From Iruekpen to Immortality: Stella Obasanjo Among the World’s Great First Ladies By Dikko Falilat Kehinde
From Iruekpen to Immortality: Stella Obasanjo Among the World’s Great First Ladies By Dikko Falilat Kehinde
A lifetime is how twenty years seems, but the name of Stella Obasanjo remains fresh-smelling, a rose whose fragrance lingers after her petals fell. In the Nigerian history garden, where all the flowers have bloomed and withered, hers is the green one, a rose that will not wither. Twenty years ago last October morning in 2005, the memory of her still radiates with elegance, graciousness, and nationalism.
Nigeria has been blessed with great women from the tenacious Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti who fought against colonial injustice, to the fearsome Dora Akunyili who battled against counterfeit drugs with unyielding tenacity, to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala who now looms large on the World Trade Organisation. Between these shining stars rises Stella Abebe Obasanjo, a First Lady whose gentleness did not undermine her strength, whose beauty never overshadowed her wisdom, and whose compassion was unseen but real.
Born on 14 November 1945 in Iruekpen, Edo State, Stella was of noble stock. Her father, Dr Christopher Abebe, was not only the first Nigerian to chair the United Africa Company (UAC), but a man whose sense of dignity and discipline shaped her approach to life. Even at a young age, she was both poised and intelligent, the princess-like grace with the solidity of a leader. Trained at St. Theresa’s College, Ibadan, and later the University of Lagos, she had with her the finish of her heritage and the braveness of her convictions.
When destiny swept her into Aso Rock’s corridors as Nigeria’s First Lady between 1999 and 2005, she bore her crown not as ornament but as a burden of duty. While her husband, President Olusegun Obasanjo, struggled to re-build a democratic Nigeria, Stella honored power. In her Child Care Trust (CCT), she advocated for children with disabilities, for the orphans, and for the world’s forgotten children. Her faith was simple and deep.. every child, regardless, is worthy of dignity, education, and love.
Her compassion was not the quiet pity of the powerful; it was the passionate empathy of a woman who believed that power is worthless if it cannot make a difference. Like America’s Eleanor Roosevelt, who revolutionized the role of First Lady into one of social action, Stella reinvented the office in her own way. She fought against female genital mutilation, spoke out for women’s rights, and became an advocate for inclusion. With her gentle but uncompromising approach, she built bridges where others tended to see barriers.
She was likened to Princess Diana “the People’s Princess” when it came to warmth and humanity. Similar to Diana, Stella had the potential to touch people with politics or good breeding. Both women had their lives cut short in an instant, and nations mourned and questions remained in mid-air. The candle that was burned for others was very quickly put out, but the light that they lit is not extinguishing.
Her premature death in Spain due to a failed cosmetic procedure remains one of the most tragic episodes in Nigeria’s modern history. She was just 59 years old. The news shook the nation like a thunderclap, because she was not just a First Lady, she was a beacon of hope when Nigerians were learning to believe in democracy once again. Her husband, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, once described her life as “a melody that ended too soon but left the echo of love.” Her brother recalled how her tranquility would de-escalate family fights proof that even at home, she was the calm in the storm.
As Argentina’s Eva Perón, or Evita as she came to be known, Stella embodied the loveliness and pain of patriotic sacrifice. Both were adored by the poor, reviled by the elite, and immortalized by history. Like Evita, Stella believed leadership lies in compassion, not competition. Her grace was never divorced from sympathy, she carried both as if they were threads in the same fabric.
If she were alive today, she might have been reassured by the progress of women who followed her on that path — Aisha Buhari’s fight against malnutrition, Oluremi Tinubu’s struggle for empowerment of women, or world icons like Michelle Obama, who redefined motherhood and leadership for an entire generation. We also saw in her the same unyielding passion of Graca Machel of Mozambique, who struggled for children’s rights across Africa. Each of these women, in her own sense, embodies Stella’s belief that power without compassion is hollow.
But Stella’s story, as with the best of literature, is a delight and a caution. She lived beautifully but died too soon, reminding us that life is a delicate petal on the wind. But her legacy and especially the Child Care Trust stays on to keep her ideals alive. The trust continues to assist disabled children so that her vision lasts longer than her voice.
At the 20th-year anniversary in Abeokuta, the mood was poignant. Dignitaries, family, and admirers did not arrive in tears but in gratitude. Her memory, as that of Kenya’s Lucy Kibaki or Ghana’s Rebecca Akufo-Addo, is not in statues or namesakes, but in hearts made to feel and lives elevated.
If Stella could look upon Nigeria today, would she smile at the growing ranks of women breaking the glass ceiling —from Air Force pilot Kafayat Sanni to tech start-up CEO Odunayo Eweniyi? Or recoil at the still-pervasive poverty and inequality she had fought to destroy? Perhaps a little of both. For the nation she loved is yet unfinished much like the roses she adored, still struggling to bloom amidst thorns.
History judges leaders by what they leave behind, but Stella’s monument is a quiet one built in children she saved, in the homes she comforted, and in women she inspired. Her legacy reminds us that greatness isn’t measured by titles, but by gentle care. She did not live in the shadow of her husband’s presidency, but in the light that lit its halls.
As the world remembers her two decades, Stella Abebe Obasanjo’s name stands above world legends women who demonstrated that femininity and power are complementary, that poise need not equal lack of compassion, and that love can be leadership. A rose that blooms even when the gardener’s hands are long gone, her legacy remains.
May this anniversary be more than a day of mourning, but of reflection, an awakening to a nation that is still struggling to break free from inequality and social decay. Stella taught us that service to humanity is the rent we pay for living on earth. And though the candle of her life was brief, its flame still guides many through the night.
Twenty years have gone by, but Stella’s rose still blooms untroubled by time, unburdened by dust, and unquenched by death. Her life was short in years but rich in substance a song, still scented in the memory of a grateful nation.
Dikko Falilat Kehinde
Author, writer and public affairs analyst Writes from Lagos Nigeria
07034484445
Kehindedikko@gmail.com
