The presidency has declared that President Muhammadu Buhari will not try to manipulate the media by telling journalists to “kill” stories that would expose anything wrong his government had done.
Special adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, who stated this yesterday, noted that rather than do that, the current administration would encourage journalists to run stories that critically examine the workings of government and point the way forward.
According to a statement by the president of the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP), Malachy Agbo, Adesina stated this on Thursday at a dinner held for him and his co-presidential spokesman, the senior special assistant on Media and Publicity to the president, Malam Garba Shehu, by the online publishers.
Also hosted is the senior special assistant in the Office of the Vice President, Laolu Akande.
He revealed that the first thing the president told him when he (Adesina) assumed office was, ‘Adesina, always tell me the truth.”
Adesina, who one of its Trustees of GOCOP, hinted that the president was firmly resolved to run an open and transparent government and would neither have anything to hide nor have any cause to want to ask for any story to be ‘killed’ – a term that means ‘do not publish,’ for stories that are likely to embarrass the authorities.
According to him, the only thing Buhari requires is that, for any news item, the Presidency should be allowed the opportunity to state its side before being put in the public domain.
The presidential spokesman commended the online publishers for coming together to form a group, even as he counseled them to watch out against spoilers, gate crashers and those who might hide under the canopy of online publishing to damage the reputation of innocent public officers.
He said, “There is a saying that one bad coin can spoil hundreds of other coins. My advice is that you should not allow any of your members to use the platform to malign innocent people. You should also find a way of sanitising the social media practitioners who just sit in their bedrooms to churn out news without professional touch.”
Also speaking, Shehu said he was grateful to members of the Guild for the support they gave him when he handled the media and publicity department of All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council as director.
The presidential spokesman noted that the APCPPC was the poorest in terms of resources “but the richest in terms of people’s goodwill”, adding that “the online publishers were the greater part of that process.”
Source:Leadership
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