Tinubu’s worrisome clampdown on the media
President Bola Tinubu
THESE are difficult times for journalists. On Tuesday, Dayo Aiyetan, Executive Director of the International Centre for Investigative Journalism, and Nurudeen Akewushola, a reporter, became the latest victims of the repression and intimidation of the media that is fast becoming a hallmark of the Bola Tinubu administration.
Both journalists were detained after honouring an invitation from the Police Cybercrime Centre and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission reportedly in connection with an exposé published in February. The report alleged that some top police officers were entangled in contract awards.
The arrest of the ICIR journalists came just days after police officers forcefully arrested Madu Onuorah, the publisher and editor-in-chief of Global Upfront newspapers at his Abuja home.
Earlier, Segun Olatunji, the then editor of FirstNews, was detained for 14 days by the Nigerian military in March. Olatunji was abducted from his Lagos home in a Gestapo-style operation and held incommunicado for days in Abuja. He was chained and tortured.
A few weeks later, police captured Daniel Ojukwu of the Foundation for Investigative Journalism in Lagos and moved him to Abuja. The online newspaper published a story about how a Presidency official was involved in the N147 million allocated for the construction of classrooms was found in the account of a restaurant. The police alleged that this was cyberstalking.
All this signposts a return to the dark days of military rule where journalists were almost hounded out of existence.
Some journalists have also suffered physical attacks. On February 23, 2024, soldiers brutalised, handcuffed, and arrested Dele Fasan, the South-South Bureau Chief of Galaxy Television for recording video footage of a labour protest over economic hardship in Uvwie, a suburb of Warri.
In February, journalists covering the All Progressives Congress governorship primaries in Edo State, including those from NTA, FRNC, and Arise TV, were attacked by suspected political thugs in the presence of the State Commissioner of Police and some party officials.
The 2024 World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders lists Nigeria among the most challenging countries for journalists in West Africa despite 25 years of unbroken civil rule. According to the report, Nigerian journalists are regularly monitored, attacked, and arbitrarily arrested.
The security agencies are hiding under the Cybercrime Act to clamp down on the media. The Act establishes a comprehensive legal, regulatory, and institutional framework for combating cybercrimes. It seeks to protect individuals from undue harm from using computer networks and assets.
Section 24 makes it an offence to send a message knowingly or unknowingly via a computer that he knows to be false for “the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred, ill will or needless anxiety or makes such a message to be sent.” The punishment is a fine of not more than N7 million or a jail term of not more than three years or both.
These offences do not fall within the purview of journalism and should not be used as an excuse to prevent journalists from performing their duties.
While press freedom is not absolute, the 1999 Constitution imposes a duty on the media to hold the government and its officials accountable.
The onslaught against the media is a marked departure from the ideals of democracy and the rule of law proclaimed time and again by Tinubu himself. There are signs of creeping authoritarianism that started during the Muhammadu Buhari administration. The Buhari government banned Twitter between June 2021 and January 2022 for providing a voice for regime critics.
It seems Tinubu must have forgotten his days as an activist and member of the National Democratic Coalition that battled the repressive regime of Sani Abacha to restore democratic rule in Nigeria. He should rein in the security agencies.
