Today, academic institutions and professional bodies, led by the Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, Abeokuta, Ogun State, are hosting “A day of tribute” for Prof Lai Oso, a classmate in the Department of Mass Communication of University of Lagos. The death of Prof Oso, who died in a car crash on the Benin-Sagamu Expressway, has ruptured the peace of the Nigerian media industry.
The achievements of Prof Oso, who comes in a small physical frame, are giant steps. For a man from humble beginnings, you will agree that Prof Oso has travelled a long way to become an icon of communication scholarship and the journalism profession.
At the public lecture held at Prof Oso’s 60th birthday in 2015, Prof Oludayo Soola of the Department of Communication and Language Arts, University of Ibadan, Oyo State, carried the oxymoron further by declaring that he stood tall among his peers.
After graduating with a Second Class, Upper Division, from the university, Prof Oso, fondly called Lai by his classmates, proceeded to Kwara State for the one-year, mandatory National Youth Service Corps obligation. After that he worked with the government-owned News Agency of Nigeria.
His NYSC primary assignment was at the Nigeria Television Authority, Ilorin, Kwara State. As an undergraduate, he did a vacation job stint with the newly established Ogun State Broadcasting Corporation during the summer holidays of 1977.
After his bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication, Prof Oso detoured to obtain a master’s degree in International Relations at the University of Ife (now known as Obafemi Awolowo University). He returned to Mass Communication for a PhD from Leicester University, United Kingdom.
Eventually, he joined his former lecturer, Prof. Femi Sonaike, at the Ogun State Polytechnic (now Moshood Abiola Polytechnic), Abeokuta, as a pioneer lecturer in the Department of Mass Communication.
He acquitted himself so well and ended up as Head, Department of Mass Communication before becoming the polytechnic’s deputy rector. He could have been the rector if he had wanted it.
A former editor of The PUNCH, Najeem Jimoh, another classmate at the Mass Communication Department, confirmed that Prof Oso declined from becoming the rector because he had indicated his support for Alhaji Waheed Kadiri who eventually emerged rector.
At Ogun Polytechnic, he was director, School of Humanities and Communication and director, Industrial Liaison and Placement where he displayed maturity to broker harmony between management and usually cantankerous trade unions.
Also, he was chairman, Staff Development Committee, Curriculum Planning and Development Committee, Staff Loans Committee, Education Trust Fund Projects Monitoring Committee and Accreditations Committee.
Prof Oso went to Lagos State University School of Communication for his sabbatical, after which he moved to the Department of Mass Communication, Ogun State University (now Olabisi Onabanjo University).
Prof Oso became a professor and coordinator of the postgraduate programme of the Mass Communication Department, where he organised the maiden edition of the annual communication conference held to honour Prof Sobowale, whom he had yielded the headship of the department.
From there, he crossed over to Caleb University, Imota, in Ikorodu Division of Lagos State, as professor and Head of Department. He returned to LASU School of Communication as a professor.
There, he rose to become dean, and was able to avoid the sword of Damocles that the National Universities Commission was going to use to deny the school accreditation to teach communication and journalism studies.
In addition to being a member of Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria and Nigeria Institute of Public Relations, Prof Oso belongs to many organisations for journalism and communication teachers.
These include Association of Communication Scholars and Professionals of Nigeria (of which he was President), Commonwealth Association of Education in Journalism and Communication, African Council for Communication Education, and Nigerian Association of Journalism and Mass Communication Teachers.
He was a silent contributor to the University of Lagos Mass Communication Alumni Association, which he supported financially. He also attended and made significant contributions during UMCAA programmes that his busy schedule allowed him to attend.
He was a member of the National Committee on the Drafting of National Broadcast Policy; Nigeria National Commission for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation; and Ogun State Inter-Ministerial Committee on Public Enlightenment.
His academic publications include: “Journalism in a Globalised Information Society,” published in Vol 5, No:3 of Africa Media Review, and “The Commercialisation of the Nigerian Press: Development and Implication,” in Vol 3, No: 1 of Mass Communication Journal.
Prof Oso is worried that the Nigerian media has deviated from the original intention of founders of the industry, and journalists have become mere news salesmen. This is evident in his argument against news commercialisation in one of his books.
Following in his scathing rebuke which the Nigerian news media must remedy to redeem its reputation: “Commercialisation of news (editorial cum advertorial schemes) raises a number of issues in terms of the autonomy and independence of journalists and the press.
“It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate news independently and disinterestedly gathered and produced from public relations and advertisement (they call it advertorial that have been paid for which properly should be called advertisements).
News on radio and television sounds more like public relations releases from multinational companies than news from the journalistic sense of the word.”
Prof Oso was in the vanguard of advocacy for community radio. In the inaugural lecture delivered after becoming a professor, he argued that, “As a matter of urgency and in the interest of the country’s economic, cultural and political development, the Nigeria Broadcasting Commission should start the process of licensing community radios.”
Prof Lukumon Adeoti of the Geoscience Department of University of Lagos and former Chairman, Lagos State chapter, University of Lagos Alumni Association, laments that with the death of Prof Oso, “Another library has just been burnt!”
Another classmate, Tunde Awobiyi, who was editor of Sunday Times newspaper, laments as follows: “Pondering over the remarkable life… of… Prof Lai Oso has… left a bitter taste to swallow for me.”
In an emotion-laden tribute, Daily Independent newspaper columnist, Ayodeji Ajayi, yet another classmate in the Mass Communication Department, described Prof Oso as “an exemplary role model for others to emulate.”
In his column in The Nation newspaper, Prof Olatunji Dare, his old lecturer, confirms Prof Oso’s abiding interest in the economic model or critical-intellectual approach to the appraisal of the media industry in Nigeria. His widow, Abimbola, described him as an intellectual who was always concerned about the development and progress of his students.
Someone testified that he gave his content, time, counsel and guidance to his students.
In death, Prof Oso will be contributing to national development. Prof Yinka Esan, his junior in the Department of Mass Communication, is brewing an idea to curb road accidents, like the one that took Prof Oso.
She is setting up a group of concerned Nigerians for “An awareness campaign to avoid preventable deaths on our roads. It will include calling attention to hot spots, such as the one that claimed Prof Oso’s life, advocacy with governments, relevant authorities and… (include) drivers’ awareness education.”
This column, written by someone whose father died on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, will be joining this advocacy to use the death of Prof Oso to achieve safer roads.
