TRIBUTE TO A MENTOR IN JOURNALISM:KAYE WHITEMAN

TRIBUTE TO A MENTOR IN JOURNALISM

 

The death has been reported of longstanding journalist Kaye Whiteman under whom I worked as a journalist at WEST AFRICA magazine in London. The following is my appreciation of the man as I knew him.
By Tikum Mbah Azonga

When I made the hop over from Chief Raph Uwechue’s AFRICA JOURNAL - at Kirkman House, Tottenham Court Road – to WEST AFRICA magazine London in the mid 1980s, Kaye Whiteman was the latter’s General Manager. Onyema Ugochukwu was Editor.

 I moved over to WEST AFRICA to replace the Veteran Mark Doyle who after years of loyal service had found another job elsewhere. I was interviewed for the job by Kaye and Onyema, with Kaye being the main interviewer.  Right there and then, Kaye impressed me with his deep knowledge of Africa including my own country, Cameroon, and his knowledge of French which I spoke. I was later to understand that he acquired his bilingualism while working for the European Union in Brussels.

As General Manager, Kaye did not unduly interfere with the day-to-day running of the magazine. He left that to the Editor, Onyema, who was assisted by Nii k. Bentsi Enchill. I was happy to get a job at WEST AFRICA because it was the most popular foreign English language magazine on which readers in Cameroon relied to get the “truth” about their country. It was in the days when the country was still under President Ahmadou Ahidjo with the one-party system. In fact, at the time, there was only the English Language WEST AFRICA produced in London and JEUNE AFRIQUE produced in Paris and in French which quenched the news thirst of Cameroonians. The plethora of newspapers and magazines we have in the country today were unknown at the time.

Kaye and I shared a minor attribute which was that we were both born under the astrological sign of Pisces – so was Moira Stewart, the magazine’s secretary when I was recruited. On a more serious note, because of his knowledge of French, Kaye wrote on Francophone issues and Francophone countries. Being Mark Doyle’s successor, I took over the French Desk, so to speak. So, Kaye’s and my paths crossed often – but without any clash.  I remember that at the height of the Chadian crisis, he used to tell me to ensure that each issue of the magazine updated readers on what was going on in the country. Very often, Kaye and I spoke to each other in French, rather than English.

With Kaye as our boss, we had a joly good time at WEST AFRICA. There were a lot of fun moments and conviviality. In the newsroom, we were Eddie Momoh, Akwe Amosu, Carol Robinson, Alison Perry and Paul Tagbo Egbunike. Tunde Agbabiaka came in once in a while.

We had such a good time at the magazine that sometimes one would return to the office at the weekend just to finish something that was left unfinished. And that was out of sheer love for the job.

But of course, our job would not have amounted to much had we not the many devoted external correspondents doted here and there in the US, France, Brussels, The Soviet Union (at the time), and a good number of African countries. We also had “Friends of the House”, who although not employees of WEST AFRICA as such, were nevertheless often with us and we shared a lot with them. Occasionally too, they wrote for us. These include Literature Prize Winner Ben Okri, Dr. Herbert Ekwe Ekwe, Dr. Yao Graham, Dr. Kole Omotoso and many others. A’dobe Obe, Maxwell Nwagboso and Kwasi Djan Apenteng were Friends of the House who later became editors of the magazine after Onyema was given a higher position in Lagos.

Kaye cared for his staff members. Once when the then President of Senegal and Current Chairman of the OAU, Abdou Diouf, came to London and gave a press conference, I attended it with Kaye. As journalists settled down to wait for the president to emerge from his suite, Kaye who had got a seat said to me: “What are you waiting for. Ask them to give you a seat before the conference begins”. He was right because when the president appeared and the conference began, there were clearly more journalists in the room than seats available to accommodate them. Embarrassed, the president paused and said: “Comment on va s’organiser, alors?”

Kaye knew Africa and African affairs very well – which is not surprising because when the Nigerian civil war broke out in 1967, he was there to cover it already as a reporter. He knew a lot of Africa’s leaders personally and was known by them. For that reason, he was a useful resource person on African affairs for the British government. But he also loved Africa profoundly. Someone once remarked that although Kaye was a Whiteman, he was more “African” than some Africans. His knowledge of the continent was so advanced that I once heard him speaking a Togolese language with a Togolese minister.

Surely, with the disappearance of Kaye Whiteman from the scene, Africa has lost a great man.