Nigeria’s President, Muhammadu Buhari last week granted an interview to Daily Telegraph, UK. The exclusive chat conducted by the paper’s Chief Foreign Correspondent; Colin Freeman would later be controversial. Adediwura Aderibigbe, a Lagos based multimedia and public relations specialist writes on the controversy
The online media was awashed with different claims, such that many Nigerians, both anti and pro Buhari began propagating the skewed version of what the president actually said in the interview. It was widely reported that President Buhari had categorically said some Nigerians are criminals; some reports even removed the adjective ‘some’. As expected, it went viral. Within hours, a hash tag #NigerianAreNotCriminals had been created. Politicians in the opposition also joined the trend with Senator Ben Bruce leading the pack.
Here is an excerpt of the part of the interview where Buhari was reported to have said Nigerians are criminals:
Q: A number of Nigerians use the migrant routes to come to the UK to claim asylum, saying their lives are at risk from Boko Haram. Is it legitimate for them to do so?
Buhari: “Some Nigerians claim is that life is too difficult back home, but then again some Nigerians have also made it difficult for Europeans and Americans to accept them because of the number of Nigerians in different prisons all over the world accused of drug trafficking or human trafficking. I don’t think Nigerians have anybody to blame. They can remain at home. Their services are required to rebuild the country. If their countrymen misbehaved, the best thing for them is to stay at home and encourage the credibility of the nation.”
Q: Do you think that Nigerians have an image problem abroad?
Buhari: “Certainly. But we are on our way to salvage that. We will encourage our countrymen to stay at home, work hard and make a respectable living at home.”
Q: Your government has launched a major corruption probe over claims that billions of dollars of oil cash went missing during the previous administration. Some suspects have been arrested in the UK. Are you satisfied with the co-operation you are getting from the UK authorities?
“One of the biggest suspects is in Britain now, although I am not going to name that person. But Britain has earned our respect in the way it deals with these matters. Our only problem is that it seems to be too thorough and it takes too much time. If there are obvious cases, like bank accounts, infrastructure houses and hotels, I would hope they could do it quicker, so that we can claim these things back promptly.”
The excerpt above showed Buhari never used the word criminals but the impression given in the media was that he actually said Nigerians are criminals.
No matter how hard you try, in this country of ours where the media has been practically hijacked from the professionals, you are likely to disseminate misinformation if you do not try harder.
I initially found myself believing that PMB actually used the word ‘criminal’ as chronicled by many online media. Some claimed he said “Nigerians are criminals” while other toned it down claiming he said “some Nigerians are criminals”.
On one hand, looking at the rate the media is being infiltrated by savages; one is tempted to think the freedom of press should be withdrawn. On the other hand, the move would of course have an adverse effect on the development of the country considering the pivotal role the media play in the continual progress of any state.
Online media is here to stay but it has to be regulated before it further hurts professionalism in the media and the earlier the unfortunate trend is checked the better for us. Misinformation is worse than lack of information.
