He described the press as an “indispensable partner” in the nation’s journey towards economic stability, press freedom, and social cohesion.

At a meeting at the State House on Friday, the president said his government would help dismantle the fiscal hurdles and “digital cannibalisation” currently threatening the survival of the press.

He gave this assurance during an interfaith dinner with a high-level delegation from the Nigerian Press Organisation (NPO), led by the NPO President and Publisher of The Guardian, Lady Maiden Alex-Ibru.

The delegation also included industry leaders and patrons, among them Aremo Olusegun Osoba, publisher of Vanguard; Mr Sam Amuka, Chairman of THISDAY/ARISE News Channel; Prince Nduka Obaigbena; Chairman of Channels Television, Dr John Momoh; Director-General of the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), Alhaji Saliu Abdulhamid Dembos; former NPAN President and veteran journalist, Mr Ray Ekpu; President of the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE), Mr Eze Anaba; President of the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers, GOCOP, Mr Danlami Nmodu, and President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, Comrade Alhassan Yahya Abdullahi, among others.

Also present were all executive members of NPAN, managing directors of media houses, top media practitioners across all platforms, and representatives of civil society.

President Tinubu said his government was already reviewing the tariff exemption list and would consider the inclusion of the items used by the media, such as newsprint, plates, chemicals, and radio and television broadcast equipment, which currently attract tariffs of 5 to 10 per cent.

If this happens, these items would enjoy a status similar to that of educational and research materials.

With the media industry reeling from skyrocketing newsprint and equipment costs, President Tinubu signalled his administration’s readiness to intervene by reviewing tariffs.

“You have the government’s full support, because we know how important your work is to the sustenance of democracy,” the president said.

Earlier, the Deputy President of the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association of Nigeria, NPAN, and Publisher of BusinessDay, Mr Frank Aigbogun, in a speech delivered on behalf of the NPO, accused some tech companies of increasingly “scraping” proprietary creative content to train AI models, often by breaching digital paywalls.

Aigbogun requested the president to direct the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, FCCPC, to work with the media to investigate complaints that Big Tech dominance and anti-competitive practices were costing local media at least 70 per cent of its legitimate income, estimated by some sources at hundreds of millions of dollars, in addition to the loss of jobs and opportunities.

Before the president’s response, the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Alhaji Mohammed Idris, said the government had already begun “engaging Big Tech,” companies including Meta and Google.

“The government will not allow anybody to come here, reap from our economy, and go away without giving back,” he said.

Among other dignitaries present at the meeting were Vice President Kashim Shettima, as well as senior aides and special advisers to President Tinubu.

It would be recalled that the NPO had, in January, written to the government and also published a statement complaining about the existential threat Big Tech operations pose to local media.

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The post Tinubu backs Nigerian media’s fight for fair revenue from big tech appeared first on Frontpageng.

As the ongoing debate about guerilla journalism suggests, there probably is no other subject in the annals of Nigerian journalism that provokes reverence and reproach in equal measure. While some believe that the phenomenon was the brave, underground response to  and heartbeat of a nation choking under military rule, others think it was an unprincipled descent into activism masquerading as reportage. Like the wise will counsel, when there is a fierce debate like this one, it is better to remember that the truth does not wear a uniform; but is always dressed in the context of its time. So, in a time that the Nigerian system is showing its most fragile nature since 1999, bogged down by insecurity, corruption, and divisive politics, maybe the ghost of guerrilla journalism demands more than a nostalgic glance – it requires a clear-eyed interrogation.

The concept itself evokes the imagery of the hit-and-run tactics favoured by revolutionaries in irregular warfare, with hidden bases, and a defiant, resourceful spirit. Guerilla journalism is a crude metaphor for media practice by a section of the press in the Nigeria of the military era – especially under Generals Ibrahim Babangida and Sani Abacha – when state and press relations was at its poorest.  That era, marked by proscription of newspapers, sealing newsrooms, arrest of and jailing of editors under military decrees meant that journalism faced a stark choice: adapt or die. It is in this context that we should see The News, Tell, and Tempo, publications which responded to state repression by finding ways to operate from shadows, using pseudonyms, smuggling stories, and printing in safe houses. They were, in the words of media scholar, Professor Ayo Olukotun, an “alternative media and counter-hegemonic forum” that refused to let tyranny silence the public square.

Regardless, the practice has its critics as the recent tribute by veteran journalist, Ray Ekpu, reminds us. In a moving tribute to his departed friend and colleague, Dan Agbese, Ekpu paid homage to a legacy of graceful, principled journalism. Yet, within his eulogy, Ekpu issued a sharp, unapologetic condemnation that would ignite a revealing debate about guerrilla journalism, describing it as “vile propaganda… not fit to be touched by any self-respecting journalist.” This was no casual aside. It was a pointed dismissal of an entire tradition of the radical press that flourished under military rule. A tradition that another veteran, Babafemi Ojudu, would soon feel compelled to defend vigorously. This exchange between two icons is more than a historical spat; it is the core of a fundamental interrogation of journalism’s soul in times of tyranny. What is the duty of the press when the state criminalises truth? Is survival through adaptation a mark of courage or a compromise of ethics?

Ray Ekpu’s position, framed within his admiration for Agbese’s decency, draws a clear line in the sand. For him, journalism’s nobility is inextricably linked to its method and bearing. He praised Agbese for practising a journalism of “graceful writing,” free from “sensationalism” and “unguarded extremism,” a craft that “expressed rather than impressed.” In Ekpu’s professional theology, the journalist must maintain a disciplined distance, serving as a beacon of integrity, fairness, and clarity. Guerrilla journalism, operating mostly underground and relying on opposition forces for leaks crossed that fine line between journalism and activism and, therefore, transformed the journalist from a truth-teller into a combatant. We understand his disdain – that the transformation undermined the very credibility and moral authority that makes the press what it is. Ekpu’s critique is thus a purist’s defence of the profession’s core tenets, reminding us that its value lies in steadfast principles, not in tactical alliances born of desperation.

The defence of guerilla journalism is powerful and, in many ways, morally compelling as we see in the  response from another veteran journalist, Babafemi Ojudu, a key figure in the very guerrilla press tradition Ekpu derided. His response offers us what looks like a sober, contextual rebuttal.  He frames guerrilla journalism was not a philosophy of propaganda but a strategy of survival. When the military government “arrogated to itself the sole right to define reality,” these journalists became the couriers of truth, he argues. Confirming what we already know, he argued that this section of the press cultivated sources within the very corridors of power, not for access to canapés, but for leaks that exposed the rot. Their credibility, Ojudu argues, was rooted in a stark refusal to “trade truth for access.” Their impact was real enough to give a sitting head of state sleepless nights, a fact Babangida himself later conceded.

The debate cannot stand in isolation. True, media scholars like Professor Wale Adebanwi, who practised in that generation, notes that these journalists indeed saw themselves more as activists in a battle to “reclaim Nigeria from military marauders,” and that in that existential fight, the “canons of objectivity and impartiality were sacrificed.” The methods were unorthodox: secret tape-recordings, disguised identities, and the use of classified leaks but their assessment of the press at the time are mostly positive and understandably so. I can relate with that viewpoint myself, working for a critical newspaper in Abuja in the time when Abacha was Head of State, when you had to avoid your office if you wrote anything negative. Notwithstanding, the ethical fault line cannot be disguised. Does extreme repression justify extreme methods? If the state has criminalised the very act of truthful reporting, does journalism not have a right, even a duty, to fight back with whatever tools keep the information flowing?

So, it is obvious that critics like Ekpu cannot be waved away because we know that activist journalism has the tendency to sometimes colours content. Activist journalists could cross the line by replacing the complex pursuit of truth with the cleaner, more compelling narrative of a “struggle.” Adebanwi acknowledges this transformative shift in identity. Furthermore, some other participants have noted the aggressive, oppositional stance sometimes “bordered on the unethical,” blurring lines that a functioning society needs its fourth estate to keep sharply defined.

The most poignant lesson from this era may be that both traditions were necessary for the same republic. The guerrilla press was the clenched fist, keeping the space for dissent from being completely sealed shut. The mainstream, ethical press was the steady hand, preserving the template for what a responsible, enduring institution should look like in peacetime. One provided the urgent defiance; the other safeguarded the professional soul.

Today, the echoes are unmistakable. As political actors deploy social media influencers in a “dark art” of paid disinformation – a modern, cynical cousin to state propaganda – the public sphere is again under sophisticated assault. How does journalism respond to new forms of repression and manipulation? If there is anything we learn from the guerrilla journalists, it is that the media must be courageous and adaptable when the need arises – like when the fight is for the nation’s soul. However, this must not compromise the commitment to the strong ethical foundation that have sustained the media since the first newspaper was established in 1859.

So, how should we see guerrilla journalism? Contextually, and to the extent that it defines a period in the Nigerian press history where practitioners were forced to respond to repression, maybe it is better to see it not as relic but a mirror. One which reflects that morally ambiguous chapter where the press was forced to become what it beheld. In this context, it would seem that its legacy is a double-edged sword: on one side, strong proof of the audacity that preserved light in darkness, and on the other, the danger signal of the potential damage when the journalists become activists. To honour that legacy is not to romanticise or demonise guerilla journalism but to understand its contextual inevitability while focusing on building a Nigeria where such desperate measures is never again required.

Dr. Olaniyan, Convener, Centre for Social Media Research, Lagos writes on Digital Culture.

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Veteran journalist and one of the founders of Nigeria’s first weekly news magazine, Newswatch, Yakubu Mohammed, has said the assassination of Dele Giwa in 1986 had nothing to do with the late Gloria Okon.

Mohammed, who co-founded Newswatch with Giwa, Ray Ekpu and Dan Agbese in 1984, said this in his memoir, “Beyond Expectations.”

Giwa, one of Nigeria’s most flamboyant journalists, was assassinated on October 19, 1986, after a parcel bomb was delivered to his house in Lagos.

After the incident, the rumour mill was agog with the conspiracy theory that Giwa had a scoop on Okon who had been arrested at the Aminu Kano Airport for trafficking in drugs.

The said Okon was later reported dead by the authorities.

The rumour, however, persisted that she had been released secretly and was living large in London.

Mohammed wrote: “Was Dele Giwa doing a story on Gloria Okon? And did he interview her in London and the tapes of the interview along with pictures brought to Lagos by Kayode (Soyinka)?

“In discussing these theories, I am mindful of the fact that I am accountable to only God, my creator.”

He stressed that the magazine was not planning to do any story on Okon.

“Not by any of our reporters, not by any of the editors and not by any of the directors – Dele, Ray, Dan and Yakubu,” he said.

According to him, the Okon story idea was suggested by Bose Lasaki, a relatively new member of staff who was determined to learn the ropes, only to discover that it was a ruse.

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“One day at the general editorial conference, she said she had a story idea.

“She muttered some words to the effect that there was a rumour that the drug courier that was arrested in Kano and reported dead did not die.

“Her colleagues laughed at her suggestion and she appeared visibly embarrassed.

“Dan who conducted the meeting advised her to do more work on the idea.

“When she reported back the following week, she admitted that there was nothing to the story. And that was the end of the story,” he said.

Mohammed said that Giwa and Ekpu were not in any of the editorial meetings and knew nothing about the Okon “fable.”

According to him, until the tragic death of Giwa, nobody heard anything again about Okon.

“But she came alive as possible reason why Dele Giwa was killed.

“Dele was said to have travelled to London some weeks before his death and interviewed Gloria Okon.

“The fact is that Dele Giwa did not meet any Gloria Okon on the trip in question.

“I know this for sure because I travelled with him to London,” he said.

Source: NAN

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Governor Sanwo-Olu, in a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr. Gboyega Akosile, on Monday, described the death of Uyai Ekpu, wife of the veteran journalist as a great loss to the Ekpu family.

Sanwo-Olu, while mourning the passing of Mrs. Ekpu, who died at the age of 73 last Wednesday, also sympathised with the entire family, friends, and associates of the deceased.

The governor also sent his condolences to the members of the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association of Nigeria, NPAN, the Nigerian Guild of Editors, NGE and the Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, over the death of the wife of the renowned journalist and columnist.

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He said, “It is with a deep sense of sorrow that I commiserate with a veteran journalist and former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Newswatch Magazine, Mr. Ray Ekpu, on the passing of his beloved wife, Mrs. Uyai Ekpu.

“No doubt, the death of a loved one is usually a painful episode in our lives because it is irreparable, but we must always take solace in God for a good life spent by the deceased person.

“We should be consoled by the fact that Mrs. Uyai Ekpu lived a fulfilling life. She was a soul mate, friend, and great supporter of her husband, Mr. Ray Ekpu. She was also a caring and loving mother to her children.

“I pray that God will grant the soul of our beloved Mrs. Uyai Ekpu eternal rest and comfort her husband, Mr. Ray Ekpu, the immediate family and friends of the deceased.”

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