BAMIDELE JOHNSON
I’ve seen many people go close to paralysis because, just because, Dele Alake ended up with the Solid Minerals Development ministerial portfolio. I don’t understand why. Is the Nigerian journalist such a one-trick pony that beyond speaking for the government, he/she can’t do anything else?
Is Alake so limited that he is unable to do anything beyond press statements, snap appearances on Arise News, TVC, Channels, AIT and full residency on NTA? Has journalism not produced governors, including of the CBN or did those chaps go to study Government and Civics before getting into office?
It is not bright to typecast the journalist like Olu Jacobs as Igwe in Igbo films, Dejo Tunfunlu as career moronic gateman and Opebe as a man with a withered hand irrespective of the story. It is not bright. Have journalists performed worse than other professionals on assignments outside the newsrooms? Is it that people are unaware that journalism has an administrative component? Can’t and won’t understand this exhibition of narrow-mindedness, including, frighteningly, by journalists.
I’m also unable to understand why it is only the assignment of portfolios at the national level that is subjected to pseudo-forensic scrutiny. It is as if state governors have the licence to appoint buskers, barbers, jesters and “furniture” as commissioners. The scrutiny is meagre, if it exists at all. I don’t remember any, actually. We don’t appear to care that the level of government closer to us can be peopled by misfits. We need to give our head a wobble.
©Bamidele Johnson