Ifedayo Ogunyemi
In early August 2021, David Ajiboye, the Station Manager at Fresh 106.9 FM, Ado Ekiti, who once reported on the Nigerian Tribune entertainment desk for about 12 years had an accident on his way to Ekiti State. He told a friend in a WhatsApp chat “But thank God I came out unhurt,” also sharing about six photos that showed his car upside down by the side of the road.
He could not have known that though he survived the accident, it would be his last Monday alive. He died on Sunday, August 8, at an Ibadan-based hospital after a brief illness which lasted a few days.
Many wondered if the accident had left him with complications that eventually led to his death, but the management of Fresh FM, in a statement, said Ajiboye died of COVID-19 complications.
“The real cause of the death has been made known by the Virology Department, University of Ibadan (UI), in the University Teaching Hospital (UCH), Ibadan,” said a company statement signed by Samson Akindele. “His body samples were sent by the private hospital in Ibadan where David breathed his last and the outcome of the result confirmed that he was COVID-19 positive.”
More than a year before Ajiboye’s death, popular TV host, Frank Edoho announced on Twitter the death of another broadcaster, host of The Morning Show on Classic FM, Lagos, Mr. Dan Foster.
Foster, aged 61, died at a hospital in Lagos a day after testing positive for the coronavirus. His wife, Lovina Okpara, also confirmed his death to the media. The former US Marine had stints with Cool FM, Inspiration FM, and City FM over the years.
Disparity in COVID-19 fatality figures of Nigerian Journalists
According to a Switzerland-based nonprofit, the Press Emblem Campaign (PEC), Ajiboye and Foster are part of the 1,994 serving and ex-journalists and media workers who have died as a result of complications arising from COVID-19 across 84 countries as of March 2022. The PEC has tracked COVID-19 cases among the media practitioners since the start of the pandemic.
According to PEC data, Nigeria has the third highest journalist fatality on the African continent after South Africa and Egypt, with 11 reported deaths.
However, data from the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), has higher fatality figures with 24 journalists having died from COVID-19 complications since the start of the pandemic. The NUJ also estimates that 64 other practising journalists tested positive for COVID-19. By this data, Nigeria has the highest number of journalist deaths from COVID-19 in Africa.
Another media personality who also died of coronavirus complications is Yinka Odumakin. The human rights and pro-democracy activist died on Saturday, April 3, 2021 of respiratory complications arising from COVID-19 at the intensive care unit of LASUTH.
His wife, Dr Joe Okei-Odumakin, who confirmed his death in a statement, said: “A part of me is gone.” In the weeks before his death, Odumakin contracted COVID, recovered, tested negative to the virus two consecutive times and was subsequently discharged from the Infectious Diseases Hospital (IDH), Yaba, Lagos.
Until his death, Odumakin was the spokesperson of Afenifere, a pan-Yoruba socio-political group for 17 years and was a weekly columnist with the Sunday Tribune. His column, ‘Voice of Courage with Yinka Odumakin’ ran on the back page of the newspaper for a couple of years. The paper described him as “a staunch supporter of Tribune who counted himself as a proud member of the Tribune Family.”
Other Nigerian journalists listed on the PEC tracker are Hugo Odiogor (former Editor at the Vanguard), Xavier Ndayongmong (Crime Editor at Daily Independent), Nkiruka Udoh (Crime and Defence Correspondent at AIT), Naomi Uzor (Business Desk at the Vanguard), Aramide Praise Oikelome (the Media Project and Independent Newspapers) and Azeez Ozi Sanni (Cartoonist at The Nation).
Although listed on the PEC database, Dataphyte/Saturday Tribune could not independently verify that these journalists died from COVID-19 nor were their names captured in the data provided by the NUJ. Further investigations revealed that some of them reportedly died as a result of other ailments including fibroid, liver problem, high blood pressure, etc. Although comorbidities such as some of the listed causes of death could drastically reduce their chances of surviving a Covid infection, if they did have Covid.
The pandemic has had grave effects on all parts of society and the world, and the media is not left out, worsening the experiences of media houses and journalists, from funding shortages to reduction of print run and paginations, in addition to burnout, career fatigue and a host of other physical and mental issues not the least of which is the lingering symptoms post covid infection that are difficult to diagnose.
Between January and April 2020, The New York Times estimated that 36,000 media workers were laid off, or took pay cuts. Although Nigerian media outlets experienced similar challenges, there is, however, no solid data on how many Nigerian journalists were laid off or took pay cuts during the pandemic.
Yet, journalists and media personalities braved the odds and joined other frontline workers to document the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on lives and livelihoods in Nigeria. Those who survived COVID-19 have since returned to the field to continue on the frontlines, giving voice to the aftershocks of the many lockdowns and economic recoveries.
More than 16 months after he tested positive in 2021, *Tochi, an Ibadan-based journalist with a national newspaper, who is uncomfortable with making his COVID-19 status public because of stigma, reported he feels he is still suffering from the effects of long COVID. “I haven’t thought about suicide all my life before my prognosis but I’ve had depression bouts at least three times in the past year,” he told Dataphyte/Saturday Tribune. “I was carrying out my daily activities among other things that naturally bring me joy, but I felt bland during those periods.”
He further explained that earlier in the year, he had to zone people out on social media because he wasn’t deriving satisfaction or feeling the need to engage in conversation. “People don’t know I couldn’t sleep for many nights, was restless and anxious countless times, developed stiffness in the chest and brain fog even in my best moments. COVID symptoms come and go at will but I kept treating it,” he recounted.
He was diagnosed with COVID-19 after returning from an editorial assignment in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, earlier in the year. He returned to full-time duties in March 2021.
Journalists’ Safety Not an Agenda
Since the start of the pandemic, over 500 million cases have been confirmed globally, according to the John Hopkins University COVID-19 database. In Nigeria, there are 256,028 confirmed cases including 3,143 casualties nationwide according to data from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).
The lack of definitive data on the number of journalists who contracted COVID-19 while working on the frontline of the pandemic is indicative of a larger problem with data in Nigeria as well as significant fear of stigma by those who have contracted the virus.
The NUJ National Secretary, Shuaibu Usman Leman, said that it is difficult to put the number of journalists who contracted COVID-19 at a definite figure because many journalists do not want to make their COVID-19 status known except for a few.
While noting that it is within their right to keep their status confidential, Leman said journalists should have been open about their COVID-19 status irrespective of the fears.
The absence of data also underscores the failure to recognize the grave dangers that journalists face in the discharge of their duties.
“I pursue stories about people infected with COVID-19 who are in quarantine centres, hospitals and other areas of confinement – hoping and praying that I don’t contract it myself,” Edem Edem, a journalist with the National Post Newspaper in Calabar, Cross River State whose colleagues also contracted the infection said in 2021.
He added that there was the need to recognise the risks journalists face in doing their essential work during the pandemic.
On the safety of journalists during the pandemic, NUJ National Secretary said “we are not satisfied and we made it known to the government that no mechanisms, guidelines or measures were taken to protect journalists who are frontline workers.”
He noted that, just like medical personnel, journalists ought to be protected because they work on the frontlines to report daily. He listed the benefits journalists and the media industry ought to get to include palliatives, extra-allowances and bailouts from the government.
He also chided media organisations for not doing enough to protect their staff members whom they expect to turn in reports from the frontlines daily without due consideration for safety.
“That really worries us and it’s tied to the type of neglect of the issue of journalists’ safety during the pandemic,” Leman said. “Journalists were not considered like other sectors to receive bailout funds. No single media house was considered.”
This report was produced under the Dataphyte Data and Development Reporting Fellowship 2022