– Editors of The Nation Arrested
– Recent Experience of sharpedgenews.com Editor
The administration of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria made a shocking u-turn in its promise to encourage free speech and vibrant media on Tuesday as it arrested three editors of the critical Lagos-based newspaper, The Nation. A late-night statement from presidential spokesman, Reuben Abati, on Tuesday cautioned the media against fanning the embers of “disunity and ethnicism.”
The manhunt which made Tuesday a red-letter day for journalists and the ideal for freedom and safety of journalists came allegedly at the prompting of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, and his connection to a letter purportedly calling on President Jonathan to effect strategic cleansing of bureaucratic appointees of Northern extraction from some key parastals of the Federal Government.
The dragnet of aggressive policemen sent to the offices of The Nation in Lagos and Abuja missed the title’s editor, Mr. Gbenga Omotoso, who is currently in London on a crucial assignment. It, however, did not miss the newspaper’s Managing Editor for Northern Operations, Mr. Yussuf Alli and the Abuja Bureau Editor, Mr. Yomi Odunuga. The Deputy Editor of the company, Lawal Ogienagbon was arrested in Lagos and flown to Abuja. The Group News Editor for weekend publications, Dapo Olufade was also arrested.
Those arrested were made to make statements on what they knew about the October 3 and 5 editions of the newspaper.
The company’s lawyer, Mr. John Unachukwu, the Chief Security Officer (CSO), Mr. Jide Adegbenjo and the Labour Correspondent, Mrs. Dupe Olaoye Oshinkolu, who volunteered to follow their colleagues were also asked to make statements, after which they were detained.
After processing at Force Headquarters on Tuesday, the editors were transferred to the office of the police Area 10, Garki, Abuja.
The government’s decision to come after reporters at The Nation is not accidental. Lately, operatives of the State Security Services (SSS) and the police have become more reactive and have launched arrest of news reporters even when they are based overseas. The Editor-in-Chief of sharpedgenews.com, Mr. Oladimeji Abitogun was detained for “belated issues” by men of the SSS in spite of his legal blindness status. Shortly afterwards, he was released in Lagos with apologies, policemen at the Ondo State Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) came after him with guns threatening to waste him.
Mr. Abitogun had to cut short his visit to Nigeria and was again harassed at the point of departure by an SSS operative who told him to “go back to the United States and write whatever he wanted, “we would deal with the matter when you come back”, Abitogun was told.
As in the case of Abitogun, the presidential adviser on publicity and the media, Dr. Reuben Abati called to apologize on behalf of the president, assuring that the administration had nothing against journalists.
In the same vein, Okey Ndibe, a columnist with SaharaReporters.com had been mistreated.
The confused leadership of the country through its Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York is also making judicial efforts to bankrupt Sahar Reporters.com for exposing the less than transparent contract award process by Ambassador Joy Ogwu. Nigerian journalists are under siege.
It is believed that apart from Obansanjo’s game-spoiling, stick-wielding, bullish pranks, Dr. Abati himself is being put at a disadvantage as some SSS operatives are said to be boasting that “we have him on our side now, let him write any more nonsense and we would deal with him.” The presidential spokesman was an unbiased critic as a columnist.
Dr. Abati in a statement on behalf of his principal warned the media to guard against disunity and ethnicism. He was reacting to a report carried by Daily Trust newspaper detailing the systematic exclusion of the North from project earmarks.