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From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
The National Association of Seadogs, Pyrates Confraternity (NAS/PC) has condemned the kidnap and incarceration of the Editor, FirstNews, Segun Olatunji, by the nation’s military high command, describing the action as uncivilised and shameful.
A statement by the association called on President Bola Tinubu to investigate what it described as ‘’the barbaric act.’’
The statement entitled: DIA’s assault on press freedom, threat to democracy’, signed by the NAS Capoon, Mr Abiola Owoaje, noted that failure to punish the soldiers, who dehumanised Olatunji, would portray the Nigerian military as being replete with misguided bullies who oppress innocent citizens while insurgency ravages the country.
He said the unwarranted action of the soldiers against Olatunji should have been condemned by the Presidency, to prove that the echelon of power was not in support of such an undemocratic act of citizen’s victimisation.
“The National Association of Seadogs, Pyrates Confraternity, condemns the kidnap and incarceration of Mr Olatunji. His detention by the military is an unacceptable and disgraceful trampling on the due process of lawful exercise of authority. It is a sad reminder of the dark days of the military under the brutal dictators, Ibrahim Babaginda and Sani Abacha, and their later civilian successors. It is an assault on press freedom and free speech, which are fundamental pillars of democracy.
“Unequivocally, this is an all-time low for the Nigerian military under the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. It is shocking that soldiers, numbering more than 30, could descend on an innocent journalist’s house and arrest him right in the presence of his wife and children, for performing his constitutional duty.
“Olatunji’s only offence was that he did his job professionally, without fear or favour. He got a story of corruption in high places and published it. How does that contravene the Constitution that the military swore to uphold? Even if FirstNews’s story breached the ethics of the journalism profession, there are local laws and globally acceptable standards for judicial redress for any aggrieved parties. Taking laws into their laws and kidnapping a journalist is criminal conduct and those involved must be fished out and made to face the law.
“We urge Nigerian President, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, to investigate the barbaric act of the DIA. By now, the Presidency should have been worried enough that the name of a top-ranking official was mentioned in connection with the abduction of Olatunji,
and absolved itself from this illegality by swiftly conducting an investigation into those men who dehumanised the journalist. This is one of the ways it can prove that the echelon of power was not in support of such undemocratic acts of citizen’s victimisation and official arbitrariness,’’ he stated.
Owoaje, who noted that the action of the military has further dented Nigeria’s poor record of press freedom, said Olatunji’s is a litmus test for President Tinubu to show if he is capable of defending the tenets of democracy.
