The Coalition Against Corrupt Leaders (CACOL), has commended The PUNCH Nigeria Limited for its recent withdrawal from the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association of Nigeria (NPAN) describing the decision as a mark of corporate integrity.
This came on the heels of a publication in The PUNCH newspaper of Friday, 18 December, 2015 that its company PUNCH Nigeria Limited has suspended its membership of the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association of Nigeria NPAN. The company was said to have communicated the decision to the NPAN in a letter dated Thursday, December 17, 2015 and signed by its Chairman, Mr. Wale Aboderin.
The PUNCH Nigeria Limited decision was taken based on the criminal charges leveled against a former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (retd.), and several other alleged accomplices. The charges which border on the diversion of public funds, totaling $2.1 billion, allocated for the purchase of arms to prosecute the war against terrorism. This is based on the revelation that the sum of N120 million was disbursed in murky circumstances to some member-companies of NPAN, ostensibly as compensation for the losses they incurred in June 2014 when armed soldiers seized newspapers and newspaper distribution vans.
“These revelations, “according to The PUNCH, “have sent shock waves through the nation and brought NPAN into disrepute. It also seems to confirm the long-held belief that the Nigerian media is corrupt and cozy with government functionaries.”
Commending the Newspaper organization, Comrade Debo Adeniran, the Executive Chairman of the Coalition said, “What The PUNCH has demonstrated is a mark of corporate integrity and untainted records of clean business. This is the way by which business integrity can be enhanced so that we would know the honest ones who can look at corrupt leaders’ eyeball-to-eyeballs and say, ‘to hell to you and your ill-gotten resources’ and can afford not to do business with any person or company of shady character.
According to the Code of Ethics for Nigerian journalists, “a journalist should neither solicit nor accept bribe, gratification or patronage to suppress or publish information” and secondly, “to demand payment for the publication of news is inimical to the notion of news as a fair, accurate, unbiased and factual report of an event.” The present ethical storm in NPAN calls for soul-searching, not just in the organisation, but among the raft of unions and other groupings in the media. The Nigerian media should be guided by a clear set of editorial and ethical values.
The Humanity Centre, that houses CACOL and other allied organizations has been in patronage on daily basis with The PUNCH for more than 25 years and we want to say they have not disappointed us on corporate integrity rating and should keep on upholding the professional ethics. Adeniran urged all other newspapers and organizations who feel that they cannot continue to be part of the rot, to take the integrity example from The PUNCH. With this, it would have been seen that corrupt people are properly named, nailed, shamed and shunned.
The Human right activist also castigated the army and soldiers for seizing and destroying newspapers and for unleashing terror on everybody even after they have failed to curb the menace of Boko Haram and other killer gangs in Nigeria.
“What is so clear about the attitude of the soldiers, is that they result to ‘soft targets’ when they are unable to win battle against ragtag armies like the Boko Haram, Fulani cattle rustlers and rearers, radical militants, ethnic militants, and the rest of them. Why in the first place must they seize news papers and vans of publishing houses even if publications are against them?”
During the pro-Biafran protests in the South-East, nine Nigerian citizens were reportedly killed by the Joint Military Task Force who more or less accused them of ‘recalcitrance’. They were said to have laid a siege to the Niger Bridge causing a traffic snarl and up till date, nobody has answered for their deaths. Last weekend, the Nigerian Army was reported to have also attacked members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria led by Sheik Ibrahim El-Zakzaky for blocking the road too; accusing the group, an Islamic sect, of ‘attempting to kill the Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai’. Many lives were lost as a result of that attack and the army is just raking up evidences in trying to justify the brutal force unleashed on the Shiites.
“That protesters resort to violence does not justify them being treated like actual enemy combatants; this abuse of power and privilege has got to stop and be replaced with a sense of responsibility towards respecting the rights of the people they purport to serve. It is high time the army knew that they are not an authority to themselves. They are subject to civil authority based on the rule of law just like every one of us.” Adeniran averred.
Macjob Temitope
Acting Media officer, CACOL
temitope@thehumanitycentre.org
cacolc@yahoo.com, cacol@thehumanitycentre.org
08029215000
December 18th, 2015.
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