Tom Ilube

Presenter0:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio Podcasts. Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne, and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week, I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book, and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. For rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:43

My castaway this week is the entrepreneur and philanthropist Tom Iloube. Back in 2017, he beat household names like Sir Lewis Hamilton and Sir Lenny Henry to top the power list, the annual chart of the most influential Britons of African or Caribbean heritage. Though if you don't already know his story, don't worry, that's just his style. These days, we're used to seeing tech entrepreneurs centre stage at product launches, whooping up the crowd and lapping up the applause. Not him. A self-described hardcore introvert, he is, he says, a start-up guy who's most at home with an empty office, a flip chart, and a brand new idea to bring to life. He's made a career of transforming blue sky thoughts into flourishing businesses over and over again. He was there at the start of the UK's first internet bank, EGG, and launched the credit ratings business, Noddle, another first of its kind. These were followed by startups in cyber security and in recent years two bricks and mortar schools specializing in STEM subjects, one in the UK and the other teaching girls in Ghana. And he's about to take on another new role. He's the incoming chairman of the Rugby Football Union.

Presenter1:55

As we'll hear today, it hasn't all been plain sailing. His successes have made his name and fortune, but for him, failure is also an important part of the story. He says, as a startup guy, you know that you will face failure. Well, I have a good technique. When I fall flat on my face, I cry like a baby, then I get up, brush the dirt off my shoulder, and move on to the next challenge. Tomalube, welcome to Desert Island Discs.

Tom Ilube2:21

Thank you very much.

Presenter2:23

So Tom, anyone who starts something new, of course, has to take that risk. Sometimes over and over again, right after falling flat, that risk of failure. Have you always been happy to stick your neck out and take that leap?

Tom Ilube2:36

I think so. I can't remember a time when I haven't uh been willing to sort of give it a go over and over again. I think it uh it partly comes from having big brothers and sisters who just uh you lose to continuously and if you don't keep coming back then you're just going to keep losing, so you get used to uh coming back over and over and over again, and that's what I do.

Presenter2:57

In the past year or so, Tom, we have seen a renewed focus on diversity in the workplace, the idea of getting more black Asian minority ethnic people into positions of power and influence. What kind of changes have you seen in the sectors that you work in?

Tom Ilube3:12

I think it is changing. I work mostly in technology, but I also see education and I see financial services and broader in businesses. I sit on one or two boards as well. Organizations are getting just more open to the idea that if you have more diverse teams, you're just going to get more variety in the conversation, and that makes for a better business. So I think organizations are gradually realizing that even if you didn't think it was the right thing to do, it actually makes good business sense to have more variety around the table, more ideas, more ways of thinking about things, and you push forward from there.

Presenter3:50

You're here to share your eight discs with us today, Tom. What's the first one that you've chosen?

Tom Ilube3:55

I was born in 1963 and my first word was the word dalek, so that tells you what it is. And so in a sense, this is the theme tune to my childhood. My father worked at the BBC at the time, so the original theme tune to Doctor Who is the theme tune to my life, and that's why I chose it.

Presenter4:43

The original Doctor Who theme music, composed by Ron Greiner, realised by Delia Derbyshire. That also brings back childhood memories of your father tone. His path must have been remarkable because I know that he was born in a very small village in Nigeria and that you've described him as a child, a little boy there, growing up without shoes. So he became an engineer here at the BBC.

Speaker 24:55

Yeah.

Tom Ilube5:05

Yeah.

Presenter5:06

How did he come to the UK in the first place?

Tom Ilube5:06

Uh

Tom Ilube5:08

Well, he joined the army in Nigeria. Before it was Nigeria, this would have been the mid-fifties when he was about fourteen years old. So he was essentially a child soldier, if you like. He sort of pretended he was sixteen and managed to get himself recruited because that was one of the ways sort of out of the village. And then the army there chose three boys to come to the UK to be trained. And they chose the three smartest, most able young lads that they could find, and he was one of them. And so next thing he knew, in about 1957, he was on a flight over to Harrogate to the Army Apprentice School. And he said him and the other lads, the first time they wore shoes was when they were put on the plane to come to England. They were given boots for the first time. He said it was very odd working with them. And then they're marching across the Yorkshire Moors in 1950 something. And he was trained as an engineer up there. And then after he left the army and he stayed in England, he ended up getting a job at some point at the BBC and became one of the first, if not the first, black electrical engineers working at the BBC.

Presenter6:20

Must have been an extraordinary path at the time, but also a huge culture shock. How did he deal with what he found in this country?

Tom Ilube6:27

He was tough, very, very tough and very, very smart, intellectually, extremely clever. And there was a lot of overt racism back then. If anything happened, rather than just saying, okay, let it go and so forth, he just wouldn't. He would challenge and fight continuously and sort of saying to me, you never ever back down. Back then on T V there was a programme called The Black and White Minstrels and he worked as an engineer, I think, either on that programme or around the time when it was going on and some of the lads used to come up to him and sort of touch his face and say, oh, yours doesn't come off. And then they'd all fall about laughing and so forth. So he had all that good stuff back then.

Presenter6:38

Yeah.

Presenter7:13

Your mum came from a very different background, I think, born in Richmond, in London, privately educated, and a teacher.

Tom Ilube7:20

Yes, yes.

Presenter7:21

Math and science, I think.

Tom Ilube7:23

Yes, yes, she's uh so I'm mixed race, so my dad was black, my mum is a white Richmond posh prep school type of lady. She ended up living with my dad in different parts of Africa for 20 plus years, teaching must have been thousands of students and experiencing things that people from her background just don't normally experience. You know, she's been in situations where there have been coups going on, armed robbers. Everything I do in education is driven from what I saw her do and the impact that she had over the years.

Presenter7:59

Tom, it's time to hear your next piece of music. What have you chosen and and why?

Tom Ilube8:03

I chose this one for my mother. She made decisions that led her down a path, a difficult path, in the early 60s. I spent the first year of my life in foster care and then came back to the family. And this song has a line in it where it says, it's in pidgin English, but in English it basically says, I won't forget you for the suffer that you suffered for me. But also, it's an incredibly jolly song. The thing about Africa is that however difficult things are, there'll be a song with most touching lyrics that you can't not dance to. So this is Sweet Mother by Prince Nico Mbaga.

Presenter8:26

Yeah.

Presenter8:40

Eat more than I never forget.

Speaker 38:42

Thank you. For this summer when you suffer for me

Speaker 38:47

Sleep mother, I know forget it.

Speaker 38:51

What is up away?

Speaker 28:53

You suffer for me

Speaker 39:03

When I de cry, my mother go carry me. She go say my picking, where did you de cry you?

Presenter9:10

Sweet Mother by Prince Nico Mbarga, dedicated to your own mum, Tom Ilube. So you've described yourself as an unexpected product of their meeting. You were born in Richmond as well, nineteen sixty three. And after that you were briefly placed in foster care.

Tom Ilube9:22

Yeah.

Tom Ilube9:26

Yes, I was in foster care for about nine months or so. I think where things were being decided and sorted out and decisions were being made and then I came back into the family. When I see programmes where people have sort of stayed in foster care and that's been their journey, I sort of wonder what would have happened to me if different decisions had been made. But I have had an amazing life, so I'm very happy with my journey.

Presenter9:52

You have a big and as you've described a very loving family, but I think you quite relish the complexity of your family tree and that there are three possible answers, I think, to how many siblings you have.

Tom Ilube10:04

Yes. In a sense, our core family, my brothers and sisters, there are five of us. Three are my mum's children, and me and Roland are full brothers and sisters. And then when my mum and dad split up and my dad returned to Nigeria, he decided that he wanted to have another family and he ended up with a number of daughters. And so I have seven sisters, six in Nigeria and one in Uganda.

Presenter10:34

So you moved around a lot as a kid. You know, you lived in England, Uganda, Nigeria, and by the age of 11 I think you were back in the UK and finding your feet at school in Teddington.

Tom Ilube10:44

Yeah.

Presenter10:44

How did you get on there? How did you fit in?

Tom Ilube10:46

I loved it. Those were my rugby playing, ice skating days. It could be tough. Early seventies, London, you know, you're a little black boy and the sort of overt racism that you have to experience, you have to figure out how to deal with it. But then I was a rugby boy and I had my friends around me and if I had to fight, then I'd fight, and if I didn't have to, then I'd navigate. And we found a way through, so it was okay.

Presenter11:13

Were you able to be tough when you needed to?

Tom Ilube11:15

Yeah, absolutely. I s could definitely stand my own in the playground.

Presenter11:20

I know that you won a role in the school play, oh what a lovely war

Tom Ilube11:24

I was young Johnny Jones, yes, yes.

Presenter11:26

Imagine Uh

Tom Ilube11:27

I actually enjoyed being young Johnny Jones. The only problem was that the opening night, we'd all sort of practised in that and I would come on and there was this song, Young Johnny Jones, he had a cute little boat, da-da-da-da, and then I'd come and do a bit of a dance and so forth. And then for some reason, on the opening night, the makeup woman decided that she would black me up because that would be quite funny and would get a good laugh and so forth. So I was sitting there having my makeup done and she blacked up my face and then other boys were coming in and falling about laughing and then she realized that I was crying because the makeup was running off my face. The main reason why I was crying was that was the night that my mum and I think one or two of my brothers and sisters were going to be in the audience. One of the teachers that was doing it, I couldn't say no, but I was so embarrassed that I was going to have to go out on stage and there would be this huge roar of laughter of little Tom all blacked up and so forth. And so she and another teacher sort of clocked that, so they scraped all the makeup off again. And so I enjoyed the play, but that experience was pretty tough one, to be honest.

Presenter12:23

Say no.

Presenter12:44

And that switch from being excited about something and looking forward to it, to then that feeling of impending the doom of that humiliation, and then actually having to go out and.

Tom Ilube12:51

Yeah.

Presenter12:55

Yeah.

Tom Ilube12:55

Yeah.

Presenter12:56

Perform anyway. I mean, that's just awful.

Tom Ilube12:58

Yeah, yeah, you do have to do that sometimes. You know what's happening, but you have to put on armor and and go out anyway. So I've I've sort of had to do that over the years. I've got quite good at that. But that was I was pretty small then, so that was a bit tough to do.

Presenter13:14

Let's take a break for some music. It's disc number three, Tom. What are we going to hear and why are you taking it with you to the island?

Tom Ilube13:21

Yeah, my early teenage years in the 70s were wonderful. Everyone around, it was rugby parties, afros, ice skating, chopper bikes, all that good stuff. And I was figuring out my identity as a mixed race kid in 1970s London. And in the middle of that, a giant rock god crashed into town, Phil Linnert, huge leather trousers, mixed race rocker, massive afro, massive attitude. So it's Thin Lizzie, the boys are back in town.

Speaker 313:49

Guess who just got back today, Them wild-eyed boys that had been away?

Speaker 313:55

Haven't changed, had much to see But man I still think them cats are crazy

Speaker 314:01

They were asking if you were around How you was, where you could be found

Speaker 314:07

Told them you were living downtown.

Speaker 314:10

Timing all the old men quizzer

Speaker 314:13

Boys are back in town, boys are back in town.

Presenter14:18

The Boys Are Back in Town by Thin Lizzie. Tom, as I mentioned, you spent time in Uganda as a younger child and I know that you have a scar from your time there. What hap?

Tom Ilube14:27

Idi Amin, the dictator at the time, had said that Asians had to leave the country. I had an Asian friend who lived next door. There was myself, a Ugandan boy, and an Asian boy. We used to play all the time. So, me and the Ugandan lad, we went round to my friend's house, and the house was empty. There was nobody in it. The door was open. I think even the radio was on, and all their stuff was there, but there was nobody in it. And as we stepped out the front of the house, there were a row of soldiers there, and the message that had gone out was that looters were to be shot on site. In their minds, they thought, We've caught some looters. But then they looked at me and thought, Are we sure these are looters? So they tied us up and put us on the ground. And fortunately, my dad was driving home just at that time, and then he looked and he thought, I know that looter.

Tom Ilube15:17

I know that little looter over there, so he sort of

Presenter15:19

You must have been terrified.

Tom Ilube15:21

It was a pretty tough time and yeah, he came over and begged them and they untied us and stood us up. One day we just packed up and got in the car, drove through Uganda into Kenya and then got on a flight and back to the UK.

Presenter15:38

We've got to make time for the music. This is your fourth disc today. Why have you chosen it?

Tom Ilube15:42

This one was a bit difficult actually. I mean I love rugby and I'm chair of the Rugby Football Union and you know the first black chair of a British national sports governing body and I'm extremely proud of that. This song, it's a rugby song, Swing Low and people have different opinions about it and there are two reasons why I had to choose it even though I agonised about it. One was that my elder brother Jim, he died in 2012 and we were very close and he was my mentor in everything. He handed his rugby boots down to me. I walked in his shoes. I played rugby in his boots and then he died and it broke me. It really did. I really struggled and we used to stand on the stadium at Twickenham singing that song with 80,000 England fans and so when I hear it I see me and him standing on the on the stands and the song was composed by two enslaved people but usually people talk about Wallace Willis who's known as the composer of the song. Everyone forgets that his wife Minerva Willis was probably the first person to sing it. So really it's Minerva's voice that we hear echoing down the years, 150 years and black women just keep getting written out of history. Someone once said to me that you die twice, once when you die and again when your name is spoken for the last ever time and so for my brother John James Stanfield and for Minerva Willis that's not going to happen on my watch and we're going to we're going to sing this song swing low by Lady Smith Backman Bazo.

Tom Ilube17:42

Single single, single single.

Presenter17:48

Yeah.

Presenter18:03

Lady Smith Black Mambazo and Swing Low Sweet Chariot. Tomalube, you studied applied physics at the University of Benin in Nigeria, and I think it was there that you also began your career as an entrepreneur with your very first business.

Tom Ilube18:18

Yeah, yeah, we used to wear quite trendy trousers and the boys were always going out to tailors, buying material.

Presenter18:27

We need to have the the trousers in our mind's eye.

Tom Ilube18:31

The trousers would have been relatively tight around the bottom and quite sort of large rather flared towards the feet. So yeah, they were

Presenter18:43

Full-on seventies numbers.

Tom Ilube18:44

Absolutely.

Presenter18:45

Live prints, crazy patterns.

Tom Ilube18:46

Nice.

Tom Ilube18:47

I had a purple three piece suit and a white shirt, and I also had a white three piece suit and a purple shirt, and I had a good sort of five inches plus of afro sticky out, and glasses so dark that sometimes I had to be led around parties.

Presenter18:51

And I owe

Presenter19:05

But worth it for the look.

Tom Ilube19:06

From the luck.

Tom Ilube19:08

So I realized that what I could do is buy huge amounts of material and then hire tailors to make lots and lots of trousers, and then we'd stick a label on them called Ace, Fashion for Men, and we'd sew on these labels and then I'd sell trousers around the universities.

Presenter19:25

After graduating, you came back to the UK and you found yourself a copy of the Computer Users Yearbook and started applying for work. How did you get on?

Tom Ilube19:33

I came back with that sort of I can't fail and I have no fear of failure and rejection at all. And so I started with the letter A. I applied to every company that began with A. They all said no. I started on the B's and British Airways gave me a job.

Presenter19:50

It was a programming role and I think you recently got to find the lady and thank the lady who gave you that break.

Tom Ilube19:56

Yeah. Then British Airways, it recruited a certain type of person from a certain type of university, and here was this little black kid from a Nigerian university with a weird physics degree. Those sort of risks that people take pay off. So it was just recently I thought I really need to find her and thank her because she has no idea what she did. That half door that she opened there, that's when my career started and I just wanted to thank her for it.

Presenter20:25

Tom, it's time for your next piece of music, disc number five.

Tom Ilube20:28

What have you got? I got married to Karen in nineteen ninety three. It would have been a year before that, but the first time I asked her, she said no. And the only thing I had to do was to organize the honeymoon. So as any sensible physicist would, I organized for us to go to a maths and science institute in New Mexico.

Presenter20:44

Executive.

Tom Ilube20:46

called the Santa Fe Institute. We drove along Route sixty six, the sun was shining, our heads were nodding, all was good in the world and we were listening to That's the Way Love Goes by Janet Jackson.

Presenter21:29

Janet Jackson and That's the Way Love Goes, the soundtrack to your honeymoon Tomalube. In the mid-1980s you'd moved to the London Stock Exchange and you were working there as a systems designer so it must have been a very exciting time to be doing that job. You know there you were in the heart of this revolution in financial trading that was taking place, presumably in a very sharp suit judging by what we've discovered about you so far. How did it feel to get started?

Tom Ilube21:56

It was a lot of people in suits, and the city was really buzzing, and I was incredibly proud to be there. I did run into some difficulties. At the end of my first week, we went out for a drink, as you used to do back then. And one of my colleagues, this chap who'd been at the Stock Exchange for about 20 plus years, he came up to me in the pub and he took me to one side and he said, Tom, there are friends of mine who would have you swinging from the nearest tree. Anyway, have a good evening. And then he wandered off again. And I'm sort of a 24-year-old kid who's just got this job, really proud to have the job and so forth. And sort of thinking, what am I supposed to do with that? Do I confront him? Do I go and talk to HR? Do I let it go? Is this what it's going to be like? And I remember feeling really quite upset about that because I'd been telling people that, you know, look at me, I'm going to work for the Stock Exchange really proudly. And then obviously, you know, at the weekend, people were saying to me, oh, what's it like working there? Is it great? And I had to say, yeah, yeah, no, it's brilliant. It's great. I'm loving it.

Presenter23:03

Must have felt like you were complicit in

Tom Ilube23:05

Yeah, I couldn't say to them, this is what happened. I didn't know how to deal with it. And there was a lot of power dynamics in there as well. I thought, if I go to HR with this, then they're going to say, oh, guess what? At the end of the first week, Tom's playing the race card. You wouldn't believe it, you know, and so forth. So I thought, we're just going to have to let this one pass and look for another battle to fight if it comes up again.

Presenter23:05

Copying it up.

Presenter23:11

Good job.

Presenter23:30

And you also need to have a sense of, presumably, your own role in the dynamics, because you mentioned the power dynamics that are at play in those types of exchanges always. They're always there. So you have to be in a position to speak out. You have to be able to.

Tom Ilube23:41

Yeah.

Tom Ilube23:46

You have to be able to speak out, or you have to know that you have allies who are going to speak out on your behalf and are going to stand up for you. There was a situation at a bank that I worked at where I walked into a meeting room one evening because I was sort of making sure everyone had gone home and someone had sketched a cartoon of a monkey and written Tommy Lube underneath it. And the chief executive heard about it and he sent an email to the entire company saying, Whoever did that, you are not welcome at this company. Your values are not our values, so I'm not going to search for you, but I'm telling you, I don't want you in my company. I want you to leave. And it was so sort of clear and stark that I've no idea whether the person left or not. We never did know whether the person left or not. But the whole company was in no doubt about where things stood. And when you've got a leader who is able to be that sort of ally with that level of clarity, that's what really, really helps in organisations.

Presenter23:57

Yeah.

Presenter24:54

Hmm.

Presenter24:55

It's time for some more music, Tom. This is your sixth choice today. Tell us about it.

Tom Ilube25:00

We're a big family. At Christmas, when we all get together, there's sort of 30 of us. We're big, noisy. We're a close family, confident under the iron rule of my big sister, Liz. And I think my confidence going out in the world comes from the strength of the family and my sisters in Nigeria and Uganda, too, on my dad's side. And when I used to drive my children, Rihanna and Matthew around, we would be listening to old Kanye West tunes, nodding our heads, trying to avoid the swearing. And so, this is for the family, and it's called Family Business by Kanye West.

Speaker 225:34

This is family business, and this is for the family that can't be with us. And this is for my cousin locked down. All the answers in us, that's why I spit it in my song. So sweet, like a photo where your granny's fishing out that you're gone. It hit us. Super hard on Thanksgiving and Christmas. This can't be right. Yo, you heard the track I did, man. This can't be light. Somebody please say grace so I could save face and have a reason to cover my face. I even made you a plate, soul fool, know how granny do it. Monkey bread on the side, know how the family do it.

Presenter26:04

Kanye West, family business. So, Tomalube. We've heard so many different sides of your personality today. You know, your tenacity is obvious, your bravery, your creativity, and we've also actually you've laughed a lot. You know, you laugh incredibly easily.

Presenter26:20

But I think it might surprise people that you have described living in what I think you call a state of persistent sadness.

Tom Ilube26:26

Yes, I'm always sad, and I'm almost always happy as well, and I can be both at the same time. I had a very odd experience once where a chap, for various reasons, was painting an oil painting of me and some other people that was going to go up on a wall somewhere. And I was sort of thinking, well, what's the difference between taking a photo and an artist actually doing an oil painting? And when I saw it, I saw into my own eyes. And I called the picture sad eyes because it was a bit scary. He had seen into me in a way that you often don't with a photo, and what he'd seen was sort of the sadness behind the eyes, I think.

Presenter26:36

Yeah.

Presenter27:14

Mm.

Presenter27:15

Is that an important part of who you are? Would you want to change it if you could?

Tom Ilube27:19

I don't think I would want to change it. I think it is part of who I am. I'm genuinely happy and genuinely sad, often at the same time, in the same moment, in the same periods, and I think that is who I am, and I'm comfortable with that.

Presenter27:37

It's time for some more music, Tom. What are we going to hear next?

Tom Ilube27:41

This really is about that. Some say that this song is a sad song, but you know, it is a bit like quantum theory. It depends on the observer. It depends who you look at. You can look at me and see happiness. You can look at me and see sadness. What I think it does is it tells a story and there's a line in it where it says, talked of life, laughed. And telling your story is really important to me. There's an African proverb that says, until lions have their own storytellers, tales of the hunt will always favour the hunter. So this is a story and it's a song called Mr. Bojango's by Sammy Davis Jr.

Speaker 228:21

I knew a man.

Speaker 228:23

No jangles any dance for you.

Speaker 328:30

You're worn out sh

Speaker 228:32

Here's so here.

Speaker 228:34

Ragged shirt

Speaker 228:36

Baggy pants

Speaker 228:40

He would do the old

Speaker 228:43

Soft shoe

Presenter28:44

Uh

Speaker 228:46

Yeah.

Presenter28:46

He would jump so high

Presenter28:50

Sammy Davis Junior and Mr Bojangles. So Tomolube, in 2005 you launched a project to open a secondary school in London and then in twenty sixteen founded a specialist science and math school in Ghana for girls from disadvantaged backgrounds. Why is this kind of educational initiative so important to you?

Tom Ilube29:11

I think it came from my mum and seeing the impact that she was having. And also my dad's journey from the village that he came from. It was his ability to sort of unleash his brain power that took him on that journey. So I've seen the impact that you can have, particularly in secondary education. I find that's where I focus.

Presenter29:35

You've described it as probably the most satisfying thing you've ever done.

Tom Ilube29:38

Yeah, absolutely. And then when I realized my dream of creating and opening the African Science Academy in Ghana for exceptionally gifted young women in science and technology that we look for from across the whole continent, some of those girls are just astonishingly bright. They come to us and they do A-levels in maths, furthermore, physics in under a year from a standing start. And almost all of them get A stars and A's and B's and then they get picked up by universities all over the world on full scholarships and we cover all of their costs while they're with us. And you just know that you're unleashing a generation of butterflies that will have a ripple effect. When they flap their wings, they'll set off tornadoes around the world and across the continent. I can sort of sit back and think, gosh, look what's happening. It's just incredible.

Presenter30:32

You recently became chair of the Rugby Football Union, the RFU, and are the first black chair of any major national sporting body, also one of the biggest organizations of its kind, representing two point five million members. How much is going to be changing under your chairmanship, Tom, and what's the first order of business?

Tom Ilube30:50

The women's game is growing massively and I'm really, really excited about that. So I want to see the women's game growing. I want to see more diversity on the pitch and off the pitch. And I just want to see the strength of England rugby growing and growing. We should be and we will be the dominant rugby nation in the world. I'm really excited about that.

Presenter31:15

Well, before you take on any of that any new challenges, you have of course got the challenge of the island to face. I'm about to cast you away. How are you feeling at the prospect?

Tom Ilube31:25

Ah, excited, excited. I um hardcore introvert, comes out to play immediately.

Presenter31:28

Hardcore introvert comes out to play immediately, this is paradise.

Presenter31:32

But one more disc before we send you off there, Tom. What's it gonna be?

Presenter31:36

Yeah.

Tom Ilube31:36

Yeah.

Presenter31:36

Uh

Tom Ilube31:36

Yes, I like to try and make change happen. And you know, from my career, I've had my fair share of challenges, but also I've tried to make change happen, and I see change happening for the next generation. So, and I think the real deep change happens slowly, and it takes time, but it does come eventually. So, I wanted to choose this song, A Change Is Gonna Come, because of that. But I wanted to choose a version by a remarkable young cellist called Ayana Witter-Johnson and asked her to perform her interpretation of this classic song because for me, she embodies brilliant change, and the way she performs the song as well brings change into it. So, it's A Change Is Gonna Come, Ayana Witter-Johnson's version.

Presenter32:24

I was born

Speaker 232:26

Uh

Presenter32:26

Bothering

Speaker 232:27

If I

Speaker 232:31

In a little tent alone

Speaker 232:36

Just like the river I've been running

Tom Ilube32:40

Yeah.

Speaker 232:41

Yeah

Tom Ilube32:42

Ever since it's been a long time.

Tom Ilube32:48

A long time coming.

Tom Ilube32:51

But I know

Presenter32:53

Yeah.

Presenter32:54

Ayana Witter Johnson performing A Change Is Gonna Come.

Presenter32:58

So, Tomalube, it's time. I'm casting you away to your desert island. What's the first thing that you'll do when you get there?

Tom Ilube33:05

I do Tai Chi and I'll find a nice spot with the sun coming down and I'll go through my hundred and eight forms.

Presenter33:14

We'll give you the books to keep you company when you've finished your Tai Chi. As always, you can have the Bible, the complete works of Shakespeare, and a book of your own choosing. What would you like?

Tom Ilube33:23

I would choose the Wormwood trilogy, of which Rosewater is the first one, by a writer called Tadde Thompson. I love science fiction, and I created an award called the Nomo Awards for African Science Fiction, and that book won the first prize. And it's an amazing vision of a future. So that's what I would choose.

Presenter33:43

You can also take a luxury item for sensory stimulation or to ease the pain of isolation, obviously, not in your case. What do you fancy?

Tom Ilube33:52

I do puzzles. I do big puzzles, 2,000, 3,000-piece puzzles. So I thought at first I should take a 10,000-piece puzzle, but then I thought I'd get it done too quickly. So I decided to create a solar-powered AI-driven puzzle creator that can generate puzzles for me. And they'd be based on pictures of my family and so forth. It's going to use a technique called generative adversarial networks. I've got it all mapped out, a 3D printer to print them out.

Presenter34:21

Oh, well, that'll keep you busy. Nice. And if you could save just one track of the eight that you've shared with us today, Tom, which would it be?

Tom Ilube34:28

It would be Sammy Davis, Junior, mister Bojangoes,'cause that's me.

Presenter34:32

Tomalube, thank you so much for sharing your Desert Island discs with us.

Tom Ilube34:37

That's my life complete.

Presenter34:39

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Presenter34:53

Hello, I hope you enjoyed that interview with Tom and I hope he's content doing puzzles on his island.

Presenter34:59

We've cast many entrepreneurs and philanthropists away over the years, including Dame Stephanie Shirley and Sir Peter Lampel, and you can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or on our programme website. Join me next time when I'll be talking to the mezzo soprano, Dame Sarah Connolly.

Tom Ilube35:27

What's the link between poisoned underpants?

Speaker 335:30

They wanted something that verbs against your skin.

Tom Ilube35:34

A plot to kill Nelson Mandela to find a poison that would cause cancer and have him die shortly afterwards.

Speaker 335:42

and the deadly riots in South Africa this year.

Speaker 335:48

I'm Andrew Harding with A Tale of Politics and Paranoia. Some people wanted me dead. Oh, and the link is Jacob Zuma, South Africa's former President. And indeed, it was quite a strong poison.

Speaker 336:02

That's

Tom Ilube36:02

It's Poison from BBC Radio 4. To listen to all five episodes, just search for Seriously on BBC Sounds.