• Journalists, CSOs condemn ban
From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye and Magnus Eze, Abuja
President Muhammadu Buhari has disowned his Chief Security Officer (CSO) Bashir Abubakar, over the expulsion of PUNCH’s State House Correspondent, Olalekan Adetayo, from the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina through his twitter handle @femadesina said, “We weren’t consulted in the media office by the CSO before he expelled The Punch reporter. President Buhari is committed to press freedom.
An amicable solution would be found to The Punch reporter matter. President Buhari does not intend to muzzle the media in any way.” Abubakar had earlier summoned Adetayo to his office and questioned him on two reports he considered uncomplimentary of Buhari and his administration.
He referred to the lead story of SUNDAY PUNCH of April 23, 2017, titled “Fresh anxiety in Aso Rock over Buhari’s poor health” and queried the motive behind it.
He also referred to Adetayo’s column, Aso Rock Lens, published on Saturday, April 22, 2017, and titled “Seat of power’s event centres going into extinction.”
Abubakar asked one of his men to go and take Adetayo’s statement and revert to him.
He, thereafter, directed the Officer in Charge, Department of State Services (DSS), Victor Nwafor, to withdraw his accreditation tag and lead him out of the premises after retrieving his personal belongings from the press gallery of the Council Chambers.
Nwafor left an instruction at the Reception that Adetayo should no longer be allowed into the premises after which he handed him over to another security operative who led him to where his car was parked to ensure he left the premises as instructed. The CSO, penultimate Thursday, had at an interactive session with members of the State House Correspondents and handed out new guidelines on how to report the Villa.
The CSO had also, in January, summoned Lekan and the Daily Trust correspondent, Isiaka Wakili, to his office over a story on an accidental discharge that injured a female worker inside the administrative block of the villa. The Goodluck Jonathan’s administration had expelled the correspondent of Radio Deuchewelle, Musa Ubale, for asking visiting Chadian President, Idris Deby, a question considered embarrassing by the Presidency. Musa’s question for Derby was an explanation on the relationship between the multinational task force fighting in Lake Chad and the South African mercenery fighting with the force.
Jonathan’s CSO, late Gordon Obua, had ordered Musa’s expulsion.
However, Adesina, yesterday, re-issued villa press pass to Musa at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. He said Musa’s re-accreditation as a State House correspondent was in keeping with Buhari’s commitment to correct the wrongs of the past.
“Part of the change promised by President Buhari is correcting things that were wrongly done before.
Mr Ubale Musa’s accreditation was wrongly withdrawn. To redress the wrong done to him by the withdrawal, we have returned his Villa Press Pass to him, so he can continue his work without hindrance,” he said. Musa is the current chairman of the State House Press Corps.
Meanwhile, many journalists and members of the civil society in Abuja, yesterday, flayed the banning of the Punch reporter from Aso Rock Villa. Reacting to the development, Co-convener of Centre Against Brutality and for Safety of Journalists in Africa (CABSOJA), Barrister Ugo Ezeikel-Hanks described the action as despicable and an outright breach of the nation’s constitution and called on the government to immediately apologise to the punch newspaper as well as pay restitution to the affected journalist.
“To stop an accredited State House correspondent and, indeed, any other journalist from entering the villa is, to say the least, despicable and an outright breach of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, especially as it affects the right of the journalist to receive and impart information as guaranteed in Chapter Four of our Constitution.”
“It is reckless for the executive to curtail the right of the fourth estate of the realms to receive information.” CABSOJA said.
When contacted, Secretary of the Abuja Council of Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Rafatu Salami said the issue would be resolved amicably.
