Lagos deputy gov. leads condolence team to the Jafojos

He attended Alafia Institute, Ibadan and Christ High School, Ilubinrin, Lagos, where he wrote the West African School Certificate Examination and passed with flying colours. He began his working career in 1959 as a Building Inspector with the Ikeja Town Planning Authority, but left for England In 1961; his bosom friend Chief Ayo Otegbola was with him on the trip.

Three years later, he gained admission into Hackney Technical College, England to study Building Engineering. After obtaining a National Certificate in 1966, he moved to Brixon School of Engineering, where he graduated with a Higher National Certificate in Building. Due to his thirst for further education, in 1969, he proceeded to the Northern Polytechnic, Holloway (now University of North) London, where he bagged an Advanced Certificate in Building Technology a year later.

While in England, Chief Jafojo was a student-activist; he was a member of the West African Students Union. It was from here he honed his skills in partisan politics. Upon his return to Nigeria, unsurprisingly, he pitched tent with the Egbe Afenifere.

Indeed, Baba wanted to practise his profession, but his people, the Awori thought differently. The Awori Welfare Association had discovered his political qualities and prevailed on him to change his mind, saying he would be of more political use to them than in any other area. It turned out that they were right. And thus Pa Jafojo bowed to the wishes of his people.

He took off by mobilising and encouraging the Awori to be politically conscious. Between 1975 and 1977, he was elected a councillor in Ikeja Local Government and later became chairman, General Purpose Committee. His contemporary is Oba Isheri Olofin, Oba Wahab Balogun.

In 1978, when the army prepared to return the country to political rule, Pa Jafojo joined the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), whose founder/national leader was the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo. His ambition was to be a lawmaker. To achieve this, he collected a form to represent his Agege Constituency in the State House of Assembly. This was not to be as mother luck smiled on him; the late sage Chief Awolowo encouraged him to join the then governorship candidate Alhaji Lateef Jakande as his running mate. The joint ticket worked; they won the election.

Thus on October I, 1979, Chief Jafojo, alongside Alhaji Jakande was sworn in as the first democratically elected Deputy Governor of Lagos.

The event was historic because at 44 years, Chief Jafojo also became the first Awori to occupy the exalted number two-seat in the state.

After their very successful term, they were re-elected. But just three months later, the Army struck and their government was sacked.