I’m blind but I can edit—Editor National Standard Magazine

We have worked together in The News and Tempo days but you were not with this problem. How did it happen and what went wrong?

I first noticed something close to blindness in 2005, which was after I won my second journalism award; BERA SO I was coming home from office that time during my days in TheNews by that time, Tempo became defunct and all of us became part of TheNews magazine.

 So after that my award in October 5 2005, I was returning home that morning with my palmtop, by then I had left TheNews for National Interest as the head of arts and Life, so I was coming home with my palmtop and phone in my hand  and so I alighted at Ikeja hoping  to crossover to the other side of Ikeja,  then I thought I was seeing because  you know, there were other people around me and people were crossing together with me and so I thought I was seeing but I didn’t know that after crossing the first lane, that on the second lane, there were so much vehicles coming,  I thought that people had stopped crossing I didn’t know that they were still crossing and I was the only person that crossed  and I blundered into an coming vehicle and so before I knew it I was flying on air with my palmtop computer and phone and so that was my first accident as a result of partial blindness. I didn’t even know until after I had left hospital to treat my fracture and the rest of them. Afterwards, I started noticing that my vision started getting blurred and I told one of my editors who recommended me to an hospital and when I got there I was shocked for the first time someone told me that I couldn’t see again with my left eye and I said no, I can read, write and see, considering how we spent night in TheNews for production so I didn’t see I couldn’t see then they conducted test on my left eye and I discovered that truly I couldn’t read if I had to close my right eye, I wouldn’t be able to read  with my left eye each time I close my right eye so that is it.

The major cause

 They said its glaucoma; glaucoma is a disease condition of the eye that leaves the victim with blindness eventually because according to the doctor, the person who has glaucoma doesn’t know that he has it until that disease condition must have taken at least one of the eyes away. So at that point, the doctors tried to advice that I should save the right eye which was very effective as at that time. So that was how the battle began.

The battle to save the right eye

They recommended some drugs and of course, the drugs were very costly especially for the kind of salary we earn as journalists. The drugs were quit costly even then I tried to get those drugs but I discovered that as much as I use them as costly as they are I get marginal improvement. The more I use them; the more the thing deteriorates. Till 2009 when it became almost impossible for me to see at all even then I could manage see very faintly, I couldn’t make out the faces of people I know, I couldn’t make out their faces, unless through their voices until it gradually became what is blindness today.

Living with it

 Well, I have been managing it since 2005, like I said because by the time I had my first accident, I had other accidents then because, it took me a long time to actually believe that I’m blind and I couldn’t see. When I need support to move around I insisted to move around myself and so I get into a lot of accidents or blundering into these reckless motorcycle riders popularly known as Okada riders. So, I started managing it as far back as 2005 by buying drugs, going to hospitals University Teaching Hospitals, General Hospitals, and Specialist Hospitals and so on and so forth, seeking all manner of solutions medically and spiritually and until now, I’m still managing it.

Any surgery

No, they said glaucoma is not curable and that it can only be managed and the only way you can manage glaucoma is when it starts first. It is an eye disease in which the optic nerve is damaged in a characteristic pattern. Glaucoma refers to a group of diseases that cause damage to the optic nerve. Containing more than a million nerve fibres, the optic nerve connects the eye to the brain. This important nerve is responsible for carrying images to the brain. The optic nerve fibres make up a part of the retina that gives us sight. This nerve fibre layer can be damaged when the pressure of the eye (intraocular pressure) becomes too high. Over time, high pressure causes the nerve fibres to die, resulting in decreased vision. Vision loss and blindness will likely result if glaucoma is left untreated. The only way to treat is to reduce eye pressure to a level at which no more damage occurs. Treatment is given in the form of prescription eye drops and occasionally, oral systemic drugs. In my own case I went to the hospital late; I discovered it late and my doctor was afraid to tamper with my right eye which was very effective then. She feared that if she should tamper with it especially with the way I was responding to the drugs in marginal way, that I might lose the whole eyes. I tried to do it about three times but the doctor said it might not work that its 50/50 chance of winning or losing the battle should during the surgical operation so eventually, I lost both eyes.

Are you still practicing journalism?

Yes, I’m.  I still write and that is the only thing I know best to do; journalism. And one of the greatest advantages I have is that I was trained in the TheNews/Tempo magazines so that prepared me a lot for whatever limitations that one may confront in the job. Eventually, when I finally came to the realisation that I may not be able to use my eyes, at least i believe in the main time, I went to the blind school trying  to learn how to use brail and a technology they call assistive technology; if you don’t want to use brail , they teach you how to use computer with the head of software call jobs . it is job assisted speech that software enables you to use computer very well especially if you knows how to type but then i dint know how to type on the computer i could only pick on the key so it was a bit difficult for me but i have to learn it as a blind person you, type on the key correctly from one key to another key and with the help of the software. Basically what the software does is when you are on computer it tells you what the computer is doing if i have my computer and typing, whatever am doing it will be telling me so it makes the job easier for me I can use all the package apart from graphics I can’t do it because, I won’t be able to see what am doing.

You are the editor of National Standard, how have you being editing the magazine      

Yes, it’s quite easy for me. I mean just like the way i do when am sighted. It is the same thing i still do. My reporters will first and foremost have our editorial conference where we discuss story ideas and try to agree on what to do for the week after then everybody goes out to do his beat until your story is done before the deadline and you submit it to me. I won’t take long hand because it is not pouched they can send it to me through my e-mail or through their flash whichever one that pleases them. If they submit it to me through e-mail, i can assess my e-mail, down load it on my computer then I will read. If what they write pleases me i take it; if it’s something i need to rewrite, i rewrite. If it’s what i need to do all over again, I will do it. If it’s all about semantic that i take care of it, I will edit it. I do rewrite stories. So am not in any way not fit as long as my job responsibilities are concerned. I go out to report; i attend events and conferences if you care to know. I go out to conduct interviews; i also go out to investigate stories. Last year i did a story on using disable persons for rituals. People like hunchback, albinos, dwarfs etc, i did the story. And when i needed these people for the story, i went to the Dwarf Association at Oshodi, they were surprise to see me and they ask me what i was doing there i told the story i was working on because, am i journalist, they were surprise to see a blind journalist asking me how can a blind man be a journalist. I brought out my laptop and we began to talk and they corporate with me and I did the story. So I still report. So I assess a situation and know the one i can do as a blind and i always go out with my reporters while am doing the talking, the reporter will be doing the sighting. And when we come back, i will ask him about what he noticed at the place or the environment and i will do the story. Last year, i did another story, how Nigerians cope with poverty. I first come in contact with the story in 2005, i went to the eatery with my friend and i excused myself to go to restroom and i saw something on the wall, ‘you need a guy for hot sex, call so so number’ because there was a number there, and i became curious so the net time i went back to eatery and i deliberately use restroom meant for female and i wrote, ‘need a sugar mummy call so number’, so by last year, i began to develop the story and by 2012, i eventually did the story. I took my reporter and we started visiting eateries until we gathered enough response and other graphite on the wall. I began to call those numbers and i told them how i got their numbers and before you know it they actually came. I got a lady who is a sex hawker,  an undergraduate who came for sex marketing, i got a guy and one lesbian including one sugar mummy and we get into talking. The way i do it is that look, how much are you taking for this..i want sex, how much do you collect and that am blind, do you mind and they will tell you they don’t mind, so i still go out to do the stories and my investigations.

But did you do the sex thing

I did the story.

I know but did you do the sex thing proper?

No, no, no! Laughter.

So what are your challenges?

My challenges are first and foremost are the challenges the physically challenged persons face. That is violation, abuse exclusion, marginalization, even where you work there are a lot of subtle violation going on. This blind person, you know loafing around here. Not only in the office, but outside there and that is what every physically challenged person all over the world faces. They are abused because people think that they don’t know anything. I have heard comments like the office give a blind person an official car, or how can you make a blind person an editor from my office, all manner of unhealthy comments but again i don’t allow that to affect me. Most times I assume that if i can be an editor of a magazine, I know more than they know. And what i know i try to let them know it and it shows in my work. I started editing the magazine since 2009 and since then the magazine has won many awards. In 2010, we won the DAME political reporter of the year, by 2010, another reporter won the telecommunication reporter of the year and i also won runners-up with my story the great gambler. In 2012, in NMA award, the magazine was a runner-up in the political and housing category. And i myself was a runner-up in the judiciary reporter of the year in the DAME award. So, I don’t see what a sighted editor can do that i can’t do.  In fact am beginning to think that am not physically challenged. Apart from the usually societal abuse and violation, sometimes they come to me directly. Some people will talk to you directly some will deliberately disrespect you by it to your face.

At that point what did you do?

Well, even if you are sighted, you cannot fight. They can tell you keep quiet, you blind man and you cannot do anything. I have had instances of my driver telling me that if you are not careful if rive you into lagoon. Somebody has said it to me before. That is an extreme case but then one is still living.

How your wife has been handling the situation? Has she any cause to quarrel with you on this condition?

Well, yes.

Are you hoping that since you were not born blind that one day you will regain your sight?

Up till now, I still believe that I can still see. One of the reasons while i went to the blind school late was that I never believed that I was blind. All the doctors’ report that i was blind, I was telling myself that even though I can’t see, that that thing that was hindering me from not seeing will disappear one day and until now, I still strongly believe that I will see again. I will certainly see again.

Let’s have your data

My name is Gbenga Ogundare. I was born in October 13, 1976. I was born in Lagos State and am the third in the family of six. I went to okera primary and secondary school Ogba Aguda, in Lagos state. After the death of my mother, i went to ijebuigbo and i attended Shamsuideen Grammer School Ijebu- Igbo and i graduated from there. It wasn’t a rosy journey because, i started having an issue with my dad right from my childhood, so the man never wanted me to go to school, and he never wanted me to do anything good for myself. So it became difficult for me. There was no money for me to continue school; i had admission three times but no help. My first admission was in 1994, which was in Ogun State College of Education then and that is Tai Sholarin College of Education now. Then later, Osun State University and i wanted to go there in 2005 but they gave me Business Administration, and i tried it again and i was offered the same course instead of Law. I got tired and i told myself since it’s not Law, it must be Mass Communication. So, i went Abeokuta Polytechnic and studied Mass Communication in Iruwa, my ND and HND was at Ibadan, so i did my HND and graduated as the best male graduating student. Upon graduation, i didn’t have the opportunity to go for service because, i had job with the Tempo magazine then in 2002. It was in 200 that i was able to go for service as a reporter and that was how i started journalism. In 2004, i won an award from the Down Syndrome Association of Nigeria for being able to report children affected by Down syndrome in Nigeria. By 2005, i was first runner-up in born vita Education Reporters Award sponsored by Cadbury Nigeria. That was when they gave me palmtop and three months’ supply of born vita beverages. By then i had left the TheNews but i wrote the story when i was in The News, it’s an investigative story of how candidates defraud examination bodies during examinations. In 2006, i won another award from Cad bury. Also in 2006, i was a runner-up in DAME and another one from ANA, association of writers. Osuigwe journalism Award.