A Brother’s Tribute

Bọ́lánlé Abímbọ́lá — “DJ”
17 November 1963 — 11 August 2026

Bọ́lá Abímbọ́lá, LLB, BL, was Asaph, and he was DJ — a teenager on the campus at Ilé-Ifẹ̀ with the Commodores and Fela on his mixtapes, keeping the party going. He was right winger for the Red Rovers, and fast — fast enough that a few hundredths of a second were all that stood between him and the 1980 Olympics. Yet the brother I knew was a quiet gentleman of few words, who had the superpower of being ọlá ìlú — “the pride of the town” — the anchor that keeps everyone else from drifting.

He was my guide and my big brother, my whole life. In school, in the world. I never once imagined a day without him. He went first and I followed, and it never occurred to me that going first could mean this. Left now are the treasures of memory, and the hope that this is only a dream — against the hard truth that the dream is the mercy and the waking is the loss.

Má jọ̀kùn, má jẹkòló, ohun tí wọ́n bá ń jẹ lájùlé ọ̀run ni kí o máa bá wọn jẹ o.

Do not eat millipedes, do not eat earthworms; whatever they are eating in the heavenly home, that is what you should eat along with them.

Rest well!

Kọ́lá Abímbọ́lá, Ph.D.