Anxiety as President Tinubu Gets 48 Hours Ultimatum to Reverse Journalists’ Ban in Aso Rock

• President Bola Tinubu has been issued 48 hours ultimatum to restore 25 suspended journalists from reporting from the presidential villa
• SERAP, in a statement on Sunday, urged the president to reverse the ban and restore their accreditation with immediate effect
• The group asked President Tinubu to publicly order officials at the presidential villa to allow the media houses and their journalists to operate

Aso Rock, Abuja – The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has called on President Bola Tinubu to immediately reverse the ban on 25 journalists and media houses from reporting the happenings at the presidential villa in Abuja.

According to Channels, the accountability group also added that the president should restore their accreditation with immediate effect.

SERAP, in a statement on Sunday, August 27, called on the President to publicly order the presidential villa’s officials to allow the media houses and their journalists to perform their constitutional duty of accountability.

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Tinubu stops accreditation of 25 journalists, media houses in presidential villa

This was disclosed in the statement, which was signed by the deputy director of SERAP and made available to journalists on Sunday.

According to SERAP, the federal government has withdrawn the accreditation of some 25 journalists from reporting activities from the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

The group stated that the banned journalists are from Vanguard, ONTV, MITV, PromptNews, Liberty, Ben TV, Galaxy TV, and ITV Abuja.

Press freedom is key to Nigeria’s democracy, SERAP tells Tinubu

It maintained that the action means that the journalist and media houses have been prevented from exercising their legitimate duties as specified in the constitution.

The statement reads in part:

“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.”

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It further stated that the cornerstone of Nigeria’s democracy is media freedom and journalist must be allow to hold the people in government accountable.

Source: Legit.ng