According to the council, Mr. Demola Babalola, who spoke with FrontPage in an interview, there had not been any directive from the NUJ at the national level to the effect that Fani-Kayode’s programme could be given coverage.

Recall that Fani-Kayode had at a press conference held in Calabar, Cross Rivers State, recently, described a Daily Trust reporter, Mr. Eyo Charles, as stupid for asking who bankrolled his project tour of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, controlled state.

Fani-Kayode who was widely condemned for his action had however apologised to Charles and the Nigeria Union of Journalists.

In continuation of his tour, he arrived Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, and planned to address a press conference but the state council of NUJ directed its members not to attend.

Speaking with our correspondent, the chairman of the Oyo State council of the NUJ said it would be too early to start attending his press conference as there had not been any instruction to that effect.

Said Babalola: “We think he should do the right thing by meeting the Daily Trust management in Abuja one on one, and the leadership of the NUJ in Abuja one on one.  The NUJ leadership should also send circular to the state councils that they should start covering his programmes and press conferences.  I think until that is done… We have to be careful.

“There was a press statement issued on his case when the incident happened. Now that he has apologised, if they want us to start covering him, they should issue a circular to that effect. That will go a long way in addressing the issue.”

The post Why we’re boycotting Fani-Kayode’s conference despite apology –Oyo NUJ appeared first on Frontpageng.

The Zamfara State based politic group behind the award, Sha’aya’u S-Pawa Foundation, said arrangements were in top gear for the award.

According to its chairman, Alhaji Sha’aya Sarkin Fawa, in Gusau, on Friday, the group said it appreciated the maturity with which Charles handled his attacker.

“We feel he deserves strong respect and recognition,” he said.

The group added that the Resilient Journalist Award being planned would be a befitting one and that it was trying to reach Charles for the event.

Said the group’s chairman: “Fani-Kayode had earlier visited Zamfara and left on its trail some controversies that are still fresh in the memory of the people.

“The good journalist posture displayed by Charles gives more hope and belief to Nigerians that we still have good media professionals in the country.

“As Nigerians, we strongly believe that if the former minister is truly the activist he claims to be, he should come out in the public domain and answer the question asked by Charles.”

It would be recalled that Charles was described as “stupid” by Fani-Kayode for asking, at a press conference in Calabar, Cross River State, who was bankrolling his project tour of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, states.

Fani-Kayode’s attack was widely condemned.

After a display of recalcitrance for some time, Fani-Kayode, who had vowed not to apologise to Charles caved in.

He tendered an unreserved apology to him, saying that by his action, he had disappointed himself, his family and his friends.

He expressed regret, saying his action was unbefitting of a public figure.

The post Reporter attacked by Fani-Kayode to get Resilient Journalist Award appeared first on Frontpageng.

“I disappointed myself, my family and friends, my colleagues and even my bosses, those who hold me in high esteem,” he said at a press conference in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State capital.

Recall that Fani-Kayode at a press conference in Calabar, Cross Rivers State, described Charles as “stupid” for asking who was “bankrolling” his tour.

The attack was widely condemned by the public with journalists launching attacks on him in return.

Some of the unions also resolved to give Fani-Kayode a black out in the media.

Apparently overwhelmed by the total attack on him, he caved in and on Friday apologised to Charles just as he expressed regrets over his action.

Said Fani-Kayode: “I’m deeply sorry for the manner I reacted to the said reporter. I was too hard on him. The question was mischievous, but I fell for it.

“I should have been smarter than that. I am using this opportunity to reach out to him, and I hope he will be kind enough to forgive me. I disappointed myself, my family and friends, my colleagues and even my bosses, those who hold me in high esteem.

“I have regrets, it was not my finest day. No leader or public figure should ever react like that. I disappointed myself. I deeply regret it and I believe it will never happen again.”

The post I disappointed myself, my family, my friends – Fani-Kayode appeared first on Frontpageng.

He said he therefore withdrew using the word “stupid” in his attack.

His words: “I met with my advisors till late last night and I wish to say the following. I hereby withdraw the word “stupid” which I used in my encounter with a journalist in Calabar.

“I have many friends in the media who I offended by losing my cool and using such words. I hereby express my regrets for doing so.”

He also claimed that no threat of physical harm was made against the journalist.

His statement reads:

I met with my advisors till late last night and I wish to say the following. I hereby withdraw the word “stupid” which I used in my encounter with a journalist in Calabar.

I have many friends in the media who I offended by losing my cool and using such words. I hereby express my regrets for doing so.

I do however wish to state categorically that no threat of physical harm was ever made to the journalist in question and neither did I send anyone to threaten him. Anyone that says otherwise is lying and I challenge them to bring the proof.

I would never seek to physically harm a journalist. For the last 30 years I have defended and worked with journalists and fought for the right of freedom of expression.

I am  also very close to many in that profession. I would be the last to seek to disparage those that are honorable and noble within its ranks.

I hope that this will assuage the pain and anger of anyone that was hurt or offended by this ugly episode. I have now put this matter behind me and moved on. Now my tour of the South continues. Moving to yet another state today! -FFK

The post I regret my attack on Daily Trust reporter –Fani-Kayode  appeared first on Frontpageng.

I watched the video of where Fani-Kayode gave a dressing-down to a journalist who asked him an innocuous question which “the Almighty” found irritating and pesky, “Who is bankrolling your tour?” That was it! Femi emptied the content of his pugnacious buccal cavity on the journalist. He called him stupid and expended minutes chopping the reporter to insignificant bits.

Femi said he had a ‘’short fuse’’ and asked the reporter to size him up because – ‘’…I am a former minister, lawyer…. Who do you think you are talking to?’’

Femi’s diatribe: “Do you know who you are talking to? What type of insulting question is that? Which bankroll, to do what? Who can give me money for anything? Who do you think you are talking to? Go and report yourself to your publisher. I could see from your face before you got here, how stupid you are. Don’t ever talk to me like that. Who do you think you’re talking to? Bankroll who? You think I am one of those ones you… from who, when, how? You have a small mind, very small mind.”

Obasanjo once said: “Femi is my boy. If you give him food, he will sing for you?’’

“Who is bankrolling your tour?’’ The non-toxic question that bled Femi’s poison. Femi is not a disguisable character for integrity. He is notorious in political circles as a mercenary who can serve anyone and any purpose as long as his belly gets filled. His former boss, Olusegun Obasanjo, whom he turned against after Goodluck Jonathan picked him up to wait at the table, put a stamp of affirmation on Femi’s devious constitution.

Obasanjo once said: “Femi is my boy. If you give him food, he will sing for you?’’

Femi was vicious on former president Jonathan – not until he was appointed to be the spokesman of the re-election campaign of the former president. But he spoke Jonathan to defeat in 2015.

Recently, Femi embarked on a PR tour of PDP states. He travelled to Zamfara where the governor treated him to the niceties of princes. The former minister who is a known adversary of the north – as his writings and public statements show – geared into duplicity afterwards untamed by his pursuit of pleasures.

He once put the trouble with Nigeria on the pouch of the Igbo. In his article of August 2013, ‘’The bitter truth about the Igbo’’, Femi wrote of his intimate congress with the wife of the late Odumegwu Ojukwu — an extraneous piece of information that he divulged to spite the Igbo.

He did not camouflage his bigotry and hate for the Igbo. But he started cantillating different when the Buhari administration came to power. He needed alliances from the south-east to confront the ‘’northern government’’ which pulled him to court on allegations of corruption. He became an abetting voice, albeit hypocritical, against the perceived grievances of the region. Not that he really cared about Ndi Igbo, but in President Muhammadu Buhari, Femi and a few Igbo politicians displaced from the dining table, found a common enemy.

Femi lives only for himself. He is vacant of character and principles. He stands for nothing and falls for everything as long as he gets fed.

Femi lives only for himself. He is vacant of character and principles. He stands for nothing and falls for everything as long as he gets fed. It is in this context that the question (who is bankrolling your tour?) of the journalist to Femi, should be situated. Why was he so incensed by the question? He could have simply torpedoed whatever the insinuations on the tour are with an intelligent and polite answer. Perhaps, he felt he was being ratted out? His outburst busts his pretensions.

Femi is critical of anyone who does not favour him, and his approach to opposition is both savage and irrational. He once called Buhari “an evil tyrant”. But it is clear; the politician would have been a more ruthless tyrant if was sitting on the throne. He pleasures himself insulting other people, but he brooks no opposition. He can throw blows, but cannot take them. That is the making of an aboriginal tyrant.

However, Nigerian journalists must redeem themselves from the curse of “brown envelopes”. Journalism is a noble profession, deserving of respect. Some journalists act like peasants before politicians for crumbs. So, naturally, they cannot stand up to them. But what is journalism when journalists are afraid of asking critical questions? We have to redeem ourselves. The profession is fast losing dignity and appeal.

*Fredrick Nwabufo is a writer and journalist (Twitter: @FredrickNwabufo)

The post What if Femi Fani-Kayode, Mr Short Fuse, was Buhari? By Fredrick Nwabufo appeared first on Frontpageng.

At a press conference held at the end of his tour of Cross River State, the Daily Trust reporter asked the simple question about who was bankrolling his tour that had seen him visit five states earlier.

The question by the Daily Trust reporter rattled Fani-Kayode who described him as stupid among other things.

In his reaction to the condemnation that greeted his outburst, Fani-Kayode said:

“During my tour of the South and after a long and successful press conference in Calabar, Cross Rivers state, a journalist put up his hand for the last question and said: ‘Well we do not know who is bankrolling you.’

“This is not a question but an assertion and an insult.

“And if this insulting ASSERTION were made before Trump or OBJ I know how they would have reacted.

“Below is my response and I have no apology to offer for it.

“The young man apologized to me during the press conference and sent his apologies to me after the conference. I have accepted his apologies in good faith and moved on.

“I have always had respect for journalists and I always will. Those of them that know me or have worked with or for me over the last 30 years can attest to that.

“However there is a distinction between asking a question and offering a gratuitous insult .

“This is all the more so when it is clear that the assertion was sponsored and engineered by my political enemies who wanted to use the young man to insult and embarrass me and question my integrity. Well they got more than they bargained for.

“I repeat this was not a question but an assertion and an insult and I will not accept that from any man born of woman. Thank you.”

The post I have no apology for my attack on Daily Trust reporter -Fani-Kayode appeared first on Frontpageng.

But Chief Femi Fani-Kayode failed in his public carriage last week when he rounded off his visit to Cross River State, where he spent about a week, probably on the ticket of the state Governor, Prof. Ben Ayade.

To climax the visit, he had asked Alhaji Rasheed Olanrewaju of the AIT to invite some media houses so that he can relay report about his extensive guided tour of Ayade’s projects, mostly in the southern part of the state.

The invitation was kindly extended to Daily Trust newspaper, a frontline national newspaper, I work for since early 2011.

I obliged the invitation not that I was deliberately left out of the guided tour led by Ayade but so that it would afford me opportunity to hear more from the former minister why he said if the national PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) secretariat denied Governor Ben Ayade the honour to control all party structures in the state, he, Ayade and good number of politicians in the party would pull out of the party. Of course, it would be interesting to read and see his body language over his new found romance with Ayade, I thought.

The press briefing was fixed for August 20, 2020 by 10:30am at Ayade’s private hotel situated adjacent to his palatial house in the State Housing Estate, Calabar.

But FKK himself said: “There is no problem at all. They should ask any manner of questions.

The hotel was believed to be moribund before now but having been refurbished, distinguished persons and government guests are routed there instead of to the massive, well furnished Lakeside Hotel in Tinapa Business Resort owned by the state government or other presidential lodges in Calabar, which are now reportedly vandalised or converted for private use.

The Government House Press crew, including Channels TV, NTA, state-owned Cross River Broadcasting Corporation, AIT, led by Mr. Christian Ita, the Chief Press Secretary, Imani Odey (Special Adviser to Ayade on electronic media) and Rasheed Olanrewaju, correspondent of AIT (Chairman of Government House Press Crew). Other journalists from some national papers present included Mr Gill Nsa-Abasi of NATION, Aniekan Aniekan of ORACLE Today, David Odey of the PUNCH, Richard Ndoma of the Leadership, George Odok of NAN, Ikechukwu Uche of Vanguard, etc.

Fani-Kayode came with his own media team and security details, including Police Officers, some of them who he shouted at, even in front of journalists carried his baggage.

The former Minister spent over one hour speaking highly of Governor Ayade, extolling his academic and political qualities and how that his acumen, sagacity, intelligence and versatility have largely been ignored even with massive, gigantic and plethora of projects he has initiated in the state.

FKK said he lives in the northern part of the country. He said he was in Cross River to see his friend, Ayade, whom he has been pulled to due to his extraordinary achievements and though with about the poorest federal allocation yet he has been able to perform more than those with much state resources.

He said soon after the COVID19 lockdown was lifted, he visited Zamfara, Anambra and five other states to meet with the governors, to appraise extent of their projects.

He said although a PDP man, yet the visit was across party lines. For instance, in Anambra State, where he was hosted by Willie Obiano, an All Progressives Grand Alliance governor, he could see that he was constructing the biggest airport in the country. But when he shared the secret with Ayade, Ayade told him he has already acquired nearly a quarter of Obudu LGA, where he hails, for an international cargo airport, that his own will, on completion, be the biggest in the country. According to FKK, he agreed with them over what he saw in both states, having himself built the Port Harcourt airport when he was aviation minister.

He spoke about how Bakassi was unjustly ceded to Cameroon when he was in Olusegun Obasanjo’s government, and how the Supreme Court also nailed the plight of Cross River by almost simultaneously ruling that the entire 76 oil wells once owned by the state now belong to Akwa Ibom State, thereby making Akwa Ibom the richest in the country. He pleaded that the Federal Government should revisit both thorny issues, and also create a special status for Cross River.

Time for question. Christian Ita moderated. But Olanrewaju interjected and sought permission from the ex-minister that questions be limited to what FKK has said. But FKK himself said: “There is no problem at all. They should ask any manner of questions.” That he is equal to the task.

Many asked questions. Gill Nsa of The Nation, for instance, asked whether his national tour had any political undertone such as having presidential ambition. A reporter from the state-owned TV asked whether some of the 33 projects he said Ayade has embarked upon such as the 278km superhighway from Bakassi to the border of Benue State as well as the Deep sea port were not, in fact, White Elephant projects. FKK disagreed strongly and said what Ayade needs is Federal Government to take over the projects and that Nigerians would see that the superhighway for instance will boost trade and integrated Nigerians.

When he returned to his suite, he sent one of his security aides to further threaten me.  The man accosted me, saying what effrontery do you have to ask such a stupid question, and what was my next action.

Now the question that would break the camel’s back! When I was recognised, I asked, “Sir, please you did not disclose to us who is bankrolling you….” FFK did not allow me to land with the question when he threw caution to the wind and shouted at me, and said the press briefing was over.

He then rained terrible abuses on me, calling me unprintable names; that I was sponsored to come and ask the question and insult him.

He said: “How dare you ask me such a very stupid question!  I know that you, a hungry-looking, brown envelop journalist, you are sponsored to ask me such insulting question. You can look into my eyes and ask me such demeaning question! I cannot take that!

“I am a very rich lawyer who has been in government; who has been detained many times by governments.  I have a very rich background. How can you ask who is bankrolling my tours of the states. It is very insulting, and I cannot take that. You are very stupid.  I know your publishers, I will call them in next few minutes. You have to be fired. I cannot answer any more questions from you or from any other reporter. This conference has ended. I have very short temper…..”

It took the intervention and pleas from Ita and other journalists before the ex-minister would leave the Daily Trust reporter, saying: “You can go ahead and write your rubbish. I have marked you.”

When he returned to his suite, he sent one of his security aides to further threaten me.  The man accosted me, saying what effrontery do you have to ask such a stupid question, and what was my next action.

Sensing how tensed up the atmosphere was, I said to the man: “I had apologised to the ex-minister. If the usage of the word ‘bankroll’ was offensive to him, then I withdraw it. What more should I do?” I then sneaked away.

Now the ex-minister is circulating a doctored video claiming I was rude to him. What could be farther from the truth! I have a modest background and well trained as a high priest to respect people of all standing. Please note too that I am a Bishop in the Brotherhood of the Cross and Star, which exalted stand can never allow me to descend to insulting public figures or anyone.

This is also to colleagues that have called to express unhappiness that I did not “give it back to FKK”. The afore listed journalists should be asked if I made any other statement aside the question.

The post Day Fani-Kayode drenched me with venom, by Eyo Charles appeared first on Frontpageng.

Fani-Kayode, in continuation of his tour of some Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, controlled states visited Cross River State, where a press conference was organised for him.

At the conference, the Daily Trust reporter, Charles, asked a simple question of whether his trips to the states were sponsored.

Fani Kayode, however, did not take kindly to the question as he became enraged and described the reporter as stupid among other insults.

His words: “What type of stupid question is that? Bankrolling who? Do you know who you are talking to? I will not take any questions from this man.

“What type of insulting question is that? Which bankroll? To do what? Who can give me money for anything? Who do you think you are talking to? Go and report yourself to your publisher? Please don’t insult me here. I don’t want to take any questions from this man.

“I could see from your face before you got here, how stupid you are. Don’t ever talk to me like that. Who do you think you’re talking to.  Bankroll who? You think I am one of those ones you… from who, when, how? You have a small mind, very small mind. Don’t judge me by your own standards.

“I have been in politics since 1990… I have been locked up many times by this government. Suffered. I have been persecuted unlike most of the politicians you follow for brown envelope. Don’t ever judge me by that standard. I spend I don’t take and I am not a poor man — I have never been and I will never be.”

Journalists across the nation have since taken to the social media, lambasting Fani Kayode over his action, as the video went viral.

Some of the comments by journalists read:

Ayo Olesin (Publisher, thenewsmatrics.com)

For those who have no idea what buffoonery means… Please watch the clip of FFK’s tirade against an apparently hapless reporter who doesn’t appear to know his onions.

Sunny Igboanugo (Publisher of whirlwindnews.com)

I would have given it back to FFK in equal measures. Nobody should speak to a journalist in this manner and no journalist should take this. Surely, this must be a starter, a novice or a fake journalist. I’m so angry. Who does FFK think he is? The best he could do was to ignore the question… I think this is unacceptable. It’s insufferable to say the least.

Marcus Fatunmole

It will be a curse of monumental proportion if any political group in which FFK has a strong influence returns to lead this nation. He’s better expelled before then.

Sola Shittu

Your outburst is absolutely absurd and uncalled for. If there is anything you have succeeded in doing today, definitely not in humiliating this honourable young man but rather you have succeeded in making a public show of your ilks parading themselves as Nigeria leaders.

Since you are a lawyer that knows everything, I wonder why it probably omitted your mind that there is no wrong question in journalism. You can simply decline not to answer and that’s all. I dare you to go ahead and report the young man to his publisher as you threatened and I assure you that you will receive the wrath of the pen that is mightier than sword. For your information Mr. Ex Minister and lawyer, journalism is not a job for slaves, it is a noble profession of nationalists and men of integrity who sacrificed and even lay down their lives for the politics that now turns you to public tyrant.

The post Journalists carpet Fani-Kayode over attack on Daily Trust reporter appeared first on Frontpageng.