When people ask me, “What job does Sowore do?”, because he’s always seen fighting for human rights, protesting, and going to court. I always laugh, sigh deeply, and laugh again.
I always laugh at their question not because it is funny, but because I usually sense their ignorance of the man ‘Sowore’ from the way they ask that question.
First off, Sowore is an employer of labor.
He is the founder and publisher of Sahara Reporters Media Foundation. He is also the founder of the Civic Media Lab.
He is a lecturer in an Ivy league University in the United States of America.
Other things he does that doesn’t fetch him money but gives him social capital, which to me is even more important than financial capital are:
He is the convener of the Take It Back Movement, a global sociopolitical movement with a goal to ‘take back Nigeria’ from the hands of the oppressive ruling class that has kept the country underdeveloped to this day.
He is the founder and chairman of the African Action Congress – Nigeria , a political party with the same aim as the Take it Back Movement .
He is also the convener of the # RevolutionNow Movement, a pressure group with a goal to revolutionize Nigeria for the betterment of the Nigerian people.
Lest I forget, he was the Presidential Candidate of the African Action Congress in 2019, and polled the 3rd position officially in that election, After Buhari and Atiku whose political parties are notorious for violence and election rigging.
I don’t want to talk about how much Sahara Reporters is worth, the evidence is on Google and Wikipedia, it is public knowledge.
Let me not talk about the fact that Sahara Reporters’ Journalists are paid in US dollars, and no staff of Sahara Reporters earn below #100,000.
Interestingly, Sowore is more than anyone know of him. Even those of us who are close to him cannot wholly quantify him.
No wonder late Professor Pius Adesanmi once said, (not verbatim), that, “Sowore’s handlers are doing a disservice to him by not revealing his achievements in several fields for those who are ignorant of him to know. His handlers only talk about his human rights and political activism”.
I haven’t mentioned how many people who are now doing great in their chosen fields, especially in journalism that were inspired, tutored, mentored, taught, supported, and given a big platform by Sowore at no cost. What could be more precious than human capital?
Maybe we should stop laughing at ignorant folks who don’t know Sowore beyond activism, instead, we should look inward restrategize, and do better at making the people know about the ‘person of Sowore’, and not just his activism.
I unintentionally omitted Sowore’s exceptional humility which is second to none that I have ever seen. Also, his unconditional kindness and service to humanity is remarkable.
Sowore pays salaries to some Public School teachers to handle some important subjects in his hometown, Kiribo, Ondo State.
Sowore also sponsor young people’s tertiary education through a scholarship under the Sowore Foundation which he does in memory of his late father. Several students also benefit from his scholarship programme across all levels of education.
Yet, Sowore would never tell anyone about this. Even I only got to know about it in December of 2018 while he was running for the office of the Nigerian President, and we had to travel to his hometown, Kiribo, in Ondo State. That night, I confirmed the annual scholarship programme as an eyewitness.
Till date, Sowore has never stopped the scholarship programme despite the fact that he has been restricted to Abuja on bogus charges by a federal judge, Justice Ijeoma Ojukwu.
After he was released on December 24, 2019, five months after he was illegally incarcerated, Sowore still made sure that the scholarship programme takes place even in his absence.
Unbeknown to him that he would be released from DSS detention before the date of the annual scholarship, Sowore still urged his followers and associates to make sure that the scholarship programme holds, even if he was still imprisoned at the time.
Sowore is an institution, an ideology, not just a person! However, the institution can never be separated from the person, neither can the person be separated from the ideology.