President’s Name, Oath and Time
The new President of the Federal Republic who is being sworn in today, what name is he going to be known by? This is a matter of the least concern for social media writers but for old-time media practitioners, this is a serious matter of professional etiquette.
In 1976 when the little-known Georgia State Governor Mr. James Earl [Jimmy] Carter began his run for President of the United States, American newspapers did stories asking, Jimmy who? He won the race and on the eve of his inauguration in January 1977, the White House announced that he should be known as President Jimmy Carter. Another furor immediately erupted in the media, which Time magazine summarized in a story titled Who Carter?
The BBC Board of News met in London for 12 hours and debated whether it was appropriate for a serious news medium to refer to a president by his informal nickname. The BBC editors then heard that the Board of Editors of New York Times had been meeting non-stop for 24 hours over the same issue. The BBC editors then adjourned their meeting and decided to abide by the New York Times’ decision. The next day, NY Times’
lead story referred to the new leader as “President Jimmy Carter…” BBC and all the world’s media then followed suit. Sixteen years later when US President
William Jefferson Clinton said he should be known as “Bill” Clinton, there was no fuss because a precedent had already been set. Or when the current US President is known as “Joe” Biden, something that would have been unthinkable for the media in the 1960s.
Which Editorial Board in Nigeria has given a thought to the name of President Tinubu? Since 1992 when he burst into the political scene as a senator of the Federal Republic, and especially since 1999 when he became governor of the country’s most populous and most cosmopolitan state, every media house in Nigeria has called him Bola Tinubu. More recently, when he became his party’s presidential candidate, his middle name “Ahmed” began to appear frequently in the news. The new president however has another name, Adekunle, which hardly features in news stories. And for that matter, Bola is not a full name. The new President’s full name is Abimbola. If the Nigeria Guild of Editors is alive to its responsibilities, it should set up a committee of veteran editors to receive from Aso Rock an official statement about the name that the new President wishes to be known, debate whether it is an appropriate name and adopt the name that the media should use.
Name is only the beginning of the problem. What about the size of the crowd at Eagles Square that will witness the swearing in ceremony this morning? Remember that in January 2016 when he was sworn in as US President, Donald Trump created controversy when he estimated the crowd that attended his inauguration at one and a half million. The media estimated the crowd at 250,000. The US Park Service, which has charge of Washington DC’s National Mall, has a method of estimating the number of people that crowd into the mall because on previous occasions, organisers of some events often exaggerated the turnout at their rallies. In Nigeria here, which agency do we have that can reliably estimate the number of people at Eagle Square? In any case, the number of people that turn up today at Eagle Square is not a measure of the new President’s popularity because strict security measures are in place, including the declaration of a work-free day, cordoning off of the Federal Secretariat and all the adjoining roads and strict security checks at the gates, so not every well-wisher can