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Media platforms online and offline have been awash with stories and tributes to Chief Alex Olu-Ajayi.
His life and times are actually inspiring, and learning more from those reports by individuals who experienced him in different dimensions is undeniably inspiring still.
I was very happy that I could make time to write a tribute too which I made available online on my platforms. I also spoke to my professional colleagues who have private magazine outfits, such as Mr. Sunday Oyinloye of Green Savannah Diplomatic Cable, Chief Tunde Busari of The Tabloid.Net, Alhaji Lai Gidado of Ebony Herald International Magazine, Madam Evelyn Onyilo of Phenomenal People Magazine, and they all responded positively with Green Savannah Diplomatic Cable beating all of us to it.
Mr Oyinloye got the tribute published even before I posted them on my own platforms. So, it was his publication that I first shared to the widow of the translated High Chief. (Those who leave descendants behind, particularly Royalties, don’t die in Yoruba Land, they only translate, i.e, they change form and keep watching over their descendants from their new realm).
An ever grateful and loving soul, Mummy Àjàyí received it with love and gratitude. In the evening of that day, she sent me the most captivating Tribute of all.
I was very happy that a few facts that I wrote in my Tribute to High Chief Alex-Olu Ajayi are corroborated in the Tribute which his widow sent to me.
It is her own Tribute to her husband. She sent it for my reading pleasure but I consider the story too sweet and so inspiring that I decided to share it with more people.
In the tribute that I wrote, I avoided dates and merely guessed times in a few places but I find enriching, the specificity of dates and times in Mummy Ajayi’s tributes and I am personally noting the dates against the future.
Her Tribute to her husband holds a lot of lessons for younger married and unmarried people, male and female.
A girl found in front of her father’s house will always be better and different from the one found in disco halls. Mummy Ajayi lends credence to this belief by her service to the world through her husband, her children, the Odoba Clan, the Church, and the society at large.
Her Tribute to her husband, High Chief Alex-Olu Ajayi is presented here unedited. The High Chief lived a fulfilled life till the ripe old age of 92, but that notwithstanding, Mummy Àjàyí will surely miss her husband like no other person will, as shown in her Tribute presented here.
May The Lord comfort her and abide with her. She is a love school embodied in a woman’s frame. The world needs her around to inspire more people and families.
The tribute is touching, captivating, emotional and inspiring:
Tribute to Chief Alex Olu Ajayi by Mrs. Adedoyin Olufunmilayo Ajayi.
The Odoba-Ahusi – The great Ajayi’s greater son – Oko Iyaegbe.
He found me at No. 20 Ishaga Road Surulere, my Father’s house (now 18 Ishaga Road) on October 3rd 1960. When he was about to leave that day, he called me by my name and said “I will come back someday to pick you up to be my very own, nitori wipe iwo ni o ma da aso bo mi nigbati mo ba ku.” I was 16, he was 30.
We got married by the Laws of Love on the 3rd of June 1966 and on the 3rd of March 1987 we got married by Laws of Marriage.
A fine Yoruba Speaker, a very fine English Speaker; Foreign to the Language but Master of it. A Latin exponent.
A strict, tough, hard man. He was made for tough, hard, difficult, arduous things and by his touch most difficulties disappeared.
He was marvellous in his ways. He knew so many things about everything. He was blessed with good memory, fantastic memory that led to wisdom. He lived a fulfilled and triumphant life. A highly intelligent man. He never forgot.
Alex Olu Ajayi specially made by God.
He enjoyed reading. Books were his companions. A fine Poet. Author of Selected Poems. He wrote Christian Hymns. Some of his hymns are in the Church of Nigeria Hymn Book.
He loved Ado-Ekiti. He was a gift to Ado-Ekiti and served Ado-Ekiti in many ways to the last. The Aboba of Oke Ewi. The Aboba of All Ado-Ekiti Chiefs.
He was fantastic and marvellous in his academic life. A Great Legend of his lifetime.
Alexander – the Defender of Men. He was always helping others in words and in deed.
‘My Love followed you to the last, lightning fast, turtle slow.’
Departed Love
Departed Love
Departed Never
To Return
I see you in all things, I will be missing you in everything.
Your Wife-Mrs. Adedoyin Olufunmilayo Ajayi