The Peter Pan Story: Fate
“He said Zik was angry, his immediate boss, Mr. Ogunrinka, was embarrassed, and the Briton who was the Director of Information was, pale. Seeing all that, Enahoro said, he knew he must leave the Ministry willingly and immediately before his bosses could prepare his of letter of dismissal.”
Peter Enahoro said during the four hour interview in his small room at Ikoyi Hotel that he always knew that he was not an academic material because he couldn’t concentrate long enough on anything. Thus, during Latin classes when he was in secondary school. Enahoro said he furtively consumed novels, serious ones, not the Hadley Chase type, because he didn’t like the Latin teacher and hated Latin itself. In one year, Enahoro said he finished all the plays and novels of Bernard Shaw and the work of many other landmark European novelists and playwrights. That’s how Peter Enahoro developed his vocabulary and put together many cunning expressions like “ garbage cans of innuendoes” which later marked him out as an outstanding newspaper columnist who used satires to drive home his critisms.
With his enormous talent for the written word, Enahoro naturally sought work in the Federal Ministry of Information in 1955 after leaving the secondary school. He was made an Assistant Information Officer. He didn’t quite make a career there before leaving government service that same year because of an incident that involved Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. The issue was revenue allocation, a perpetual Nigerian headache which even as far back as 1955 pitted Dr. Azikiwe against Chief Awolowo. According to Enahoro, Chief Awolowo supported renenue allocation by derivation, meaning that an area of the federal producing the most must get the most. But, Enahoro recalled, Dr. Azikiwe supported allocation by need, meaning regardless of production, the nation’s booties should be shared according to the needs of different areas of the country. Enahoro said all that was so, not because the two age-old political foes had economic differences, but because self-interest dictated their positions. Cocoa, which was the chief money earner for Chief Awolowo’s Western Region, was doing well in the world market at the time. But palm oil, which was the chief money earner for Dr. Azikiwe’s Eastern Region, wasn’t doing so well at that material time. It happened that Dr. Azikiwe travelled abroad for some external loans, something that regional premiers in those days had the power to negotiate. On his return from that trip, Dr. Azikiwe gave a press conference in Lagos which the Federal Ministry of Information had to set up. As an Assistant Information Officer, it was Enahoro’s duty to work on the conference, and it was his duty to make Zik’s work at the conference light. But Enahoro said he saw things differently.
Anyway, a reporter asked Dr. Azikiwe that in view of the fact that he came back from his trip abroad with some money, would he then opt for sharing the booty by derivation or need? Enahoro recalled that the question appeared funny, although looked at closely, the question was equally serious. He said Zik chose to treat the question lightly. Enahoro, just 20 years old at that time, said he couldn’t care much about what hie role was that afternoon. He stepped forward, he said, and repeated the reporter’s question, taking time to explain to Zik that it was a serious question and not something to laugh about. He said Zik was angry, his immediate boss, Mr. Ogunrinka, was embarrassed, and the Briton who was the Director of Information, a man named J.D. Stoker, was pale. Seeing all that, Enahoro said, he knew he must leave the Ministry of Information willingly and immediately before his bosses could prepared his letter of dismissal.
When Enahoro got back to his desk, he began to write his letter of resignation. A journalist present at the press conference who was impressed with Enahoro’s bravery came over to Enahoro as he was drafting his resignation letter and offered him a job. The journalist was a man called Abiodun Aloba, aka (also known as) Ebenezer Williams, the editor of Sunday Times. “Aloba came over,” Enahoro recalled, “saying he (Peter Enahoro) should be a pressman and not a press officer.” Enahoro said Aloba called back and got him in touch with the then Managing Director of the Daily Times, a Briton by the name of Percy Roberts. Meanwhile, Enahoro said he went to Peter Osugo, aka PECOS, to ask his advice. Osugo, he said, told him to take the job. Thus, in 1955, Enahoro joined the Daily Times Company as a sub-editor. Apart from a scattering of short stories, he didn’t write anything memorable until he resigned from the company in 1956 – on principle.
He had joined with others in staging a protest to the management on salaries. The company’s reaction was to fire three people believed to head the protest. But Enahoro said he was angry that he wasn’t fired since he was the kingpin of the protest. The reason he wasn’t fired, he said, was that his brother, Anthony Enahoro, was the Minister of Information in the old Western Region. In anger, he resigned and joined the Rediffusion Company in Ibadan where he was made an Assistant District Manager, a position which Enahoro now describes as that of a “veritable store keeper.” A year or so later, Enahoro said he came to Lagos to show off. Jeffrey Taylor who was the Editorial Adviser in the Daily Times saw him and saw through him that he, Enahoro, didn’t really like the “store keeper” job and wanted to come to the Daily Times. Enahoro confessed. He was re-tired by Alhaji Babatunde Jose who had become the editor of Daily Times. Enahoro was put on a salary that was just about two thirds of what he was making at the Rediffusion in Ibadan.
“My mother,” Enahoro recalled,” thought I was unstable” to leave a promising job for the poverty of newspaper. Enahoro said if his mother had know that he was taking a cut in pay, she would have concluded that he was raving mad. Less than a year on returning to the Daily Times, Enahoro said he was asked to act as the features editor of the paper, and in two months or so was asked to act as the editor of Sunday Times for Peter Osugo who had gone to the United States for a short course. He was subsequently confirmed as editor of Sunday Times. That’s when every Sunday, Peter Enahoro used to write under three different by-lines: Peter Enahoro, Peter Pan and George Sharp.
©Daily Times, December 12, 1979
(Pp.14-16)
