Mike Enahoro []1939 – 2015]

The burial is set for tomorrow of the great Nigerian broadcast veteran Mike Enahoro, who died on October 9 at the age of 76 after a brief illness.  The Enahoro family of Esan in Edo State announced that the burial will take place in Lagos. The death of Mike Enahoro evoked deep seated nostalgia in […]

The burial is set for tomorrow of the great Nigerian broadcast veteran Mike Enahoro, who died on October 9 at the age of 76 after a brief illness.  The Enahoro family of Esan in Edo State announced that the burial will take place in Lagos. The death of Mike Enahoro evoked deep seated nostalgia in the older generation of Nigerians who savoured the brilliance, diction and clarity of his presentations on screen during his hey days at the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA). He was to rise through the ranks to become its Director General. He is remembered for both his perfect diction and being one of the first Nigerian newscasters to appear on set in full traditional attire, in his own case the Ishan native dress, which gave lie to other broadcasters’ assumption that they must dress like White men to appear on the screen.
The late Mike was the youngest of the famous Enahoro brothers, which included elder statesman Chief Anthony Enahoro who  bbeyond excelling in journalism  and at the age of 21 becoming one of Nigeria’s youngest indigenous newspaper editors also championed the struggle against colonialism. Chief Anthony Enahoro it was who in 1957, as a Member of the pioneer Federal House of Representatives first moved a motion for the independence of the country. Mike’s brother Peter (Pan) Enahoro also set enduring standards in Nigerian journalism firstly with his emergence at 26 years of age as the youngest ever editor of the Sunday Times. Peter was to later serve as the editor of the flagship title the Daily Times. A high point of Peter’s sojourn in journalism is the highly successful book he wrote in the 1960s titled How to be a Nigerian. The book outlined many idiosyncrasies of the Nigerian national character. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) once voted Peter Enahoro as the best journalist to have come out of Africa.
The late Mike, even as the second youngest of the Enahoro brothers was not left out of the honours roll which his brothers occupied with merit, as he was also in all respects an icon. Before his career as a broadcaster he was an adept footballer whose silky touch on the round leather would have earned him a choice place in the top ranks of today’s soccer professionals.  He was also an ace instrumentalist, specialising on the guitar playing under Roy Chicago and Sir Victor Uwaifo who with Bobby Benson were the leading lights on the indigenous Nigerian music scene at the time. He released several records under the stage name “Mike Mikado”. In his later years Mike Enahoro emerged as one of the earliest Nigerians to establish a private television station, Prime Television Limited, which was a forerunner to present day private TV outfits in the industry.
It is unbefitting that Mike’s primary constituency of television gave little prominence to the passing of one of their own who was amongst the best in his generation at a time before satellite and private TV stations when NTA had a virtual monopoly of the airwaves. It is not a very good commentary on the state of television’s institutional memory in Nigeria.
With his death the nation has lost another standard bearer of the ethics of the profession whose enterprise opened new career vistas for succeeding professionals to exploit. Our broadcast industry will ever remain indebted to the likes of Mike Enahoro for the commitment they deployed to raise service quality. Whenever the history of Nigerian broadcast journalism is written Mike Enahoro will be remembered as one of its true icons.