It was about 9.47am on Tuesday, January 9, 2024. I was in a bank in Nyanya, FCT for a transaction. As I waited for the bank official I was seeing to finish with what he was doing before he could attend to me, I opened my phone to my facebook page to gain some intelligence about what was going on in my country and the world. The very first item that confronted me was a mention that hinted at the demise of Ben Achu Olayi, a fellow Bekwarra man, friend and brother who rose to the position of Director, Department of State Security (DSS) before he retired honourably about seven years ago. His last port of service was Lagos state.
A facebook friend on whose wall the news was posted, wrote in a mournful, poetic tone mentioning his name but it was not quite clear and definitive to me that Olayi was dead. Shocked, I wrote, ‘’what happened?’’, expecting the person to tell me in plain language whether or not Olayi was dead or alive. Ever since the early 1990s in those ‘analogue days’ of our country when Nigerian journalists came short of professional diligence and excellence in the handling of the rumours of the late Zik’s death, I learnt my lesson not to be very carefree in the handling of the news of anyone’s death. Since then, I never break the news of the death of anyone! I do not want to be quoted as one of those who said someone else was dead when in fact the person is alive, hale and hearty.
I waited a few minutes to get a response to my query but it was not forthcoming so I scrolled down, browsing. Two minutes after, I noticed that it was all over the cyber space that Olayi was dead. Shortly after, Ben Olofu, a cousin of the late man, who knows my warm relationship with Olayi, sent me this via WhatsAPP: ‘’Good morning, sir. Last night, my cousin brother, Ben Achu Olayi, the retired DSS Director, arrived from Bekwarra for medical attention in high spirits and very full of life. Barely 30 minutes after arriving at his Gwarinpa house, he became very unwell and was rushed to the DSS medical facility where he was pronounced dead’’.
This, from Ben Olofu, shattered every doubt in me about the death of Ben Olayi and left me completely shattered. I uttered a barely subdued shout which attracted the attention of the man I was waiting to see who said to me that he hoped there was nothing wrong. I just mumbled some few words to him and fell into a recollection of Olayi’s life and times.
Ben Achu Olayi was one of my fellow Bekwarra brothers and sisters who were pioneers of the famous Bekwarra Secondary School, Abuochiche, Bekwarra LGA, CRS, a community school which was opened in 1975. While I went to N.K.S.T. Secondary School in Adikpo in Benue State two years earlier, these pioneering set of BSS and the sets that came on later, helped to make a name for Bekwarra in academic and sports. Bekwarra people were proud of their exploits. Today, many who passed through the portals of that school are great success stories in many sectors of our national life, with Achu being one of the leading stars.
After graduation in 1980, Achu joined the Cadet Inspector Cadre of the DSS when it was then known as the SSS – State Security Service- and rose to the height we have mentioned after obtaining his first and second degrees in UniAbuja.
When one of us, a fellow Bekwarra son, Mr. Odey Ochicha, expressed his desire to run for the governorship of CRS in 2007, Achu offered to host meetings of some politically inclined Bekwarra sons in his house in Gwarinpa to strategize support for Ochicha’s bid. It was on this platform that I keenly watched and admired Olayi’s intelligence, his political sagacity and the depth of his humanitarian disposition.
On a personal level, I later recollected with some faint amusement that Olayi and I shared some common similarities. One, we were two Bekwarra elite who rose to the pinnacle of our respective professions as Director in the Federal Service. Two, we retired and didn’t stay in the comfort of Abuja and Lagos. We went back home to our villages to engage in farming, he to Anyikang and I to Gakem and we were only visiting Abuja occasionally to see our families. Three, God gave us the wisdom to build fairly comfortable houses in our villages which made it possible for us to retire to those habitations without much sweat or any serious thought about it. Four, we love our communities and the nation that have been so good to us. Five, we have a passion for farming and interestingly, we share common boundaries in two of our oil palm farms located in the Bewo and Adi-Ugah areas of our LGA.
In fact, with the possible exception of the rich and wealthy Hilary Ushie, I do not think there is any other Bekwarra man who has a larger oil palm farm than Achu Olayi, with his farms scattered in many locations of Bekwarra land. Unfortunately for Achu, a persistent and severe affliction on his leg which orthodox medicine described as arthritis, which I suspect led to his eventual death, could not allow him to be an engaged, practical and on-hand farmer he desired to be. The last time we met at one of the farms with which we share a common boundary, was about three years ago when we were to put our two good heads together to see how we can create a motorable road into our farms through our common boundaries. I could see that my brother and friend was in severe pains from that affliction that seemed to defy both orthodox and traditional medications.
I was not in the least surprised when sometimes last year the Administration of CRS Governor Bassey Otu appointed him Chief Security Adviser in-charge of the CR North Senatorial District, a position he held until his death.
Ben Achu Olayi was not a complicated man. He had a liberal disposition, a likeable personality and he was honest and plain to whoever he was dealing with. This explains why he is being deeply mourned by the Bekwarra nation and other Nigerians with whom he came into contact. Fare thee well, great brother and friend. It has pleased God to decree that you go first now. We will, surely, join you one day when the bell tolls for us.
