By Isaac Massaquoi
Please don't expect any clear-cut answer to this question because the truth is, I don't know. The family, workmates and friends of the late journalist also don't know. And from what I've been told, his doctor provided some answers but it appears as if it's a different narrative that many people believe. And they include the two priests who officiated at his funeral mass.
So instead of trying to find out WHAT really killed Obai Wurie - meaning the real cause of death - against the backdrop of the new narrative, here I am asking the question: WHO killed Obai Wurie? I am joining the search for a person or group of persons, because the priest himself said: "Obai was killed" because of his attack on the forces of corruption, violence and suppression of the poor.
Hundreds of people turned out at the funeral mass for the late broadcaster at Saint Anthony's Church Brookfields and the Rev. Father made some statements that to me suggested that Obai met his death in unusual, even unnatural circumstances. The priest may have been tapping into that same narrative which emerged in the days following the appearance of the first pictures of a frail-looking Obai Wurie in hospital with a caption suggesting he may not survive an attack by evil forces.
In some media ethics debates, I am bound to raise serious questions about the professional considerations that informed the decision to publish such gory photographs. It's not as if this was some humanitarian appeal for cash to pay for his treatment. Wurie comes from a family that is more than capable to meet his medical bills anywhere in the world. But even if fund-raising was the motive, the picture and the caption ought to have been far less intrusive as the one I saw in at least one local newspaper.
As soon as that picture was published, it was suggested that Wurie had been struck by the charms of a witch doctor, probably hired by somebody or a group of people who were very uncomfortable with the late broadcaster's commitment to the defence of the weak against the might of powerful people in our society. Obai's recent style of journalism came straight out of the thesis of H. L Mencken - comfort the afflicted by afflict the comfortable.
There are so many stories doing the rounds in Freetown these days about such witch doctors hanging around at a place called Up Gun waiting to be sent on a killing mission for as little as less than ten US dollars. And the whole reason for killing somebody could be because they hissed in a way suggesting they were being abusive. Indeed, so-called traditional medicine men have gained high profile status in the last five years to the extent that they are now invited at official ceremonies and could be seen with all their charms in places where they never dared show up just yesterday. So could it be that one of these people killed Obai because he touched their interests or were hired by somebody whose interest was in Obai Wurie's line of fire?
One of Wurie's workmates who gave a moving tribute at the event was confident that Obai's killers would "confess" soon. I hope so because forget about journalistic curiosity, I would like to see what the people of the underworld look like.
The Catholic Priests who officiated at the funeral mass, appeared to have bought that narrative. One of them said during his homily that "this man was killed for the kind of job he did". The man of God said he wouldn't understand why life had become so unbearable for journalists and ordinary people who dared to speak their minds on social issues in Sierra Leone. He challenged the congregation to rise up and speak out because it was now time to do so.
We're not used to such fiery homilies from Catholic Priests in Sierra Leone like their colleagues in Southern Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe. So at this funeral mass, the priest was in the mood and the mourners, more than 80% of whom were either non-Catholics or Muslims, loved it. But as a Catholic, I sat there thinking: is this priest playing up to the gallery here by suggesting the dark art of black magic was responsible for Obai's death? I was hoping to hear from the priest the line that says only God has power over life and death.
The closest episode I remember that looks like this, came from my Sunday school lesson in the late 70s. It was the story of how a confused King Saul consulted the Witch of Endor to find out from the dead prophet Samuel, how his army would perform against their powerful neighbour, whose army was at the gates of his kingdom. So I concluded that the priest was not alone in believing that the power of the underworld invoked to get things done, negative or positive. In this case the "killing' of Obai Wurie.
I worked with Obai Wurie for several years at the then SLBS. And in true SLBS style, he was the normal reporter who covered ministerial news conferences and NGO activities staged for the media with great deference to authority. He loved life. Obai was a man who used every free second available to him to squeeze in some jokes and have a good laugh. He did this even on those normally tensed early evening production days at SLBS. This was a time when reporters queued up in the studio behind increasingly temperamental VTR editors to help prepare the news.
There's hardly anything more to say about him without running the risk of saying too much.
It would appear that when we all got fed up with the drabness and poverty of ambition in that highly controlled environment called SLBS and quit, Obai Wurie underwent a Damascus Road type experience in his life which convinced him to sharpen his journalistic teeth and re-focus his journalism where it really ought to have been even in his SLBS days - in the true interest of the huge number of Sierra Leoneans who are poor and powerless and who are constantly being suppressed by those who have power and wealth and who accumulated all that on the backs of the same downtrodden people.
Obai Wurie absolutely set himself up as a man who was willing to listen to those people. He found a powerful channel for this new journalism in Culture Radio. The Radio is completely cut out for this purpose. Culture Radio is a real breath of fresh air in a media landscape poisoned by politically-correct journalism that deliberately marginalises the poor and uneducated masses of Sierra Leone while creating the false impression that our politicians were angels and all was well in Sierra Leone.
There was fighting talk from the lady from Culture Radio who spoke at the funeral. Sounding a bit like Winnie Mandela addressing an ANC crowd before a rally in the days when Nelson was in jail, she promised that Culture Radio "will fight on", and keep the memory of Obai Wurie alive.
But with Obai and his Shekpendeh partner, Wilreen dead about a month or so apart from each other and the dominant narrative now making the rounds that they were killed by the use of black magic because of their aggressive and challenging style of journalism, I left the church feeling that confidence in the mission of Culture Radio has been badly shaken and the radio station will never be the same again.
I also suspect that the entire journalism community in Sierra Leone is now having to ask important questions about whether the people behind the alleged black magic killings pose an existential threat to their profession. I will not be surprised if black magic killing of journalists makes it to the agenda of next month's Annual General Meeting of the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists in Makeni.
(C) Politico 06/05/14
