Ajele Cemetery

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ajele Cemetery was a major cemetery on Lagos Island demolished by the Lagos State military government under Brigadier Mobolaji Johnson in the 1970s. Ajele in Yoruba means government administrative official[1] and the cemetery was so named because of the many British colonial officials who were buried there.

Demolition[]

Brigadier Mobolaji Johnson, military governor of Lagos State demolished Ajele Cemetery in December 1971 in order to situate the Lagos State Secretariat.[2] The demolition met with a lot of criticism and many historians and commentators noted the loss of valuable history. Prof J.D.Y. Peel noted that the demolition had deprived "Lagosians not only of a precious green space in the heart of the city but of the memorials of their forebears".[3] Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka called the demolition "the violation of that ancestral place" noting that "the order came from the military governor: 'Dig up those dead and forgotten ancestors and plant a modern council building – with all its lucrative corollaries on that somnolent spot".[4][5]

Notable burials[]

References[]

  1. ^ J. D. Fage; Richard Gray; Roland Anthony Oliver. The Cambridge History of Africa, Volume 4. Cambridge University Press. pp. 231. ISBN 978-0521204132.
  2. ^ Smith, Robert (1979). The Lagos Consulate, 1851–1861. University of California Press. p. 167. ISBN 978-0520037465.
  3. ^ Elebute, Adeyemo (2013). The Life of James Pinson Labulo Davies: A Colossus of Victorian Lagos. Kachifo Limited/Prestige. pp. Foreword–xvi. ISBN 978-9785205763.
  4. ^ Godwin & Hopwood (2012). Sandbank City: Lagos At 150. Kachifo Ltd (2012). p. 155. ISBN 978-9785108460.
  5. ^ "Mobolaji Johnson, A Former Governor-General PassesM". THISDAYLIVE. 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2020-12-19.

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