For Dan Agbese (1944-2025)

I never worked with Dan Agbese in a formal setting. But I have been his student and admirer for as long as I can recall. He was one of Nigerian journalism’s all-time greats whom I greatly admired.

Tall, dark, and bespectacled, he fitted my earliest image of a college professor. The closest I came to working with him was in 1985 when the late Dele Giwa invited me to join Newswatch at Dele Olojede’s instance. There, at 62, Oregun Road, I was in Giwa’s office when the duo of Ray Ekpu and Dan Agbese joined what turned out to be a short interview where Giwa did most of the talking. I do not recall if Yakubu Mohammed, author of “Beyond Expectations”, was present. It was my first time meeting Oga Dan.

Even as I did not accept the offer to join Newswatch, I followed the ongoings there. For forty years since that encounter, I was his student as I studied his writings and the man at various professional fora where we met.  When my colleagues and I decided in 1990 that we wanted to elevate the task of media watching to a monthly critique, Mr. Agbese was one of the people whose counsel we sought.

His response was short, but positive. “I agree with you that we do need a very serious-minded ombudsman for the Nigerian press. I am glad that you and your colleagues have given this more than a thought. I look forward, very eagerly, to Media Review” (MR, April 1991, p. 43). In forty-one words and three sentences, he endorsed the project; first, by accepting the statement of the problem, then by praising the preparation that had gone into it, and finally, by expressing interest in seeing what the final product would be like. Newswatch went on to be a steady corporate subscriber to Media Review for the next twenty years.

Four things about Agbese resonated with me: his encounter with the cities of Lagos and New York, his commitment to journalism, and book publishing.

Like him, I attended the University of Lagos. Whilst he was a 1973 graduate of mass communication, I carry a 1979 bachelor’s degree in history. Whereas Agbese earned a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University, New York, in 1977, I received my master’s in public communication from Fordham University, New York, in 1982. Agbese lived and breathed journalism for 58 years, I have been a journalist for 44 years. I pray that I will be a journalist longer than the fourteen-year gap between us. Agbese was a prolific author with nine books to his credit; I have managed seven.

When the opportunity came to recognise Agbese’s contributions to journalism, I was part of a platform that did so. On December 4, 2016, at the 25th edition of the Diamond Awards for Media Excellence, Dan Agbese was honoured with the DAME Lifetime Achievement award. What we said of him then remains true today, as it will always be.

“He is as witty and sarcastic as they come that if you read him on the surface, you may misunderstand his message. A great columnist, stylist, and wordsmith, Dan Agbese is easily one of Nigeria’s most respected and influential writers. He loves the trade so much that he has practised journalism actively for the last 49 years. He has been a sub editor, features writer, editor, columnist, administrator, and author. Agbese’s lasting impact, perhaps, lies in the rigour he brings to his work, in the care employed in his choice of subjects and words, in the logic that accompanies his writings, and the engaging style in which he presents them. He is a teacher who writes lucidly and a writer who teaches with his words; he is truly the master of informed commentary.”

Much has been written about this gentleman of the press, who sired six children, who, in turn, gave him and his wife, Rose, seven grandchildren. He was an “uncommon mentor who improved everyone that came in contact with him;” a “compassionate boss whose doors were welcoming.”

What did he think of the craft of writing that brought him recognition and respect?

In a tribute to another expert in felicitous prose, Alade Odunewu (1927 to 2013), Dan Agbese said of writers, “A writer creates a bond between him and his audience by how he expresses his views. Show me a writer who does not know how to communicate with his audience, and I will show you a failed writer. Indeed, what distinguishes a good writer from a labouring prose hack is in how he chooses to make his point. The labouring prose hack hits the nail on the head; the master craftsman drives the nail into the head. They may achieve the same purpose of killing the unfortunate man whose head has become their piece of furniture in the making, but one does it with elan and effectiveness; the other merely welds the hammer. That is important.”

That tribute to Odunewu, titled “Style and the Man” is on pages 104 to 112, in the 2011 book, “Nigerian Columnists and their Art”, edited by Lanre Idowu. In it, Agbese left another thought that is worth repeating for both readers who enjoy reading lucid and profound prose and the writers who craft it. “Simplicity is a product of profound thoughts. Only the tortured mind resorts to torturous expressions.”

Agbese’s simplicity of expression conveyed thoughts and ideas that are worth communicating across the divides of geography and time. I pray that the family heeds Chief Segun Osoba’s advice to compile Agbese’s columns into a compelling tome. I hope they find a way of completing the memoir on which he was working, so that a year from now the informed public can gather to celebrate his genius.

Finally, may the tribe of expert prose stylists stay hallowed in the land. And may the soul of Dan Agbese and all the faithful departed in Christ, through the mercy of God, Rest in Peace.