Naija government don yarn the media say make dem stop to dey yabbis oga Presido Muhammadu Buhari for their platforms.
Minista of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, as im dey react to editorial wey dem publish by National dailies.
Make Una read wetin im yarn
“There was an editorial in an otherwise respected national daily a few days ago that without any scintilla evidence, they denigrated the person of Mr President.
“Make no mistake about this, the media is free to criticise any President but not to denigrate anybody.
“If you have the facts, please come out. How can anybody say Mr President favoured one group than any other?
“The President of a country, irrespective of the party or tribe which he comes from, is the symbol of the country.
“When you denigrate him, you are denigrating yourself. We therefore want to appeal to the media organisations to desist from this.
“Some of them are consumed by hatred and bitterness that they throw cautions to the winds. This is not healthy either for the media or for the country,’’ he said.
The minister stressed that fake news was beyond publishing what was not true.
“When you hide under editorial to pursue agenda which are driven largely by sentiment, emotion, vengeance and bitterness, it does not augur well for the country,’’
In defending the position, the minister explained:
“If you remember in 1960 the country population was 45 million today we are 190 million hence the struggle for scarce resources.
“Lake Chad used to occupy 25,000sq km in 1963, today, the same lake has shrunk to 2500 sq km yet 35 million live from Central African Republic, Cameroon, Niger, Nigeria depend on the lake.
“The Lake is the natural source for their fishing, irrigation farming and water supply.
“This is the tension we are seeing. It has nothing to do with religion or ethnicity.
“How do we input religious and ethnic motives into this? It is the duty of the media to look at this and interrogate it very seriously.
“It is a pity that the purveyors of fake news have not relented. They are perfecting their strategy to de-market this administration and it is so sad that some main stream media have joined in this,’’
