Private Life In Public
“The only possible reason for his vitriol against me and others was that we all work for concord newspapers which they consider enemy territory … this type of writing raises serious questions about the role of journalism in a nation’s public life.”
“Dele Giwa,” wrote Akin Dowoni in the Nigerian Tribune of July 15, 1980, “is of course no surprise, no sooner than Cole (Dr. Dele Cole) brought him back from the US to extol the Obasanjo regime he turned the Daily Times feature pages to an NPN megaphone. His types,” meaning poor me, he continued, “would only go down the drain. I feel people shouldn’t bother much about him, those who know him at close quarters have much to say of his sense of moral values …” And on, and on. Although Mr. Dowoni said no one should worry about me, he was worrying about me by writing the scurrilous things as contained in the excerpts from his July 15 piece. I never knew the man, and I was sure he didn’t know me. Why he should write to abuse me and cast aspersions on what he called my “sense of moral values” was beyond me. The only possible reason for Mr. Dowoni’s vitriol against me and others like Labanji Bolaji and Doyin Aboaba was that we all work for the Concord newspapers which Dowini and his ilk consider enemy territory. It didn’t matter to them that we were journalists merely answering a calling and that none of us had written any abuse against anybody. Mr. Dowoni’s article was called Awo and Socialism, written to defend Chief Obafemi Awolowo on the question arising from the revelations published in the Concord newspaper on Chief Awolowo’s land transactions. While not really addressing himself to the issues raised in the land publications, Mr. Dowoni ran amok abusing the most senior journalists working for Concord, referring to Doyin Aboaba as an ex-Editor falling out with her publisher, and wondering exactly what Labanji Bolaji was still doing at the Concord Press.
This type of writing by Dowoni raises serious questions about the role of journalism in a nation’s public life. No doubting the fact that a journalist who rises to the position of an editor has become a public figure and as such cannot expect a whole lot of privacy. Part of his job was to dig into the lives of public figures and by the same extension others will dig into his private life. The kind of probing definitely did not include character assassination. At least Dowoni cannot point to any piece I have written – for Daily Times and Sunday Concord – in which I abused people. And I challenge him to tell his readers how I turned Daily Times into an NPN megaphone when Page seven which I edited hardly ever carried political stories.
And I wonder whether Michael Asaju, president of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, understands the contents of a paper he presented to students at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism and published in the July 21 issue of West Africa magazine. Asaju said he noted that the Concord newspapers had shifted from it national objectivity to what he called parochialism. It is hard to understand what Asaju understands parochialism to mean and what he described as Concord’s yellow journalism. He said he found that the newspaper carried fabricated and imaginary stories all determined to destroy individuals. In his lengthy piece, one would have expected Asaju to mention a few stories fabricated by the Concord newspapers and document how they were designed to destroy individuals. It is really all incredible that in the same piece, Asaju went on to laud the Nigerian Tribune as a fearless newspaper practicing his kind of journalism. As an after- thought, he sided the Tribune for its hostility to President Shagari.
The sort of reckless statement by Asaju was responsible for the confusion in which Nigerian journalism had found itself. Here was a man who is blaming graduate journalists for the corruption among practitioners of the profession. He said they were responsible for abusing the codes of their profession to gain access to the corridors of power during the military regime. He also placed on the shoulders of graduate journalists the corruption he said was endemic in the civilian regime that succeeded the military. As usual, the NUJ president failed documents such a serious observation, believing that it was enough that he made them. It seemed as though the man hated those who had university degrees and who became editors at relative tender ages. Hear this: “Today, among Nigerian journalists and university graduates who rose rapidly to the posts of editors in printing and electronic media at the expense of the professionals with long years of service and experience who were not privileged with university education.” And that was contained in a speech delivered to students of a higher institution. People like Dowoni glory in the phantasmagoria spun for them by people like Asaju who should know but apparently don’t know.
More on Death
Remember Muhammed Iginla of Zaria who said he knew something about death and God which other mortals knew nothing about? Since sending me that inresting letter other have joined the exchanges which have become arresting. Mr. Iginla later said he would come down to Lagos for a face-to-face talk about his encounted with death, God and angels. Meanwhile, he has replied through to a letter written by Mr. Salam and published in the Sunday Concord of July 27. Although I was not aware of it, Mr. Iginla is saying to Mr. Salam that my article “raised concern on the problematic agnosticism, atheism and fanaticism.” It was certain that more people will join this discussion on Mr. Iginla’s existentialist thoughts and was certain that we had not heard the last word from him on the matter.
©Sunday Concord, August 17, 1980
(Pp.80-82)
