Goodwill Message by Comrade Adams Aliyu Oshiomhole, mni Governor of Edo State, at the 10^th Year Colloquium Organized in honour of Prof Bade Onimode on Saturday 10^th December 2011 at the Omonogun Hall, Lokoja, Kogi State

I wish to thank the comrades and friends of Prof Bade Onimode, who have taken the initiative to organize a colloquium in memory of this illustrious patriot, revolutionary thinker, organizer, humanist and scholar of international renown. Prof Onimode deserves any efforts to celebrate his person and his contributions as an activist, scholar and intellectual statesman.

Bade, as we all fondly called him, enriched each of us who knew him as a scholar and activist. He furnished the global progressive and revolutionary anti-imperialist movement with a devastating critique of the economic and political structures of finance and monopoly capital.

Prof. Onimode’s stature as an international scholar derived from his deep theoretical versatility and the originality of his critiques, which manifested in his analytical synthesis of classical Marxian paradigms with the highpoints of the Dependency School.

In addition, he helped to generate theoretical legitimacy for the quest for African alternatives, which resonated in mainstream scholarly and policy literature and discourse all over the continent.

He contributed his quota to popular struggles in Nigeria, especially in mobilizing resistance against Military dictatorship. He led the Academic Staff Association of the University of Ibadan, the fore-runner to the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), up to June 1978, when he was sacked by Gen Olusegun Obasanjo’s Regime. In that period, the alliance of Labour Movement, the Left, students’ movement and other popular forces was at its peak, driven by a common quest for social change. It had just given the Military Government a bloody nose through a massive national students’ uprising supported by popular forces, including intellectuals like Bade.

Beyond that, although he was a hugely successful academic, he maintained organic links and a regular working relationship with the Labour Movement, from the shop-floor to the leaders.

Bade’s death remains painful to those of us who knew his worth and who can appreciate how much the nation, the continent and the world have lost by his death. But we are comforted that his progressive ideas and the agenda of an African Alternative, which he promoted, have not relented. They continue to clarify our thoughts and inspire our actions.

May the soul of our comrade, brother, leader and co-patriot continue to rest in the bosom of the Lord, Amen.

Adams Aliyu Oshiomhole, mni

Governor, Edo State