Saturday, January 10, 2009

An Eavesdropper Reminisces

Billed as the most embarrassing book ever written about the private life of an African leader, a former Nigerian president is portrayed by his first wife as a sly, violent, vindictive womaniser...

What ensues is an almost slapstick riot of affairs and breathless high politics punctuated with domestic violence and desperation. And it's one in which Mama Iyabo is happy to name names. In the early 1970s her particular nemesis was an older married woman called Mowo Sofowora. One evening, she recalls: "I was eavesdropping on the phone downstairs while Obasanjo was in the bedroom. They had spoken for about 30 minutes when she then said she was having a headache. I had heard enough, so I butted in: 'It's that headache that will kill you, shameless married woman dating a younger man'. On hearing my voice, Obasanjo charged downstairs to beat me and we had one of the many fights that had come to define our marriage." (more)