Obafemi Awolowo

Chief Obafemi Awolowo (1909-1987), full name Obafemi Jeremiah Oyeniyi Awolowo, was a Yoruba nationalist and a Nigerian politician. He was leader of the Action Group political party, former premier of the western region of Nigeria, and also lawyer and educator.

Wisdom & Quotes

• There are times when even the greatest tactician in diplomatic cunning is outclassed in his own game. It is then that he discovers that all that he thought he had gained is but loss, and that what is left of national honour and dignity is but the shadow of an illustrious past that is gone forever, or of a potentially great future that will never come.

- Autobiography

• After rain comes sunshines;

after darkness comes the glorious dawn.
There is no sorrow without its alloy of joy,
there is no joy without its admixture of sorrow.
Behind the ugly terrible mask of Misfortune
lies the beautiful soothing
countenance of Prosperity. So, tear the mask!
- Autobiography

• Constructive agitation... is above all a weapon of peace, a weapon of love, and it is through such a medium that God comes more readily on the side of those who fight in a just cause.

- presidential address to the Action Group Congress, Lagos (July 12, 1957)

• Violence never settles anything right: apart from injuring your own soul, it injures the best cause. It lingers on long after the object of hate has disappeared from the scene to plague the lives of those who have employed it against their foes.

Nelson Algren