In his last journey, DOT Man goes home

I had wished over and over again that the evening of Tuesday, August 25, 2026, be erased from the English calendar, at least in this part of the world, but it has stubbornly stuck on like a magnet and steel. This illogical wish is not without basis. May you never understand this by attempting to deny a piece of information that you have not tried to verify. Before verification, you are already praying it would turn out to be a great lie.

That was precisely what happened to me on the evening of this faithful day when my friend, the Editor of Vanguard, Eze Anaba, called me out of the blue (because he doesn’t just make flippant calls), asking when I last spoke with another friend, Dotun Oladipo, the Publisher of Eagle Online, who was our course mate. That, in itself, hadn’t aroused any suspicion.

Eze’s calls are not cheap. As the President of the Nigerian Guild of Editors and a close friend, he could be dishing out one of his difficult assignments or asking where one could be hiding around the globe at any time. After completing working on a special page for the day, I decided to relax a little before the next task when Eze called.

“Demo, have you spoken with Dotun today?” he asked. “Not today, but yesterday; we spoke yesterday!” You need to call the wife,” he said sharply, already betraying concern. “But why?” I asked. “I hope it is not true. I learnt that Dotun died this evening,” Eze said in a trembling voice before ending the call sharply. “What! It can’t be true.” My caller was gone.

While praying that this rude ‘rumour’ remained one, I knew calling Ayaba (Dotun’s wife) wasn’t a good idea. I decided to call Siji, another friend and a course mate. Before I could say a word, Siji confirmed my dreaded fear. Then, my head flew off. I didn’t know where. It looked like I was in the middle of a real nightmare that refuses to disappear.

It’s not that people don’t die, but the cut of losing Dotun at 56 was too deep, shocking, unreal, too sudden in many respects. Events of the past two weeks have brought me back to the reality that Dotun has indeed departed without a proper goodbye, despite putting up a real fight to stay on this side of the divide till he could no longer continue.

Dotun and I met at the former Ogun State Polytechnic (now Moshood Abiola Polytechnic), Abeokuta, where we were students between 1990 and 1992. Apart from academics, our main preoccupation in school was sharing the same passion for different reasons and logic. Dotun and I were the only photographers in the school initially at the time and in the same classroom.

As the son of a police commissioner, he got into photography more for pleasure than for the money. As a self-sponsored student, my survival in school depended on it. It was a daily, full-time job, including night parties and weekends.

After some months of this ‘business’ in our first year in 1991, however, tragedy practically struck. My Zenith 12 camera was stolen by some young delinquent, light-fingered relatives of the man I had come all the way from Abeokuta to cover his wedding in Lagos, on the street linking Iju Road and College Road by the Lagos State General Hospital, Ifako-Ijaiye, Lagos, on the morning I completed the coverage.

I was prevailed upon by the family of the brand-new husband not to get the police involved so as not to scatter the family, but my camera was gone and has never been recovered to this day. My head swirled round continuously without moving as I went back to Abeokuta on that Sunday, not actually sure how I would complete my last year in school as my weapon of warfare had been stolen by those rogues.

Dotun came in handy. I would ‘seize’ his camera for a few days, doing my business as if it was mine. He would willingly release it before I completed the formality of asking, and never complained. I was a consistent absentee from the first lecture of the day. My first class of the day was the photo lab at Isale Ake, where I had to pick up my photos.

I never ceased to wonder how a course mate, in the same sector, could abandon his business just because he wanted me to survive, and by the grace of God, I did, without owning a camera of my own again before the completion of our academic sojourn in Egba. My ‘business partner’ was there to give a poor student the luxury of typing his project on a computer (in those days o!). I can’t remember how much I paid.

Dotun ensured I had a few graduation photos in 1992 after a very tempestuous character, Taiwo Adesanya, whom I had arranged to take my graduation photos, disappeared into thin air on the day. Dotun ensured I had the photos even though we had dispersed from school.

He was instrumental in my getting employed at the PUNCH newspaper when my then-fiancée (now my wife), Olori Omobolanle, ‘forced me’ to go into journalism. Despite leading the pack during the test and interview, the editor preferred someone else who came second. The fellow resumed for work and never showed up in the office again. Dotun was among the Ojere cabal who pressured the editor to employ the leading candidate in the selection process. I resumed in PUNCH four days after my court wedding in January 2003.

Last year, after I left PUNCH, my friend was there to offer every support I needed to start my business. When I was still perfecting my corporate account, Dotun’s account came to the rescue. I never feared any surprises; it’s never in his character. You can commit your most treasured possession to Dotun and sleep soundly.

One of the few persons I could trust with such a sensitive issue, Prince Adebowale Adejuyigbe, my adopted brother, equally died on March 8 last year. He had arrived at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, on oxygen, but still very conscious. Ninety minutes after arriving at the hospital in that state, the hospital workers hadn’t deemed it fit to attend to him until it was too late.

One wonders how a facility established to save lives has transformed, in popular opinion, into a cradle of undertakers, with scores who besiege the hospital daily, returning home as corpses due to the laxity of workers and the siddon-look approach of the management despite serial complaints.

In the Association of Mass Communication Graduates 1992 Set, MAPOLY, Dotun was a strong pillar, a man with an expansive heart. He carried the association on his shoulders beyond what one can describe on the pages of newspapers, in resources, planning, and organization. His generosity could make a stranger doubt Dotun’s logic and judgment, as well as inflate his worth.

Regardless of the enormity of a task, Dotun had an answer. Beyond the call of duty, he could almost abandon personal assignments to attend to the pressing needs of others. There was never a ‘no’ from Dotun. He knew who to call in every situation. “Let me call someone. I will call you back, my brother,” he would say calmly. And surely, he would.

A first-timer would readily describe Dotun’s wife, Ayaba (Taiwo), as a member of the AMACOG ’92 set. She needs no introduction at the association’s gatherings. Ayaba is better known than some members of the set for her dedication, commitment, and service. Though the husband, the bond between Dotun and Ayaba ordinarily ‘converted’ the couple to twins. Only God knows who infected whom between the two.

I have ransacked my human database; I haven’t been able to find any time when Dotun lost his cool or got angry over any matter, even when there was a justifiable reason to do so. Dotun and I’s friendly fire on the group’s platform sometimes looked like two sworn enemies in a hot battle, while I never forgot to label him ‘Omo Ake’ on each occasion.

In many groups and platforms that he belonged to, Dotun was the rallying point, a fixer, the coordinator extraordinaire, the go-to person. Hardly do you have this combination in a human being, the same components he shared with the late Prince Adejuyigbe. Strangely, these two were from Ilesha, Osun State.

It is such a pity that at a time AMACOG ’92 should be planning its end-of-year party and Dotun’s 57th birthday in December, the grieving members are busy planning our member’s funeral.

As Dot Man takes his final bow this Friday, one can only take solace in the fact that he lived a life of service, exemplifying excellence in his chosen profession, serving as an umbrella for all shades of opinion and positively influencing the people around him.