By Lade Bonuola
Editors are the modern day prophets. They are like the prophets of old: The Day of Judgment is nigh; Repent! That was their mission outcry. Editors are like artistes. When everyone is looking at skyscrapers and a mansion with clenched fists hitting the air in admiration, what an artiste is looking at is the unwashed gutter and foul, putrid water flowing through it in front of the ornate imposing buildings. We learn in the enlightenment through higher knowledge spreading in these times that artistes are the most with the soil to receive hints of what is true and sublime. Their values differ. The ignorant would try to push the artist to whom the skyscraper means nothing out of the way.
What I am saying is unfortunately the experience of the Nigerian Tribune today. There is all manner of dirt being thrown at the newspaper editors and their columnists for their position on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. It is too late to get the Tribune to bend to anybody’s inclination, tendencies or beliefs or gag her editors. They are pressing to get Dr. Lasisi Olagunju, Suyi Ayodele and Dr. Festus Adedayo to see no evil and to hear no evil. The traducers do not want to know if the newspaper is looking at a bigger picture than they are seeing. That will be contrary to what the Nigerian Tribune stands for. They do not want to know the editorial policy of the newspaper.
The Tribune is to hold views according to her own light with truth as the focus. She is to direct the gaze of her readers to what is high and noble and hold the government accountable to the people of Nigeria. And she has discharged this responsibility as a bulwark of freedom and liberty creditably in her existence clocking 74 years in about a week’s time, 16 November. She has always carefully chosen her editors. Can anyone so quickly forget Ayo Ojewumi, Professor Emiola and, of course, the great and exemplary leader himself, Lateef Kayode Jakande, LKJ? Ojewumi, Jakande and Bisi Onabanjo wrote editorials from prison which were smuggled out, forwarded to Emiola deputising for his boss, Ayo Ojewumi; fearless and brave men all. Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola, the Premier of Western Region, once wrote that Tribune was the embodiment of Obafemi Awolowo spirit. Lateef Jakande wrote to the Inspector-General of Police, Kam Salem, that should his men find anything irksome in the Tribune editorials, it was he they should come for, not his editors. Jakande was Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper. He was the ubiquitous face of the Nigerian Tribune.
Chief Awolowo once sent for me. He said to me that he would like me to join Felix Adenaike in Ibadan to screen some materials for the editorship of The Tribune. He said he trusted I was familiar with the attributes Tribune was looking for in her editors in view of what I represented while in the editorial suite myself. Adenaike was Editor-in-Chief whom we fondly called GOC. He got into the saddle in succession to Tola Adeniyi, Aba Saheed. When I got to Ibadan, Gbolabo Ogunsanwo was already seated. From here you can get my drift. The writings must be clean and the editorial, must be scholarly and when necessary trenchant, unsparing no matter whose ox is gored. Right is right and wrong is wrong; no room for cant and homburg. It is righteousness that exalts a nation. The regular contributors to the newspaper besides in-house writers were Dr. Tai Solarin, Gani Fawehinmi, and Kanmi Ishola Osobu. Ebenezer Babatope (Ebeno Topsy), Bola Ige (Uncle B), Bisi Onabanjo and occasionally Odia Ofeimum later joined the galaxy of columnists.
Long before the assignment at Imalefealafia, in 1979, Chief Awolowo had sent for me. On getting to Ikenne, he told me that he had mentioned me to Chief Bola Ige to invite me to the Board of Governors (Board of Directors) of Radio O-Y-O. Foluso Opadina, a Nigerian magazine publisher in Germany, Prof. Emiola and I were the professionals on the Board. Chief Awolowo said to me that there is the temptation for a party in power not to countenance what the Opposition had to say and joyfully accept their materials to go on air. If listeners were availed only government policies and programmes, and those of the Opposition were shut out, how were they to make informed choices? He was certain Emiola, Opadina and I would not allow Opposition voices to be muzzled. He said O-Y-O was a successful radio station and self-financing. He told me that our success would be measured by the business flourish of the station. If the station went back to draw subvention from the Oyo State Government headed by Bola Ige, it meant we had failed. We were five on the Board with a prince of Ife being our chairman. And there was a lady lecturer from the University of Ibadan. And, of course, the General Manager, Adeleke, and Secretary, Olayinka. That was the standard Chief Awolowo infused in these organizations. His vision was to make a BBC of O-Y-O, severely independent of the government of the day. Her loyalty must be to the Truth.
Tribune has lived up to her billing. She is the oldest lady among the pack of private newspapers in the whole country today; where are her peers? She has remained standing because she has successfully warded off all pressures considered inimical to the interest of Nigeria, and that of the Western Region in particular which stretches passing through Benin City, Ishan, Auchi in Edo State, Warri to Asaba in Delta State and the whole of South-West.
The editors have said they are not opposed to Tinubu in order to bring him down, but his activities and conduct will be subjected to strict scrutiny. I am neither for him. I must remain independent, staying clear of political murky waters. The occasional intervention I make on political matters is to contribute to ensuring peace and harmony in the land. For instance, I was the first on these pages to canvass for Bola Tinubu Muslim-Muslim ticket if he wanted to win the election. Since the rich basket of votes for him was in the Muslim North, his running mate could only come from the zone to maximize his harvest. I did state that Tinubu was not a religious bigot; but a city boy and I listed all his commissioners who were Christians when he was governor of Lagos State. His wife of more than 40 years attended Our Lady of Apostles, Ijebu-Ode, a Roman Catholic School, and later, during her marriage to Tinubu, she has even become a pastor at the Redeemed Christian Church and Tinubu was present at her ordination. I have had cause to draw attention to his gift of head hunting.
I have also written about Atiku Abubakar whom I always refer to as the Northern Star who is sufficiently exposed to lift the country to a new high. I wrote about Peter Obi, saying of him that the educational standard in Anambra State rose dramatically upon his mounting the saddle such that Anambra was leading every time in WAEC and NECO examinations. His simplicity was endearing; so was his prudent management of public funds.
What I am getting at is that the strength of the South-West is in views and ideas of her people contending. If the Nigerian Tribune has reservations about anything, these will not go away by assailing the dignity of the editors and intimidation.
Where does all this leave us? What is truth? In discussions at which all manner of opinions are expressed — for or against, we seek the truth. It is either one party is right or the other is wrong. But each party holds on to its standpoint as the truth, the gospel truth. Can a man be a hero to his people and a villain to others? Is he a hero or not? It may even so happen that he is neither a hero nor a villain at the end of the day. Usually also attacked with the truth is the purveyor who may be wounded in the process, mortally wounded for that matter: “Carry your truth go,” it is often said. Jakande was wont to say: “In the contest between truth and falsehood, who has ever heard the truth being worsted”?
Each human being will absorb the splitting of truth streaming down from On High in accordance with his capacity and it is to that which is a measure of his inner radiance he will give expression. It is the gap in the rays of the inner lamp in one and that in the other person that often leads to disagreements, conflict, aggression and even war. The gap can then only be managed with love and understanding and where called for, firmness.
* Lade Bonuola (Ladbone) is a former Managing Director of The Guardian newspaper