•Gives Eye Witness Account Of What Happened In OCT. 1986
The shocking death of Dele Giwa, the founder and Editor-In-Chief of now rested Newswatch Magazine back in October 1986, still remains one of the country’s biggest unsolved murder cases. Nobody saw his death coming. At the time he was killed via a parcel bomb delivered to him in his home by yet to be identified persons, late Dele Giwa was the Doyen of Investigative Journalism in Nigeria. His hard sell news magazine, The Newswatch, was by far the country’s number one news magazine. At a point, every edition of the publication was sold out. Dele Giwa became a feared and celebrated journalist. The high and mighty became his friends. He was the journalist no one wanted to offend. His fame soared so high, he was regarded as one of those media personalities who could do no wrong.
But, like everyone who has reached the sort of height he had achieved, Dele Giwa also made some enemies along the way. A lot of them. Unfortunately, he really couldn’t identify all of his enemies, as he wined and dined with both the powerful and the highly placed in the society. This is why, till today, it is believed that the parcel bomb that killed Dele Giwas was probably sent to him by one of the powerful high and mighty who knew him very closely.
In this interview, London based journalist, Kayode Soyinka, who was with the late Dele Giwa at the time the incident occurred, gives City People Publisher, SEYE KEHINDE, an eyewitness account of what happened on that fateful day of October 19, 1986. Kayode Soyinka is the Publisher of Africa Today Magazine.
He was one of the closest friends and associates of late Dele Giwa at the time of his death.
Let me ask you, sir, how does it make you feel each time you think about the October 19, 1986 incident? Each time you think about it and remember your good friend, Dele Giwa, how does it make you feel?
It makes me very sad because we shouldn’t have lost him. He was a good man. He was a very outgoing, very friendly person. I have a chapter on him in my book. There’s a chapter on the parcel bomb incident in my book. To answer your question, it makes me very sad because we lost a real gem in Dele Giwa. If Dele Giwa was alive today, he would’ve been very useful to Nigeria as a nation, not just in the journalism industry. He would’ve been a good talent that Nigeria could’ve used in so many ways. It makes me sad in that sense, and secondly, that it happened right in front of me. I saw him being blasted and I only survived by the sheer grace of God. You never contemplate that kind of thing. I mean, by the time we were holding the parcel bomb, none of us knew what was in it. We didn’t know what we were carrying because he gave it to me as well immediately Billy brought it. Over the years, I have read the accounts of some senior police officers who were lying in the interviews they had with journalists, trying to distort the facts. They said that I ran into the toilet. They always forget that some people came and dropped the parcel at the gate and gave it to the maiguard, can you see the journey of the parcel? And on the way, they met Dele Giwa’s son, Billy, and handed it over to him. They were trying to say I was the one who got the parcel, but they forgot about the journey of the parcel. Then, of course, Billy got the parcel and brought it to his father who was having breakfast with me in his study. I was sitting right in front of Dele. He held the parcel, looked at it briefly and gave it to me to look at. It was because I had it in my hands and I was able to look at it closely and then saw the inscription on it, ‘coming from the Cabinet Office, to be opened only by the addressee,’ so I handed it over to him. Ordinarily, because of our closeness, I could’ve opened it. He could open my letter. Whenever I was in Nigeria, I stayed in his house, whenever he was in the UK, he stayed in my house, even with his family, Funmilayo, Aisha and himself. We had a very close personal relationship and that was the reason why I was there when this thing occurred. So, it makes me very sad. I lost an Editor. I lost a very close family friend of ours. He was very close to my wife. All of them, Ray Ekpu, Yakubu, they were very close to my wife. They were always around us when I was dating my wife and that was why they played very important roles during our wedding. And the psychological effect of that event lives with me every day. If you look around my study, you will see Dele’s picture somewhere behind me, same with the picture of his children, Tunde and Dele, in New York (shows picture on the wall). This was taken in my house in London. I went to New York to bring them to London for a holiday. So, lets put it this way, it is like a cross that I carry. Even up till today, when I come to Nigeria and see some people who have heard about me but have never seen me before because my reputation precedes me if I want to interview them, they interview me first because they would like to hear from me first how that parcel bomb incident occurred.
But, sir, what do you make of the stories that were making the rounds then that both of you were working on a big story then, there were all sorts of versions then…
Yeah, again, there was a lot of falsehood. Some even wrote that I met with the associate of the former Nigerian first lady in London or Paris and that Dele Giwa and I were trying to do a story on her. I still don’t know how some of these editors allowed those stories get into their publications without investigating them. And when you go online and Google, you’ll see some of these lies there. People who do not know about what happened might take this kind of information as the gospel truth. So, there’s been a lot of outright lies being told by people who claim they are experts on the matter. They didn’t talk to me to find out what really happened on the day and I’m sure they didn’t talk to other people who were involved with us in Newswatch. They just came up with their own theories and were trying to make a sense of it themselves. Those stories are not true at all.
Is it true you suffered some ear defects at that time?
At the moment of the incident, my two eardrums were blocked completely. If you are close to me and talking to me, as loud as you may, I won’t hear you. When I was at the First Foundation Hospital, and making my first statement to the police, it was Dele Olojede who was behind me when I was doing it and he was talking to me, letting me know what the officer was asking. But I was finding it difficult, no matter how close he was to me to even hear what he was saying. It was the big blast of the bomb that caused my eardrums to be perforated. And for many years, it was like that. By the time I got back to the UK, I had a check of it. They said there was nothing they could do about, that it would heal by itself. And the noise that was going on in my ears was continuous and could be very irritating. And it was like a hissing noise and that was going on for about five years. I was carrying that with me all through that period. Who do I blame in Nigeria for all these injuries and psychological trauma one was going through?
Did that experience change your perception of life as a person? What sort of effect did it leave on you?
Sure it did. What I am today as a professional journalist, is affected most importantly and in so many ways affected by that event of 19th October 1986. It affects my sense of judgement, the way Nigerian journalism operates, opens my eyes to the reality of media and politics in Nigeria. It affects my work as a journalist especially when you’re dealing with different types of authorities and how to deal with them as journalists and particularly as publishers because publishing is a business which must survive. It will be even better if you’re a publisher with a reporter’s background, an editor’s background. It makes you a better publisher so that you can have a better business sense when you’re dealing with authorities like when you have the military. You must know the people you’re dealing with. You must understand the way the system works, including security as well. And the same thing applies today under a democratic setting. The media has a very important role to play and the number one role, with what we’ve gone through under the military rule is to make sure that our democracy survives. There is no bigger role for the Nigerian media today than making sure that democracy survives because we, the media, fought for it through our tears, blood and sweat. But the problem we have in the media today is that some of our colleagues are too much in bed with politicians and that affects our editorial judgement. There should be a thin line between business, politics and government. Let us retain it like that and not go over that line. This is why I advise media houses to continue to spend money to train journalists, this is something newspaper houses were doing back then but it stopped. And it shouldn’t stop, it should continue. It is very essential. You must give the people working in the newsroom the confidence that they are in a very serious profession.
