About a week to the the ‘D’ day in 1956, the coming of the Queen Elizabeth II of England to Ijebu-Ode on a visit to the Ogbeni Oja, The late Chief Timothy Adeola Odutola, made rumour mill to bubble with strange enthusiasm. Neighbouring towns were not spared either as people gathered in groups to discuss the visit of the white queen.
The visit was leaked by Chief Odutola’s domestic staff who were fully engaged and neck-deep involved in the cleaning of the Castle’s Compand, yes, Chief Odutola’s house was (is) a castle of European standard. The castle was not only cleaned up, but was also given a facelift to make the house a befitting place to play host to a European queen.
The question on most people’s lips who heard about the visit was: How come the business mogul was chosen to play a host to the queen? Chief Odutola was not a state player or official. His town too, Ijebu-Ode, was not a regional capital either. That was why tongues were wagging when people learnt of the visit. Most indigenes and residents of Ijebu-Ode never knew that Chief Odutola was a friend of the queen’s father, the late King GeorgeVI.
Queen Elizabeth II of England, came on official visit to Nigeria in 1956. That she visited the country was no longer news, because that was several decades back. During the visit, something out of place, something unusual took place. She slept in a private home of an industrial magnate, the Late Chief Odutola in Ijebu Ode. At the time of the visit, the chief had built a European-Standard Castle in the town. From a distance the building’s height was intimidating, dwarfing, as it were, all other houses in the vicinity. It is not an exaggeration to say that the house looked impregnable as it exuded strength and opulence put together. In Nigeria then, there were a few houses in the length and breadth of the country that could match Odutola’s castle in standard and style.
It was a site to behold. The first class standard about everything in the house was not surprising, the owner was a big cheese industrial-commercial and business world, whose tentacles spread beyond Nigeria and Africa. There was no way Chief Odutola’s exposure would not tell on his taste for accommodation. It was, therefore not surprising, that his house befitted a noble, which he was.
Odutola’s inter-continental business relationship enabled him to build a social network that facilitated his relationship with the father of the Queen. That, perhaps was why the Queen could confidently broke the protocol that determined and guarded her itinerary whenever she was out in foreign land on tour. Ijebu Ode was not one of the towns or cities on the scheduled itinerary of the Queen. Ijebu-Ode was not a regional capital. It was not a federal capital either. The colonial administration in Nigeria had scheduled stopover in Lagos, that was the federal capital, Enugu, Ibadan and Kano for the head of the Commonwealth of Nations. The castle where the Queen slept was in Ijebu-Ode. Her journey to the town would not have been possible if not for the motorable road network constructed by the administration of the Late Obafemi Awolowo, who was the then head of government business in the defunct Western region.
On that August day, Ijebu-Ode bubbled as the best hospitality that the town could boast of was on display. The people of the town celebrated the Queen’s visit with what could be by its scale qualified to be called a festival. The king, chiefs, notables and the people rolled out their drums to add panache and splendor to welcome the monarch. No wonder, the visit memorable. Chief Odutola, the Chief Host was well prepared for the visit. The castle was given a new touch of royal standard. It was a visit like no other. From the entrance of the town, people dressed in what could be described as their best clothes lined the road that led to Chief Odutola’s castle. It was dancing and singing all the way. People were in happy mood and they were proud that one of the town’s chief had attained a position of eminence that qualified their town for a visit by the Queen.
Chief Odutola described as the queen host had woven a social life that sprawled beyond the coast and boundary of Nigeria. Nigeria was one of the Britain’s areas of influence in West Africa. Other British colonial territories in the sub-region included Ghana, Sierra-Leone and The Gambia. Cameroun was a Germany’ s controlled state lost to the Allied Forces in the World War II and handed over to Britain for administration on behave of United Nations (UN). The queen was not only the head of Britain or the United Kingdom, but also the head of the Commonwealth nations, which is bigger than than the United Kingdom that comprises Britain, Scotland, Ireland. That was why he new at the time, Nigeria was still under the colonial wings of Britain as the country’s independence was four years away in 1960. It was an understatement to say that the visit was strictly a state’s affair puctured by a private visit to Ijebu-Ode.
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