Ajimobi mourns Remi Oyo’s exit
Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State has condoled with family, friends and associates of the immediate past Managing Director of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Dame Oluremi Oyo, over her passing.
The governor, in a statement issued in Ibadan on Thursday by his Special Adviser on Media, Dr. Festus Adedayo, said that the demise of Mrs. Oyo, who was also a two-term President of the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) in a London hospital on Wednesday, was shocking and disheartening.
“Mrs. Oyo was a leading light in the journalism profession in Nigeria. She was a professional to the core and had used her skill and dexterity to lift the profession and impact positively on the lives of upcoming journalists.
“Her indelible contributions to the soaring image of the Nigerian Guild of Editors during her two-term tenure as the President of the body between 1999 and 2003 cannot be over-emphasized as she raised the ante of the Guild and brought it into more reckoning in the scheme of things in Nigeria.
“Indeed, her brilliant performance at the Guild enhanced her appointment as the Senior Special Assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo on Media and Publicity. This was aside her earlier appointment as a member of the 1999 Constitution Drafting Committee by the General Abdulsalami Abubakar administration,’’ he said.
Governor Ajimobi also recalled how the late Mrs. Oyo, a recipient of Nigeria’s National Honour of the Officer of the Order of the Nigeria (OON), turned around the fortunes of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) during her six-year tenure as the Managing Director, a fear which he said had endeared her to the entire staffers of the agency.
The governor described the late veteran journalist as humane, kind hearted, humble and pleasant, stressing that her motherly but intellectual approach to issues of national discourse had proved her as a patriotic citizen who worked assiduously to ensure an egalitarian society.
“To this extent, such a woman, who was a rare gift to humanity, should be celebrated rather than mourned as she lived a fulfilled life worthy of emulation,’’ he said.
Governor prayed God to grant the soul of the deceased eternal rest, and the family the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss.
