A few weeks back, Architect Muyiwa Ige turned 50. He is the immediate past Commissioner for Lands, Physical Planning and Urban Development in Osun State, and the son of late Minister for Justice, Chief Bola Ige. This great son of Esa Oke in Obokun LGA, in Osun, was born into the illustrious family of late Chief Bola Ige, SAN and Hon. Justice (Mrs.)Atinuke Ige, JCA, OFR, on the 28th of January, 1967.
Muyiwa is happily married to Oyindamola Adeyoola Ige, a successful legal practitioner, academic and author. The marriage is blessed with 3 Omo Iges (their 3 prosperous nations). Below are excerpts of his wife’s special tribute to him @ 50.
Unknown to many people Oyindamola his pretty wife calls him M.I. and she gets excited anytime she starts to talk about Muyiwa Ige. She says its a name that “I coined out of love for the man I will share the rest of my life with. Muyiwa Ige, My “Mr. Incredible, My Mr. Iconic, My Mr. Incompressible, My Mr. Incontestable,”
Read warming piece below:
My Mr. Incredulous, My Mr. Indefatigable, My Mr. Intelligent, My Mr. Inestimable, My Mr. Inspirational, My Mr. Insurmountable, My Mr. Ingenoius, My Inimitable … Ours was divine and destined. We and a few people who know our story know what I am talking about. I was one of the few brides who walked down the aisle knowing that she was marrying the bone of her bone and the flesh of her flesh. Her own husband. I recall one of my big Mummy’s in Geneva, Prof Peju Olukoya, and the way she always teased me each time you called. She would say ‘Mr. Bring This’ is on the line again. Mr. Bring this because it was indeed God who brought you into my life!
Indeed, only God could have answered my father’s selfish prayers. As an only girl, it was my father’s wish that I marry an Ijesa man. He never spared to say it anywhere, even when it made him sound like a Tribalist. In fact he further prayed that my husband will build our home in the same compound with him so he could see me every day. It was when I landed in summer school for 3 Months in IIesa that I realized my father wasn’t playing! It was his strategy to make sure I met an authentic Ijesa man. It was the most futile exercise ever because that experience left me traumatized! However, I must confess that my father was right about one thing – they were authentic with their conk Ijesa accents and wooing ways.
It didn’t help that I had a mother who didn’t support my father’s wishes. In her opinion Ijesa men were crude and most unrefined no matter how educated they were. I always wondered why in this case what is good for the goose is not good for the gander; after all, she was married to an Ijesa man and never for once seemed in a hurry to leave him.
As for me, I was not perturbed at all because the three Month summer school experience assured me that there was no Ijesa man in my generation worthy of my “ghen ghen!” How wrong I was! Unknown to me at 15 years old did I realize that God had saved me the best Ijesa man “ever liveth!” Our first meeting was 6 years later in Ibadan in my clogs. Those clogs did a number on you, apparently. This Lagos girl in Ibadan wearing clogs. Oga ju!
The meeting was brief and uneventful. We both followed our different paths in life and at the point when it seemed like we were not going to ‘be’ God brought us back together under the most spiritual circumstances, and in a foreign land too. It’s clear to me now that the reason God frustrated me in Nigeria and took me to Switzerland was so you could find me. I am eternally grateful to Him!
You had me at “hello” during our first phone conversation. That voice, that correct grammar plus the accent floored me pata pata! Pinch me! This cannot be an Ijesa man! Surely! By our second conversation, you declared very assuredly that you were going to marry me! I was and still am in awe of your declarations. Lo and behold, even with all my shakara we were engaged and married within 8 Months.
Seventeen years later, I am still ever so grateful to God for giving you to me; and I know that the next 50 and more years together will be even more glorious in Jesus name. Amen! Like I keep saying, I am the only woman with your formula; in every sense of the word!
Thank you for letting me be who I am and supporting and encouraging me through it all materially and otherwise. It’s a gift I don’t take for granted as I listen to so many women talk about how oppressive their husbands are. I have experienced good women change for the worse in their marriages because of terrible husbands, but you have allowed me to be who I am, and if anything you have positively enhanced the woman that I am both spiritually and otherwise. Your sincere appreciation and support of my walk with God makes my spiritual experience worth every moment and for this God is blessing and shall continually bless you!
Thank you for being an amazing son to my mother and an amazing ana (in-Iaw)to the rest of her family. Nothing gives my mother greater joy than to see me happy and content in my husband’s house! As far as she is concerned you spoil me too much, and as far as she’s concerned MI can do no wrong! I cannot quantify my joy and pride when each year you win husband of the year in my nuclear and extended family. Who you are and what you represent has given me a pride of place in my family. You are a priceless crown on my head and God shall continue to bless, protect and keep you, Oyinda’s husband! Oko mi atata, Olowo ori mi, ale nobody, MI no rival!
The greatest gift you are to me is being an amaaaaazing, responsible, deliberate and intentional father to our three amazing boys. I got three mini vou’s in seven years to the glory of God! Thank you for raising them to be God fearing, cultured, respectful and respectable like their father. You make fatherhood look so effortless. You continue to instil priceless values in them as they quietly watch you and interact with you as their father and friend.
I will never forget the day you brought the “high five greeting” tradition to an abrupt end in our home and mandated that they greet you, I and every adult with full “idobale” (prostrating) first, before the high fives. They were traumatized by this change, but you explained to them that they are Yoruba’s and must act accordingly. That singular act has won our sons the award of “most respectful.” Thank you! Thank you for teaching them that the quality time we spend together as a family dancing (yes a lot of dancing goes on behind closed doors in this home) and playing games is more valuable than material things.
They are so grateful to have a “Pops”(as they call you) like you! Cool as a mate, but firm as a father. As the bible says, your children and children’s children shall surround you like olive branches well into your old age in Jesus name. Oko mi, a jeun omo ka le. Amin! I thank God for your Godly and goodly heritage. It is true that one must not marry a man in isolation but must marry his entire family. My mother never failed to tell me that it is tolerable to have a terrible husband, but it is intolerable to have terrible inlaws. I cannot thank God enough for daddy and Mummy Ige; especially Mummy Ige who with the help of God raised a son that any woman will want to call her own. Like I always say -If ever we were given second chances at life, I will find you and marry you again and again because of Mummy Ige! They left for you a worthy inheritance of hard work, integrity, honesty and pride of name that you wear proudly like a badge. Won bi e dada. iwo na tun tu ara e bi.
I bless God for Aunty Funso, Uncle Gbenro, Kayode, Ayotunde, Aunty Toks & Tamilore, Bros K, Sis Bisi, Toni & Semilore for their role in our life. Ours is a small but strong family and I could not have asked for better. I pray that God shall continue to bind us together with cords of love that can never be broken in Jesus name. Amen. Oko Mi Atata, Oyinda’s husband, Olowo Ori mi, My ATM, My Central Bank, the Father of my Sons, Omo Ige, MI special, my tribute is not only in letters but in the way I carry you in my heart daily. Through thick and thin we have stayed true to who we both are.
The past 50 years have brought laughter, tears and then laughter. Through it all the Lord has never forsaken you. I have shared 17 beautiful years out of those years with you, and I am assured that as the Lord lives in Heaven, we shall spend the next 50 years together with our children in greater joy because the bible says that our latter days shall be more glorious than our former. So shall it be in Jesus name. Today, like always, I celebrate you, My Husband, My Baby, My Hero, My Friend & My Daddy all wrapped in one tall, dark & handsome package! “Ghen Ghen!”
Happy 50th Birthday!
I love you now and forever!
Your “QMA Baby”
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