Remembering Nigeria Journalist, dele Giwa (March 16, 1947 – October 19, 1986)
He was born Sumonu Oladele “Baines” Giwa was born on March 16, 1947 to a family working in the palace of Oba Adesoji Aderemi, then Oni of Ife, and attended local Authority Modern School in Lagere, Ile-Ife. It was when his father moved to Oduduwa College, Ile-Ife as a laundry man, that Dele as his name was shortened gained admission to that school.
Thereafter, Dele Giwa travelled to the USA for his higher education, earning a BA in English from Brooklyn College in 1977 and enrolled for a Graduate program at Fordham University. He worked for The New York Times as a news assistant for four years after which he relocated to Nigeria to work with Daily Times.
In 1984, Dele Giwa and fellow journalists Ray Ekpu, Dan Agbese and Yakubu Mohammed founded Newswatch, and the first edition was distributed on January 28, 1985. A 1989 description of the magazine said it “changed the format of print journalism in Nigeria [and] introduced bold, investigative formats to news reporting in Nigeria”. However, in the first few months of the administration of General Ibrahim Babangida who took power in August 1985.
Dele Giwa was killed by a parcel bomb in his home at Ikeja, Lagos, while in his study with Kayode Soyinka, on Sunday October 19, 1986.
The assassination occurred two days after he had was interviewed by the State Security Service (SSS) officials. In an off-the-record interview with airport journalists, Lt. Col. A.K. Togun, the Deputy Director of the SSS had claimed that on October 9 Dele Giwa and Alex Ibru, Publisher of the The Guardian Newspaper, had organised a media parley for media executives and the newly created SSS. Togun claimed that it was at this meeting that the SSS and the media executives reached a secret censorship agreement. Under this agreement, the media was to report any story with potential to embarrass the government to the SSS before they tried to publish same.
Giwa had been invited by the SSS to their headquarters for the first time on September 19, 1986 after writing an article in which he described the newly introduced Second-Tier Foreign Exchange Market (SFEM) as “God’s experiment” and suggested that if SFEM failed, the people would stone their leaders in the streets. Giwa was interviewed and his statement taken by two SSS operatives. He was later taken to meet with Lt Col Togun, the deputy director of the agency in his office. Togun is reported to have told Giwa that he found nothing offensive in the story as Giwa had also stated in the same story that he was hopeful that Babangida seemed determined to make SFEM work.
According to Giwa’s neighbour and colleague, Ray Ekpu, on October 16, 1986, Giwa had been questioned over the telephone by Col Halilu Akilu of the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI) over an allegation that Dele had been heard speaking to some people about arms importation. SSS officials reportedly summoned Giwa to their headquarters again on October 16, 1986, and on the next day Ekpu accompanied him to the SSS headquarters for the interview. Lt. Col Togun accused Giwa and Newswatch Magazine of planning to write the “other side” of the story on Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, who was removed as Chief of the General Staff, to Babangida. The magazine had published a cover story titled, “Power Games: Ukiwe loses out”, in its edition of October 20 which was on sale on October 13, 1986. Togun also accused Giwa of plotting with the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, and students to carry out a socialist revolution. The story was still running when on October 19, 1986, Giwa was killed via a parcel bomb. May his soul rest in peace!
Courtesy, Wikipedia
