The late Ayinla Omowura sang this : “Won ni ki o je, o ni egun ni, won ni ki o so danu, o ni eran wa ni be” meaning that “They tell you to eat it, you say it’s bone, they tell you to throw it away, you say, no, it is meat..”. Lol. That’s what Fela Anikulapo-Kuti described as “Confusion breaki bonu, yeepa, double wahala for deadi body..” .
Why are some set of people always complaining about Arise TV Morning Show anchored by Ruben Abati, especially the interview style of Rufai Oseni ” the smoking Ruffy”and yet they refuse to boycott the station, thereby continue to make it one of the highest viewing stations in Nigeria, first or next to Channel TV?
Why is it that most of those always having disagreement with Arise Tv are from one political phylum who want the interview conducted according to their own prejudicial narrative? Invited guests have a choice to appear or not on any television or radio station. I once appeared on the program and I felt no pain but I knew the team had done very thorough research on me and the topic.
Arise Morning Show is “Hot Seat”, when you voluntarily appear, prepare for no holds barred questions and being fact checked. No non lawyer teaches a lawyer how to examine & cross examine in court,. No “purutun” teaches a doctor how to conduct surgery, a molue driver does not teach a pilot how to fly plane. So how do you teach a TV host how to conduct his interview with a guest including good, moderate, arrogant or lying guests.
I just watched a no holds barred interview of Oby Ezekwesili by a foreign journalist on corruption in Obasanjo regime. It was a total drilling of the brilliant and bold Obi that she is not likely to forget in a hurry. If such exhaustive interview was conducted on Arise TV or Channels TV, Obi’s blind supporters would have protested and accused the brilliant sharp young journalist of bias who wants to embarrass her for political reason.
All serious journalists, interviewers like other citizens are biased to either say the truth or lie, defend the status quo or expose it for improvement, defend the vulnerable or support the conscienceless power. So, let us stop pretending to certain bogus neutral values of professionalism that do not exist. As bad as the government is under Tinubu , those who profit from it or want to profit from it including politicians, media practitioners and “activists” will always defend it and those who want a better country as promised, will always protest bad governance. That’s why it’s not surprising seeing some unprincipled turncoat “activists” who used all their useful years to protest against some bad policies in the past bad governments, are now defending government that is unleashing the worst versions of such policies on the nation.
Please go and watch the interview Christiane Amanpour (the CNN witch) had with Paul Kagame, Rwanda president when he was planning to change his country’s constitution for his elongated terms. Amanpour turned the president into a lying school boy. For me, that’s a minimum standard of any serious interview with public officers who have the fate of millions of citizens in their pockets.
I can only pity those old conventional broadcasters and journalists who are used to “what’s your name, you are looking good sir” feel good questions. Lazy non digital interviewers who have been wrongly schooled in the bourgeois ultra conservative ethics of a neutral toothless, class- less watchdog journalism in a collapsing country under the misrule of rogue political class without scruple. Such professional indoctrination of see nothing, say nothing and do nothing journalism belongs to the past. Telling journalists covering massacres in war to be neutral, for example, is stupid and unrealistic.
Adeola Soetan
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