Boko Haram, which has claimed responsibility for numerous bombings in several cities in northern Nigeria in recent months, has threatened to take action against three newspapers for alleged false reporting.
(MRA/IFEX) – 12 March 2012 – On 11 March 2012, the dreaded Islamic terrorist group, Boko Haram, which has claimed responsibility for numerous bombings in several cities in northern Nigeria for many months, has threatened to take action against three newspapers for alleged false reporting.
The sect alleged that the newspapers had attributed statements to it which were not made by its members and published opinionated reports on the group. It also claimed that the newspapers published reports which portrayed the sect negatively while the government and security agents are positively reported.
The sect’s spokesperson, Abu Qaqa, made the threat in a phone-in interview with reporters in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital in North-east Nigeria. Maiduguri is the base of the sect.
Abu Qaqa said the three daily newspapers: National Accord, Vanguard and Tribune, have defied the ethics of journalism by publishing what he said were “opinionated reports and features on our group and its activities in the North, while we did not make such statements or claims in the cause of establishing the Sharia legal system and the release of all our members as the main condition to dialogue with the Federal Government.”
On 22 October 2011, the sect shot and killed Alhaji Zakariya Isa, a cameraman with the federal government-owned Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) at his Bulunkutu ward residence in Maiduguri. The sect accused Alhaji Isa of spying on them for the security agencies.
