{"id":24367,"date":"2018-08-06T07:53:31","date_gmt":"2018-08-06T06:53:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/?p=24367"},"modified":"2018-08-06T08:05:07","modified_gmt":"2018-08-06T07:05:07","slug":"our-ray-ekpu-hooray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/our-ray-ekpu-hooray\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Ray, Hooray"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Ndaeyo Uko<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Chairman looked at the name on the visitor\u2019s form and shrugged. The name did not ring bell; it gave a tiny and rather disquieting tinkle: an Akwa Ibom name: another one fresh from \u2018home\u2019, arriving in Lagos days ago and deciding to drop in without an appointment, ostensibly to pay respects to his \u2018brother\u2019, the Chairman of the editorial board of the Concord <\/em>newspaper group, but the chairman knew what \u2018brothers\u2019 want: a driving job at the prosperous newspaper group belonging to the money bag, Moshood Abiola.<\/p>\n

The Chairman had no driving job to give his unknown \u2018brothers\u2019, so he\u2019d offer\u00a0 them \u2018transport money\u2019 and good wishes.<\/p>\n

The Chairman asked his secretary to send his latest \u2018brother\u2019 in. The Chairman was Ray Ekpu, and the account above was largely his, and the latest \u2018brother\u2019 was Ndaeyo Uko. The year was 1983. This brother wasn\u2019t looking for a driving job. I\u2019d just been hired working as a senior reporter at The Guardian<\/em>, and I\u2019d come to convey the special greetings of his friend in Uyo named Jerry.<\/p>\n

Our enduring friendship started there. He invited me to dinner at his home that night, and his amazing wife, Uyai, packed me a bachelor\u2019s hamper to take home. What first struck me about Ray Ekpu was the warmth with which he related to a man he thought was, well, a beggar of sorts. There are countless things to learn from Mr Ekpu, but I have space for only two.<\/p>\n

First, good things do come from Nazareth\u2014if those things work furiously hard and have faith in themselves. In Nigerian journalism, Ray is and will remain one of Nigeria\u2019s greats, a reference point.<\/p>\n

Second, humility and grace take nothing from greatness; they elevate and illuminate it. \u00a0Ray Ekpu has always treated me as an equal, which I always found amusing and sometimes odd\u2014having me call him Ray, making me part of his family and circle of friends, driving to the airport to see me off once when I was flying out (he was a big man in Newswatch<\/em> and I still an ant at the Guardian then), letting me pay for lunch at least once, and more. And this is a man whose extensive network of friendships, include the political and military principalities and powers, \u2018captains of industry\u2019, as we like to call them, and the media\u2019s ruling class. \u00a0I\u2019ll illustrate Mr Ekpu\u2019s humility and grace with a reconstruction of an event that started in Mr Ekpu\u2019s house one Sunday morning.<\/p>\n

\u201cNdaeyo, I\u2019ve never been to your house.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, Ray, you haven\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t you take me there?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSure, when?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow.\u201d<\/p>\n

He drove behind me to my flat. I had no cognac, no expensive wine; just a bottle of Calypso, a coconut-flavoured rum.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve never had this. It\u2019s great!\u201d<\/p>\n

I gulped. It cost less than a bottle of standard wine.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll conclude with a simple but instructive finding: Just say, \u2018Ray\u2019 \u2013 just Ray \u2013 and any enlightened Nigerian will know exactly who you are talking about. I dare you to ask, \u201cRay who?\u201d<\/p>\n

Ndaeyo is a good friend of BLERF<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF\u2019S\u00a0 NOTE\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ray has been my mentor, brother and friend, since he invited me to, through an accidental meeting in 1975 at the Cross River State Library (opposite Watt Market, Calabar), come and help him set up\u00a0 a ” Research Media Library ” at the Nigerian Chronicle, Calabar. The rest is history!<\/em><\/p>\n

I agree with you that something extraordinary good can come out of Nazareth, through hardwork and professional commitment.<\/em><\/p>\n

I salute you and Ray!<\/em><\/p>\n

I celebrate your talents, creativity and fame.<\/em><\/p>\n

Best wishes<\/em><\/p>\n

nyaknnoabasi osso<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ndaeyo Uko The Chairman looked at the name on the visitor\u2019s form and shrugged. The name did not ring bell; it gave a tiny and rather disquieting tinkle: an Akwa Ibom name: another one fresh from \u2018home\u2019, arriving in Lagos days ago and deciding to drop in without an appointment, ostensibly to pay respects […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":24364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2431],"tags":[2445,2579,2451,2576],"class_list":["post-24367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-blerf","tag-concord-newspaper","tag-mko-abiola","tag-ray-ekpu"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24367"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24369,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24367\/revisions\/24369"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blerf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}