By Tony Okafor
As The RAZOR Newspaper celebrates its fifth anniversary, I look back on the journey with mixed feelings.
The idea of establishing the newspaper was a noble one, driven by a passion for journalism and a determination to contribute meaningfully to public discourse.
However, the journey has been anything but a bed of roses. It has been an odyssey of the good, the bad and the ugly.
Barely two years into our operations, I received an invitation from the Anambra State Criminal Investigation Department (CID).
After interrogation, I was clamped into a cell for writing a news report that did not sit well with a certain influential figure in the state. I was accused of endangering the itinerary of the “big man” through my report.
That experience was my baptism of fire in a police cell. Until then, I had never had any encounter with the police, either as a suspect or as a complainant.
It took the intervention of my colleagues at The RAZOR, the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Anambra State Council, and the cooperation of the then Commissioner of Police, CP Aderemi Adeoye, to secure my release. The Police Public Relations Officer, SP Ikenga Tochukwu, also played a significant role in securing my freedom.
Since that incident, it has sometimes felt as though the gates of confrontation have been thrown wide open against me.
It has often been a case of one week, one trouble, with government officials threatening on several occasions to arrest or jail me over stories I have written.
On another occasion, a top government official invited me to his office, where lawyers, members of civil society organisations and other officials formed a panel to interrogate me over a publication.
In the course of the proceedings, the official threatened that he had the capacity to get his boys to eliminate me.
Apparently uncomfortable with the remark, members of the panel expressed their displeasure, prompting him to recant and insist that he had no intention of harming me.
There have been other troubling encounters that could have made anyone consider quitting journalism.
Yet, my passion for the profession remains as strong as Agwu, the spirit associated with guiding a person’s path in Igbo cosmology.
By God’s grace, we will not quit—not now, and certainly not because of threats. It is not easy to walk away from a calling that has consumed half of one’s life.
After all, there is another side to journalism: the satisfaction of informing the public, holding power accountable and giving voice to critical issues through editorials and news reports.
Sometimes, you even have the privilege of dining with kings.
Perhaps that is why journalism is described as a leveller.
Five years on, the RAZOR journey continues. We have endured, learned and remained committed to responsible journalism. The road has been rough, but our resolve remains unshaken.
