He went on to beat everyone in the classes he was promoted to. His colleagues, Malam Shehu Malami and Alhaji Isiaku Ibrahim proclaimed such brilliance exercised by Talba (his traditional title in the Bauchi Emirate). Yerima Abdullahi, also a classmate of his, said, “Tahir is a very brilliant person. If you want to teach him a book, teach him a quarter, he would teach himself the rest.” He was an encyclopedia of knowledge. After his years at Barewa College, Tahir moved to Cambridge University, UK where he obtained his doctorate.
Mohammed Haruna in his column in Daily Trust had also said, “if erudition only meant producing a body of scholarly works, Tahir would hardly qualify”……, but like Sanusi Abubakar, Tuesday columnist of Daily Trust, said in his tribute to Tahir, “Tahir is a radical conservative sociologist who was more prolific in speech than in writing”.
He had a close relationship with Malam Adamu Ciroma and Malam Mamman Daura who were equally gifted writers but were no match to the rare Tahir when it came to speaking. He was an orator. He was as eloquent as say, Barack Obama, in speech and as skillful as say George Orwell in the mastery of the written word”.
Adamu Adamu of the same Daily Trust had also said, “the country has lost one of its greatest intellectual giants and for those who knew him, the loss was also that of a philanthropist—yes, a philanthropist of legendary proportions.
If Sardauna was Namiji Uban Yanboko (father of scholars), Tahir must have been without doubt, the Emir of Yanboko (emir of scholars). He was an eloquent and tireless defender of traditional values and institutions. He was a scholar imbued with that elusive quality that C. Wright Mills called the sociological imagination. He usually argued his antagonists to an intellectual full stop back in his days of battling Marxism at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. He once advised me not to end up as another jewel on the dust heap, which was a regrettable resignation of his own predicament”.
Malam Adamu Ciroma, Malam Abba Kyari and Malam Mamman Daura all wrote vibrant tributes to the late doctor. Abba Kyari said, “eulogies have variously described him as a Northern intellectual star and great Nigerian scholar. That diminishes him. He was a genius personified. He had great industry and great acuteness. His knowledge is extensive, great and profound.”
His mind was equally distinguished by the amplitude of its grasp. Dr Tahir was held in high intellectual regards at Kings College, Cambridge. He had no inhibitions. He was self-assured and exuded confidence.
A great conversationalist with a roaring laughter, he will keep any audience spell bound. Unlike other public intellectuals who agitated minds, Dr Tahir engaged and fertilized minds”.
Sir Lord Dennis Stevenson also wrote in his letter of condolence, “I fondly remember how General Gowon, as the President, would regularly ring our cottage to talk to Tahir, consulting him on national issues”.
The ANPP said of him in a message, “the demise of this great icon and patriarch is a big loss not only to the family and people of Bauchi State, but also to all lovers of democracy. We will always honour him by building a true democracy in Nigeria which has been his desire and what he had long fought for”.
At the time of his death, I had a torrid battle with living up to his expectations when he dies and abiding by his regularly long preaching on how we should be strong when he finally departs this world.
I denied myself the emotions, the depression and the sadness I ought to have exercised. I tried to be strong and was busy, so busy consoling others. The depth of the loss as Adamu Adamu rightly said, was that of a philantrophist which left myriads of persons, family, students, government officials and many friends standing alone.
I will come to appreciate and realize the kind of loss from the wailing of other persons, unknown to me. Their dear Talba was gone, dramatically like a fountain had closed out on them.
Each person had a personal story, an encounter or a fascinating memory of how Talba had helped them, or entertained them, or carried their burden as his, or joined in their quest for whatever it was. Babatalba was selflessness embodied.
I have not come across a person who carries another person’s cross the way Talba did. I thought to myself, who am I to mourn Talba when there are others with better reasons or causes than I have? I scorned myself, I scolded myself not to be selfish. Do not melt and fold up when I am gone Babayaya, he would often say to me. Each time I felt emotional, I fought back the tears, I deceived myself that all was going to be well just as Babatalba promised.
He had reminded me so much that he will be gone, that I begun to live in illusion that I could cope when he was gone. In the middle of the night, I would wake up in tears and just as well, his voice will roar to me, don’t weep for me, Babayaya. He calls me by his dad’s nickname. He used to say, Babayaya, my departure will be the entrant of a new horizon for you all. As towering as all the tributes and fine tales and memories of him have been after his death, and the fact that each day I run into a new person condoling me for Talba’s demise, it is all too sudden to get over such a compound loss as the loss of Dr Tahir. Recapturing his life and his works would mean putting together an encyclopedia.
As a teenager, I wondered and quizzed how he exerted himself on everything, said and did all he did, and remained awake overnight with a few intermitting nods on his couch. He had so much energy with the zeal of a 16 year old. He tired at nothing and gave up on nothing. He had so much around him which were too numerous to comprehend. Gradually, like a benign cancer, I am contending with the reality of his loss, his absence is setting in, the hollow he has left is widening and the echo of his voice is loudening. I will continue to mourn you Talba, and in that is the inspiration to continue praying for you, as you are gone a year now, Allahumma af’anhu, wa ‘arhamhu, wagsilhu bi ma’in minaz zunubi wal khadaayaa, waj’alhu fi jannatul Firdausi ameen.
Tahir is a son of the late Dr Ibrahim Tahir, who died on December 8, 2009
