APA – Lagos (Nigeria)
The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has given President Bola Tinubu 48 hours to reverse the ban on some media houses from the coverage of the country’s seat of government, the Presidency.
In the letter dated 26 August 2023, the organisation said: “Barring these journalists and media houses from covering the Presidential Villa is to prevent them from carrying out their legitimate constitutional responsibility.”
The organization has therefore urged President Tinubu to use his “good offices and leadership position to immediately reverse the unlawful ban on 25 journalists and media houses from covering the presidential villa and restore the accreditation of those affected.”
SERAP urged him “to publicly instruct the officials in the presidential villa to allow journalists and media houses to freely do their job and discharge their constitutional duty of holding those in power to account.”
According to the letter signed by SERAP’s Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, on Sunday in Lagos noted that the Federal Government recently withdrew the accreditation of some 25 journalists from covering activities at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
It stated that the banned journalists include those from the Vanguard; Galaxy TV; Ben TV; MITV; ITV Abuja; PromptNews; ONTV, and Liberty.
“Your administration cannot with one broad stroke ban journalists from covering public functions. Citizens’ access to information and participation would mean little if journalists and media houses are denied access to the seat of government.
“Media freedom is a cornerstone of Nigeria’s democracy and journalists must be able to hold the government to account. This is a matter of public interest. The government cannot cherry-pick journalists to cover its activities,” the organization said.
GIK/APA