Nigeria moved 15 years backward at the weekend. In the post-military era, soldiers were on the prowl on the highways, seizing consignments of newspapers and tampering with the freedom of information. This kind of torture on the media was not even witnessed under the power loaded President, Olusegun Obasanjo, who loomed large on the beleaguered country for eight years.
Following the crackdown on selected media houses, the fate of a supposedly free society hung in the balance. As the Federal Government targeted the newspapers for liquidation in a military style, ahead of the next year general elections, suspicion grew about the real motive of the security agencies. Many believed that it was a deliberate attempt to gag the Fourth Estate of the Realm and curtail the freedom of expression. It is note-worthy that some of the affected newspapers are not government’s praise singers.
The siege on the newspapers distribution was carefully planned. Media circulation vans were ambushed. The consignments were forcefully seized. The vans were impounded. The drivers were molested, harassed and arrested. Vendors, who waited in vain for the confiscated newspapers in major towns and cities across the federation, cried foul over the disruption of their daily work. Nigerians who eagerly waited for daily supply of newspapers were denied access to information. In the evening, the soldiers on rampage reluctantly released the consignment at a time the newspapers were no more marketable. In Nigeria, the cost of producing a newspaper edition is high. Thus, the affected media houses incurred huge losses.
Defensively, the Defense Headquarters offered a feeble and spurious explanation. The Director of Defense Information, Gen. Chris Olukolade, alleged that media vans were moving materials with grave security implications. Yet, when the vans were searched, nothing incriminating was found. More worrisome was that the consignments that had already been delivered at distribution centres were also taken away by soldiers. In some Southwest and Southeast states, security men laid siege on outstation offices. They pounced on some reporters under the guise of searching for elusive bombs.
The onslaught was sudden. It provoked outrage among media executives, lawyers, politicians and leaders of civil society. Angry stakeholders berated the soldiers for acting without thinking. Some said that, if the soldiers, who were obviously disturbed by their lack of success in the war against the dreadful Boko Haram sect, have now decided to vent their frustration on the media, it was a misplaced aggression. As the renewed emasculation of the media continues to generate controversy, the weekend brutality will elicit a fury of criticisms this week from the parliament, opposition governments and concerned statesmen.
However, the siege is not over. The soldiers, who opened a new chapter in media oppression, suppression and travesty of democracy, continued the condemnable assault yesterday. More consignments were seized. Now, van drivers whose distribution schedules are night-bound, are complaining that their lives are in danger.
The last time a curious war was waged against the media was during the military regime. Then, the tension between the sit-tight military rulers and the progressive media was sustained by the fight for popular rule. Although some reporters and few media houses have suffered skeletal bruises under this administration, they paled into insignificance in the face of the massive onslaught, including the closure of media houses, unjust arrest, detention and imprisonment of journalists, which characterised the military era.
Observers contend that the Federal Government may have not learned from the lessons of history. There was never a time any government succeeded in its vituperation and virulent attack on the media, especially at a time practitioners are committed to the pursuit of an egalitarian society. It is also likely that those in power do not understand that the media is not for or against any government. Emphasising the legitimate role of the media in the nurturing of a democratic society, the doyen of the profession, the late Alhaji Babatunde Jose, pointed out that, in the final analysis, the media is for the people of Nigeria.
Efforts by past governments to trample on the press and frustrate its devotion to the pursuit of truth, the rule of law and justice were futile. The gulf between the pro-people media and dictatorial regimes can be attributed to the rejection of the notion that the press, as the most popular and durable agency of the oppressed society, is willing to always play its role as partner in progress in the effort to genuinely find lasting solutions to the crises of nation-building and challenges of development. However, whenever the media seeks to carry out this exclusive patriotic assignment without let and hindrance, its position may rattle or unsettle the unpatriotic elements in high places.
The press has two options. One is to forge an alliance with the government without reservations. The other is to play its role as the watchdog as requested by the people. With a benefit of hindsight, society can only become a better place, when the media decides to take the latter route. When the media is aloof to economic stagnation, political deterioration, theft and graft in high places, cluelessness of government in the face of mounting challenges and lack of courage to take firm and decisive steps that can move the trembling nation forward, then, it has become an accomplice and a major contributor to the rot. Thus, it can be argued that the greatest national asset is the uncompromising media that is eternally dedicated to cause of the society, and invariably, the welfare of the common man, through the practice of journalism with a sense of balance, proportion and truth.
Instead of pouring venom on the media and censoring the media, government can do better by perceiving the press as the mirror and link between it and the people that conferred the democratic mandate through their votes. In the collective search for the way forward, it is counter-productive for the government to uncritically brand a section of the media as a foe, or dismiss it as the pervasive symbol of partisanship, when its focus and the summary of its exposition is the solution to the national question in the national interest.
Truth will always bail the press out in a moment of trial and predicament. The dark period will always be short-lived. Historically, the colonial masters charged many nationalist-journalists, including Dr. Nnamidi Azikiwe, Ernest Ikoli and Anthony Enahoro, with sedition. But, the move did not cripple the struggle for independence.
Also, in the post-independence period, the media had survived the tyranny of lords of manor, including the over-zealous military governor, who shaved the hair of reporters with knife and broken bottle, military Heads of State who rolled anti-democratic decrees under which journalists were hounded into detention and jailed, and the ebullient military propagandist and fork-tongued minister of information, who shut five media houses under Babangida and Abacha regimes. The media survived their atrocities.
Freedom of the press is an essential elements of democracy. Once it is annulled, the country may regress into civilian dictatorship. No government wages war against the press and still expects to remain popular. Also, no responsible media will mobilise public opinion to support an inept administration in a democratically conscious polity. It is also against the libertarian philosophy of journalism for the media to engage in self-censorship and condone the increasing laxity of government. It must also be noted that it is very difficult for any government that cannot permit full press freedom to guarantee other fundamental rights. When troops are deployed to intimidate reporters, it is an abuse of the military establishment by the Commander-In-Chief.
Fifteen years of uninterrupted civil rule is enough to douse the acrimony between the government and media. But, since many past military apologists and collaborators still form the bulk of top government functionaries, it appears that the role of the media in democracy is still beyond the ken and comprehension of old military lackeys in the civilian dispensation. What the recent seizure of newspapers by soldiers portends for the polity is that a conducive atmosphere may not be guaranteed for journalists to perform their traditional roles, especially as the polity prepares for the crucial 2015 general elections.
However, the greatest implication of the sledge hammer on the media, 15 years after, is that Nigeria has only achieved civil rule. Democracy is still far.