Nigeria, Nov. 10 -- He saw the way I looked woebegone that day in 1995 at Tejumola House, Omole, Ojodu-Berger Road in Lagos. That was where Tempo, where I started my journalism career, operated from. It was one of the strategies by the ICNL management to form a mosaic of operational centres to beat Abacha and his Praetorian Guards, who were baying for the blood of our bosses and their staff, who showed him pepper with what they were writing.

"What is the problem, Demola?" Mr Dapo Olorunyomi (Dapsy), one of the founders of TheNEWS, Tempo, AM NEWS, and PM NEWS (and now publisher of PREMIUM TIMES), asked me. "I just secured a one-room self-contained apartment at Abule Egba. I want to buy a mattress, but my money is not enough."

I fished ou...