President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo have restated their faith in the Nigerian media and defence of press freedom for the sake of responsible journalism.
They told visiting members of the Standing Committee of the Nigerian Guild of Editors, NGE, during a courtesy visit by the Guild to the Vice President on Wednesday.
Mr. Femi Adesina, spokesman for the President reaffirmed the President’s passion to continue to protect journalists and to encourage press freedom among professional journalists who practise within the limits of extant laws of the land.
“President Buhari that I know will never want to gag the press. We do not kill stories; all he wants is for him and his government to be reported fairly,” Adesina said in his brief remarks.
According to Adesina, “President Buhari will not deny anything he has done; he is man who stands by his action and his word; all he wants is fair reportage of his actions.”
Vice President Osinbajo spoke extensively on the dangers posed by social media. He said social media is a real threat to building a fair, just and equitable society because of it does not confer responsibility on those who use it to disseminate information.
According to the Professor of law, “a media where anything goes and where freedom to publish has no boundaries is a licence for anarchy and that is what social media is.”
He told vising Guild of Editors members that he is a respecter and believer in press freedom but that such freedom must be exercised within the confines of responsibility and the law. Osinbajo said he has had a long standing interest in the media so much so that his first book which he co-authored was on Media Laws in Nigeria.
He challenged professional journalists to fashion ways of helping the public distill what is factual and professionally reported from fiction that runs through social media.