Many Journalists No Longer Speak Truth To Power

• Veteran Journalist/Publisher, NOSA IGIEBOR

Some of Nigeria’s greatest media icons gathered at the Colossus Hotel, Ikeja, Lagos, on September 6, 2024, to remember and celebrate with a Lecture, one of their own, the late Dimgba Igwe, who died on September 6, 2024, exactly ten years ago last week. The late Dimgba Igwe had been fatally hit by a car whose driver’s identity remains unknown to this day. He had fled the scene the moment he knocked down Dimgba. At the time of his death, Dimgba Igwe was Associate Publisher of Entertainment Weekly Newspaper. He died at the age of 58. Mr. Dimgba, alongside his colleague and best friend, Mike Awoyinfa, pioneered the now rested Weekend Concord newspaper, The Sun Newspaper and co-authored several books including Osoba: The Newspaper Years, The Arts of Feature Writing and Mike Adenuga: The Business Guru. The veteran journalist, until his death, was the Assistant General Overseer of Evangel Pentecostal Churchý, Lagos.ý

At the 10th Anniversary lecture of late Dimgba Igwe, many of the prominent journalists today, who at one point or the other worked with him, were in attendance. The title of the lecture was Tabloid Journalism: Yesterday, Today And The Future. Guest Speaker was Mr. Muyiwa Adetiba, the founder of the defunct but hugely successful Prime People magazine and he spoke on the power of soft sell magazine in Nigeria. The journalists converged to pay tribute to a man who influenced their journalistic careers in several significant ways, and two of them were the Special Adviser, Media and Publicity to former president Muhammadu Buhari, Femi Adeshina and award winning journalist, Mr. Shola Oshunkeye, and several others. They were among key organisers of the event.

One of the speakers at the event was veteran journalist and co-founder of TELL magazine, Mr. Nosa Igiebor. Many will remember his close shave with death during the military era of the Sanni Abacha regime. He, along with his colleagues with whom they ran TELL together, were constantly hounded and arrested by the military for speaking truth to power. They were the voice of the voiceless. On one occasion in 1995, Igiebor, the editor in chief of Tell Magazine, was arrested by six members of the State Security Service at his home in Lagos. Authorities demanded that he reveal his sources for articles critical of the government and accused him of receiving financial support from “outsiders.” It got to a point that arrests and detentions were no longer terrifying to Nosa Igiebor and his colleagues, they were always prepared for it. He was once arrested and kept in detention for several months.

Till this day, Nosa Igiebor remains one of the most fearless journalists in the continent. Even now that age has slowed him down (he is in his 70s) he never shies away from criticising the government of the day and their policies and he demands that from the younger journalists as well. During his speech at the late Dimgba Igwe’s 10th anniversary lecture, Nosa Igiebor wondered why many people, including journalists, were no longer asking the government questions and speaking truth to power. Below is his speech:

“It was just a few days ago that Femi and Oshunkeye came to me and when you have such collosus of the media come your way and tell me that they want me to be here today, of course I couldn’t say no to that. More so because of the main reason why this event is taking place, the tenth anniversary of our dear brother and colleague, Dimgba Igwe, somebody I got to know after I left Concord. Oshunkeye failed to mention that I’m also a very prominent member of the Concord family. I was one of the pioneer staff of Concord, Mike and Dimgba probably came in months before I left Concord. But, as it happens in our profession, we get to know each other in the field of practice. I get to interact with them outside Concord and my impression I have always had of them is that they were one of the greatest brothers in journalism that we have ever seen. Dimgba was not just an excellent gentleman, he was a fine journalist. And no matter what they say about Mike, I also know him to be a fine gentleman, we all know he is a fine journalist and also a fine gentleman. But apart from the great friendship they share and their passion for the work they do a journalists, what stood out for me is their humility. Dimgba was a very humble guy, so is Mike. Mike is soft spoken and they will tell you that don’t be deceived by his soft spokeness, but he’s a gentleman, humble to the core. And I remember the first time he and Dimgba came to me, I think it was when they wrote their first book, The Captains of Industry, and of course, one of the industries they picked on was our profession and industry. And they came to me, they said they wanted to interview me. I said Mike, Dimgba, how did Nosa Igiebor qualify to be captain of industry? They said the problem of journalists is that, we recognise others, but we hardly sing about ourselves as journalists. Well, they insisted, we had the interview and the book turned out to be one of the best I’d ever seen, especially the way it was structured. I still want to commend Mike and Dimgba for that great effort you made. They went on to write other great books like the great book they did on former governor Olusegun Osoba.”

“What I will say, really, apart from thanking Mrs. Igwe for carrying on the torch of the family, because its not easy when you lose a husband or a wife, especially at a time when the children were still growing, but then, it also shows the power of the love you shared with your husband. I believe with the power of the Almighty God, the only one who can empower anybody, you have been able to take care of most of the difficulties that you were confronted with. We thank you for making your husband’s memory one that everyone will be proud of, your chdren, members of your family and those of us who were his colleagues and friends. Our prayer is that God will continue to give you that power and the grace to carry on the torch of the family on behalf of your late husband. This is a very auspicious day I would say that we are marking the tenth anniversary that we lost a dear friend, colleague and brother. And I was reflecting last night, knowing I was going to be here for this event today, and I thought, what would Dimgba be thinking now, seeing the state of our nation? We can only speculate but those of us who know him will know how he would feel about the situation and what he will be thinking and saying. And this is my exhortation to everyone of us here. I know that Nigerians, we are very easy going people and we are also very tough people, but what I found disturbing is the fact that even in journalism, we have come to accept the normalisation of the abnormal in Nigeria and that’s the greatest problem facing this country today, where everyone of us accepts what is abnormal to be normal.”

“I remember last year in the heat of the campaign before the election, one of my nephews came to me and we were talking about a whole lot of things going on at the time. And the question he asked me was, if at this level, the things we teach our children, like the morals we try to pass to them like being honest, being truthful, God fearing, they have watched us turn all those upside down in the name of politics. People no longer ask questions about those who lead us. That’s how we have found ourselves where we are today And we have seen the impact of bad government. And it did not start with this present government, its been decades in the making. And because we have refused to control the monster of bad governance, Nigeria has been reduced to a joke, not only among our neighbours, but continentally and globally. This is what we should really focus ourselves on, its something we should reflect on very deeply. What are we leaving for our children when we go? What legacy are we leaving for our children? I don’t know what the next speaker, Muyiwa intends to focus on in his speech, but like I told him moments ago, I don’t miss his column every week, he is still one of the few journalists who still try to speak truth to power. At least, that is what we owe ourselves, its what we owe our profession. We can’t stop speaking truth to power because Nigeria is at the cross roads. And we cannot come here today to honour our brother without addressing this existential threat. That’s why I said, last night I was thinking, what will Dimgba be thinking of Nigeria of today, if he was still with us today?”

“Again, I want to thank those who put this event together. Like Idowu reminded us, Osoba advised that we should not wait for others to celebrate us, because we do so much for this country but journalists are the least recognised in terms of our efforts at nation building. We contributed more to Nigeria, in the colonial period, during the fight for independence and post independence than any other group of people or profession in this country, so that’s why I agree with Chief Osoba, we must always celebrate our own. We must celebrate who we are, what we do, our profession. It’s truly noble, despite all the difficulties, the sacrifices we make, many of us remain committed to doing our job with passion, and that was what Dimgba Igwe and Mike Awoyinfa had and that’s why we are here today to celebrate his memory. I wish you all the best, thank you very much.”

-WALE LAWAL

(08037209290)