Vice President Yemi Osinbajo says he is feeling sad over the trial of the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Justice Walter Onnoghen, on allegations of false and non-asset declarations.
The Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) had scheduled Jan. 14 for the arraignment of the CJN.
However,
the process was stalled as the CJN failed to appear before the CCT; and
a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja also ordered the CCT to halt
proceedings.
Osinbajo, who spoke at the 2019 Online Publishers
Association of Nigeria (OPAN) conference on Wednesday in Abuja, said
that President Muhammadu Buhari had no prior knowledge of the
arraignment.
The theme of the conference is “Free Press and Objective Reporting in the 2019 Election Year.’’
According to Osinbajo, Buhari’s approach is that institutions should do their work.
“
I can tell you for a fact that he did not even know about this until
Saturday evening. He did not even know that there will be any kind of
arraignment until Saturday evening.
“He has said categorically,
do not interfere with whatever institutions are doing; sometimes, it has
consequences such as we have today; such that people say how can such
an important person be subjected to a trial without the Federal
Government?
“But I can tell you without any equivocation
whatsoever that he was not even in the know because it is a specific
instruction that he gave.
“So , even where somebody else calls a
public officer such as Ibrahim Magu of EFCC and says something or the
other, he will say `no, no, no, Mr president has said I can do my work.
“My
take is that I would rather not have a situation where senior members
of my profession are being tried for an offence; certainly, I will
rather not have that kind of situation.
“ So, I do not feel
particularly good about it; as a matter of fact, I feel very sad; that
it is going on at all, that is my position.’’’
Osinbajo tasked
online publishers to go after details and check the facts before
publishing; warning that online news was losing credibility.
The
vice president said that elections had heightened ethnic and religious
tensions and tended to threaten and challenge Nigeria’s unity and
security.
“So, it is even more so, the case today that we just
must be more responsive because anybody on their beds can launch a
website, post images from anywhere in the world and tell whatever story
he wishes.
“So, the online publisher is essentially in a poorly
regulated space and can publish practically anything, even outright
falsehoods.
“Perhaps because the worst that can happen is a libel action if your publication tarnishes a person’s reputation.
“The
problem with the current situation is that online news may lose
credibility; and that is a very bad situation because the loss of
credibility is bad for everybody, bad for business and weakens an
important social tool of public communication.’’
He suggested the
encouragement and promotion of forums for online practitioners to
engage and develop by interaction with others.
“As for elections,
I think it affords an opportunity for an online publication to become
well established as a credible and speedy source of news and
information.
“News on election results will be so sought after
that anyone who can provide them accurately and in a timely fashion will
be the go-to-site, even in the future.
“The point to bear in
mind is that integrity pays. Being the first to break the news,
especially when it is unverified, might bring in some traffic initially,
but it does not take that long to lose reputation.
“And once the credibility of the publication is damaged, people will not take the news seriously,’’ he said.
Earlier in a remark, OPAN President, Mr Austin Ogannah, said that the association as founded in 2011.
According
to him, the idea is to have an association that self regulates
practitioners in the online news media; so that members can hold one
another accountable.
Ogannah said that the essence of the conference was to understand objective reporting in an election as captured in the theme.
Source:- Thenationonlineng
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