By Veronica Funmilayo Ogbole
I met Rafat for the first time at a workshop on Gender organised by the Action Aid, at Kini County home, Akwanga, Nasarawa State, in 2015 and as if it was planned, we hit it off immediately as friends. In her usually warm nature, she requested for and collected my phone number.
Weeks after the workshop, she created a WhatsApp Group and added me on the platform named ‘Journalists Round Table (JR). I was initially surprised and wondered why I was included on the platform since I was not an Abuja based practicing journalist, but an information Officer with the Nasarawa State Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism while most of the members on the JR platform were Abuja based journalists.
It took me months before I could start chatting on the platform as I was then not familiar with most of the members that soon became part of my family. Rafat and some other members’ warmly embrace made me so comfortable and loved that I started contributing on the platform.
We had several meetings tagged; “Sit Outs”, in different locations in Abuja. During such “Sit Outs”, I will travel all the way from Lafia to attend.
Rafat was blunt, but liberal, social, and tolerant of those of us that take alcohol.
With her selection by the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), to join me as a co-trainer in the Gender Equity and Safety for Women Journalists, sponsored by the Norwegian Union of Journalists, we become more bonded like sisters and not just because of the path that qualified us as trainers of women Journalists on Gender Equity and Safety, with our TOT in Dakar Senegal, but sisters and friends.
From there, our journey to almost all the States of the country commenced. We later traveled to Dakar and Tanzania for retreats and became popular among other female journalists in Africa. As a result, Rafat was nicknamed “Mama G”, after Patience Ozokwor, the Nigerian actress because of her funny and dramatic ways of doing things while I was nicknamed “Mama Vee”.
Significantly, Eva Stabell, the International Adviser for the Norwegian Union of Journalists, calls us ” the Mamas”.
We were her favorites.
Eva expressed shock at Rafat’s death, and said she thought she was okay and hearty until she saw her on a wheelchair. She described Rafat as the “most lovely and lively of us all”.
We had our differences, but we were always able to resolve them in our usual matured ways without quarrels whatsoever.
There was one particular time we had a little misunderstanding and we were to travel for a training program. Rafat in her usual manner which no one can take away from her, sent me the travel information and the flight we were to use to get to our destination. By the time we got to our destination, none of us remembered we had a misunderstanding earlier.
That was the vintage Rafat, whom once she says (said) it, life goes on with no hard feelings. Rafat and I, shared information and matters of common interests concerning our families and challenges. I have lodged in her house not as a result of lack of alternative or choice, but for friendship sake just like she did put up in my house too.
During my first son’s wedding (namesake of her son, Ahmed), even though she was unable to attend, she organised and mobilised financial contribution by the JR family that went a long way in assisting me so much.
In the same vein , during my daughter – Dr. Maryam’s wedding in 2022, Rafat took it upon herself as if, it was her daughter’s wedding. Again, she championed another contribution from JR. The joy she exhumed and expressed was so much as was displayed through her dancing. Any time I watched the video of her dancing at my daughter’s wedding, it gives me joy and causes me to laugh with so much relief.
From colleagues, to trainers, to friends and then sisters and in spite of the fact that I am older, I learnt and gained so much from Rafat. On any issues concerning her children, that was when you will see Rafat’s 100% concentration as she will spend hours on phone until she ensures the issue or issues are sorted out and resolved.
Rafat was bold, decisive and fearless, especially in expressing her feelings.
It was when we were in Akure, Ondo State for a training that I discovered that she was born and grew up in Ikare, Ondo State which gave me a better understanding of her grasp of the Yoruba language which she spoke fluently even as an Ebira from Kogi State.
One experience that I know made Rafat disappointed was when she lost the Chairmanship election of NUJ, FCT Council. She really felt disappointed with members of the JR, especially the women among us, as per gender equality. Anytime we discuss the issue, you could feel her pain, but thank God, she overcame it in few weeks and moved on thus, reconciled with the members.
Rafat was many things to many people, a good mother, friend, sister, colleague, gender and human rights advocate and a trainer.
Rest on, GOC, SOC, Amotekun 1 of JR.
May God forgive her shortcomings and grant her Arjauna Firdaus
Adiu Rafat, we will surely miss you.