A year without auntie Rafat, a lifetime of lessons
A thoroughbred professional, widely admired for her intellect and commitment to mentoring excellence.
By Temitope Mustapha
Twelve months have glided past like sunlight at dusk since Rafat Onyecher Salami, an enforcer of standards and an exceptional journalist whose career embodied diligence, integrity, and excellence, left us without a goodbye.
A thoroughbred professional, widely admired for her intellect and commitment to mentoring excellence.
Why a tribute after one year? Because the reality of her passing left me in deep shock. Her departure created a void words struggled to fill.
Yet her brilliance, doggedness, resilience, and leadership style rooted in clarity, genuine guidance, and accountability continue to echo vividly in my memory. I called her Auntie Raf.
Beyond the newsroom, #RafatSalami was a devoted mother, whose love and strength shone through her steadfast support for Ahmed, her son living with autism (whom I fondly call my Grammarian).
Auntie Rafat championed the autism cause through Ahmed with patience, courage, and compassion, earning admiration far beyond her family and colleagues across states and even beyond Nigeria.
Her life embodied the truest meaning of motherhood: nurturing, protective, and endlessly inspiring to all who knew her.
THE JOB AND OUR QUARRELS
In my 14 years at Voice of Nigeria (VON), over six years were forged directly under the exacting supervision of Rafatu Salami — years anchored in excellence and accountability.
She owned the health beat with rare devotion, steeped in the details of primary healthcare and uncompromising about accuracy. Often, she left me as her sub-editor, assuming responsibility while she was away on assignments, until she returned to the newsroom and reclaimed her authority with a touch of ceremony.
By 5:45 p.m. daily, she arrived, with a red biro in hand to inspect the bulletin. All she wanted was clarity, structure, and editorial discipline.
Anything less invited interrogation. “Temitope, what is this? I thought they said you have work experience?” Her words could unnerve and reduce me to shivers and stutters.
I would plead for a chance to re-angle the stories and return them for vetting while hoping she wouldn’t simply take over the editor’s seat herself. Mostly she did at 6:30pm at the nick of breaking news and final touches on the news bulletin that goes live on VOICE OF NIGERIA NEWS’ flagship programme, SIXTY MINUTES.
That was Auntie Rafat, thorough, demanding, and relentless. Yet through that pressure, she helped forge a newsroom culture where excellence was non-negotiable, and I was better for it.
THE THREE-WEEK BACK-TO-BACK EDITORIAL ROSTER
Around 2013, while I served as a news editor and had the privilege of leading an editorial shift from Level 9, Mrs Salami was the officer-in-charge of the roster. What followed remains etched in my memory. For nearly three weeks, she ran me back-to-back on the editorial schedule, relentless and exacting.
While others enjoyed more off-days, I seemed perpetually on duty, barely catching my breath as colleagues rotated more freely. I disliked the treatment but kept silent, choosing endurance over complaint, until the then deputy director of news, Ben-Shemang (now retired), observed my routine and questioned why I had worked almost every day of the week for three consecutive weeks. That intervention finally restored the two to three off days accorded to others on the same desk.
With time came clarity. What once felt excessive revealed itself as formative, rigorous, unforgettable, and deeply impactful. It became an experience of lasting professional significance.
Even in those demanding stretches, she found moments to tease me after particularly tasking assignments, smiling knowingly and promising she would “figure-eight” me in two days.
In those lighter moments, the weight of the grind eased, revealing that beneath the firmness was purpose, and beneath the pressure, care.
THE QUARRELS AND DEADLINES
Temitope, I need you to give me exclusives…her firm charge always to me. My restlessness for news writing, particularly human-angle stories, often met the exacting editorial standards of Rafat Salami.
While on annual leave in Ilorin, I stumbled on the story of the Kwara “blue-eye” family and, driven by instinct, pursued it.
I wrote a narrative on Risikat and her children’s ordeal and filed it for the Voice of Nigeria blog. What followed were multiple rounds of rewrites, re-editing, and rearrangement under her meticulous supervision, even as the same story shared with ICIR and other media was published while we remained on it for days.
Frustrated, I protested quietly and then withdrew.
The lesson came later. The then director of digital media, Hajia Sani, now retired, having read the story on ICIR with my byline, directed that it be published on the Voice of Nigeria website before dawn.
Only then did I understand that the process was not punishment but training, an insistence on patience, structure and more administrative balance.
When the story finally appeared on VON, it drew thousands of readers, leaving me with an enduring lesson: what felt like delay was discipline, and what I resisted was refinement.
BEYOND THE NEWSROOM: A GUARDIAN IN DIFFICULT SEASONS
Auntie Rafat’s compassion for vulnerable women and her support for me during some of my most difficult seasons remain deeply humbling.
Her care went far beyond the newsroom. With just one call, “Temitope, bawó ni? Ṣé o wa okay?” She conveyed reassurance, concern, and presence.
It was never a formality; it was genuine. She looked out for me not only as a professional but as a person, often placing concern for my family and wellbeing above official or institutional obligations.
Even in personal battles I never voiced, she somehow found her way to stand guard, firm, attentive, and deeply caring.
During the 2018 Kaduna attack that I survived miraculously, Auntie Rafat visited my home repeatedly, checking on my health and spirit, reminding me with quiet conviction that I would emerge stronger.
Her support in that period was not loud, but it was steadfast, and it remains one of the most profound expressions of mentorship and humanity I have known.
HATE HER OR LIKE HER: THE UNBENDING RAFATU
Unapologetically, Rafat Onyecher Salami stood for truth. She trained with firmness, not flattery, and believed that journalism had no room for shortcuts.
Under her watch, scripts were questioned, angles were challenged, and excuses were rejected. She demanded clarity, accuracy, and accountability and an unyielding gaze that left no doubt about her standards.
Yet, beneath the severity was purpose. She shaped journalists, not just bulletins; she taught patience, discipline, and courage in the pursuit of truth.
Many of us trembled under her edits, but we emerged stronger, sharper, and principled. Love her or resist her methods, Rafat Salami’s legacy in broadcast journalism is unmistakable: she trained many to tell the truth, properly and without compromise.
RAFATU’S STRENGTH WORN WITH HUMILITY
Mrs Salami’s humility, quiet yet profound, was always carefully preserved, never diminished by position or authority.
I watched her, time and again, respond to her superiors with effortless respect and grace. “Oga Shemang, you sent for me, sir?” She would say, her voice steady, her posture composed. In those moments, leadership met humility, and power yielded to courtesy.
Even in the heat of editorial rigour, she never lost that grounding.
While I stood before her defending story angles, she would pause, gently wave me aside and say, “Temitope, park one side my madam is calling me.” Let me respond to Hajia Sani first.” There was no drama, no pretence, just respect for hierarchy and people.
I also remember her coming downstairs personally to congratulate me after I won the Best Broadcast Category award for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation story on women’s empowerment. And again, in 2014, she celebrated me warmly for the Committee of Vice-Chancellors Appreciation Award.
RAFATU SALAMI: THE UNIONIST
True to her character, Rafatu Salami believed that silence in the face of injustice was complicity. She led and participated in numerous peaceful protests, standing shoulder to shoulder with colleagues to demand better working conditions, improved welfare packages, and respect for the profession of journalism.
These were not acts of defiance for attention but deliberate, disciplined actions driven by conscience. She was fearless yet orderly, vocal yet responsible.
Long before her final days, she had built a reputation for showing up fully, consistently, and with principle wherever the welfare of media practitioners was at stake.
She served as secretary of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) council (2015–2018), deeply committed to union duties and to championing press freedom and responsible journalism.
She also served as treasurer of the International Press Institute (IPI) Nigeria until her death on December 20, 2024.
Till her death, Rafatu remained active in NAWOJ. She reflected a lifelong commitment to gender equity and professional dignity in the media space.
Even as the assistant director of digital media at VON, “Madam Rafat” carried the same union spirit into leadership, firm standards, protective instincts, and a results-driven approach rooted in uprightness.
SERVICE TO THE POINT OF DEATH
Even while confined to a wheelchair, the International Press Institute found in Auntie Rafat a servant of uncommon devotion.
Though in severe pain and physically constrained, she gave herself fully to duty. At the maiden annual conference of IPI Nigeria, she showed up not in half measure, but in spirit and strength.
She welcomed guests with warmth, coordinated logistics with quiet efficiency, captured moments on her phone, and served with grace until her body could no longer bear the weight.
It was a powerful testament to who she was as a woman whose commitment outpaced her discomfort and whose sense of responsibility remained steadfast even when her strength was fading.
Just as testified to by the President of IPI Nigeria, Musikilu Mojeed, in his words, “Her commitment was a reminder that journalism is not merely a job; it is a calling.”
“It demands sacrifice; it demands conviction.”
Hence, Mojeed confirmed the decision of the IPI Nigeria to immortalise Rafat Salami by endowing a prize at the University of Abuja (UniAbuja) in honour of its late treasurer.
AHMED AND THE GUARDIANS OF AHMED SALAMI
The family has never dropped the ball in caring for Ahmed, yet grief has a language of its own. Ahmed misses his mother, not just as a parent, but as everything else she was to him.
Rafatu Salami was his routine and his reassurance, his interpreter of a complex world, his fiercest advocate, and his emotional anchor. With her passing on December 20, 2024, a quiet order he relied on was suddenly altered.
Ahmed Salami, a Nigerian vlogger and the last son of the late Rafatu Salami, lives with autism, cerebral palsy, and ADHD. Ahmed’s vocabulary is enthusing; hence, I call him my Grammarian.
Ahmed’s elder brother, Jameel Salami, recently shared that Ahmed is managing, held steady by consistent caregiving support, and even showing eagerness to return to vlogging.
Still, the loss settles in differently. Ahmed struggles to fully grasp why his mother is gone, yet he feels her absence intensely in disrupted routines, unfamiliar silences, and the missing cadence of daily reassurance.
The care around him is strong, but the space she left is profound, calling for prayer and gentle constancy as he learns, slowly, to live in a world reshaped by her absence.
Ahead of his mother’s first death anniversary, the Guardian of Ahmed Group, led by Dr Jummai Ahmadu, Lara Owoeye-Wise and Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, amongst other selfless Nigerians, and a WhatsApp platform of 402 members, have successfully raised over N5.5 million, opened the Ahmed Salami Trust Fund with Fidelity Bank, and formally handed over the bank statement to Jameel.
Ahmed is a confirmed signatory to the Trust Fund (Account No. 5601613076), alongside Dr Jumai Ahmadu (Chairman, Board of Trustees). Dr Badewa Adejugbe-Williams Mr Francis Oko Mohie (Secretary).
REMEMBERED IN PRAYERS, REFLECTED IN SERVICE
The Al Habibiya Mosque have continued to remember you in their prayers. They still carry on the quiet work of easing the burdens of the poor and the vulnerable, a cause you held close to your heart and served with deep commitment.
One year on, Rafatu Salami’s absence still speaks, but so does her legacy. Time has not dimmed the courage she lived by or the standards she upheld. Instead, it has clarified them.
In the stories she shaped, the lives she defended, and the people she quietly lifted, her spirit remains present, steady, instructive, and enduring.
Today, on the #firstanniversary of Rafat Salami’s passing, I celebrate this superwoman of valour, an exceptional gift to humanity, rare and luminous like Halley’s Comet, and defined by an uncommon commitment to truth, service, and compassion.
Though she passed through our lives once, the impact of her light continues to return, guiding, reminding, and inspiring all who were privileged to know her.
Rafat Salami stood for something—and she made that unmistakably clear through the way she lived and worked. In a world where compromise is often convenient, she chose uprightness. Where silence was easier, she chose responsibility. When doing the right thing was uncomfortable or unpopular, she stood her ground.
She stood for professional excellence without shortcuts, for accountability over convenience, and for leadership guided by conscience rather than applause. Her life asks a question that lingers long after her passing: what do you stand for?
Temitope Mustapha is a journalist and writes from Abuja.
