VENERATING A WARLORD AT 70: PROF PHILIP OLUSOLA OLATUNJI

It is customary for some members of the UNILORIN 49+ to call and greet one another as “Warlords”, but I dare say that only a few in the caucus, let alone among outsiders, know the origin of this practice. On a fateful day in January 2001, after a series of negotiations between the authorities of UNILORIN and UNILORIN ASUU, in which Prof. P.O. Olatunji participated as a member of executive under the Chairmanship of Dr Taiwo Oloruntoba-Oju, the then VC, Oba Abdulraheem came across Prof Olatunji on a corridor on the Main campus. The VC looked up at Prof Olatunji and said, “Look at them, the ‘WARLORDS’!” That was at the epic peak of the UNILORIN-ASUU SAGA. Since then, “Warlord” jokingly became the reference to those who pressed on unrelentingly in the defence of a decent university environment in Nigeria. Prof P.O. Olatunji waged the “war” as a leader, as a think-tank member, and as a prayer warrior. He once headed the Editorial Suite of “The Clarion”, the UNILORIN ASUU Newsletter. He was also well known as an understanding husband and heroic father, in addition to being a refined scholar of medicine. I once encountered him on the hospital ward-round alongside a number of medical students. The awe I saw expressed by his students gave the impression of a set of young people eagerly waiting to absorb from a teacher some new knowledge that only the teacher could impart. I saw a set of glowing non-impressionistic restless eyes darting behind the heels of a medicine intellectual who was set to teach, nay, ‘preach’ medicine for the uplifting of man and God. A man of many parts: a great discussant, critic, editor, pastor, ASUU leader, defender of the human rights, dependable friend and brother. I find it hard to fathom how he copes successfully with all of it all. Indeed, a Man of all trades, Master of all. I doff my cap for

Comrade Warlord Professor P.O. Olatunji as he graciously becomes 70, and wish him renewed vigour to spend the rest of the years ahead of him in great bliss. ‘Demola Jolayemi PhD cum laude Professor of English & Digitised Linguistics The Dean, Faculty of Arts …from the creeks of the Niger Delta.