The management of ThisDay/Arise News is entangled in an exchange with the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign council’s (PCC) director of media and publicity, Mr. Bayo Onanuga and the council’s adviser on media and communication, Mr. Dele Alake over what the ThisDay/Arise News consider attempt by the duo to adopt the Donald Trump tactics to silence independent media, cower as well as bully free press ahead of the 2023 general elections. The ThisDay/Arise News board also takes exception to the APC PCC media aides’ continuous attacks on its owner, Mr. Nduka Obaigbena.
ThisDay/Arise News statement as well as the joint reaction by Onanuga and Alake is published below.
You can’t bully free press, silence media – ThisDay/Arise editors tell Alake, Onanuga
The Board of Editors of THISDAY/ARISE News yesterday accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council’s (PCC) Director of Media and Publicity, Mr. Bayo Onanuga and its Director, Strategic Communication, Mr. Dele Alake of attempting to silence independent media, cower as well as bully free press ahead of the 2023 general elections in what they described as a copycat style of former US President, Donald Trump against independent media.
The THISDAY/ARISE News Boards of Editors stated this in a joint statement titled: “Tinubu and THISDAY/ARISE Media Group and the Attack on Free Speech.”
They also noted out of envy and pettiness, the continuous attacks on their Chairman & Editor-in-Chief, Prince Nduka Obaigbena by both Alake and Onanuga.
The editors pointed out that in at least four separate press statements and interviews in the last three weeks, Onanuga and Alake, instead of responding to issues or sending petition to the organisation’s Ombudsman, have variously accused the group of bias against the APC Presidential Candidate, Mr. Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
“They are wrong. Truth and the pursuit thereof, and the reporting of facts is no bias. The duo has taken unprofessionalism, recklessness, picayune politics and blackmail to a new art form. After their first press statement, we ignored them; but they authored a second statement, which we again ignored, not wanting to insert ourselves into the political discourse.
“But the more we have ignored them the more they have mistaken our silence for cowardice and continued their unrelentless attacks with virulence, even threatening us with The Nigerian Press Council.
“A Press Council that has been completely rejected by the mainstream independent Nigerian media precisely for this reason: misuse and abuse by an incipient dictatorship.
“Imagine these insecure duo of Onanuga and Alake already threatening the free press when they are seeking our votes. What will they do if Tinubu was elected President? Kill independent media or take their markets over using the power of the state and replacing them with media platforms they control and which kowtow to them?” the editors stated.
The editors pointed out that the attacks intensified since the publication in the THISDAY edition of 18th November, 2022 of the death of one Mueez Adegboyega Akande, a Tinubu associate mentioned as being involved, by US authorities, in a drug trafficking investigation of the APC candidate in 1993.
According to the editors, the THISDAY report introduced the person that died as Mueez but included a condolence message from Lagos State governor to the family of Dr. Kolapo Akande.
“Did THISDAY mix-up the identity (of two brothers?) We needed to be sure before issuing an apology. We needed to hear from the family. Till date we have not heard from the family. The fact is that mistakes in reporting the death of someone who may not have died is not unusual in the media.
“But then a quick statement from the family of the person so reported to have died, as happened when the media mistakenly reported the death of the late nationalist and past President, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, in the ‘90s, would have quickly laid the matter to rest.
“Most newspapers, including the national television stations (Except THISDAY) made the error and was quickly corrected. THISDAY later became the first newspaper on May 12, 1996, to exclusively break the true story of the passing of Nnamdi Azikiwe,” they added.
However, for some strange reasons, Mueez, since the publication of the story, has not disowned the THISDAY report that he was not dead, nor has any of his family members.
Therefore, the editors stated that they found it curious that it was the APC Presidential Campaign Council that would issue a statement that the person that died was Kolapo, not Mueez.
In a statement he issued on 21 November 2022, Onanuga had accused THISDAY of denigrating Kolapo, a medical doctor and “an Accord Party candidate for the House of Representatives some years back”.
But a quick internet search showed that the Accord Party candidate in question was indeed Mueez, not Kolapo.
“Where was Onanuga’s professionalism in passing off Mueez for Kolapo? Did he verify his story as a journalist of several decades? Strangely, the trio of naijanews.com, sarconnectmedia.com, kossyderrickent.com, which highlighted the poster in an internet search outline, have since deleted it on their websites.
“What a curious coincidence! Perhaps, Onanuga, the self-assigned publicist of the Akandes, may wish to clarify this. He should also clarify his relationship and the relationship of the APC PCC with the Akandes and why they would issue a statement on behalf of the family.
“Or better still, get Mueez Akande to step out, so we can close this matter. We note that the APC campaign council is riled by our report on Akande’s death,” the editors stated.
According to THISDAY/ARISE Board of Editors, with documents already in the public domain about Tinubu’s funds forfeiture over drug investigation in the United States of America, it was important to state that for national security, foreign policy, and national interest, any candidate aspiring to be the president of Nigeria should not shy away from media scrutiny concerning any link with drug trafficking, or be associated with anyone so involved, however tangentially.
They stressed that it was a national security question for which all patriots must seek answers, saying it goes to the heart of the country’s nascent democracy and indeed its political stability.
Furthermore, they demanded for full and complete answers on the entire circumstances leading to the forfeiture.
They recalled the case of Manuel Noriega, the Panamanian leader who the US helped to put in power between 1983 and 1989, and whose involvement in drug trafficking later led to the US invasion of Panama, and his capture, trial and conviction in Miami.
As a result of the foregoing, the editors warned that Nigeria, “cannot afford a Noriega moment despite some of the acrobatics of APC spokesmen trying to make light of forfeiture of funds linked to drug trafficking.”
“Have the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), the Nigeria Intelligence Agency (NIA) and the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) investigated this? We need their reports and clarity, one way or the other, in this most important national security question on the 2023 elections with implications for our democracy.
“We also note that two senior APC campaign officials had separately requested that we move THISDAY Editor and columnist, Shaka Momodu, and The Morning Show co-host on ARISE News, Rufai Oseni, from their current positions to stop the attacks or get reprieve from a future Tinubu presidency.
“The Boards of Editors of THISDAY Newspapers and the ARISE News Channel would like to state without equivocation that we do not fire journalists because of their views.
“Facts are sacred and opinions free is the age-old dictum to which all free-thinking men subscribe. We allow our editors the freedom to air their opinions unfettered and have created The Office of the Ombudsman to take any complaints and discipline any abuse of office by any of our staff members,” they explained.
However, despite the unwarranted attacks, unprofessionalism and envy of THISDAY and ARISE successes by Onanuga and Alake in the face of their journalism failures, who both wish to create a cabal to ring-fence Tinubu (away from more moderate and reasonable APC leaders), they assured the APC, it’s PCC and the Tinubu Campaign of fair and robust coverage of THISDAY and ARISE Media group as they do for other political parties.
“We will continue to be open, unbiased and professional. However, we will not be intimidated by the bullying tactics of some APC campaign officials. As Michelle Obama said in response to Donald Trump, when ‘they (Onanuga and Alake) go low, we go high’, for the greater good of journalism and Nigeria.
“A journalism that holds leaders accountable to the people by always telling truth to power. In the words of Othman Dan Fodio, “Conscience is an Open Wound, Only Truth Can Heal It,” they added.
*ThisDay, December 12, 2022
Onanuga, Alake responded in a joint article in The Nation of December 13
Nduka Obaigbena and his ThisDay/Arise News hypocritical grandstanding on public morality
Bayo Onanuga and Dele Alake
It is laughably tragic that the Chairman and Editor-in-Chief of THISDAY and Arise News Television, Mr. Nduka Obaigbena, has the temerity to pretend to be a guardian of public morality in contemporary Nigerian media practice.
The fact that this character is an unscrupulous hustler and blackmailer who has done tremendous damage to the journalism profession in the country, is well known within and beyond the profession.
Hiding under his media houses so-called Boards of Editors, Obaigbena, who is one of the most irresponsible media owners in the country, with scant regard for corporate good governance and ethics, issued a statement Monday accusing the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council (PCC) Director of Media and Publicity, Mr. Bayo Onanuga, and Adviser, Media and Communication, Mr. Dele Alake of attempting to silence independent media and bully the press ahead of next year’s general election.
This allegation is baseless.
The statement published on the front page of THISDAY is illustrative of the penchant of the two media houses under Obaigbena’s corrupting influence to peddle falsehood and engage in brazen political partisanship, contrary to the ethics of journalism practice.
It is instructive that Obaigbena’s media group is isolated in making this frivolous allegation against the duo. Not only does THISDAY newspaper publish unfounded rumours masquerading as truth, many of its columnists substitute vile and vulgar abuse for sound logic and informed analyses while its television anchors heckle and harass their guests, particularly those of the APC in their jaundiced, flagrantly unprofessional programmes.
We recall that both THISDAY and ARISE Television sought to bully and compel the APC presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, into attending its Town Hall meetings with presidential candidates, despite the media team’s explanation that it would not attend such programmes organised in a haphazard and uncoordinated manner by individual media houses.
Each candidate’s campaign team has the right to adopt its own strategies for reaching out to and interacting with Nigerians. As we have repeatedly said, the Tinubu campaign will not succumb to the blackmail, intimidation and harassment of Obaigbena and his media group.
THISDAY’s attempt in the said statement to justify its false news report on the purported death of one Mueez Adegboyega Akande and the attempt to insinuate mischievously that he died in suspicious circumstances failed abysmally. Rather than apologise for this professional lapse, it resorts to tendentious rationalisations. Its futile attempt to link Asiwaju Tinubu to a drug case in the United States, even when as far back as 2003, the United States government had categorically stated that the candidate has no criminal records in that country, shows the depths of mischief the newspaper is willing to descend in its bid to bring down the APC candidate at all costs. This campaign of calumny is doomed to fail as it always has.
Our candidate is focused and will not be distracted by this diversionary tactics to throw mud at him simply because he is the obvious front runner in this race and some believe that the only way to stop him is to peddle falsehood against him.
While pretending to be a public trust, THISDAY and ARISE descend into the political arena by publishing lies in a way that does such a great disservice to journalism. Last month Arise TV was sanctioned by NBC over a fake report that INEC had ordered a probe of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, over the platforms’ equally fake narrative about our candidate.
Nduka Obaigbena tries to cast aspersion on the professional and personal integrity of Mr. Alake and Mr. Onanuga. They stand on a higher moral and professional pedestal than he can ever aspire to. It is astonishing that a man like Obaigbena can even pretend to be protecting public morality and the public interest. How does this media owner run his media outfits? He is notorious for not paying the salaries of his staff or fulfilling his pensions’ obligations, forcing most of the journalists in his stable to resort to the most unethical practices to survive. This model of media practice, which he exported to South Africa in 2003-2004, failed spectacularly as he had to flee that country as a result of his unethical business practices. His short-lived THISDAY left unpaid debts to staff and the printers and the South African tax office.
He exported the same irresponsible business practice to the UK where he operated his Arise TV as a registered company since 2012. In 2021, judge Raquel Agnello disqualified Obaigbena from serving as a company director in the UK for seven years; in a case brought by the official receiver of the Insolvency Office in the country.
The application for disqualification was made under Section 6 of the Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986 and arose from the compulsory liquidation of Arise Networks Ltd of which Obaigbena was the sole director since its incorporation.
According to the judgment, the company by 2016 had garnered a total debt of £25,671,167, which included debt to trade creditors and staff, estimated at £5,850,730.
Judge Agnello found Obaigbena’s conduct as sole director of Arise TV to be unfit and that the company had continued to trade despite “complete uncertainty” about its funding.
In Nigeria, Obaigbena is notorious for owing his staff their salaries. He is also notorious for owing newsprint suppliers for years without payment. This sharp practice led to the ill-health of one of his suppliers, Afilaka, who suffered massive stroke.
While Alake and Onanuga, were known to have endangered their lives in the struggle against military dictatorship and the enthronement of the democracy we enjoy today, Obaigbena was known to have collected substantial sums of money from the military junta to campaign against the June 12, 1993 elections, widely acknowledged as the freest and fairest polls in the country’s history. He even featured on the CNN to justify the annulment of the election and the continuation of military dictatorship. Yet, this man dares to preach on public morality and the national interest. He even claims that Alake and Onanuga are envious of him! How preposterous!! What is there to be envious from a man whose business practices and personal lifestyle offend every known decency. Mr. Alake and Onanuga can never be jealous of a man who uses extortion, subterfuge, and cheap blackmail as his working capital. Here is a publisher who deployed his media group in aid of the immoral and illegal presidential ambition of a sitting Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) even when this flagrantly violated and threatened the integrity of that critical institution.
It is absurd when Obaigbena uses his media outfits to push the false narrative of Tinubu’s link with narcotics in the US, when a member of his Board of Editors and Arise TV anchor, Dr. Reuben Abati, was a running mate in 2019 to the governorship candidate of the PDP in Ogun State, the late Senator Buruji Kashamu; a man who had been indicted for narcotics trafficking in the US and was a fugitive from the laws of that country until his death. The same Abati remains a card carrying member of the PDP and yet, shamelessly pontificates and postures on ARISE TV as a dispassionate analyst.
Lest it be forgotten, Abati was Media Adviser to former President Goodluck Jonathan and was detained by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in 2015 for reportedly collecting N500 million from ex – National Security Adviser, Colonel Sambo Dasuki purportedly on behalf of the media.
Obaigbena himself was detained for weeks and made to refund N600 million by the EFCC, which was part of the diverted funds for arms purchase for the Nigerian military under Jonathan. Obaigbena as president of NPAN also collected millions of Naira meant as compensation for the media owners whose papers were seized by overzealous security agents during the Jonathan presidency. Many newspapers reported that they did not get the money.
It is a sad commentary on the state of the Nigerian media that a man with no moral scruples whatsoever like Obaigbena will boldly pose as a publisher who can preach morality to others.
Here is a man who has done such grave damage to media practice in Nigeria, posturing as defender of free speech.
Unless media practitioners begin to treat him like the plague and cancer he constitutes to the industry, the future of the industry will be endangered.
It is well known that many private sector corporate executives pay him huge sums of money as retainership to avoid being blackmailed by him. It is also a pity that many of the journalists who work as his employees pose as self-righteous saints who criticise others and keep mum on the unhidden moral deficits and shenanigans of their boss.
