Articles by Media Rights Agenda (MRA)
JOINT ACTION: ARTICLE 19 and MRA promote access to information in health matters
Participants at two pilot workshops organised by ARTICLE 19, in partnership with the Center for the Right to Health (CRH) and Media Rights Agenda (MRA), have adopted strategies promoting the right of access to information in health matters in two Nigerian states: Enugu and Lagos. (ARTICLE 19/IFEX) – 30 April 2009 – Nigeria: Promoting Access […]
Political thugs assault photojournalists
(MRA/IFEX) – On 26 April 2009, three photojournalists from different media organizations were assaulted by political thugs at the home of a leading member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Ayo Arise, in Ekiti State, southwest Nigeria. The journalists – Segun Bakare of the private daily “The Punch”, David Idowu of “Horizon Express”, […]
Radio station fined for airing materials capable of “inciting violence”
(MRA/IFEX) – On 27 April 2009, Nigeria’s broadcast regulator, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), fined private radio station Adaba FM 500,000 Naira (approx. US$3,350) for allegedly transmitting on 25 April “materials that were capable of inciting members of the public to violence and consequently leading to breakdown of law and order”, while covering the re-run […]
Detained newspaper bureau chief Akin Orimolade released; criminal defamation charge dropped
(MRA/IFEX) – On 24 March 2009, Akin Orimolade, the Abuja bureau chief of “National Life” newspaper, regained his freedom after one week of detention, when a Magistrate’s Court sitting in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa state capital, rescinded a warrant of arrest issued for him and two others over a publication involving Governor Timipre Sylva of Bayelsa […]
Editor Akin Orimolade detained and charged with “criminal defamation” after newspaper publishes story about state governor
(MRA/IFEX) – On 18 March 2009, Akin Orimolade, the Abuja Bureau Chief for the Lagos-based weekly newspaper “National Life”, who disappeared mysteriously from Abuja on 17 March, was arraigned at Yenagoa Magistrate Court 4 in the Niger-delta state of Bayelsa. He was charged, along with two others who are still at large, with criminal defamation […]
Publisher and three editors charged with criminal defamation, injurious falsehood
(MRA/IFEX) – On 27 November 2008, the government of Nigeria arraigned the publisher of the Abuja-based privately owned “Leadership” daily newspaper, Sam Ndah Isaiah, and three other editorial staff, daily editor Abdulrazak Bello Barkindo, Sunday editor Lara Olugbemi and ex-associate editor Simon Imobo-Swan, at an Abuja magistrate court. They were accused of “conspiracy, joint illegal […]
Newspaper editors, publisher harassed and detained by security service and police
(MRA/IFEX) – For about a week, the publisher and editorial managers of the Abuja-based private daily “Leadership”, have faced a series of harassments from both the State Security Service (SSS), Nigeria’s intelligence police and the regular police. On 14 November 2008, the SSS invited the Executive Director of the daily, Mr. Abraham Ndah Isaiah, to […]
Reporter receives death threats from church members, asks security service for protection
(MRA/IFEX) – Mrs. Ibiene Rowland Ogundu, a reporter and programme presenter with Rivers State Television (RSTV) in Port Harcourt, South-South Nigeria, on 2 October 2008 petitioned the State Security Service (SSS), Nigeria’s intelligence agency, in Port Harcourt over threats to her life from the presiding pastor and members of a Port Harcourt-based church, Salvation Ministries […]