‘Editorial’ Mr. Wayas Didn’t Read
“The most incredible and laughable aspect of the whole story was that Mr. Wayas didn’t even read the article in question. He thought it was an editorial.”
Poor Ben Enahoro. Mr. Enahoro is the Sergeant-at-Arms of the National Assembly, Lagos. His job is impossible, if for nothing else than that the man may not be able to agree with his employers that certain errands are not worth carrying because they may not be properly constituted. One of the things Mr. Enahoro is expected to understand is the process by which the National Assembly leaders can direct him to fetch any member of the public. It would be recalled that poor Ben Enahoro was dispatched to Daily Times to “fetch,” as he put it, the Managing Director of Daily Times, Patrick Dele Cole, and the editor of the paper, Tony Momoh. Mr. Enahoro should have informed the President of the Senate, Mr. Joseph Wayas, that the two gentlemen had committed no offence that would warrant the National Assebly to summon them summarily to Tafawa Balewa Square.
Anyway, Mr. Enahoro came down to Daily Times with no authority directing him to Dr. Cole and Mr. Momoh. All he brought were his name, his title and the slip of paper handed him by the Times receptionist on which he scrawled his errand: “to escort Dr. Cole and the editor, Mr. Tony Momoh, to the president of the Senate.” Dr. Cole told Mr. Enahoro to go back to the Senate and bring a letter stating the Sergeant-at-Arms’ mission. He went back and brought a letter “inviting” Dr. Cole and Mr. Momoh to meet with Mr. Wayas the following morning.
In reporting the Ben Enahoro incident, the Nigerian Tribune speculated that “dependable sources told the (paper) that Dr. Cole had already fallen out of favour with the Senate and the House of Representatives.” Quoting its dependable sources, the Tribune said that there are graves charges awaiting him.” Well, these sources are undependable. The reason that Mr. Enahoro was sent down to Daily Times was an article I wrote, entitled “Mr. Ume Ezeoke’s Recklessness,” in which said the speaker was acting beyond his power in telling the public how to behave. In the first place, it’s difficult to see how Mr. Wayas was involved in the episode. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, who was the subject of the article for which the Times executives were “invited” by Mr. Wayas, hard the same authorities as the President of the Senate. The most incredible and laughable aspect of the whole story was that Mr. Wayas didn’t even read the articles in question. He thought it was an editorial. Mr. Wayas welcome the two newspaper executives to his office with the accusation that Daily Times was trying to undermine the Federal Government by publishing a dangerous editorial. Dr. Cole asked the Senate President the editorial he was referring to. Mr. Wayas answered that the editorial attacked the person of the speaker of the House of Representatives who, Mr. Wayas added inauspiciously, “is the fourth person in line to succeed to the presidency of the country,” that is after the Vice-President and the President of the Senate in that order.
Mr. Momoh was fuming that he was brought down to the Senate to hear how outraged was the President of the Senate because of an article he didn’t even bother to read! When Dr. Cole and Mr. Momoh told Mr. Wayas that Daily Times didn’t write any editorial on Mr. Ezeoke, that the piece that Mr. Wayas was referring to was an article, the Senate President was contrite. He sent for the issue of Daily Times in which the article was published. Meanwhile, he began to placate the angry gentlemen who didn’t know whether to laugh or just walk out of Mr. Wayas’ office. He said the legislature and the press should work together and so on. But as he was saying that, the National Assembly was finalizing arrangement to: “request” the same Patrick Dele Cole to appear before the assembly’s joint committee on remunerations. Of course, Dr. Cole appeared before the National Assembly committee as were other 40 or so executives of companies who included Mr. Ola Vincent of the Central Bank and Chief Tunde Ibikume, chairman of the Savannal Bank. But it was clear from the nature of questioning at the committee that Dele Cole was the fish and others were the bait. Fair enough, many members seemed only interested in knowing how Dr. Cole and the others could help the committee in deliberating on the issue of salaries of public officers facing the National Assembly. But it seemed that someone like Senator Jaja Wachukwu was more interested in embarrassing Dr. Cole because his questions were so personal and irrelevant that some of the senator’s colleagues on the committee had to about him out of order several times.
Of course, Mr. Wayas regretted asking the two executives of the Daily Times to come to the National Assembly over an item in the press he apparently did not read. And the fair members of the National Assembly did not allow Senator Wachukwu to continue asking what they called irrelevant questions. One hopes that the war on the press which, to many members of the National Assembly, is represented by the Daily Times, is over.
©Daily Times, December 14, 1979
(Pp.54-56)
