Gani Adams: OPC protect the Yoruba land from Broko Haram

Chief Gani Adams

Chief Gani Adams, national coordinator of the Odua Peoples Congress (OPC), was asked this question:
THE founder of OPC, Dr. Fredrick Fasehun as founded a political party called Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN). Where does Gani Adams belong?
his response:
Let me correct that impression, nine people founded OPC. So, Dr. Fasehun is not the founder of OPC. If you want us to put the record straight, OPC is a unique organisation that anybody cannot say he is the founder of. It is spiritual. The progenitor, father and ancestor of Oduduwa; of Yoruba race, is God. So, if you wants to talk about the founder, first, you ascribe it to God and then, the progenitors. Maybe that was one of the problems Dr Faseun has that is affecting him, because you are rubbing shoulder with the spirits.
Of Oduduwa Progressive Union now, I can easily say I’m the founder because I brought the name, almost everything that started the organisation was brought by me. But I couldn’t bring myself to say that I am the founder. Instead of that, I took the title of convener and I told them that you are autonomous on the basis of running the organisation, but the coordination comes from us. We will just guide you. I am a citizen of Nigeria; when I visit you, the homeland must coordinate what they are doing, so that you will not deviate from the aims and objectives of the organisation.
And at the same time, when you want to talk about the protocol of founder, you can say you are a founder of a church. If you are a spiritual leader, you gave the church a name alone, built it alone, did almost 80 per cent of the starting point alone, you can call yourself the founder of the church. For example, I call myself founder of Gani Adams Foundation which I registered about six years ago. It is my name. So, I call myself founder.
When there was this reconciliation move by former Governor Gbenga Daniel in 2005, we observed it. The governor asked me what the problem was and I told him that this old man must not call himself the founder. Nine of us started it together at 110, Palm Avenue on the 25 August, 1994. At 3.30 p.m., we started the meeting and ended it at 5.30 p.m. We suggested two names, Oduduwa National Congress, Oduduwa People Congress. Tony Ngrube as an Ijaw man was the one that even brought the initiative of this organisation, not Dr Fasehun. We suggested that he should be the convener. But when the crisis started, he realised that about 96 per cent nominated me as the national president and he saw a situation that nobody nominated him as national president. So, he asked the media to write on that, and that was how it started. There was no document, photograph or convention that shows that we made you the founder. If it was done, it is a serious error on the organisation, but it was not done. He called himself founder because he wanted to put himself ahead of everybody.
You talked about UPN as a political organisation, which is partisan, OPC is not a partisan organisation. So, there is no way you can mix a partisan organisation with a non-partisan organistion. If I want to go into a partisan organisation, I have to drop the membership of OPC. If not because of OPC, Boko Harram would have overrun Yorubaland. Psychologically, the existence of OPC is a threat to different groups that are aggressive about Yoruba interests.
The initial name we meant for the OPC was from Faseun, but sometimes, we keep silent when he speaks, because as an elderly man, the age difference is too wide; intellectual wise, he is more learned than I am. He is a medical doctor; even though I’m building myself gradually.
So, we are being careful. Sometimes, he draws us to a media battle, which we will never surrender. If you surrender a media battle, you are dead. Not physically, but spiritually. Anything people write about you will affect your generation. When the issue of pipeline policing started, we decided to keep quiet until he drew us to the media battle which we had to respond to because if you keep quite when he is lying, people will believe him and the old man is perfect in lying. When he wants to lie, he removes his cap so that people can see his gray hair. We are not involved in UPN, but we believe in the ideology of UPN when it was still alive through Chief Obafemi Awolowo.