Sunday 30 December 2012

Orkar coup pranks that deceived us — Turner Ogboru

 by Anna Okon 
Turner Ogboru
If you remember the Colonel Gideon Orkar coup, then the name Turner Ogboru should ring a bell to you. Turner would not forget April 22, 1990 in a hurry. That was the day everything about him took a dramatic change.
“Turner Ogboru’s life was well ordered,” he begins his story. Recalling his walk to wealth, he says fortune smiled on him through his brother, Great Ogboru.
“My elder brother was a faithful salesman and at a point in our lives, his salesmanship paid off. An Israeli who wanted to transact stockfish business, was referred to Great, who was then, a salesman at Exchange Fisheries. My brother told him that the fish could be sold as frozen fish and the profit would be more. My brother sold the whole fish, made more profit than he had envisaged and returned all the profit, including the excess to the white man.
“Impressed by his transparency, the white man handed over the entire business to him. In the process, we had the Bulgarian, Russian and the United Kingdom connections and the empire became bigger! Then, we registered the company at the Corporate Affairs Commission for N5m. Then, we signed a joint venture with the Russian government to fish in the whole African waters when Perestroika started.”
However, suddenly, the joy of good fortune took a back seat. It came as a nightmare in the wake of the Gideon Orkar coup of 1990, against the General Ibrahim Babangida regime.
Ogboru narrates that unfortunate incident. “The day the coup happened, April 22, 1990, was a Sunday and we went to minister in songs at a church in Surulere. By the time we finished, we heard that there was a coup but it failed. I arrived home to learn that the coup plotters had used our company facilities. Then, I knew that we were in deep trouble! I remembered that they had deceived us into believing that they wanted to host a party, requesting our facilities to stock cold drinks. Normally, we refrigerated drinks in our cold rooms for people who had parties— birthdays, funerals and marriages. My staff and even others they had invited for the gathering were all in the dark about their intention.
“The following day, they caught some members of my staff and said they should come and fetch their boss. So, I went to meet them at Ikeja Cantonment, where Ishaya Bamaiyi was the Brigade commander. I told him that I was not a coup plotter but that our facilities were dubiously used for the plot. He took me to see the then Lagos State governor, Raji Rasaki, who ordered them to take me to Aliu Tongo, the man in charge of security at the time. Tongo took a decision to keep me in protective custody. I was there when one immigration officer came to inform them that I escorted my brother, Great, to the border when he was travelling out of the country.
“It was then argued that the borders were opened when my brother travelled and there was no crime in a man escorting his brother to the border. Then they further reasoned that, given my educational background, I ought to have known that my brother was involved in the coup. I was sentenced to life imprisonment.”
Wondering what happened during his incarceration which lasted eight and a half years?
“I met Vivienne, a qualified marriage counsellor, who was a prison nurse at the time,” he begins his romantic odyssey.
Though he married her, he recalls his attraction to her: “She was extremely generous and nice while caring for the inmates. She spent her salary buying drugs for inmates. A lot of people die in prison because of lack of care.”
After eight years in jail, help came through Chief Ernest Shonekan, who was then, Head, Interim National Government. There was amnesty for all political prisoners. Turner was released from prison.
Back to his prison memoirs. He recounts: “When I was eventually released, she was not there and had been transferred to another place. I invited Vivienne to my place. At that time, the family of the girl I was engaged to marry had been in touch with Gen. Babangida, so they stopped her from continuing the engagement.”
What effects did incarceration have on his life and business?
He responds, “The entire business was shut down. The military decreed that all our things should be sold and all the fish in our cold rooms were carted away. Property that were taken away at that time were in excess of $42.7m. Great was 32 years old and I was just 30 at the time.”
For the Delta State-born, a process of recovery took place. A graduate of Law from the University of Benin says amidst smiles, “It was God’s grace. The business bounced back because the king of Glory was the chairman of the Group. Great went abroad, started buying ships (he bought five vessels) and employed Europeans to work. We were then fishing in European waters, and he had over 300 Europeans working for the company. It was when we came to African waters that the African problems started affecting the business.
“I give God the glory. With hindsight, God made me go through that imprisonment so that He can reveal Himself to me like He did throughout the period. He was teaching me about the Holy Ghost and the evidence of speaking in tongues, which I did not know about before the incident. I never believed God could speak to people face to face as I am speaking to you now. I experienced it in prison. Before then, even as a full time Christian worshipping with the Household of God Church, my business was moving well, I did not see any need to get involved in ministry, I preferred to bring out money to support the work. But sometimes in November, 2012, while I was driving down from the Third Mainland Bridge, the Lord spoke to me to start my ministry on December, 24, 2012.”
Now heading for a full time ministry (it kicked off December 24, 2012), does that stop him from being a businessman? “No,” comes his response. “The business goes on. In the Bible, Apostle Paul continued in his tent-making business. In my business now, I have more than enough boys to work for me. The work of the ministry requires a lot of funding and most of it would be self-financed.”
Fashion? Well, he retorts, “All my life I have been a modest man. I am from a very humble beginnings. I ate rice with my hands before I even started eating with spoon and the spoon was not even silver spoon! The ministry that we are called into does not recommend flamboyant dressing; I am brother Turner, a modest dresser.”
For him, there is no going back, even in the face of frustration. “I am living a borrowed life,” he says.
“The old Turner is dead; the Turner that I am now cannot be frustrated and intimidated. God will always equip the people he has called.”
ThePunch

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