By Steve Osuji
The bully in the house: Dr. Reuben Abati is a public intellectual of no mean repute. A brilliant mind, a well-read fellow, a columnist, editorialist and lately, a news talk show host on Arise Television. For full disclosure, we were both denizens of the famous Rutam House, home to The Guardian newspapers stable.
In the early 1990s, he was on the editorial board while yours truly was Assistant Editor with the weekly journal, The African Guardian. This was over 30 years ago.
Reuben is in the news again. Yes, he trended not quite long ago when he openly (on live show) upbraided a younger correspondent filing a report, for calling him by his first name, Reuben. He insisted that he was Dr Reuben Abati to the reporter and not simply Reuben.
All entreaties to Abati that the universal convention in broadcasting is that nigh everyone is on first name basis, never sank in. He insisted that it must be his way: that he must be addressed with the full complements of his honorifics, including his first and surname. He bullied his colleagues to play by his rule. And so it has been till now.
NEGATIVE STEREOTYPE OF NDIGBO: Reuben has been trending again since last weekend. He had what may be described as a faux pas or a Freudian slip, even. But he won’t admit it, not to mention apologise.
During the Arise Tv Morning Show last Friday Reuben had started off about Ndigbo of the southeast of Nigeria being industrious; including the jaded and patronising fable about Igbo being at every corner of the earth and that wherever there’s not an Igbo person, people are to flee because such a place may not be habitable.
Then Reuben went on to present what he calls the flipside of the Igbo tale: which is that free as Igbo are to live in other people’s land, especially Lagos, they don’t sell land to non-Igbo people in the southeast.
Reuben supported his assertion by recounting what’s obviously an anecdotal tale told at a public function in Lagos by late Chief TOS Benson, First Republic Minister of Information. Benson, according to Reuben, told an audience how in his old age, he wanted to build a house for his wife (and daughter) who was an Igbo woman but her people refused claiming they don’t sell their ancestral land to outsiders. To Reuben, this is enough proof that Igbo don’t sell land to outsiders and he went on to flippantly draw negative conclusions about Ndigbo and their relationship with other Nigerians.
Abati’s single-story position and negative stereotyping of Igbo race of course caused much ruckus on the internet. And Reuben trended wildly, with many of his critics actually going overboard and detailing his voracious appetite for wives among other unrelated matters.
On the show the following morning, Reuben’s younger co-host Ojinika Okpe had called attention to Reuben’s trending, asking if he had anything to say. This innocuous request, which is normal in the practice seemed to have brought out the beast in Reuben. He yelled, he raved, he quaked, trying to shutdown the young lady for daring to review a trending story emanating from yesterday’s programme.
“If people are suffering from selective hearing, that’s their problem. .. Nobody should tell me any nonsense,” Reuben growled, unable to manage his anger on live television.
“It’s our duty to present the other side, a whole tribe cannot be judged by one man’s experience,” Ojinika managed to quip to a now raving Reuben. But Reuben was adamant, and arrogant in his own supposed infallibility, insisting he has “no nonsense duty” to any one. His colleagues and co-host watched the drama, seemingly petrified. Even the quick-witted Rufai Oseni couldn’t find his voice.
One is shocked that Reuben seems to lack some of the basic ethos and etiquette of journalism. Just like the first name convention mentioned above, journalism thrives on some basic tenets. The right of reply code and the need to allow readers and listeners some space is one.
Young Ojinika seems to know these basics. She gave Reuben an opportunity to ‘redeem’ himself, so to speak, and address the obvious questions of profiling and generalisation at issue here which raised the ire of a large segment of Reuben’s viewers. No educated person, how much more an intellectual would make such sweeping statement in the public space. It’s an open assault on the sensibilities of a whole race. It’s like asserting in public that Yoruba are tribalistic on account of one or two experiences. That would amount stereotyping that borders on hate.
That Igbo don’t sell land to outsiders has no basis in truth or fact as many commentators have revealed. Reuben has no personal experience of the matter and he probably has done no checks of his own.
TOS Benson’s tale that Reuben based his opinion upon sounds queer because no man returns to build a house for his wife in her father’s house. You may build a house for your in-laws, but not for your wife. She’s never going to return to his father’s house to live. That’s an anomaly in Igbo land.
Besides, in Igbo villages and rustic communities, daughters are not entitled to inherit landed properties. A wife inherits from her husband and not her father; especially in family land matters. This probably explains why TOS Benson was denied a land by his in-laws to build for his wife. It’s unheard of in Igboland. Perhaps TOS was tired of marrying his wife and tried to return her back to her father by stealth!
LAND IS ECONOMICS/BUSINESS: It’s shocking that Reuben would parrot what’s obviously motor part talk on a global platform such as Arise Tv. It is even more troubling that he can’t discern that land anywhere is governed by economics and not tribal sentiments. And economics and business are blind to race or tribe. No man calls a meeting of umunna before he sells his land – even his ancestral land. You need money and the price is right, you close the deal. Most men would sell even their so-called ancestral burial grounds if approached with offers they can’t refuse.
Today, land agents like PWAN have acres of land across the southeast they desperately seek to sell.
REUBEN’S FREUDIAN SLIP: Therefore, to insist that Igbo don’t sell land to outsiders is not only negative stereotyping, it’s a form hate speech apparently emanating from an inherent envy for the Igbo. If there wasn’t a deep seated angst about Igbo in Reuben, he wouldn’t be quaking and raving about a simple matter he could have made a joke of the following day. Surely, not many are comfortable with Igbo buying and developing swathes of Lagos. But again, how would Lagos look and what would a Reuben say if Ndigbo decide not to invest in Lagos and rather invest only in the southeast? That too is economic decision, it can’t be decreed.
There was a time Japan was buying up American businesses. China is on now taking up chunks of America. India almost controls British economy. Nigerians have heavy property investments in Dubai, UK and South Africa. It goes round and round.
EVEN GOLD WILL RUST: where are the likes of Ojukwu Transport in the Lagos of yore? Where’s MKO Abiola of recent memory? Money has no ancestry, as Yoruba say. They also say that it’s God who gives wealth (to whosoever he wishes).
Therefore, let’s stop fretting about bricks and mortar; or about who owns what. Let’s not get weary about gold and silver, they too will rust. Eventually, everything will come to naught. What will matter in the end is the life you lived, the imprint you left and the health of your soul…
IN THE FINAL ANALYSIS: Reuben is clearly in error here. And it’s not too late to take back his unreflective outburst and nigh insult on his numerous viewers. There’s more strength in humility.
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▪︎Osuji was formerly, editor with The Guardian, THISDAY and NewAge. He was also editorial board member at The Nation*
