money in the United States, whilst
holding the post of executive of the corporation’s Nigerian
subsidiary.
Abiola invested heavily in Nigeria and West AfricaHe set
up Abiola Farms, Abiola bookshops, Radio
Communications Nigeria, Wonder bakeries, Concord Press,
Concord Airlines, Summit oil international ltd, Africa Ocean
lines, Habib Bank, Decca W.A. ltd, and Abiola football club.
In addition to these, he also managed to perform his duties
as Chairman of the G15 business council, President of the
Nigerian Stock Exchange, Patron of the Kwame Nkrumah
Foundation.
Moshood Abiola sprang to national and global prominence
as a consequence of his humanitarian exercises. The
Congressional Black Caucus of the United States of
America issued the following tribute to Moshood Abiola
“Because of this man, there is both cause for hope and
certainty that the agony and protests of those who suffer
injustice shall give way to peace and human dignity. The
children of the world shall know the great work of this
extraordinary leader and his fervent mission to right wrong, to
do justice, and to serve mankind. The enemies which imperil
the future of generations to come: poverty, ignorance, disease,
hunger, and racism have each seen effects of the valiant work
of Chief Abiola. Through him and others like him, never again
will freedom rest in the domain of the few. We, the members
of the Congressional Black Caucus salute him this day as a
hero in the global pursuit to preserve the history and the
legacy of the African diaspora”
From 1972 until his death Moshood Abiola had been
conferred with 197 traditional titles by 68 different
communities in Nigeria, in response to the fact that his
financial assistance resulted in the construction of 63
secondary schools, 121 mosques and churches, 41
libraries, 21 water projects in 24 states of Nigeria, and was
grand patron to 149 societies or associations in Nigeria.
Moshood Abiola was twice voted worldwide businessman
of the year, and gained various honorary doctorates from
universities all over the world. In 1987 he was given the
golden key to the city of Washington D.c., and he was
bestowed with an award from the NAACP and the King
center in the USA, and also the International Committee on
Education for Teaching in Paris, around numerous others.
In Nigeria, the Oloye Abiola was made the Aare Ona
Kakanfo of Yorubaland. It is the most noteworthy
chieftancy title accessible to everyday citizens around the
Yoruba, and has just been given by the tribe 14 times in its
history. This basically rendered Abiola the ceremonial
Viceroy of the greater part of his tribespeople. According to
the folklore of the tribe as recounted by the Yoruba elders,
the Aare Ona Kakanfo is expected to die a warrior in the
defense of his nation inorder to prove himself in the eyes of
both the divine and the mortal as having been worthy of his
title.