THE MAN OF HIS ALMA MATER: HIS EXCELLENCY DISTINGUISHED SENATOR OBARISI OVIE OMO-AGEGE, CFR.

If greatness is measured by what you built at where you began, then Ovie Omo-Agege is St. George’s Grammar School’s living cathedral.

In the hall of public service, some figures are framed by promises that echoes loudly but faded into silence. I recall a certain governor of my alma mater who spent eight years speaking passionately of educational uplift, yet left his alma mater untouched, his words evaporating into thin air. He keft oromises without footprints. I envy, righteously, St. George’s Grammar School, Obinomba, because her son, Senator Obarisi Ovie Omo-Agege, chose a different path.

He fashioned his legacy not from rhetoric, but on stone, steel, light, and water. His alma mater bears eternal proofs: lives uplifted, structures erected, futures reimagined.

Like an oak rooted in familiar soil, Omo-Agege towers where his youthful laughter once rang. He is “The Man of His Alma Mater,” a living hymn walking the same corridors he once trod, now leaving more than memories but as a living momentum.

Unlike a certain sheriff who search for classmates in vain, Omo-Agege stands shoulder to shoulder with the Class of ’79—Dr. John Uhomopibhi, Barr. Babatunde John Kwame Ogala, SAN, and others. Their bond is not nostalgia, but a river of shared vision, flowing back to water their alma mater.

Once, students trekked to the Ethiope River at dawn. Today, because of Omo-Agege, they drink freely from a solar-powered water project. He gave not just water, but dignity, health, and hours redeemed for learning. A 30,000-gallon tank now sings his legacy on campus.

He paved roads and lit paths with solar-powered street-lamps. Each light is a verse in the poem of school life, guiding young feet safely home, ensuring no dream stumbles in the dark.

At the Diamond Jubilee, Omo-Agege launched the ₦100 million E-Library & Administrative Block. He stood not merely as alumnus, but as architect of possibility. This hub of knowledge is a sanctuary where curiosity meets capacity.

His promised two-storey building of 12 classrooms, a dining hall, and 100-bed hostels is not just infrastructure, it is an incubator of fellowship and greatness. These walls will whisper inspiration long after we are gone.

At the 45th reunion of the Class of 1979, he was honored for “outstanding infrastructural development.” But beneath the plaques and roads lies something deeper: mentorship, torch-passing, and silent invitations for every student to rise higher.

Like a river returning to its source, Omo-Agege has strengthened his roots and reshaped his banks for generations to come. He did not drift past his alma mater, he has anchored it. Not with echoes, but with edifices; not with nostalgia, but with nurture; not with memory, but with momentum.

In every corridor he built, every lamp he lit, every drop of water his solar wells provide, Senator Obarisi Ovie Omo-Agege stands revealed: the living embodiment of a man of his alma mater, a builder of tomorrow from the clay of yesterday.

For these and more, Ovie Omo-Agege remains the best reason for a better tomorrow for Deltans come 2027. 

Senator Gold says so.

Itse-Elijah Wilkie 

[Senator Gold]