Chief Bode George, former Deputy National Chairman, South-West, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has mourned the late Chief Alex Akinyele, former Minister of Information and ex-Chairman, National Sports Commission (NSC), describing him as a patriot.
George, who spoke in Lagos on Saturday, also said Akinyele was a man of culture and indifferent to stings of malice, stressing that the nation had lost a great Nigerian.
The PDP chieftain said he learnt with heavy sadness about the death of the Ondo High Chief, who according to him, was one of his informal advisers when he was privileged to be the military governor of the old Ondo State from 1987 to 1990.
He maintained that Akinyele struck him as an ebullient man, full of energy, vibrant, gregarious, loud in genial conviviality, pointing out that he was proud of his heritage, stoic and unmoved by the taunts of envy, woven in a world of his own.
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“Akinyele was genuine, sincere, scripted in an original liberty in his large beaded accouterments, striking and distinct even in a crowd. He was an amiable elephant you couldn’t miss in any particular space.
“Student activist, Public Relations icon, minister, man of tradition and a patriot, Akinyele lived a fulfilled life, stripped of rancor, always friendly, boundless in boldness, firm and sure, latched to a world of personal wonder and attractiveness,” he said.
George said that Akinyele would be sorely missed, even as he wished the former minister goodbye, calling him an enigma, nicknamed “Baba Aleco”, and prayed that he would find eternal peace in the bosom of the Lord.
