Veteran journalist, Benson Idonije and radio personality, Adegboyega Oyedele a.k.a Afrologic of Classic FM, 97.3, have punctured the age long held narrative that afro beat music founder, Fela Anikulapo -Kuti, was an average student whose WAEC result was not good enough and so could not have studied medicine in the UK in the 1960s; this is contrary to the wild held belief that he rebelled against his parents and chose the part of music.
Idonije and Oyedele were panelists at “Fela’s Influence on Music: Afrobeat’s Bloodline & Blueprint” as part of ongoing exhibition on Fela titled ” Fela: Afro Beat Rebellion” holding at Pan African Centre, Ekobank Building, Ozumba Mbadiwe, Victoria Island that will run from Oct 12 to December, 29 2025 where they made the revelation.
In his contribution as a panelist Idonije had said that it was Fela’s mother, Funmilayo, that first promoted her son’s music when she brought one of his early albums to the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission’s (NBC), director, seeking airplay for the album .
The revelation prompted a question from a journalist who sought to know how true the revelation was since story had it then that Fela went against his mother’s wish by studying music instead of medicine and in answer to the question, Idonije said that it was not true that Fela was sent to England to study medicine like his other brothers, Olikoye and Beko (elder and younger respectively) and ended up studying music at Trinity School of Music, London.
According to Idonije who later became Fela’s manager in the first 10 years of his musical career, the iconic musician’s WAEC result was not good enough to earn him admission into medical school in London.
” I still have that result. It was an average result that would not have qualified him to study medicine,” he said to the astonishment of the audience most of whom were gen zs who had lapped up past narrative that Fela rebeled against his parents by studying music instead of medicine.
And to authenticate Idonjie’s claim, Oyedele added that it was Beko, the younger brother of Fela, that (persuaded their mother who was the
first female in Nigeria to drive a car, in a letter he wrote to her from England, to allow Fela come over to England to study music since he has the calling.
Idonije who is now close to 90, also regale the audience on how one of Fela’s albums was a commerical success that he demand the car of the then managing director of E.M.I, the record company that released the album in line with the agreement he reached with the MD as a result of the poor showing, commercial wise, of his earlier record .
“Fela’s first album with E.M. did not do well in the market and E.M.I as a result refused to release his next album until Odion Iroje who produced the said album, ‘Jeun Ko ku’ and deal was struck between Fela and E.M.I that if the album did not sell, E.M.I bears on responsibility but if it does, Fela can get what he wants. And when the album was released, three months it be a commercial success and Fela went back to E.M.I and told them that he wants the kind of car the MD is driving, equipment for his band…,” again the audience roared in Laughter
The organisers of the exhibition, also used the occasion to give out autographed copies of Idonije’s new book on Fela titled ‘Dis Fela Sef’ just like Idonjie said that. Odion would made the panellist.
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