Guild promotes Isah to acting president, cautions FG against regulating social media - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

The Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) has promoted its Vice President, West, Mr. Mustapha Isah to the post of acting president, to fill-in the gap created by the exit of the immediate past president, Mrs. Funke Egbemode, who was recently appointed the Osun State Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation, reports ITREALMS.

This is coming as NGE cautioned the Federal Government against regulating social media, describing it as inimical to the growth of press and defiles democratic tenets.

Announcing this development, the Standing Committee of NGE, ITREALMS gathered, had constituted itself into an Electoral College to effect the promotion and relaying on Article 13(4) of the Nigerian Guild of Editors Constitution.

Thus, they elected Mr. Mustapha Isah as Acting President of the Guild, to fill the vacant position of Mrs Funke Egbemode as President, upon her appointment and acceptance of offer as Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation in Osun State.

The communique arising from the meeting personally endorsed by the acting president, Mr. Mustapha Isah and General Secretary, Mrs Mary Atolagbe, the Standing Committee also revealed it discussed the state of the nation and the media and took particular note of the ongoing plans by the Federal Government of Nigeria to ‘sanitise’ the Social Media space and thereby resolved as follows:

That the Federal Government should rescind the decision to regulate the Social Media, as such measure is in clear contravention of Section 39 of the 1999 Constitution (As amended), which guarantees every Nigerian citizen the right to “freedom of expression, including the right to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information without interference.”

The Guild reminds the Federal Government of the dire consequences of similar attempts in the past to gag freedom of speech, as such initiatives were usually misconstrued by security agents and some public officials to harass, arrest and in most cases, illegally detain journalists and other Nigerians for holding their opinions.

Advising the Federal Government to seek ways to maximize social media to disseminate information on the activities and policies of government, rather than its current attempt to stifle it: the Guild urges the government to engage the founders and promoters of social media, namely: Facebook, Instagram and Twitter among others – to creatively find ways of sieving information disseminated through their respective channels, to curtail extremisms of violence and hate speech.

Recognising that Nigeria is already in the red zone of nations with very poor record of Press Freedom and Freedom of Speech, the Guild notes, for instance, that the 2019 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders places Nigeria in a distant 120th position among 180 nations under review. Also, in the 2019 Global Impunity Index published by the Committee for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ), which chronicles countries where criminal groups, politicians, government officials, and other powerful actors resort to violence to silence critical views, dissent and particularly the media, Nigeria ranks as high as the 12th position, sharing the top bracket with impunity-prone and conflict-riddled nations like Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia, Mexico, Pakistan etcetera.

Sadly, this is not a good profile and the Federal Government of Nigeria should not take further actions that would add to this unpleasant tar on the nation by seeking to ‘sanitise’ Social Media but, should rather build bridges and collaborations with the Nigerian media and promoters of social media. Such synergy and partnership in an Information Age, is the best way to make the most of the advantages of social media which far outweigh any perceived disadvantages.

The Guild notes that Nigeria has enough extant laws, including the Cyber Crime Act 2015, to deal with issues of ‘hate speech’ and ‘Fake News’. It urges the government to test such laws in the courts of competent jurisdictions in accordance with due process of the law rather than create another legal instrument and atmosphere that would give agents of state the latitude to harass and criminalise citizens especially journalists.

The Guild observes that in most cases, it is the officials of governments at all levels that push out Fake News and hate speech by their words and actions; stressing that it behoves government actors to check their actions and utterances.

The Guild uses this opportunity to call on government and security agencies to release forthwith all journalists being detained nationwide, as their continued detention run contrary to the grains of the Constitution.

Further, the Guild congratulated Mrs Egbemode on her appointment and wished her well.





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Acting President, Osinbajo sacks Daura, D-G, DSS - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

The Acting President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, SAN, has sacked the Director-General (D-G), State Security Service (DSS), Mr. Lawal Musa Daura, reports ITRealms.

This is coming as Mr. Daura has been placed under arrest, following the siege conducted by DSS on the National Assembly (NASS) Wednesday morning.

Osinbajo in the termination directive made available to ITRealms in a press statement endorsed by his Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, said the termination of the appointment is with immediate effect.

Mr. Daura was also directed to hand over to the most senior officer of the State Security Service until further notice.

Further, ITRealms gathered that the Presidency has denied DSS over the blockade of the National Assembly, saying it was not aware and subsequently is against the rule of law.

The 65-year old DG, was appointed into the office on July 2, 2015. 

Uboshe Uboshe/GEE

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Nigerian Guild of Editors lament state-of-the-nation, elevates Egbemode to acting president

ITRealms:

The Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) concluded its 2nd quarterly Standing Committee Meeting of the year on Friday, July 8, 2016 in Abuja with songs of lamentations, just as they elected Mrs Funke Egbemode, the Managing Director/Editor in Chief, Telegraph Newspaper, as the Acting President, reports ITRealms.

Egbemode’s elevation follows the recent appointment of else-while president, Garba Deen Muhammad as the Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).

ITRealms also reports that NGE in a six point communique noted with dismay that the economy is largely in a bad shape showing signs of recession, as statistics of unemployment is worsening while the future looks bleak. It therefore urges the Federal Government to take urgent steps to revitalise the economy in the area of job and wealth creation in order to alleviate the suffering of the masses.

The Guild equally condemned in strong terms the vandalism of oil facilities in the Niger Delta region and called for dialogue by creating avenues to engage the various agitators in order to address their concerns and urged the agitators to embrace dialogue.

The Guild also noted with concern the increasing spate of kidnapping across the country and calls on the new Inspector-General of Police to come up with more proactive measures to curb the menace.

“It, however, commends the gallantry of the Nigerian military in its fight against terrorism in the north east and the recovery of territories from the insurgents and urges government to pursue the anti-terrorism fight with more vigour until peace is fully restored to the troubled area,” the statement signed by the duo of acting president, Funke Egbemode and General Secretary, Victoria Ibanga, decried.

Further, the Guild expressed concern over the pathetic living condition of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and called on government, corporate organisations, individuals and international agencies to come to their aid.

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