“A man will turn
over half a library to make one book”
—Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English critic and lexicographer.
Waiting for Aremo Segun Osoba’s book, BATTLELINES: My Adventures In
Journalism And Politics, has been akin to the experience of the two
characters expecting the arrival of someone called Godot who never arrives. In
his 1952 tragicomedy, Waiting For Godot, Irish writer,
Samuel Beckett presents the helplessness and an accompanying barrenness of an
endless wait for a Godot who doesn’t show up. Joined by three other funny
actors, these tarrying figures get further mired in a futile wait for the
person they do not know. The play closes, tragically and comically, without
Godot being revealed in the two-act work.
 |
| *Segun Osoba |
Mercifully, lingering for the autobiography of Osoba, former editor of
Daily
Times of Nigeria, who went on to become the paper’s Group
managing-director and the governor of Ogun State, hasn’t followed the
trajectory of Godot. Yes, there was a long expectation. But, as it turned out
the other day in Lagos, it wasn’t a wait for Godot. Osoba’s own Godot arrived
at the presentation of his book ahead of his birthday.
