Osinbajo Expected At Launch Of Book Recalling Guardian’s First Decade

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo (SAN) is expected to grace the formal launch of the epochal book on The Guardian in Lagos in April.

According to the book authors – Aaron Ukodie and O’seun Ogunseitan, Prof Osinbajo’s spokesman Laolu Akande confirmed that the VP would honour the invitation to be the Special Guest of Honour at the event.

The book launch is scheduled to on 7 April 2021 with other dignitaries which include media moguls, public officials, politicians across the political divide, captains of industry, and other high profile Nigerians.

Quoting Akande, who the authors describe as a “star correspondent” being himself a long-standing and prolific journalist at The Guardian, the book authors disclosed that there had been a positive from the VP to the invitation sent to him at the close of last year to attend the event as Special Guest of Honour and to deliver a keynote address.

Among those to grace, the occasion alongside Osinbajo are the Chairperson of Nigerian Governors Forum, Governor Kayode Fayemi, who also an ex-Guardian staff; Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, and others have also been invited as a special guest to attend the event.

The founder of the Guardian, Mr Alex Ibru, who will be posthumously honoured at the event for his sterling entrepreneurship and proprietorship, will be represented by his wife Lady Maiden Alex-Ibru, who is now the publisher of The Guardian whose management has also endorsed the epochal publication.

The late Publisher Alex Ibru gathered a selected handful of the best hands in Nigerian journalism practice back then, mixed them with a sprinkle of the best of the academics in the arts, philosophy, and even the sciences, to found The Guardian.

The newspaper attracted the late iconic writer Dr. Stanley Macebuh and outstanding authors, media men, and teachers like the inimitable Lade Bonuola, Professors Onwuchekwa Jemie, Femi Osofisan, and Dr. Ibekwe Chinweizu.

The Guardian also had the likes of Harvard University teacher Herbert Ekwue-Ekwue and Oxford-trained economist Dr. Ashikwe-Egom, who called himself the motor park economist and then advert guru and now  Professor, Jide Oluwajuyitan.

The Guardian also had emeritus Professors Godwin Sogolo and Emebvo Baikolo apart from hordes of Ph.D. holders Edwin Madunagwu, Yemi Ogunbiyi, Patrick Dele Cole, and Tunji Dare who converged, at The Guardian then, to make the newspaper the Flagship of Nigerian journalism.

The Guardian Book is expected, by many, to be the historic book of the year, also because of the number of professors and top media men that have contributed to its making.

Contributors to the book include all the founding stars of The Guardian and others including media industry icons such as Mr. Femi Kusa, top media manager and SMEs advocate, Ted Iwere, renowned NTA-anchor Kingsley Osadolor, senator Ayogu Eze, Mr. Onuoha Ukeh, Managing Director of Sun Newspapers and Thisday editorial board chairman, Segun Adeniyi, Yinka Fabowale and Laolu Akande himself among many other former journalists from The Guardian.