SWIFTER THAN A TIGER

Do you know Baba Oje with his zoom-lensed  camera? 

Adefunpe Ojeyemi's middle name was integrity and which was why he did his job with single- mindedness.

He was swifter than a tiger .

Let me tell you a story in the centre of which his agility provided me the fulcrum upon which I won my first professional award for journalism practice in Oyo state in 1992.

I woke up one early morning with God sending me a message to someone at Apata. I wasn't sure it was God's voice and so I asked for a sign to confirm it.  That same day was a day one multi-million naira corporate outfit wanted journalists to be at the NUJ Press centre, Iyaganku, Ibadan for a briefing.  

My going to Apata to deliver the message would involve cancelling my official assignment for that day and the consequences of failing in my Punch duty was never going  to be a tea party and which was why I wanted to be doubly sure it was God behind the vision . As I was ruminating over this, one of my friends ( Adenuga now in US) arrived at my Ring Road flat , that same hour and said to me :" Here is my car , I am here to take you anywhere today. " 

I needed no further confirmation and that was why I asked him to drive me straight to Apata , the point of delivering my divine assignment.  To cut a long story short, it took me three or four hours to get through with the message which God sent me to deliver concerning the naming ceremony of a bouncing baby boy .

The story of the arrival of the boy is another story entirely because I had the Grace of being the vessel God used to communicate to the mother of the boy that He would console her with the arrival of the new born baby.  

I arrived at my office after all my colleagues had sent their stories of the  press briefing which I could not attend.  As I was just wondering aloud about what could be the consequences of missing such story, a young undergraduate ( Kolade Adebayo , the author  of The Only Child ; being a literature book for schools) stormed my office gently and gave me a hint that a siamese twins were given birth to at a hospital in Iwo road.  Hunted now more than the hunter, I set off to the place.  Every photographer that worked with me understood that I shared the same body language with the famous editor, R.J. Minney. 

" Go out and get the story, If you can't climb the fence, fall over it, but for God's sake , don't come back without the story. " That's the Minney's mandate to the reporter and his word is a commandment which no reporter dared to treat with levity.

I shall expatiate in the next series on how my own body language to camera men under my supervision had tremendously benefited all of us jointly and made us all multi-award winners.

Trust Baba Oje who with the agility of a tiger was such a goal- getter  who always pursued trouble to its origin , he soon landed different shots of the mother and the twins, even at such unholy hour of the night. 

Straight, he wangled his way through the traffic and landed at ikeja with exclusive pictures of the first siamese twins in the South western state of Nigeria.

Timeliness is the lifeblood in Journalism practice and which is why the race to keep deadlines in the newspaper industry is a heavy race .

In the words of Larry Arhagba, :" It is a moment for the editor to forget all side attractions, including his wife, his children...

Those who work to meet deadlines are his friends; others who do not are instant foes."

It was one great scoop that I was the only reporter in the ancient city of Ibadan to get the story but getting the story across when it was still exclusive was the real challenge of the hour . 

Knowing what  siamese twins looked like in the early 90s was the most important factor which Baba Oje's zoom lense camera hotly provided .

It was this story , coupled with interesting follow up articles that won me my first NUJ Best journalist award in Oyo state. 

The take-home lesson which God whispered to my ears on the day I was being garlanded as the Best Journalist of the Year was this :"Do mine first."

OLALERE FAGBOLA.